f13.net

So my dad wants an all-new computer because my old one is finally showing its age after 6yrs of constant use (really it hasn't even been formatted in the last 3-4).  Now I quickly stopped him from buying anything pre-built but I didn't realize how much the landscape has changed in the last few years.  I just dont have time to wrap my mind around everything that is going on in the world of hardware.  He has decided he must order the computer sometime next week.

Money is of little object, he wants something that he can show off and will work perfectly for as long as he needs a computer.  He doesn't run games but he does want to get into doing some movie/picture editing and has been talking about getting a rig that could handle those tasks for awhile.

So here is my basic premise after about 5 hours of trying to read up on 3 years of hardware advancement...   :|

CPU:  Literally I'm not sure what is going on with Intel's new stuff, I dont want to waste the time to figure it out.  As cpu's are always confusing.  Seems like Intel is back to being the way to go, which is nice as I've still always used them even back when AMD was way better on the $$-results scale.

But do I go with the Core 2 duo e6400 or the Xenon 5050?  I mean wtf is going on, the prices are similar enough per pricewatch to seem irrelevant...

Mobo:  I always figure out the mobo last, when I know exactly what I need to fit in it.  Suggestions are welcome.

RAM:  I love spending money on ram, nothing is more satisfying in my opinion.  DDR-2 is a given, according to some reading I'm thinking top-brand PC2-8000 but I could be talked into something else easily.  Some [H]ardOCP searching should answer this one for me...

Video Card:  GeForce 7900GT the next step didn't seem worth it, BUT!!  I have little to no grasp on what system resources video editing stresses, typically I've found paying bleeding edge prices for video cards is stupid.  The three rigs I've built in my life, all responded more to dumping cash into RAM/CPU.  This is why I've ignored SLI, as it pains me to give him SLI when he does no gaming.  Again, if anyone who has worked on videos on their computer can chime in, that'd kickass.

Hard Drives:  I can't believe that this has its own section but here goes:  I'm looking at a 36GB 15,000rpm Maxtor Atlas II to run the OS.  That was not too hard but here comes the tricky part.

I need him to have a very reliable storage backup, way back when I was last doing this, RAID setups were starting to become more and more talked about.  But back then the jury seemed out where I was reading.  Anyways, I need something that can backup very important data, and be trusted.  So I will take all the suggestions I can get on this front, I have never had this type of need for my rigs so this is totally alien territory for me.

Again money is not a big concern, but really he doesn't need that much power imo.  I'm not sure if he'll ever even do the video editing.  This may be more of an e-peen contest between him and one of his buddies then anything.  So top-shelf but not $30 bucks a shot stuff. 

Thanks in advance to anyone who can help, wish I had more warning to do more of the work myself I feel really clueless right now (more then usual!).

Well, if he's going to be video editting and you have your sights on a 36GB highspeed drive for the OS, then I assume you plan a seperate much bigger drive for data. My photos alone take up around 80GB of space.

The 7900GT is probably more than enough card in my opinion. The only real reason to go bigger is when you get in to heavy CAD or Modeling, in which case you'd want a workstation card instead, which start around $1200, so yea - stick with the 7900.

RAM - 2 Gigs minimum. I've never really known if the high performance stuff makes any difference.

CPU - probably no real reason to go Xenon.

Backup - lots of options here. Raid 5, disk mirroring, external drive, or plain old DVD backups. I wouldn't personally bother with Tape anymore, since you can dump 8GB on a dvd. Figure out how much data you need to backup, how regularly you need to do it, and remember - if you go RAID, your hdd requirements change a lot.

Honestly? I'd buy a Dell XPS. Their high end models are super super nice.

I agree.  If you are going to let someone suck money out of you like that, might as well sit on the Dell pipe.  Warranty and such, too.

a)  I want to build something, its been awhile and I have no money to do anything to my machine right now.

b)  I hate buying pre-built stuff (some kind of gamer pride going on)

c)  My mother, despite my outrage, bought my half-brother and herself a "top-of-the-line"  :roll: Alienware from Dell.  When it got to her, there was a power cable sitting loose inside the case (wtf) and beyond that the machine did not actually work (seemed like mobo problems).  Oh and they didn't give her some quiet fans she paid extra for.  So fuck that, I've never bought pre-built and I'm not going to start now.



@Bunk:  Yeah of course there will be additional data storage, I run a 34gig for my OS (only 10,000rpm sigh) with another 160gigs internal for music/anime I'm watching and a 400gig external drive as well.  But I have no clue as to data backup solutions.  I'll ask him today what exactly he needs on that front.  My understanding is he is concerned because he keeps client database, payment info, accounting software info and legal docs on the computer.  Loosing that would be devestating etc.

Thanks for the replies guys.

If he is not heavily into games following would be an OK setup:

Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4 GHz tops
Any Asus dual-channel DDR2, PCIe x16 slot (don't bother about SLI or such, you need only 1 slot) with build-in raid
4 GIGs of DDR2 (2 pairs of matched 1 gig) DUAL CHANNEL PC-6400 should be enough but faster is better
GeForce 7900 GS tops, 7600 probably good enough.

Now here is kicker, something to wow your dad:
2x Western Digital Raptor SATA (WD1500ADFD) 150GB 10,000 RPM hard drives RAID 0

Raptors are freaking fast hard drives for non-SCSI, load times will be significantly reduced for any application. I have this set-up (only with 2 74G) and it is real boon for any non-gaming application.

Short and quick.

Intel CoreDuo.  Pick the fast one, I guess.
Matching mobo.  ASUS is good. PCI-E, make sure it takes 8GB RAM.  Don't get the one with integrated GFX.
HD is good.  Get another large SATA other than the boot one.  You'll have six SATA ports, go nuts.  I hear there's a 700GB jobber out there.
I like the GeForce 7 series but if I was Monty Burns I guess I'd get one of the 8 series.
Sound card, I guess get the one that costs the most and/or has the most holes in the back.
Zalman HSF.  Thermal paste too.
I like Crucial RAM, never broken on me.  Get the 1GB sticks, how many up to you.  I'd say four, at least.
Might want to get a LARGE power unit.

With optical out. Built-in sound cards are garbage. I assume your dad already has sound system to hook up to his new PC., if not forget PC and get him good set of 5.1 (7.1 is excess IMO) energy speakers and beefy receiver.

Video uses CPU, RAM, and HD speed+space. The video card does nothing except maybe speed up playback and reduce artifacts in DVD playback. You can buy seperate encoder cards as well. CPU determines how fast you can transcode video. Depending on the transcoder a second core/cpu may not be used. RAM lets you buffer more video while transcoding (I assume). HD speed lets you read and write the transcoded video faster. Also transcoding from HD A to HD B is faster then from HD A to HD A. Uncompressed video is HUGE (30MB? per second @ 720x480). I have an 180 gig drive full of only ~100 minutes of video in various different formats and sizes. I got 80 gigs back by deleting half of the uncompressed video. Any compressed video is pretty small though.

I'm not sure raid 0 would make much sense if data integrity is his big concern.

Raid 0... damn, my MCSE memory is fading - is that mirroring or the other thing? Mirroring is a nice simple redundency solution, but I'm assuming you'd take a performance hit.

Raid 5 is always a wow factor, but it doesn't do much for you if someone steals the whole PC. Personally, were I backing up vital data on a regular basis I'd just be using dvds on a regular schedule. Possibly if I had money to burn I'd use hotswappable drives on a rotation. :)

A few of the guys here know plenty more than I do, since I've been out of IT for over 5 years, but I like talking about this stuff anyways.

Raid 0 is striped.

I don't have 10,000 rpm, but pretty good nonetheless.

Awesome awesome, I'm seeing some consensus here, I'll be back tomorrow at the latest with a list of specific parts.  Gotta do some mobo research...

Raid 0 offers no additional protection, it is basically just a speed/performance increase for gamer/modders which some points of authority debated the validity of back in the day.

I'll talk to him about what he "wants" in terms of backup integrity and post back.

@Krakrok:  Ok good, sounds like I may bring the Geforce down another level even then.  If the cash savings seem good.  I'm thinking I'll want to put 300gigs of internal storage if not more, will depend on where the price-jump happens.  Thanks for that info.

I was thinking of this for sound:  http://www.audiomidi.com/Revolution-7-1-P3409.aspx  because he subscribes to stereophile and at $100 it didn't seem like a big deal.

@Yeg:  I'm with you on Crucial, that and Corsair have always been my favorite.  But anandtech and hardocp people were bringing up all sorts of other brands I've never heard of, I'll figure something out.  I'm also totally with you when it comes to Zalman, I love the giant copper flower of theirs I put on my current rig's cpu.

Anyone have opinions about who makes good power supplies?  I'm thinking 600W might not actually be a retarded thing for this computer and I've never bought one that big but its come to my attention that I should take power supply purchases more seriously then I have in the past.  They've been the first thing to fail on my older machines twice.

