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Official 2008 "I Need A New PC" Thread
- Thread starter Kosma
- Start date
AstroLad said:
it really isn't though, since the mirror has been submitted to the same stress as it's sister, if you lost one member it will not be long till you lose the other.
by the way, if you guys are looking for raid controllers and want quality stuff. go with 3ware. their cards are freaking awesome. you guys wouldn't believe the crazy things I do with 24 port 3ware cards!
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
What's the practical use of it then over simply doing a "real" backup?otake said:
Ha, same here. I try to explain some things to my girlfriend when she asks how the day was and she just looks at me like I'm crazy.otake said:
But anyways, Raid 5 is your basic level of awesome. And lucklily, most PC motherboards nowadays support Raid0,1,and5 at least. Although there are more awesome levels out there, such as Raid1+0(10)...so awesome.
Your machine can continue to run when a hard drive goes out, you do not lose any data, and you do not need to perform any recovery procedure besides plugging in your new drive.Angry Grimace said:
v-- sort of
Angry Grimace said:
giving you time to do the back up. keeps the system up while you fetch a drive. if you didn't have a mirror and the drive failed, that's it! you don't get any time to back up. raid1 essentially buys you time.
Cheeto said:
raidz man, raidz!@! my g/f at least pretends to listen. it's so hard to talk about work in down to earth way. there's just no simple way to explain these things. Today, we lost a stripe set out of 24 in one of our servers. I had to change the drives, document everything, etc. how do you explain that in common words? how!?
Hazaro said:
that's raid0,
lachesis
Member
Not much to see, but here's my main computer (1st build) that I did back in January:
Antec P182 case - added another 120mm fan in the mid-front section (comes with three 120mm fans on top, back, and bottom PSU/HDD chamber. Bottom Chamber can hold upto 4 HDDs.
Q6600 B3 Stepping - at stock speed. Does its job of making my room much warmer. LOL!
Asus Maximus Formula MB. (X38, IIRC)
Corsair Dominator 2x2gb DDR2-1066 (new fan-less version)
Zalman 9700 LED cpu cooler
Corsair HX520w modular PSU
EVGA 8800 GTS g92 512mb
Single IDE Sony DVD Burner. (Didn't know they also had a SATA version, until I bought it)
150gb WD Raptor HDD for main OS/Programs
500gb WD Caviar for data
Eiomax (?) el-cheapo wifi-g pci card
Thanks to the modular PSU and Antec P182 - the cables are mostly hidden. One great thing about P182 case - but a pain once you decide to make some changes once everything's done. Long videocard was little too close to the mid-HDD section, so I put the HDDs on the lower chamber, vertically.
And.. here's my more recent 2nd build for 2nd computer - for retro/light gaming and movie watching machine.
MESSY!!! LOL.
Case: Cooler Master Centurion 5 - added additional 80mm fan on the side vent
E7200 CPU running at stock speed (for now)
Arctic Freezer 7 CPU cooler
Asus P5QL-Pro MB
Crucial Ballistix Tracer DDR2-1066 1gb x 4 (Currently only using 2, as I'm RMAing bad modules)
Antec Earthwatt 500w PSU (non-modular)
Hitachi 500gb 7200rpm HDD
EVGA 8600 GTS (256mb DDR3)
A couple of old opticals which I inherited from my now retired 6 yr old Dell
Eiomax el-cheapo wireless-g pci-card.
I really need to do some cable management - but I was building this rather in a hurry
Although it's rather messy - but I really loved this case for ease of building. Drive slots are not as secure as one might hope - but as long as you don't move around too much, I think it would be just fine for what it is.
Alright, here are my final upgrade plans. Right now, I'm on an:
Opteron 165
2GB PC3200 ram
8800GT
I'm keeping the 8800GT, and I'm about to pull the trigger on:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231145
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131322
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115041
Any other recommendations? Otherwise, I think I'm gonna order this tonight and rush it so it ships out tomorrow!
I'm thinking of possibly going with this mobo instead, but it's only P35, which means no PCI-e 2.0. Does anything think that'll be remotely necessary any time soon?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128337
Opteron 165
2GB PC3200 ram
8800GT
I'm keeping the 8800GT, and I'm about to pull the trigger on:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231145
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131322
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115041
Any other recommendations? Otherwise, I think I'm gonna order this tonight and rush it so it ships out tomorrow!
