The (new) Official PC building thread!

abuzar1,

That was a long time ago! Bad health can do that to a person. Doctors and Hospitals can eat up a lot of money in a very short time, believe me! Years ago I sold everything I owned and divided everything up between my children. I'm glad that I did it now as if I had waited, I would have lost everything, and my kids would have wound up with nothing! I still make a living, but on a considerably lower scale! LOL!!

As a kid I grew up poor which fortunately gave me a good sense of value for things. I had a lot of fun when I could afford to. I still have fun, but now it's got a different meaning to it. The two cars were the only extravagance we ever had. Aside from that we preferred a very middle class lifestyle. I could never see me mixing with the rich mucky mucks that live in mansions behind 8 foot walls in what I consider mausoleums! LOL!! I lived my life with the door always open and the Coffee Pot always on. I never complain about what I haven't got, but thank God every day for what I do have!

It's taken me some time to get the type computer I always wanted from the very beginning, but hey, I've got it now and to me that's all that counts. There's a sense of appreciation and accomplishment that made the struggle all that more rewarding.

Merry Christmas to You and Yours,
Russ

 

Vista build? Actually, AD has a download that solved most my problems when my wife got her Vista laptop recently. http://www.afterdawn.com/software/video_software/codecs_and_filters/vista_codec_package.cfm

 

Yeah, but I have to argue about those walls. I think walls around a house are awesome, of course this is coming from a Pakistani guy, and we have walls around every house, rich or poor.

Anyway Merry Christmas to those who celebrate it.

 

@abuzar
MCE 2005...Is ok...Vista's Media Center is just nicer...and it does actually work...

 

I tried using it but it came off as unnecessary. I remember some time ago retailers were aggressively pushing it to the point as if it was a total new OS.

 

Just another Phenom update for your consideration.

I think a good portion of my problem was simply a bad driver install. That corrupted some of the OS files. I went ahead and did a full reinstall of the OS including the long format and new partitions.
I moved my wireless hub a lot closer and installed things in this order:

Motherboard drivers from the disc.
Wireless USB adapter drivers from the disc.
Download AVG Free virus protection.
Activate Windows.
Nvidia driver for the 7900GS video card(The HD 3780s deserved a better home).
Windows XP updates.
So that's where I'm at. It's only locked up once, during the first virus scan. (I had rearranged logical disc letters after installing the virus program so I think it was trying to scan the DVD drive).
I managed to complete a 3DMark06 run and with the 7900GS card got a score of ~5200.
The CPU portion of the test looked equivalent or better than what the OC'ed E6700 was getting so I'm feeling a bit better about this.

I did manage to get the CPU overclocked again from 2.2 to 2.3. Anything faster would crash it. (Vcore set to Auto). There is more available but I don't know what safe voltages/temps for this CPU are. I'm waiting for a better Phenom so it doesn't matter.

I learn something from every build, this one has taught me to be very careful when installing drivers, among other things.

I'm not ready to blame my magnetic screwdriver yet, lol.

 

@Abuzar: Because theone has no need to. His PC serves him perfectly well now. You don't get rich writing cheques!
Lp: Easy install? I gave up after 15 tries on my old motherboard. Of course I didn't know back then that the chipset was foobarred.
Frank: Interesting. I know the 7900GS isn't that powerful, but that score is still bunk considering what CPU you have. 1000 marks of my 5600 (when I didn't overclock my GPU) came from OC'ing my CPU from 1.8Ghz to 3Ghz. I sincerely hope a Phenom is more powerful than my dual core, so you should see an additional boost from that.

 

What do you guys think about this HD?

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=469718

Reviews are mild with some saying it's better than the Samsung SpinPoint T166 HD501LJ(drive i was gonna get), others say it's worse.

 

He_Man,

Let me put it this way! Some very knowledgeable people in this and other forums refer to them as "Deathstars"! LOL!! The only one I ever bought died in less than a month!

Best Regards,
theone

 

What's wrong with a Nice Seagate or WD HDD with 16mb of cache? They ARE pretty good, and with RAID 0 they can get speedy.

 

I'm going Seagate on this next build. I've built with WD and they are good so nothing wrong with them afaik. A couple of my friends have "recommended" Seagate so I'm gonna try it.

I also have an old 40G Deskstar (IBM) and it's still going strong after 6+ years and numerous formats.

You'll always have "fans" of this or that but "experience" normally ways out over everything else. All I can suggest is going with something that has been recommended by someone you trust. Hopefully you won't get a DOA and also something that will last for years.

Good luck with your dilemma and may you make the best choice for YOU....

....gm

 

Nothing, its just getting to a point where the newer 32mb are at or near the price of the older 16mb. Nothing wrong with having an old AMD Opteron 185 processor, I cant talk about mine because these forums just tend to stay with the latest and greatest and everyone talks about C2D this and Gigabyte that now when 2 years ago it was AMD and Asus.

 

Greensman,
You might give this a try. Just make a boot CD or Floppy and it tests your mrmory at the machine's basic level. It will check all the memory at the same time and tell you if there's any errors and which stick(s) is the problem! It's free and works very well!

http://www.memtest.org/

Best Regards,
theone

 

Thanks Russ. I did that about 6 months ago but I guess it would be a good idea to do it again.

....gm

 

I agree about the 185 Opteron processor, a GREAT cpu for the money a couple of years ago BUT it makes NO sense to get the Opteron NOW when you can get the E6750 for about $40 USD less or the E6850 for about $60 USD more.

I have a AMD X2 3800 and an ASUS mobo which is ironic but they've been good the last year or so. I couldn't afford to do the AMD Opteron or an Intel C2D build a little over a year ago so I decided to save for whatever was the "best" at the time I could. You guessed it; the Intel C2D cpu and Gigabyte mobo.

Don't hate the builder just hate the manufacturer that makes US spend our HARD earned CASH for the newest and greatest. lol.

....gm

 

I didnt sound hateful did I? Long day with the inlaws sorry Seriously though, if I wanted to be a hater I'd hate on abuzar1 for actually building a system with his nice new case. I bought mine first but it still sets, all the parts ready for a build except mobo and CPU. And when I do buy, it'll probably be Gigabyte and Intel LOL (not sure if I leap when Penryn is out or use the price drop that always happens to old stock for a C2D)

 

Greensman,
As far as I'm concerned, this is about as good as you can get right now for a fast Sata 3.0 hard drive with a 32MB cache. I'm saving up some of Uncle Sams Green Stamps right now for one! LOL!!

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148288

The price beats the competition all to hell!

Best Regards,
Russ

 

I've got 2 250Gig Deskstar.They both went out while still under warranty [1yr]. Hitachi was very good about replacing,but the replacements also went out.So in less then 2yrs all 4 HDD went bad [never again will I buy Deskstar].I'm using Sansung 500's right now and am very pleased so far,also bought the seagate external 500 on sale 99.00 at compusa,also pleased with it.Both have long warranties

 

Deadrum33, yeah that's right you did order the case first. Well it's awesome, but let me tell you, the dust filters are a b**ch.

 

Good find there Russ and I've looked at it before. I'm looking at getting to 320 SATA Seagates at Bestbuy tomorrow. $59.99+tax with NO rebates. That'll be about $130 for 620Gb and I'm thinking about putting them in RAID. That should make them almost as fast as the single 500Gb Seagate.

....gm