Antec is a currently popular choice for cases and power supplies.

If he's serious about the editing you are going to want dual monitors so get a video card that has dual DVI, preferably. You'll also want some sort of TV output. If he plans on editing HDV at some point you will need a RAID 0 setup so plan on maybe three internal drives (system drive with apps, no RAID, two RAID 0 drives for editing) plus multiple external drives (eSATA would be fastest) for near term archiving/backup and Blu-ray or dual layer DVD-+RW for long time archiving. You'll also need a Firewire port, preferrably Fireware 800.

Lian-Li makes some sexy cases.

You don't want a 50XX Xeon -- that's a P4 core. If you want a server CPU you'll want a 51XX Xeon -- those are Core2 cores. The 51XX Xeons are useful you if just can't get enough CPU cores and need to be able to stick multiple physical CPUs in a single motherboard. Otherwise, don't bother.

Good editing programs do take advantage good GPUs to accelerate some of the video playback but anything that isn't complete trash from NVIDIA and ATI will work fine. If you've used a software DVD player it's like the "use hardware acceleration" checkbox to lower the the CPU usage during video playback. A bigger question is whether or not you want to cough up the extra bucks for a DX 10 card.

I talked about this in my previous reply but as you can tell from the other replies there are lots of options here. Krakrok suggestion about transcoding from one drive to another is an interesting one except that transcoding is CPU bound so if it was a choice between two drives in RAID 0 or two separate drives to facilitate transcoding I would still go with the RAID 0 setup. Now if you wanted to have 4 or 5 internal drives, that's a different story :D.

For backups optical media is fine -- I trust them more than magnetic tapes -- and you can spring for the "long life" types if you are worried the dyes might fade or otherwise get damaged over time. The best strategy if you are really paranoid is to use multiple backup formats including hard copy output (on archival quality paper).

Edit:
It used to be there were only a handful of really good power supply makers but now everybody and their uncles (including memory manufacturers for gosh sakes) are jumping into the "high end" power supply marketplace. My preference is still SeaSonic though Enermax makes good ones as does Antec with their higher end models.

For the Core 2 Duos, higher-speed RAM doesn't do much.  There are a few experiments that showed a 1-5% performance improvement going from dog-slow to bleeding-fast RAM.  I just built a few E6600-based systems and swapped out RAM in one from PC2-4200 to PC2-6400 (5-5-5-12 for both) and saw about 2% performance improvement.  (of course, benchmarking is a very black art, so there are benchmarks that will show a much nicer boost, but that's rarely reflected in real-world apps)

One thing to watch out for are overly-picky motherboards, especially if higher-end RAM is desired.  Lots of the higher-end RAM seems to run at 2.2v, while a fair number of motherboards will only support 1.8-1.9v, or worse yet, will only be stable with 1.8-1.9v RAM.


The Core 2 Duo E6600 seems to be at the sweet spot for price/performance right now, but the $1K-ish "Extreme" versions may be appropriate if money isn't an object and it's an e-peen thing.  Performance gains from the "Extreme" version are fairly small.  There's always the excessive-overclocking route, as well, if spiffy cooling systems are desirable.  Apparently most of the Core 2 Duos are very OC-friendly if one has the right motherboard and RAM.  Quad-core might be an option if they're available yet, but it's probably massive overkill and there may be operating system license issues.

Hoax, what operating system will the system have?  If it's a 32-bit OS, then 2 GB of RAM is probably appropriate--32-bit XP won't see more than 2.5 GB (I hear), for example.  For Vista (ugh), 2 GB is really the minimum, which will give you around 1.4 GB for apps after it boots, and 4 GB is probably more appropriate.  Plus, with Vista, you'll get help your dad experience the many joys of aggressive DRM, especially if he's going to try to do video editing.

For disks, 750 GB SATA II (or UATA-133) drives are readily available for ~$350 or less.  1 TB drives will be out by the end of Q1 2007, supposedly (but note that's 1 billion bytes, not 2³⁰ bytes).  Most Core 2 Duo-supporting motherboards will have 6-10 SATA ports, plus 1 UATA 33/66/100/133 port for the optical drive(s).

32-bit XP will see 4 GB of RAM (2 ^ 32 = 4 GB) but some apps may only be able to use up to 2 GB, I believe.

If you have 4G of RAM on Win32, you get 2GB for applications and 2GB for the system.  There's a switch you can flip to let an app use 3GB, but I've had bad experiences with it.

Ah, I wasn't aware of that switch (the /3GB for boot.ini?); I'd just run across a lot of people complaining about the "2 GB limit" for 32-bit Windows and never dug deeply enough to determine that it was 2 GB per process and not for the system as a whole. Looking at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/memory/base/memory_limits_for_windows_releases.asp (http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/memory/base/memory_limits_for_windows_releases.asp) seems to show more variety in memory limits than I was aware of.  Does anyone here run with >2 GB in a 32-bit version of Windows?  Does one end up being able to make good use of the extra memory?

Get a C2D chip. e6400 or e6600, price for performance cannot be beat right now. Also, stay away from any 680i motherboard, they are having some serious problems. Some thing like 30% are having to be RMA'd.

In less he is hardcore the 10,000rpm drive is a waste of money, get him a huge SATA2 (or SATA 3.0gb as they are sometimes called) drive for much much less cash.

I ran WinXP (32 bit) when I built this system for a short while.  I primarily switched to XP64 because as far as I could tell, nothing could see more than 2GB, and I often ran into the need to enable a swap file.  Since switchign to XP64, I've not once had the system complain that it needed any swap.  Theres still a couple thigns that don't run, mostly games that are badly programmed, compatibility mode often fixes them.

Outside of enterprise simple backup is plenty for insuring data integrity.

Get a case with 400W Antec power supply in it.

Wait about 30 to 60 more days and get the 53XX line for Quad cores.  The only real difference between the Xeon line and the Consumer line is that the Xeons can have more then one physical cpu socketed into the motherboard and the chipsets usually have raid / ecc memory built in.  If your Dad wants to do a video editing and video editing fast,  a pair of 53XXs  with 2-4GB ram and a pair of 10K or 15K raid drives is going to be something well worth showing off.  But you are probably approaching a $5K price tag.


If you are putting in 4GB of ram you probably don't need 15K drives, they will help a bit but you will be hard pressed to push 4GB of ram in most uses today. Even video editing.  The trick in the older days is you want different disk channels and have the OS / apps on one,  data on one, and swap on one.. but with 4GB ram while windows always swaps, you may want to disable your swapfile.


Ram is not where you want to be putting money unless you are going to be over clocking the system. There is zero need to buy faster Ram then the cpu / bus needs.  Get the middle of the road to cheap ram.  You are better off with 4GB of spec'd speed ram then you are with 2GB of primo over speed rated ram.

.

if Video editing is the thing,  get the Quad core extreme from Intel.  Nothing can touch it today. Otherwise if money is an issue get the 2.6Ghz Core 2 Duo.

15K drives are useful for video editing, especially if you want to edit HD video but putting far cheaper 7.2K drives in a RAID 0 config is a much better way given how much room you'll need to do HD editing. Plus there's the extra cost for a SCSI controller.

PC2-8000 is not all that interesting. PC2-8500, however, means that you can run your memory bus in sync with your CPU which is intriguing. In the normal configuration the CPU runs at 1067 MHz while the memory runs at 800 MHz. With PC2-8500 they both run in sync at 1067 MHz. However the benchmarks only show a small performance improvement (~5%) and the cost is quite a bit more.

That's only if the programs his dad will be using will be able to take advantage of all four cores.

Overkill in all departments, its wasting money on performance that will never be used.

Just curious about motherboards; with Core 2 Duo motherboards, how can you tell if the voltages on the memory slots are going to work with PC 8000 or PC 8500. On New Egg, the ram has voltage ranges listed, but not on their motherboards. Even the Asus site doesn't list this as a spec on their motherboards.

Download the motherboard manuals and check in there.

I've learned a few things in this thread. Neato.

I will say though, looking back at the orignal posts, I get the feeling his dad is looking to do more ameteur level video editing than some of what we are getting in to here. Splicing and fancying up home movies, that sort of thing. Plus he mentioned photo editing, which means that if he doesn't want to go the Arrgh! route, you need to set aside $1000+ for CS2.

Just went through the manual for the Asus P5N32-E SLI and the Intel Intel® Desktop Board D975XBX2, who I consider top competitors for the best Core2Duo boards, and I honestly cannot find a reference to memory voltage limitations. Perhaps its because the issue has been resolved for these two boards in particular. Here are the links

P5N32-E SLI (http://www.asus.com/products4.aspx?l1=3&l2=11&l3=397&model=1459&modelmenu=1)
Intel® Desktop Board D975XBX2 (http://www.intel.com/design/motherbd/BX2/BX2_documentation.htm)

Page 4-23.
That's not the manual, this is:

http://www.intel.com/support/motherboards/desktop/d975xbx2/sb/CS-023492.htm

However that thing is mostly useless as is typically the case for Intel motherboard manuals.