I'm thinking of possibly going with this mobo instead, but it's only P35, which means no PCI-e 2.0. Does anything think that'll be remotely necessary any time soon?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128337
So thus far, you guys were so right about Vista 64...I tried launching Portal, just now, and it shows the Valve intro picture and then goes black and crashes.
Loading zip files in a regular windows explorer is apparently messed up...I had to download 7-zip to do unzip one (fortunately, 7-zip is great).
Good times.
*edit* Ah, it seems that whenever I download a new game (hopefully that's the only time) I have to restart Steam before the game will start without crashing. That's the second Steam game that's happened on. Might be Steam, might be Vista, might be both.
Another fun Vista 64 thing is that the Nintendo wifi USB adapter doesn't work with it. So if I want to use my DS or Wii online, I'll have to see if I can find a cheap router...one that can work with my desktop AND my wireless stuff, and that can be locked down as tight as possible to MAC addresses or whatnot so no one else can use it.
Loading zip files in a regular windows explorer is apparently messed up...I had to download 7-zip to do unzip one (fortunately, 7-zip is great).
Good times.
*edit* Ah, it seems that whenever I download a new game (hopefully that's the only time) I have to restart Steam before the game will start without crashing. That's the second Steam game that's happened on. Might be Steam, might be Vista, might be both.
Another fun Vista 64 thing is that the Nintendo wifi USB adapter doesn't work with it. So if I want to use my DS or Wii online, I'll have to see if I can find a cheap router...one that can work with my desktop AND my wireless stuff, and that can be locked down as tight as possible to MAC addresses or whatnot so no one else can use it.
Gully State
Member
I'm thinking about building a new PC and I want to recycle as many parts as possible from my previous build that's about 4 years old now. I currently have a 500 W Ultra Xconnect modular power supply and I'm wondering if it's compatible with the latest p45 motherboards.
Are you sure about that? I see two DS3L's - one of them is P35, which makes no mention of PCI-e 2.0, and the other is P45, which only has 2 PCI slots.Hazaro said:
Unless you think that PCI-e 2.0 will be absolutely unnecessary even 2-3 years down the line though, maybe I'll go with it.
Blizzard said:So thus far, you guys were so right about Vista 64...I tried launching Portal, just now, and it shows the Valve intro picture and then goes black and crashes.
Loading zip files in a regular windows explorer is apparently messed up...I had to download 7-zip to do unzip one (fortunately, 7-zip is great).
Good times.
*edit* Ah, it seems that whenever I download a new game (hopefully that's the only time) I have to restart Steam before the game will start without crashing. That's the second Steam game that's happened on. Might be Steam, might be Vista, might be both.
Another fun Vista 64 thing is that the Nintendo wifi USB adapter doesn't work with it. So if I want to use my DS or Wii online, I'll have to see if I can find a cheap router...one that can work with my desktop AND my wireless stuff, and that can be locked down as tight as possible to MAC addresses or whatnot so no one else can use it.
yeah that's odd. i have vista 64, sli, the whole mess and have never had problems with steam or portal. can't remember about the wifi adapter though it's been a while.
dLMN8R said:
I could of sworn it had it...
Browsing newegg I found this board: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131335
As for PCI-E 2.0
Since we are getting dual GPU single card solutions I think it will become necessary.
Yeah, I don't much care about Linux but thanks for the warning anyway
Also yeah, it's good to know that the Q6600 draws a shit ton more power when overclocked. My power supply is good - a high-quality Fortron 530W that I got 3-4 years ago, and it still works great, but I don't want to push it higher than I have to.
I also know how to overclock, having done so with my Opteron 165, but I'd rather not go through the process again if I don't have to. Having 2.8+GHz out of the box will be nice.
Also yeah, it's good to know that the Q6600 draws a shit ton more power when overclocked. My power supply is good - a high-quality Fortron 530W that I got 3-4 years ago, and it still works great, but I don't want to push it higher than I have to.
I also know how to overclock, having done so with my Opteron 165, but I'd rather not go through the process again if I don't have to. Having 2.8+GHz out of the box will be nice.
dLMN8R said:Yeah, I don't much care about Linux but thanks for the warning anyway
Also yeah, it's good to know that the Q6600 draws a shit ton more power when overclocked. My power supply is good - a high-quality Fortron 530W that I got 3-4 years ago, and it still works great, but I don't want to push it higher than I have to.
