The (new) Official PC building thread!

Heh, and I use one of these
http://www.shop.bt.com/productview....&SearchKey=All&SearchMode=All&NavigationKey=0
but if we're being pedantic, neither are under £40.
This then:
http://www.shop.bt.com/productview....orySelectedId=11154&NavigationKey=11154,50473

 

Don't worry, i am not gonna be too fussy over £10-£15 over budget. The drive i get now is just gonna be a storage drive in a few months cause i wanna get a raptor x in March.

 

Don't do it - they're crap!

 

O RLY?

Why is that?

I thought the 10,000 rpm was a godsend for loading the OS?

I checked the status of my order from Ebuyer, "Goods loaded onto a van"

I hope the van has wheels.

 

yes this is kinda way off topic here sorry

Russ you lucky dog you... i would loved to have seen Nolan Ryan toss one of them 7 no hitters. my oldest son is named after him.(Ryan)
not bonds but the newest roid head (Clemons) wish he was Nolan...lol

i seen Nolan pitch agains the reds in 84 i think it was, the reds knocked him out in the 3rd inning but he still had 7K's in 3 innings

id have to say the greatest player i have ever seen(other than pete or anyone on the big red machine) would be Ken Griffey JR...they made the movie the natural about him...lol....when he was healthy noone roamed centerefeild like him. nad please dont test his arm.also 594HR without roids.......

ok back to the PC world.

 

He_Man: LOL!
The 150GB Raptors are known for poor reliability - most of the people I know who have them, they've stopped working after less than a year - Tom's Hardware used to use them for their test platform but abandoned them in favour of the normal Caviar 5000AAKS due to reliability and compatibility issues. The Raptor Xs are even worse as they're not even guaranteed for very long. No case that I've seen has ever let you see sufficiently to make use of the Raptor X's window anyway.
10,000rpm drives are great for loading the OS, but do yourself a favour and buy the original 74GB or 37GB versions, those last ages - they're probably more reliable than most Maxtor drives.

 

I think this is the same model that I use. Sorry at work and don't have the serial number handy. Good luck with your decisions. btw I have 3 of these, they're new so I can't give a "fair" evaluation. 5 year warranty!!!

linky to Seagate 320

....gm

 

well I bought a 500Gb model ( seagate ) for my secondary drive and so far it's working good after maybe 6 or 7 seven months no complaints ! The WD it replaced Died after about 2-3 years so hopefully this one will outlast it by a fair margin ! and For What it's worth The Local Computer repair shop Uses Seagates for Replacements and in their custom Builds because of their Quality & warranty !!!!!!!!!

 

For what it's worth, I've owned 8 WD drives, and only 1 of them has ever been faulty, and even then it wasn't a total loss. Additionally, I've owned 2 Seagate drives, neither of them have been any problem. I'm happy to recommend either brand, but I usually go with WDs because they're slightly quieter, run slightly cooler, and because I'm more familiar with them.

 

Ya, are these by any chance the same WD drive?

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-120-WD

WD5000AAKS

http://www.shop.bt.com/productview.aspx?Quicklinx=42DD

It's just BT Shop says WD5000KS

 

The BT shop lists them as the AAKS as well. I don't own 8 of those (though that would be nice) but I've had three. One of them was the faulty drive I specified, the other two however have been excellent. Additionally, my friends own five of those between them and haven't had any issues.

 

Sam your WD drive is nice but it has higher latencies, seek times and write times. That's the only reason I didn't buy them.

Heman, a nice 7200RPM with 16MB of cache is the way to go. The Raptor wont speed tings up much more.

 

The differences in latency are marginal. Here you are criticising a 10% difference and then pronounce that the 50% difference between a raptor and a barracuda is unnoticeable?
On that note, I timed my XP bootup time using a Raptor and my WD2500AAJS:

Raptor: 26 seconds
WD2500: 41 seconds

I think that's pretty pronounced.
Both readings taken with an entirely clean install of XP.

 

Ah sorry, I was reading the bottom part on the BT Shop.

Looks like ill be purchasing this tonight. However my quad is still not here!!!!!

If it has not arrived by the deadline (8pm) then i will wait till tommorow and cause riots.

 

When I bought mine both were the same price.

Sam, yes that is a pretty pronounced difference. Do you know how much time it takes it to boot up a game? Like a comparison. It seems it does make a big difference, but it's a lot more expensive.

 

Honestly who cares about a few more seconds on loading WinBLOWS anyway?? And loading games as well. It's not like you guys have anything better to do with that 15-45 seconds anyway. Go get a bEER or soda (whateva is yo choice) and get ready for hours of entertainment. lol. Spatting about a few seconds when you're gonna play something for hours.... SILLY I say SILLY!!!!

Anyway comparing the Raptors to "regular" drives isn't fair. The Raptors are 'marketed' at a certain crowd and like sam said the 150 Raptor is "marginal" at best when it comes to "longevity" or "reliability". I think a couple of 74's in RAID would better serve a GAMER anyway. My weak opinion but mine none the less.

I like the Seagates for the simple fact you get 5 YEARS of warranty compared to 3, UNLESS WD has changed there policy lately. I know when I bought the 2 250's that I have over a year ago they only offered 3 years and I only got 1 year because they were OEM refurbs. It didn't sway my purchase then tho. lol.

He_Man or whoever really!! BUY what you feel is the best for you. The advice here is just that and it doesn't matter if sammyboy, me (greensman), or the POPE suggests something to buy we can't be held responsible for the decision you make. So in other words be happy with what you bought cause we didn't make you do anything. lol.

Well again I offer my OPINION and didn't ask anyone if they wanted it.

GOOD LUCK to all!!!

...gm

 

WinBLOWS? What is this 4th grade?

Windows is pretty good for what it does. Much better than that Mac crap.

 

Heh, I had the 37GB, I never installed any games on it, there wasn't room!
Greensman: 74GB Raptors yes, RAID no. A definite no. RAID ups the peak transfer rate of the drives (if they're in RAID0 or 5, and if you use RAID0 you've probably got no idea about how RAID works) but it worsens the latency, which is really what Raptors are best for. In the transfer rate department they're only 15% or so faster than top end high capacity drives. It's the access latency you're paying for. RAIDing raptors loses you their one advantage.

 

I wouldn't know about Mac and don't plan to in the near future. I like being able to build my own rig for cheap. I KNOW NOTHING about the Mac OS's so there's that.

As far as WinBLOWS, XP POOP, or any other cheap shot at M$!! It's all in FUN!! And it's the 3rd grade thank very much!!!!! I run Windows exclusively on my stuff cause of the support of other products/programs. I would like to try Linux sometime for more than a few clicks. lol. BUT I don't have enough time for the stuff that I have besides entering into a LARGE learning curve for Linux.

And besides with all the OT comments/posts I thought I would thro a dig at M$ and NO ONE would notice. Guess NOT... lol.

.....gm

 

Linux is... well bad. I tried it and I don't plan on using it again for another 10 years lol.