This one:

http://www.intel.com/support/motherboards/desktop/sb/cs-020304.htm

Is slightly more useful but it's generic for all their desktop motherboards. However it implies that at least for some of them you can manually set the voltage to 1.8 or 1.9.

As I recently learned, many of the Intel motherboards are very picky about memory voltage; the original set only took 1.8v, but some were upgraded in mid-November to take 1.8v or 1.9v.

According to http://forums.legitreviews.com/about6572.html (http://forums.legitreviews.com/about6572.html) (as a random message board hit), that specific motherboard does support a broad range of memory voltages, for what it's worth.  http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/mainboards/display/20061129064932.html (http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/mainboards/display/20061129064932.html) says that the D975XBX2 is Intel's "enthusiast" motherboard which supports overclocking the CPU as well as a broad range of memory voltages (1.8v-2.8v!).

I just ordered that Intel board, the Bad Axe2. It is getting very good user reviews at all the major tech forums. Its being called one of the most stable boards out, and it OCs pretty damn good from what I hear.

Let us know how that board works out, Morphiend. I read some reviews that mentioned some buggy issues with raid, but then again, it may just be people who are apalled you still need a floppy drive to load raid drivers during Windows install.

Let us know if you can run the memory bus at 1067 MHz.

I'll second this and add that some boards that support the higher-voltage RAM will default to 1.8v.  The last thing I'd want to do is find out that I have to buy and install lower-voltage RAM so I can access the BIOS and adjust it to boot with the fancy 2.2v RAM.  Personally, I'lll be sticking with the 1.8v RAM on my upgrade since I believe it will reduce hassle.

Here are the stats for my new machine. Its a beast. I have been saving for the right time to buy, and here it is.

Intel BOXD975XBX2KR LGA 775 Intel 975X ATX Intel Motherboard
eVGA 768-P2-N831-AR GeForce 8800GTX 768MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 HDCP Video Card
Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 Conroe 2.4GHz LGA 775 Processor Model BX80557E6600
SONY Black 1.44MB 3.5" Internal Floppy Drive Windows 98SE/ ME/ 2000/ XP
CORSAIR CMPSU-620HX ATX12V v2.2 and EPS12V 2.91 620W Power Supply
SAMSUNG 18X DVD±R DVD Burner With 12X DVD-RAM Write, LightScribe Technology Black SATA Model SH-S183L
Antec Nine Hundred Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Model TWIN2X2048-6400
ASUS Silent Square 92mm Sleeve CPU Cooler


Total build is costing me around $1700. A bit more than I wanted to spend, but I figure once in my life I wanted to get a very top of the line type machine.

I can't come in under $2400, so I think I'm holding off until Mayish to build (I'm looking to buy a house, which really messes with any big purchases). Sucks to hear about the 680i's being buggy, hopefully it'll be ironed out soon. I had intended to use one, guess I better look around a bit more.

Core 2 Duo e6600
eVGA 8800 GTX
(680i or whatever)
2GB DDR2 1066 (corsair 8500C5D)
PC Power & Cooling 750W
WD Raptor 150GB
Antec p180
Zalman cooling
X-Fi Elite (need the digital outs capable of surround)

At some point adding a laser wireless mouse, maybe a new keyboard and a DVD burner. I'd love to use a quad-core, but hopefully they'll be cheap by the time they're useful :) Figure on getting the e6600 to mid-3GHz range.

You should be able to hit about 2k for that system using some OEM parts from the egg. Also, there is no reason what so ever to get 680i in less you plan on going SLi, and also you shouldnt need more than ddr2 800, in less you plan to do some serious serious overclocking. you could get a ASUS board for around 180-200, and cutting the ram down from 1066 to 800 should save you $200+.
There is expensive system, and there is over the top system.

Over the top is fun :) I probably won't SLI, it was more for the faster memory. Be nice if the board was quad-core friendly. Serious overclocking...not too serious, hoping for 3.6GHz on the 6600, which I think is actually 800fsb (that o/c speed, I mean)?  This is using the egg, of course. Should knock off at least $100 in hardware with  rebates, but that'll go towards a new OS (MCE, I guess).

I've been spending more time looking at mortgages than pc parts, honestly.

I've lost track of the video cards and what's what now.

Can anyone tell me where an ATI X800 Pro stands when compared to, say, a ATI X1900 GT? Is the 1900 twice as good?

(I like my X800, but looking to upgrade my mobo to a dual core with PCI-e and so would need a new video card - but I don't want to spend $400+ on one).

Too bad there's only a couple of mobo's that have both AGP and PCI-e .. and they are older.

I can only go read AnandTech or Tom's to answer your question about the ATi cards; not my brand.  I do remember that one of those two put out a "best bang for $X bucks" set of articles, probably Anand, and that was what I glanced at when deciding on which 7-series Nvidia part to get.

As for the AGP situation, I decided the thing to do is go ahead and move to PCI-E, but I find that a lot of those cards don't have a D-SUB, as they seem to be called now.  I suppose getting a DVI->D-SUB adapter would work, but I'm a tad suspicious of such things.  For no good reason other than being an unfrozen caveman.

They work fine. I've got a couple Dells I have to adapt both ways. Some are analog with digital adapters, some vice versa.

That's great since a new monitor would likely double my upgrade costs.

The DVI to VGA adapters work fine. There are a bazillion different DVI connector types but the type used on a video card has dedicated analog output pins so the adapter is just mapping pins, it's not doing any digital to analog conversion -- that's being done on the video card like it always has.

Ah-ha.  Thanks for the explanation.  Fears banished.

I'm planning on building this (http://arstechnica.com/guides/buyer/system-guide-200612.ars/3) for my next system, with maybe a couple of minor tweaks.  Picking out my own components and trying to figure out whether they'll all work together is just too much of a headache.   :-P

Its really not hard. Pick out a system, and then post the specs on one of the various hardware forums, asking nicely if anyone can see any problem with your system.
I personally like [Hard]forum, as the people there are pretty nice. Anandtech works also.

On another note, I got all my components yesterday, and installed them last night. I only had time to get windows xp pro installed before bed, but so far so good.

Here is a pic taken with my phone this morning. I havent done my cable managment yet.

(http://img234.imageshack.us/img234/9467/0110070847da9.jpg)

That's a couple months old, you sure you want to use that?

I picked up a logitech G15 keyboard. I've typed on better, but I really like the backlighting. It's great for late night typing.

Dang, Morphiend, what CPU fan is that? Looks like the terminator of cooling. Also, did you do raid on that box? How did that work out with the XP install? Finally, let us know about performance and stability. I always take word of mouth over some review, no matter how reputable the source.

It's one of these things:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835101002

That's obscene. How much does it weigh? It looks to be at least a pound of metal you have strapped to that poor CPU.

They weigh a lot less than you think. There's not a lot of metal in the base since it uses a heat pipe design to draw the heat away and the fins are very thin. For example the ASUS weighs 656g.

In comparison one of these, which is a more traditional non-heatpipe design:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835118115

weighs in at 918g

though the Zalman includes a fan in the weight while the ASUS does not.

Also because the fins are so thin the heat sink is not "top heavy" like the above Zalman is so even though it's really tall it's not putting a lot of torque on the motherboard.

Is clearance almost a problem with something that tall?

Clearance to the side cover? Not in a standard ATX case. The fan, if you use one, mounts on the "side" not on the top so you don't have to worry about clearing that extra space. Depending on where the CPU socket is, it can interfere with other things like the power supply and drives that are sticking into the motherboard space so you do have to check the dimensions carefully. You don't usually have to worry about the stuff right around the socket or the memory slots (though they may be hard to get to once the heat sink is installed) cause with the tall heat pipe design the base isn't very big and then the heat pipes angle out from there.

I have to admit I kinda got giddy when they started making that form factor hs/fan. It's like people don't look at how air flows through a standard atx case when designing things. BTX has some great ideas in it, like blowing gpu heat up & out, instead of down & around. Being able to vent with a 92mm (that's what I have now, but venting sideways, not back) directly out the back is wicked.

My heatsink probably weighs a pound.  It's old-school.

I love that fan, if I was still kit building my boxes, I'd get one. Hell, I may get one and mount it on the outside of my current beast just 'cause it looks so badass.

And the G15 is teh shiz as far as backlit keyboards go, IMO. Yeah the tactile does leave a bit to be desired, but the backlight and the programability of the LCD more than makes up for that.

I wish I could get a wireless version of the old mechanical keyboards. My logitech cordless keyboard is ok, but flimsy, and newer versions are something from pimp my fuckin' keyboard or something. Backlight would be cool, but kill batteries.