I also know how to overclock, having done so with my Opteron 165, but I'd rather not go through the process again if I don't have to. Having 2.8+GHz out of the box will be nice.
But they OC so well
3.2 or 3.4 will be cake
The parts are ordered, thanks guys for the input, even if I didn't use much of it
I'll definitely get around to overclocking the q9550 eventually, but it's not at the top of my priorities. A format first will be a pain in the ass...I have so many things installed on Vista it's ridiculous. But alas, I want to move from Vista 32 to Vista 64 so I can use all 4GB of ram.
I'll definitely get around to overclocking the q9550 eventually, but it's not at the top of my priorities. A format first will be a pain in the ass...I have so many things installed on Vista it's ridiculous. But alas, I want to move from Vista 32 to Vista 64 so I can use all 4GB of ram.
I recently put together a new PC and after about a week of research and experimenting I realised the SLI setup I had wasn't going to give me the performance I'm looking for. So I've returned my 2 9800 GX2s and I'm looking for a new graphics card.
I'm looking at the 4870 X2 right now, but to be honest the benchmarks I've seen from when the card first came out seem a little disapointing for such a pricey single card, although its the same as the the 9800 GX2s costed me. I've also read about that my monitor resolution may be an issue with that card (as it also may have been with my previous setup). My monitors native and max resolution is 1366x768 and I've read some comments that the card doesn't really "shine" until you run it on pretty high resolutions.
I'm interested to see what you all think about how the 4870 X2 would work in my system. If not, any other recomendations? Here is the rest of my system:
nForce 750i SLI FTW
Q9300 (OC'd to 3.0 comfortably right now)
4x 2GB DDR2 Corsair Ram
Vista Business 64bit
My PSU is a 950W Rosewill, I can't remember the model number.
Running everything in 1366x768 (my monitors native and max)
Thanks in advance for the help, and I'll check back often if you guys need anymore information from me.
I'm looking at the 4870 X2 right now, but to be honest the benchmarks I've seen from when the card first came out seem a little disapointing for such a pricey single card, although its the same as the the 9800 GX2s costed me. I've also read about that my monitor resolution may be an issue with that card (as it also may have been with my previous setup). My monitors native and max resolution is 1366x768 and I've read some comments that the card doesn't really "shine" until you run it on pretty high resolutions.
I'm interested to see what you all think about how the 4870 X2 would work in my system. If not, any other recomendations? Here is the rest of my system:
nForce 750i SLI FTW
Q9300 (OC'd to 3.0 comfortably right now)
4x 2GB DDR2 Corsair Ram
Vista Business 64bit
My PSU is a 950W Rosewill, I can't remember the model number.
Running everything in 1366x768 (my monitors native and max)
Thanks in advance for the help, and I'll check back often if you guys need anymore information from me.
Vista Home Premium 64-bit update:
Portal still crashes with the "HL2.exe has stopped working" thing if I click to skip the opening intro. If I hit escape instead, it gets to the main menu successfully. If I wait through the intro, it also gets to the main menu successfully. I tried installing my motherboard's chipset/network/sound drivers. Presumably it's better that I have them anyway (and I don't think I'm noticing the weird sound issues anymore), but the Portal launch crash is still there.
I wouldn't care so much if it was just a matter of hitting escape instead of clicking, but I fear for stability in general, since the games apparently also give the error when they exit, and TF2 crashed shortly after I tried playing it. Plus I had an invisible crosshair and a bunch of crosshair command errors...I can only hope it was because whatever server I tried had some weird custom options?
*edit*
Actually, the sound thing is still there. It's typically only really noticeable when I have no other sound on. If I'm wearing headphones and not playing sound, I can do some action, like scrolling a GAF thread in Firefox. This produces a quiet ticking sound in the headphones, almost like some sort of noise interference. I haven't tried using the sound output from the back of my computer instead, but I don't know if that's even intended for headphones.
Portal still crashes with the "HL2.exe has stopped working" thing if I click to skip the opening intro. If I hit escape instead, it gets to the main menu successfully. If I wait through the intro, it also gets to the main menu successfully. I tried installing my motherboard's chipset/network/sound drivers. Presumably it's better that I have them anyway (and I don't think I'm noticing the weird sound issues anymore), but the Portal launch crash is still there.