The heatsink actually has a fan in the middle of it, blowing straight at the rear case fan. It IS pretty large, but it fits fine, and it looks really really nice.

I got my new hard drive yesterday, and got windows installed and all patched, and got all my drivers and tweaking programs and monitoring programs last night. I left it on all night running nTune System Stress program. The system didnt even flinch. So far it has been rock solid, and I got 10,000 on 3dMark06. I did not go for a raid this time. My previous computer had a raid0 in it, and it just wasnt worth the slight performance for the hassle. So far I am very impressed with the whole system.

I spent several hours last night with some zipties fixing all the cables, and let me say it looks very sexy now. Ill post some more pics later tonight.

 

Cool beans. I'm interested in how you like it, given how similar our builds will be. I'm also pretty excited about graphics because I'm resolution limited to 1280x720, which is a good thing in a way, since review sites are looking at 1600x1200 and whatnot. The 8800 should chew through anything pretty well on my monitor. One reason I waffle on the cpu choice, because I'm nearing the point of being cpu limited (!).

I just purchased a CPU upgrade for my AMD 939 socket board. I'm currently running a Gforce 7950gx2 video card, and that card is swell, but I think the the CPU is making the system lag behind. I'm laboring under a AMD 64 3500+, which for nearly all things does fine, but its starting to show some wrinkles.

I bought a 939 socket, dual core AMD 64 FX-60 2.6G San Diego chip. I'm not expecting miracles, but I decided I am not ready for the hassle and expense of new motherboard, chip and ram. The CPU was expensive, at $450, but the other option would have been around $1000.

I get it today, and I'll post impressions.

Just wondering, but I heard at one point that you need to have your OS discs handy when changing out a CPU. Is the process actually pretty painless?

I'm banking on one of either two results from changing the CPU. Either I have no problems, and the OS adopts the new CPU without any additional fiddling, or, if it fails to boot, do what I call a 'repair' install of windows. This essentially is the second repair option when you boot from the WinXP cd. After you hit f8, accepting the license agreement, the disk searches for pre-existing OS, and asks if you wish to repair that OS. This process strips all drivers from the existing install and then reassembles the OS for the new hardware. Its SOP here at work, when putting a pre-existing image from one machine onto another machine with different hardware, and I've had no problems with it thusfar.

There may be another method, but I do not know of it.

Well hey, at least you have upgrade options. I don't even see any options for my current AMD Athlon XP 2700+.

Yep, in your case, I would pretty much simply start saving to buy a new motherboard, cpu and DDR2 ram. You can shave off dollars by going with a lower end cpu and not buying the bestest ram ever and also going for a reputable but not too fancy motherboard. Stay away from DFI and other manufacturers who clearly have poor documentation. A quick visit to their web pages lets you know how 'serious' a company they are. Gigabyte, for example, although seemingly a two-bit Taiwanese company with poor english, actually has a decent website and their boards have treated me well in the past, when I've not wanted to spring for Asus or Intel.

At this stage, I would urge you in the direction of an Intel CPU, rather than AMD, simply because their AM2 chips are lack luster, and the benchmarks for their new 60nm dual cores (not yet on the shelves) are benchmarking below Core2Duos. I love AMD, and wish they'd catch the hell up.

Oh yeah, I know my only option is a total overhaul. But I'm probably almost a year away from that.

But when I do upgrade, I just have to make sure it counts. I'll probably spring for a sweet mobo with one of the latest slot-types, to maximize my ability to upgrade further down the line.

I have hard times believing that passive cooling solution can work well. I build my PCs around designing airflows, with passive cooling its all up to chassis fans and can result in hot zones around your HDDs, video card, PSU. Its also not that quiet since you have fewer fans but they have to work harder and there is less redundancy.

I'm feeling pretty confident about these choices.

CPU =  (E6400 Conroe 2.13GHz) (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819115004)  $220
RAM =  (CORSAIR XMS2 2GB) (http://2x http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820145034#spec) $236x2=$472
VIDEO CARD =  (Radeon X1300PRO) (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814125022&ATT=14-125-022&CMP=OTC-pr1c3watch) $70

I've also narrowed the mobo down (I think) to these two:

 MSI 975X Plat. v2 (http://www.msicomputer.com/product/p_spec.asp?model=975X_Platinum_V.2&class=mb)
or
 Abit AW9D-MAX (http://www.abit-usa.com/products/mb/products.php?categories=1&model=326)

Which are $170 and $210 respectively on Newegg.  I'm leaning towards the Abit mobo, although I do need to take a look at Intel's boards still.

The whole HD situation is annoying as he wants to run a mirrored raid setup and I've never done that but it doesn't sound difficult.

Thoughts are welcome.  Also anyone got a HSF they really like for core 2 duo?  I was looking at something from Arctic Cooling but I'm always open to suggestions on that front. 

I found a nifty device I want to pick up at some point.

http://www.frozencpu.com/products/4081/psu-208/FrozenCPU_ATX_20_Ultimate_LCD_Power_Supply_Tester_2024_pin_ATX_SATA_P4_Xeon_PCI-E_Floppy_4_pin.html

So I spent the last day or so testing my system and stressing it, and installing shit.

I LOVE it. It has been chewing through everything. I got 10,000 points in 3dMark, which is very high, and then I got 8,000 in PCMark, which is also in the top 95%.

I installed the FEAR Extraction Point demo and ran it with everything maxed, ran very smooth. Also installed WoW and ran it in max resolution (2048x1500) with every setting maxed. And I was getting 80+FPS in the middle of Org. (WoW limits FPS to around 85).

The system is pretty damn stable, and running nice and cool. 28-29c at idle and 35c under full load. Also it looks really nice. Which while not really mattering, I like my shit to look good as well as perform good.

35c under load? That's pretty nice. I'm lucky if my CPU hangs around 60c under load.

Then again, it's an old-school AMD; heat is the name of the game with those.

Ya, those AMD XPs run pretty hot. The AMD 64s are cooler. Mine runs like Morph's does, with the default factory fan.

Addendum, 23 minutes after getting home from work, I'm running my new CPU. The upgrade from an AMD 64 3500+ to a dual core AMD 64 dual core 60FX was a matter of switching them out, and one reboot. No additional fiddling required. Now, to test drive this puppy!

Sounds luscious.

This post is to point out that according to page 2, Morphiend got a floppy drive.

Morphiend. Floppy Drive. For real?

There are a few situations where you still could want a floppy drive. Raid driver at the time of installation come to mind.

It was like $5 OEM, I didnt install it in my case, but last time I did a build, I ended up needing one for the RAID drivers, and it held me up for 3 days. I didnt want that to happen again, so I bought one. It is currently sitting on my desk still in the bubble wrap. Im going to put it away in case I need it.

I had picked out the ABIT Fatal1ty Socket AM2 mobo for my new rig (go go stock options!) but I just realized it was a SLI board not a CrossFire board. I had wanted to stay with ATI vid cards since that's what I am familiar with (how to overclock them, etc etc).. but now I'm not sure what to do. There are like 3 CrossFire mobo's with AM2 chipset, with a few others for the 939 socket.

There goes that plan, /grumble.

Are you going to be doing CrossFire with two ATI cards? Otherwise, I wouldn't fret about it one way or another.

That was the plan. Buy one ATI card now and then CrossFire it with another later. But, I think I'll go Nvidia because those are the better mobos right now. So far this is my plan:

Asus Crosshair Socket AM2 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813131593) mobo (ghey name) - $190 for openbox
Athlon 64 X2 4200 Windsor (http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16819103747) - $165
eVGA 7600GT 256mb (http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16814130017) - $140 (rebate brings it down to $120)

I'll probably SLI the 7600GT later this year. I don't mind learning Nvidia cards, I just have to go read a bit and find the "cool" tools.

Tom's Hardware VGA chart (http://www23.tomshardware.com/graphics.html) is pretty useful when comparing video cards (ie: X1600 PRO better or worse than 7600 GS?).

Nvidia really isn't all that bad. The board looks promising; do you by any chance know if it can accomodate the upcoming 60nm dual core chips from AMD?

Later this year you should probably simply be saving up for a DX10 card.

From what I've read the 65nm chips will work on today's Socket AM2 mobo's - there's just a bios update needed to 'read' the new CPU.

I've backed down from the Asus Crosshair because I decided that the 'openbox' version isn't for me, and the regular retail box is $230, so now I back to the Abit Fatal1ty AN9 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16813127237) mobo for only $170 retail.

Hopefully I'll have my new setup running by the end of the week.

I would never buy anything with Fatal1ty's name on it, just out of principle.  :evil:

The first one also wasn't that good. But I agree with your principle.

I hate to say it, but if there's anything one should not skimp on is the motherboard. Just in terms of upgrade and support, a good name brand is more likely to do the work to put BIOS upgrades out there to support new technology, whereas 'economy' brands feel no such obligation.

Not saying that Abit is bad, since I do not know the first thing about them, but I'd sooner get an Ebayed video card for 50 dollars less and spend that 50 bucks on a retail Asus, Megabyte or other 'top end' board.

Abit is comparable to a Gigabyte (I'm assuming that's who you meant) or an MSI. Abit was at one time the premier "enthusiasts" board maker being the first to offer overclocking through the BIOS rather than having to set jumpers. They faded for a while as others copied them and then surpassed them but have been on the comeback trail with their Fatal1ty line.

Yep, I meant Gigabyte. I have a board, still running, going on 5 years of pretty heavy treatment. I know they aren't considered in the league of Asus, but personally, I've been satisfied with what I've seen. Good to know that Abit has the acumen as well.

I actually have beef with Asus, in my first two machines the Asus board was the first part (other then a burned out video card) to die after like 6 and 4 years respectively.  So they have been replaced by Abit in my pecking order, the MSI board got solid reviews as well so I included it in case anyone had a strong opinion on one or the other.

My Asus board should be dead at least twice over - it's still chugging along.

I have a giant 400 watt powersupply hanging out the back of my shuttle box. My computer has been through hell and come back alive. By all accounts, it's undead.

I'm going to have to tag you with Misuse of an Adjective here.

So, upgrading is never as easy as you would think.

I ended up buying a floppy drive (-gasp!-) after not having one for about 5 years. I wanted to install XP on my new 3 disk RAID ($40 for a 80gb SATA drive at New Egg), so I had to have it load the drivers during setup. The funny thing is, XP Setup won't read from anything but your A: for a driver! It'll use the CDROM all day long for loading files and checking your "previous version of windows" but god forbid it load a driver from a CD!

Anyways, I ended up losing all the data on my files drive (IDE drive I use for music and downloaded apps repository, plus My Documents) because XP Setup didn't recognize it as a valid NTFS partition (wtf?) and reformatted it so it could load boot drivers on to it - apparently XP can't boot from a RAID array. I didn't have anything amazing on that drive, but I haven't even started using it to figure out if I've lost something I really needed. :P

Oh, and I should have known this, but the new mobos want DDR2 memory and won't work with DDR mem - so I ended up having to buy a 512 stick at CompUSA just so I could get this POS back up and running. For some reason I didn't even think to check and see if it'd work with my current DDR memory - I mean, wtf, going from DDR to DDR2 requires a new form factor? Ahh well.

Ya, DDR2 memory is actually mostly the whole point in switching to the new form factors for AMD. That's why their AM2 chipsets have been so lackluster; they were developed mostly to take advantage of the far faster bus rates of the new DDR2 ram, but the actual chips themselves weren't much, if any, of an improvement over the 939 chipsets.

Speaking of memory, I'm looking at getting two crucial sticks, this one  (http://www.crucial.com/store/mpartspecs.aspx?mtbpoid=D6055E3BA5CA7304) or this one (http://www.crucial.com/ballistix/store/MPartspecs.Asp?mtbpoid=4B1CBC47A5CA7304&WSMD=A8N32%2DSLI+Deluxe&WSPN=BL2KIT12864Z503).

I have a AMD San Diego 64 FX 2.6 Ghz processor. I noticed that the Ballistix 1gigx2 sticks run at PC4000 or 500mhz whereas the 'regular' 1GBx2 runs at PC3200, or 400mhz. Is there any point at all in buying a PC4000, or will it just throttle down to the 200mhz frequency anyway? Crucial states that my motherboard, an A8N-32 SLI Deluxe, supports only DDR SDRAM Frequencies from PC2700 and PC3200, so why are they pusing the Ballistix stick at me?

It's only useful if you want to overclock your system and given that the FX's are completely unlocked it's easier just to bump up the CPU multiplier rather than overclock the base frequency (the 200 MHz setting).

This thread upsets me because it makes me think about building a new computer.  I started pricing components and I can't believe the nicest video cards cost more than a PS3.  And I mean just one, not two in an SLI config.

That's why you don't go ZOMG TOP OF TEH LINE. Staying a few months or even a year behind the top of the power curve results in huge savings, while trading off just a little bit of performance.

I just priced out a decent system for someone last night for about $1600. It will be a kickass system with plenty of upgrade options.

So, let me see if I understand, which I probably don't. If one gets a PC4000 (500mhz) ram chip, you'd have to overclock the base frequency of the CPU from 200mhz to 250mhz to make it even use the ram? Is it even possible to over clock by that great a factor?

Seriously video cards are never ever ever worth the money, ever.  Even when building my own rigs for gaming I've found myself best served by setting a budget getting everything else at where the price jump is and then fitting the best video card I can afford in as the last choice.  Unless you are lan-party'ing with the fps crowd I can't imagine a time when in the current market a $150-200 card wouldn't be more then enough for any game you played.

Your motherboard should allow for that though you may have to lower your CPU multiplier unless you have special cooling or happened to get a really nice die but actually I forgot that most A64 motherboards allow you to clock the memory bus at a different speed than the CPU so you can set it that way.

I was tinkering around with AI Booster, the AMD 64 overclocking utility and I didn't see a way to separately modify the ram settings, other than voltage. I do see a place where I can both modify the CPU base frequency and the multiplier. I will poke around in the BIOS later to see if there's a place to change the ram speed without altering the CPU base speed (If I understood you correctly).

But the bottom line is, PC4000 will not work without some manual overclocking, yes? There is no automatic memory speed adjustment made when you install one of these modules, correct?

My A8N-SLI Premium motherboard has it as part of its BIOS settings.

I don't know, for my gaming rigs I always buy memory with the fastest timings at the normal rated bandwidth speed that I can afford since I don't overclock. The bandwidth setting should be stored on the chips just like the timing settings are so your motherboard may pick it up automatically depending on how "enthusiast" friendly it is.

Thanks again for your help. I'll do a bit more research on the matter.

Doesn't RAM automatically downclock to the highest supported frequency?

I learned some time ago, and the hard way, that I should disconnect all other disks when installing WinXP.

Ok so here we go I'm basically all done but I have some annoying questions...

PSU: SeaSonic S12 Energy Plus 550W
CPU:  Core 2 Duo E6400 Conroe
HSF: Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro
MOBO:  Abit AW9D-MAX
RAM:  CORSAIR XMS2 (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) TWIN2X2048-6400C4
HD: 2 x  Western Digital Caviar 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s
CASE:  Antec Performance One P180B w/ 2 x VANTEC TF12025 120mm Case Fans added  :mrgreen:

So I'm clocking out at somewhere around $1600 (including a monitor he's picked) at the end of this.  The only thing left is to pick a Video Card.

Here are my problems.

Is there anything I really need to know about setting up RAID1 ahead of time?  It seems like it shouldn't be too hard from the small amounts of reading I've done.

The fucking real problem I have is Vista he keeps bugging me about Vista.  I have made a point of not following Vista.  I dont really want to know about it.  So is Vista going to screw me somehow that I should know about, because he thinks he wants or will need to run it.

So regarding Video Cards, I was thinking, couldn't I just pickup something decent from ATI and then if he somehow needed more GPU power he could get a second card and run them in SLI or Crossfire or w/e?  Or are SLI/Crossfire setups something that have to be bought together?  I know I could probably find the answer but really I'm lazy, sorry.

Finally any personal gripes or horror stories about any of the brands or w/e are always welcome.

There are better CPU coolers out there (http://www.silentpcreview.com/article285-page5.html) unless you don't mind noisy fans.

That chipset doesn't support a full 32 lanes of PCI-e if you/he want to go the Crossfire route (you get 8 lanes x2). Also remember that AMD bought out ATI so you are buying an Intel chipset motherboard with an Intel CPU and trying to use an Intel competitor's video card technology on there. Not that it won't work but going into the future I would expect that the AMD/ATI combination will be the better supported one than Intel/ATI.

As long as you have some means of loading any necessary drivers you should be okay. But why do you want RAID1? Do you have some sort of mission critical data you plan on storing on there?

Your system should be fine for Vista but you'll need to check if the OEM copy of Windows XP you are getting comes with a Vista coupon. Otherwise that's a big extra expensive if he wants to upgrade to it in the future. Also you have to be careful with version of XP you get since that will determine what versions of Vista the coupon will allow you to upgrade to.

You don't need to buy them together and Crossfire is nice(r) in that you don't even have to have matched GPUs. NVIDIA's SLI is not an option on that motherboard so you will have to go with ATI GPUs if you think he may want Crossfire in the future unless he's willing to just toss out the original card.

Regrettably, NewEgg doens't carry the Scyth Ninja 120 cooler they rate so well agains the Freezer 7 Pro. They do have other Scythe fans, but hey, with fans, it seems that one or two manufacturing changes and the advantages go out the window.