I wouldn't care so much if it was just a matter of hitting escape instead of clicking, but I fear for stability in general, since the games apparently also give the error when they exit, and TF2 crashed shortly after I tried playing it. Plus I had an invisible crosshair and a bunch of crosshair command errors...I can only hope it was because whatever server I tried had some weird custom options?
*edit*
Actually, the sound thing is still there. It's typically only really noticeable when I have no other sound on. If I'm wearing headphones and not playing sound, I can do some action, like scrolling a GAF thread in Firefox. This produces a quiet ticking sound in the headphones, almost like some sort of noise interference. I haven't tried using the sound output from the back of my computer instead, but I don't know if that's even intended for headphones.
Don't know if this only happened to me, but here goes.
When I got my Q9550 that I had ordered the S-SPEC read "SLAWQ" (which means that I got the old version of the Q9550). But when a friend helped me to put together my new computer today we realized that it wasn't the old Q9550, it was in fact the new version with E0-stepping. So don't trust the info on the box entirely if you have ordered a Q9550.
When I got my Q9550 that I had ordered the S-SPEC read "SLAWQ" (which means that I got the old version of the Q9550). But when a friend helped me to put together my new computer today we realized that it wasn't the old Q9550, it was in fact the new version with E0-stepping. So don't trust the info on the box entirely if you have ordered a Q9550.
I returned my 9800's because I just decided I'm not a fan of SLI. I did a bunch of research and tried lots of different settings, but I just couldn't get the performance out of it.
I know I wouldn't really be getting my money's worth with the 4870 at my resolution, but I would rather upgrade my monitor/tv (which i plan to within a year) than get a new graphics card sooner than I would like. I'm not planning to upgrade my pc after this for quite some time, so I want to get top of the line for now.
I know I wouldn't really be getting my money's worth with the 4870 at my resolution, but I would rather upgrade my monitor/tv (which i plan to within a year) than get a new graphics card sooner than I would like. I'm not planning to upgrade my pc after this for quite some time, so I want to get top of the line for now.
A 9800GX2 is already SLI and considered one of the top three GPUs on the market. Quad SLI, two GX2s, just like Crossfire X, is worthless and not beneficial to 99% of the stuff you'll run. The GPU is much cheaper than the 280GTX and beats it in many cases, even edging the 4870X2 in certain areas as well. When you got rid of it, your options are limited in many cases depending on what you plan on doing. And if it's for gaming especially Crysis, well, yeah.
Kadey said:
just curious, i know your an owner of a 4870x2 now too and also like me a previous 9800GX2, and its definitely a YMMV issue here, because where the hell were you getting better performance from your 9800GX2 over your new x2 card? my 4870x2 absolutely destroys the performance i was getting from the old gx2. in every game. period. are you talking about other applications? also whats your cpu running at? i know my card felt a bit slow until i oc my cpu to 4.2GHZ now its a monster
rod said:
Most games that "are meant to be played on Nvidia" and certain games at lower res without AA stuff. Crysis for example is still phenomenal with the GX2 at 1200p without AA. I only upgraded to see if the X2 would "destroy" the GX2 but that's not the case.
Let's not jump the gun and just think about our own setup. The guy doesn't even have a monitor that will take advantage of the X2. He didn't even need two GX2s in the first place.
I just had an idea. Instead of buying a cheap PATA controller to recover the stuff from my old hard drives, might it be an ok idea to just buy a good-name SATA DVD burner for around $27 and use that while I just plop my old hard drives onto the single PATA controller on a new motherboard? Since I had an old 160GB sitting around that I never actually used (and hopefully assuming that it wasn't DOA back then, having sat around in a dark, dry place in its original box and static bag for three years won't have harmed it?) I could just use that as my secondary hard drive with whatever single new SATA HDD I get as my boot drive, and my old main hard drive I'll slave to the 160GB PATA.
Most BIOSes would have the boot drive set to one of the SATA by default right?
Most BIOSes would have the boot drive set to one of the SATA by default right?
eznark said:
I like my simple Creative Fatality keyboard but I'm eying one of these. http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/keyboards/keyboard/devices/4740&cl=us,en They just came out and I like the slim design.
''You've just gotten home. It's dark but you still have e-mails to write, people to chat with, blogging to do. While everyone else is in the dark, you're getting ready to shine. Don't you deserve a keyboard that shines with you?''Kadey said:
awesome :lol
I've got the curve 2000, once you get used to the slightly curved layout it works like a charm.