 Do any of you use another online outlet for computer needs that's reputable and has similar customer service?

Actually they do (I bought mine from them). They sell the "plus" version (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835185001) of the original and the updated model (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835185038) as well. They sell the Thermalright XP-120 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835109118) as well. Note that in the SPCR review linked above they are using a 3rd party fan so YMMV.

I hear good things about Monarch (http://www.monarchcomputer.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv) but Newegg is the only one I use for online purchases at the moment.

Wait, Crossfire can use mis-matched cards? SLI requires 2 of the exact same card, right?

Yes though they both have to support Crossfire. Crossfire supports something they call "scissored" mode where the scene is divided into two pieces and each piece is sent to one card to render however the pieces don't have to be the same size which is how they can support two GPUs with different rendering capabilities/speeds.

ATI rushed together their original "solution" and they've been constantly updating it since that point so it can be hard to keep track of what you actually need to make it work. For example at first you needed a special "master" card and then later they got rid of that requirement (though the GPUs still need to be able to support Crossfire). You also needed a "pass through" external cable connector like the old school Voodoo cards and now they support the inter connection through the PCI-e bus like newer SLI setups.

They no longer have to be the exact same card, just the same GPU.

Snazzy....something to keep in mind for when I eventually get a new PC.

Can anyone tell me a couple good brands for a power supply? I think my 400W isn't working too well with the new setup, as I get random reboots when going graphics heavy for awhile.

I don't know if CoolMax is any good, but NewEgg has a 500W CoolMax Power Supply (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817159062) for FREE with mail-in rebate.

I might have missed recommendations for this earlier in the thread, too bad you can't easily search the thread!

Personally I would be a little suspicious of a power supply that cheap (price pre-rebate) but I don't know anything about that brand.

I like SeaSonic like the one Hoax is planning on buying above, but you pay for that sort of quality.

Antec is reputable, but the most tested for clean power and stability over time come from PC Power & Cooling. (http://www.pcpowercooling.com/home/) They are not glamorous, but they are reputable. They also have a lot of documentation if you want to go off the tech geek deep end with them.

Trippy I forgot to reply, thanks a ton for the info, I'll get back to this thread one last time but I've got to handle some of my own shit this morning.

On the HSF I have no idea how that happened, but I am retarded and glad I posted the list.  I spent like 45min yesterday looking for the reason I would have put that HSF in and I can't find it.  Looks like the Scythe will replace it...    :oops:


On PSU's I have a Zalman in my current personal rig and I've found it to be quiet and work fine.

Does anyone know of the SeaSonic has nice long cables?  The case I am looking at puts the Power supply on the bottom and I've read that many don't have cables long enough to reach up to the motherboard.

Yikes those PSU are expensive. I was hoping to get away with less than $50! (The wife is already mad at me for having to buy RAM and a floppy drive that wasn't in the budget).

The majority of people I've seen have pc problems, both here and irl (heh) have been due to psu issues. Most psu's are cheap cheap. Even the relatively good one in my 3-yr old pc isn't good enough to go into my nascent pc. The old proverb: buy quality and you only cry once.

Not to mention that you can nearly always port over the old PSU to the new system you're using, if you don't skimp, that is, and get good quality and high enough watts. Remember, for SLI you want 600 and just in general, its good to get at least that much for whatever newfangled thing the future may bring.

Revised list...

Intel Core 2 Duo e6600
2GB Crucial Ballistix DDR2 1000
ASUS P5W DH Deluxe 975X
Antec P180
eVGA 8800GTX 768MB
WD Raptor 150GB SATA
Lite-On CD/DVD burner w/lightscribe
Creative X-Fi Elite (need optical breakout box)
PPC&C Silencer 610
Scythe SCNJ-1100P (looks nice, thanks for the heads-up, hope it fits :|)
Logitech RF Wireless MX3200 bundle

Comes in at $2500 on the nose. I know getting the bleeding edge video is not wise...I've never done so before. But I figure if I'm going to spend that much dough on an entirely new system (no parts from the current system), I'm not going to skimp the last couple hundred bucks...

Survey says?

Is there a big improvement over the $200 dual core and the $800 one? I haven't seen anything that shows so. They both seem like absolute monsters. Knock down on the processor and buy yourself a 360. ^_^

Nice man. With the only caveat that I'd want a raid0 with 3 drives, that's my dream machine right there.

Ya, there's a difference. the 6600 and above have higher HT rates. People are opting for the 6600 and not messing with the EXtraEEamM! edition because the 6600 lends itself to overclocking nicely.

Still using a 400W Thermaltake PSU in my rig. For some reason, I've had weird problems with power in the past when I go to add new stuff (twice, exactly). Oddly enough, wiring some of the stuff solved whatever the problem is.

I take it that long daisy-chaining can be a big problem? I've tried to stay away from it when cable length allows.

A word of caution about the original Scythe Ninja (the 1000(P)). I had a difficult time "clipping on" the heat sink on a Socket 939 server-style motherboard for my Linux box. It felt like I was back in the Athlon XP days trying to wrestle with an inflexible clip on attachment. I did finally manage to get it on but I had to use so much force I was worried I was putting too much strain on the motherboard so I took it off and put on a Zalman 9500 which I also have on my Windows box. The Zalman doesn't cool as efficiently and is potentially nosier since it has a 92mm fan (and it's built in which is somewhat annoying, though it does come with a fan speed controller which is nice) but the mounting procedure is super easy and super safe since it uses screws that you tighten. My problems may have been caused by the fact that I was using a server motherboard (which shouldn't have mattered in theory) or maybe I just had clip mechanism that was slightly offspec but it's something to watch out for.

The Ninja 1100(P) has a different attachment mechanism than the 1000 and for the Intel 775 socket attachment it uses a nifty "push pin" attachment mechanism. The AMD mount on the 1100 still requires you to use a clip-on mechanism though I don't know how it compares to the 1000 since it's been redesigned.


The SeaSonic cables are pretty long but if you are worried or if you are a neat freak and want to try to route the power connector *under* the motherboard in a P180 case you can get something like this (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16812198007).


Needs more disk space.


It depends on which $800 one you are referring to. Some of those are quad-core (or more accurately dual dual-core) rather than dual-core which is why they are so much more expensive.

I think you mean FSB. AMD uses HyperTransport but Intel does not. However you would be hard pressed to buy a Core 2 Duo these days that runs at 800 MHz. Even the E6300 runs at 1066 MHz.

It shouldn't matter unless your power supply has a dedicated video card power cable of the standard peripheral power connector type rather than a PCI-e power connector and you mixed that up with the other 12V power connectors. You may just have have some bum Y splitters.

This time around I bought a Modular power supply, and I will never buy anything else. Its so awesome. For those of you who dont know, modular means the cables come unattached from the psu, and you only hook in the ones you need. It freed up so much clutter in my case, its amazing.

What PSU did you get?

I didn't even think to look for a modular PSU, but that's a great idea. The black Hiper model on This Page (http://www.xoxide.com/moposu.html) looks pretty sweet, but I'll have to look at the review sites to see what is recommended.

Oooh a Type-R power supply! But I don't see the wing on it. And it has no lights -- that's just wrong.

I'm pretty sure you can get undercarriage lights for it, whatever those are called.

The e6600 is the $316 version. It's the bottom of the 'good' version of the chip. I hope to o/c to 3.6GHz or so...If I were rich, I'd buy the quad-core version, since it's the same price as the extreeeeme version of the dual-core. Also, not enough games on the 360 that I'd want. Mass Effect will push the issue, but I hope they come to their senses and make a pc port in a few years (Jade Empire is strictly x-box exclusive! Don't ask about a pc port! :))
I don't RAID.
Not at first. DVD burner to backup data when things get crowded. At some point, I'll be getting an external drive for data. I mean, I just paid $83 for a 250GB MyBook. That's silly cheap. Going to get one for my music project and to transfer my cd library, which is now a mishmash of formats on my work machine.

I recently read in the NY Times  (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/27/technology/27chip.html?_r=1&oref=slogin) that Intel has just pushed the envelope even further with the creation of the 45nm transistor. The old standard since forever was the 90nm transistor, based on silicon. Not sure what material the Core2Duos use, but they're the new-ish 65nm transistors. AMD seems to be falling woefully behind, which is sad.

Essentially, it looks like Moore's Law has risen from the grave and we can expect CPUs and anything else using micro transistors to at least double in processing potential in the next few years. Not necessarily in terms of clockspeed, but in the amount of transistors that can be stuffed onto a chip, and the degree to which one can push electricity through them without power loss.

It's not the 45nm process that's special it's the use of hafnium as the insulating layers rather than silicon dixoide and IBM jointly with AMD essentially gave the same annoucement as Intel did in response to Intel. And Intel has always been on the leading edge of chip technology. That's been their advantage from the beginning. E.g. they are always the first to move the newest process size ahead of all their competitors. Intel has been on 65nm for a while now and AMD is just starting to move over to it now.

If I read the article correctly, its the use of halfnium in the transistors that allows them to be that much smaller.

Cool!

http://anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2915&p=1
Zing. Shoulda bought me some Intel stock before Conroe and Penryn!

Trippy I was thinking of putting two 500GB drives into the new rig, now RAID01 is a requirement, but there doesn't need to be a hell of a lot of space devoted to it.

Would there be a problem, with a setup like this:
80GB partition of each drive running in RAID01
Two 420GB drives for media storage

I have been google-wandering but I'm not sure what question to ask exactly so I was having a hard time.

Oh I settled on a Connect 3d X1800GTO, which is a little weaker according to reviews then the Geforce counterpart but is on ATI's list of approved crossfire boards.  Sure perhaps waiting for a D3D-10 compliant board would be prudent but I dont figure that will matter (in terms of software he might use caring about such things) for some time.  Also at $125 the card isn't too nice to just be passed down to one of the older machines with a shrug.

Per Abit's site: for that mobo so it really shouldn't be a problem.

HSF has been changed as well.

RAID 01 (0+1) or 10 (1+0) require a minimum of 4 drives to implement. Also having one partition of a physical hard drive be RAID and another not be RAID generally doesn't work with your typical PC MB RAID implementation unless you are going with a pure software solution but I don't know if that's possible with Windows (you can with, say, Linux).

It may have two x16 slots but that doesn't mean it supports 32 lanes. The Abit spec page is crap and the manual is wrong as well but if you look on the Intel page for the 975X you'll see this:
Doing research for Cheddar and schild's motherboards there doesn't appear to be any chipset out there that supports Crossfire and 32 lanes with dual x16 slots. You would have to go with an NVIDIA 680i chipset MB if you wanted that.

A fucking pox on whoever made things so much more complicated in the last three years.  Back to google tomorrow then...

The 680i's are still a bit finicky from what I've been reading. That's the chipset I was originally considering, then I backed it off to something more 'conservative'.

You crazy kids and your RAID. I'm just going to use a raptor ;)

Yes the NVIDIA Core 2 chipsets still have some teething problems. E.g. they keep patching problems with the SATA controller which doesn't lend a lot of confidence to the boards that use it. Personally if I absolutely had to go with a Crossfire setup *right now* I would go with the Intel 975X chipset even though it only supports 16 channels in a dual x16 video card setup.

I went with an EVGA 680i about a month ago. It's been totally stable. I'm guessing the issues come up when you OC.

It's not just OC'ing apparently. RAID setups have issues as well. You might have the latest BIOS as well.

Yes I do. First thing I did was flash it.  The ASUS version is a bit flashier, but I couldn't justify the extra $100 for some flashing lights.

Bumping because I'll probably pull the trigger tomorrow. Already missed one of the rebates for $20 because the fine print says the deadline isn't for purchase, but rather for postmarking (most deadlines are for purchase with a postmark a month or two later). Overall in price reductions and rebates it should be about $2400.

My pc has been buggy and I've decided it's time. Since I probably won't be able to afford one for a while once I take on a mortgage...booya.

First round of games: Marvel Ultimate Alliance and Gothic 3. Possibles include 1701AD, Medieval 2, BF2142 (ugh).

So any last thoughts, my wizardly friends? On the hardware, not the games :P

Sky, get the SATA DVD Burner. It has lightscribe, and its like $45 OEM on the egg. You are going to love your machine, the only thing you might look at is that some of those ASUS motherboards have HORRIBLE onboard sound. I dont remember which model it is, but one of them has really subpar sound, that could make you end up needing a soundcard. That was the deciding factor for me between the Asus and the Intel Badaxe2. Now, let me stat, thats its not ALL the ASUS boards, its just one of them I cant remeber which one, P5W or P5B or some thing like that, but you might want to double check that its not your model.
I *Think* it was the board that had the built in Wireless network adaptor, but I cant remember.

You will NOT regret getting that graphics card, I fucking love mine. I can run FEAR at 2500x1600 res, and get around 60+ FPS. It is simply amazing.

Woops, just noticed that you are getting a sound card, so I guess the above point is mute, but Ill leave the post there as a warning to others. Also, I think you will be much happier with 1 raptor than trying to hassle with a raid 0. My last system was Raid 0, and the set up hassle wasnt worth the few seconds it shaved off the start up for stuff.

Given you plan to use this as a htpc, I think you will want something that can handle HD-DVD's and be compatible with DX10 and all the DRM with Vista. I'm not too sure on your MB choice. I'd go with a i680 solution instead for the dual 16 bit pci express lanes. That way you can buy another videocard in a year and still be doing "ok".

In a year he would probably get more performance for just buying one new top of the line card than dropping another 8800 in the system.

SATA burner: check, added to list. Out of Stock :| But under $40.

HD-DVD: Probably grab a 360 drive at some point. Not really worried about it right now. The gpu will be fine for HD content and it's HDCP-friendly, as is my 'monitor'. If not, I don't really care, either :)

GPU: I do not intend to SLI at any point. I'm breaking tradition buying a new-gen tech. I normally wait for a tech to mature and buy the best edition, the Voodoo 3, the TNT2 Ultra, the Geforce 2 Ultra, the 9800pro still in my system and jamming. But I'm sold on unified shaders and it kicks ass eight-ways to sunday especially when you consider I'll mostly be using 1280x720 resolution...

You might want to consider picking up FEAR and the expansion. The game will look really good on your system.

Make sure you get a fan for the bottom section of your case to keep your hard drive cool.

Ok, I found the burner you linked in the other thread. Not sure what the heck I was looking at. Added to the cart. I'll add another 12cm fan, I think I've got one lying around from an old server but I'm not sure what kind of connector it's got.

I two parted the order, so I could make sure to get a few rebates and discounts, already saved a little over $200! Of course, the RAM, HDD, PSU and hs/fan & paste set me back $775 already, heh.

I was thinking of adding FEAR to the list. Just bought some skis last night and was in the consumer area, so I dropped by BB & CC. CC has an abysmal stock and almost no deals, their prices are about a month behind everyone else. BB had a great selection and prices inline with current online prices. I can't believe WoW:BC is going for forty bucks. But I admit it's wily capitalism, chaching. I'll probably get Medieval 2 because the girlfriend seems real interested in it, she loves historical fiction. I know she'll get bored pretty quick because it's strategy, but what the heck. I should make her get it for me for my birthday!

First round delivered! First impressions.

Antec P180 - nice looking case. Clean, big, no windows or pimping. Rubber grommets for hd are a nice addition, as is the aluminum/plastic/aluminum sandwiching of the case itself: plastic to aluminum joints should reduce sound even further. Pull-ring removable drive cages are nice. Only thing that stands out on first inspection is lack of a removable mobo tray, I got spoiled with that on my Wavemaster. But really, that should only be an issue during this install and maybe if I upgrade to quad core in 2009 :)

Scythe Ninja - dude...it's a ninja. How cool is that? Looks huge, but should fit. Hope I can fit the 120mm fan on the interior side blowing back, with the 120mm case fan exhaust right behind it...should be chilly on that e6600 I hope to pump to 3.6GHz or so...

PPC&C 610W Silencer - zomg 49A on a single 12V rail. Braided cables, looks nice. Not much more to say until install day.
WD Raptor - 150GB 10k rpm SATA drive? Woohoo! Zooom! Can't wait to start filling it up.
2GB Crucial Ballistix PC8000 - Heatsinks! Ok, not much to say about these last couple items yet, heh.

Rest should be in tomorrow, barring the nor'easter that will decimate all society. Work's closed tomorrow, and parts are to be delivered there...UPS guy was cool and hopefully will be true to his word to bring them over to my house despite being out of his service area. If so, the man gets a hella nice tip imo. Out of the way during a blizzard? We'll see, color me skeptical, though.

Let me know how the ninja fits in that case. I have the black one p180b I think its called.

The P180 is extra deep compared to your typical ATX case (by about 1.5") and there's no power supply at the top to worry about bumping into so there should be plenty of room even with the fan mounted on the side closest to the DVD drive. In fact as you can see on this page (http://www.silentpcreview.com/article255-page6.html), if your MB CPU socket is centered near the "top" edge the Ninja will be at the prime position of the intersection of the rear and top fan/vent holes. Yes they are indeed cooling the CPU in that pic without needing a fan attached to the Ninja (scroll down to Configuration 4 to read the details). I wouldn't recommend people normally do that but those guys are quiet freaks.

Praying to the winter gods, Ymir guide yon UPS truck to my domicile! Four damned packages on the truck today. Successfully called the center at 6:30 am, told them my driver's name and said he wanted my stuff put on the ghetto truck. Hopefully that works, and if not for all packages, hopefully he delivers them like he said he might.

Of all the days to get a snow day and sit around the house with nothing to do!

Ancient japanese secret.

Im seriously excited for you Sky. Your machine is going to be a monster, and its a joy to work on a machine like that. Also, its fun as hell putting it together.

By the hoary hosts of Hoggoth! Yon truck didst strive mightily through the drifting mass of icy death to mine demense!

Have to wait for parts to come to room temp before digging in. I hope these cables will reach, I got teh linked extension cable earlier in the thread (which will be perfect, thanks), but there is one other extender cable I might need. Hope not! Ok..more first impressions:

Creative  X-Fi Extreme - I feel like it needs more Xs in its name. I was surprised how big and heavy the box was, the breakout box was larger and more substantial than I expected. Nice piece of gear, actually. Comes with a stand, remote, bunch of cable odds and ends (oh, and the PCI card).

Asus mobo - Another darn remote! Has wifi onboard, plus all kinds of crap I probably will ignore. Came with a lot of cables and stuff.

evga 8800 - Holy mother of...this card is Fuccillo. That means HUGE in car dealership speak. I've never seen such a substantial heatsink cover plate.

The new logitech cordless stuff will take some getting used to. The laser mouse is a nice feel, but the keyboard is a bit softer and smaller than I like, the function keys are tiny and they re-did the location of the arrow keys and 6-button pad above that. Eh, we'll see. I mostly wanted the mouse anyway. The recommended SATA DVD burner looks nice, I like samsung stuff, thanks for the heads-up. The C2D retail comes with a nice standard hs/f, I'm impressed compared to older retail hs/fans I've seen.

Medieval 2 came in as well, and I got a couple freebies: GRAW was a bonus with something from the egg (cpu, maybe?) and Dark Messiah was bundled with the 8800. Meh, ok. Cool for free, but doesn't GRAW have tardforce?

This thread has inspired me to pretend I have $$$, too.  Please don't tell my husband.

Ah, the joys of being snowed in with a new pc to construct. I was in geek heaven yesterday.

Build went pretty good once I found my stupid tube of arctic silver (I lost it twice!). The Scythe Ninja fit /perfectly/ over the ram by several mm and about a cm shy of the case. There's plenty of wiggle room with the fan, the heatsink clears everything easily. I've never been a fan (sorry) of case top fans, they just don't fit my idea of airflow, and I removed the top fan (need to find a nice-looking way to block that, just a book on it now). I left the back exhaust fan with the ninja blowing over the heatsink. That should keep things chill. I removed the upper hd cage and put the top fan as a front intake fan. My psu is long, so I had to fit the bracket for the lower chamber fan on the backside if where it was supposed to go, flipping the fan to keep front-to-back airflow. That made it tight (but do-able) for the lower hd cage, the SATA cables are nice for streamlining. I could've just bolted it onto the frame because there are screwholes, if I had thought ahead and done it before I installed the psu.

The only tough one was the cable I was worried about, but it fit ok, if not ideally. The 4-pin power cable to the mobo takes a route under the gpu, but it's acceptable. Because the larger mobo power cable plug was located near the traditional IDE spot, I ended up not needing the extender (but it was cheap, so no big deal). The gpu itself is monsterous, amazingly so. But it actually fit in well because I had already decided to remove the upper hd cage. The gpu takes two pci-e power plugs! Luckily, I did my homework and got a psu designed for SLI that had two such cables.

Still need to install the sound card + breakout. One nice thing about this mobo is that it comes with block plugs for the case front panel connections. So all those little hd power lights, power switch, etc that I've always struggled to get in the right spot while balancing the manual in one hand...just plug them all into the clearly labelled block and then plug the block into the mobo. Little thing, but very nice!

The RAM is purty, but I have a closed case :P Here's a pic of the assembly just prior to first boot, sans sound card, sans cable management (in case I need to remove stuff). Note the power cable running under the gpu. I already have most of the fan cabling tucked behind the left panel. Also, the purty RAM.

(http://farm1.static.flickr.com/143/391165605_f1b61d2032_o.jpg)

(http://farm1.static.flickr.com/163/391148794_bac9a9b583.jpg?v=0)

Sweet. Im not sure about the rainbow party lights, but you have a closed case so it doesnt matter. My case had a window, so I went with all blue lighting. I really need to post some pics now.

Not sure about the christmas lights, but I admit the 'undercarriage' blue and white lights are nifty. The green and blue blink with activity, it's crazy. I guess I'm 'oldschool'.

A question I've been meaning to ask about lighted cases:  Wouldn't the heat from the lights be bad for internal heat, shortening component lifespan?

Not that I'll ever build a comp with lights, as I don't see the point, just curious.

I don't think the LEDs leak much wattage as heat at all, I'd have to check to be sure.

I've never used cold cathode ray tubes that most builders pimp with, but I assume they are cool as well.

Geez.  The lights are my favourite bit.   :|

I think your RAM has a case of the gay.

No way. It's just a cylon. Or KITT.

Update...Going to have to RMA the Creative part back. I thought perhaps this part might do digital 5.1, but to date, NO creative part does. I might try a plain x-fi with the DTS-610, which takes analog 5.1 -> optical 5.1 to the receiver...but the thought of DA/AD conversion bugs me. Not sure it's all worth the hassle to get EAX.

I put the Auzentech X-Plosion in the new box and it's happily converting to optical DD5.1. Once I resolve my Oblivion crash issue, I hope it doesn't develop the waveform noise problem that made me quit playing last year :|

And yes, I have crash issues. I still need to tweak Oblivion's settings, I may have been overly aggressive. EQ2 was doing a strange crash, but seemed fine for a while once I logged in, even with shadows. Oddness afoot.

Might have to revisit my cooling solutions, the 8800 runs pretty hot.

KITT is a Cylon!!!

I guess "more familiar" is subjective.

HAY ANYONE REMEMBER K.A.R.R.?!

I thought the Audigy 2 Platnium supports digital 5.1 output.

So I'm putting together my PC, and the mobo manual indicates that I have to hook up 3 power connectors - a 2x12 (or 2x10), a 2x4, and a 1x4.  It does not at any point say that connecting the 1x4 is optional, but it does say that I should definitely connect the 1x4 if I use a 2x10 in place of the 2x12.

My power supply provides a 2x12, a 2x4, and a 2x2, but not a 1x4.  Is the 1x4 made unnecessary by the 2x12, or should I be trying to find a 2x2->1x4 adapter?

This page (http://www.intel.com/support/motherboards/desktop/sb/CS-012037.htm) suggests (much more clearly than the printed manual does) that the 1x4 is unnecessary, but I would feel a lot better if it came right out and said it with no room for ambiguity.  Especially since there are dire warnings everywhere that hooking up the power inadequately will cause the mobo to assplode.

Hlep!  I r nub!   :oops:  Someone reassure me plz.

Hmm. Can't help you :|

Having some serious issues of my own, basically anything 3d is crashing (though it looks omgawesome before it does). I'm starting to get depressed, I've done pretty much everything I can think of to fix it. No 3d games, and 3dmark also crashes, after like a couple minutes or so. I've run a battery of system stress thingies and testers and can't seem to find any problems.

Fuck.

You need either 2x10 + 2x2 or 2x12, not both. I do not recommend plugging in all 3. At all.

I just realized that the 1x4 connector is just an ordinary molex connector.  Which somehow evaded me because those cables aren't plugged into the PSU yet and therefore weren't sitting there looking me in the face.  *headsmack*  So that's not a problem after all.  I just ignore the 2x2 connector entirely and if I want to connect that 1x4 I plug it in with one of these here cables that came with the PSU.

Engels, is it actually dangerous to plug in more power connectors than are strictly needed?  I'm pretty sure that the 2x12 and 2x4 are where they're supposed to be.  From doing a bit more research online I get the vague sense that the 1x4 is there to provide an auxiliary source of power to the PCIE slots (i.e. for big bad SLI setups).  I'm guessing I could get along without it, but my gut says more power hookups are better.  Is my gut wrong?


(edit) Re: Sky's problem, can you swap out the video card temporarily to see if that's the weak link?  Does it have the latest drivers?  Does the whole system power down, does it BSOD, or does just the app crash?

This might only apply because I run server 2003 but everytime I rebuild my system I have to go into display->troubleshoot tab and actually turn on the use of 3D by moving the hardware acceleration slider all the way to the right, then I have to go into dxdiag->display tab and also enable direct draw, 3d etc.

I underclocked it and it was able to complete 3dmark tests. Doesn't 9790 sound a bit slow? I clocked it to the factory defaults for a non-KO 8800 GTX (the KO is factory overclocked). I'm bummed, it should be stable at factory clocks. I think another RMA is in my future.

Sure it's not your PSU?

I don't remember what you have, but I find that it's almost always the PSU when heavy graphics cause crashes.

That's why I'm curious what exactly "crash" means in this context.  If it's an application fault or a BSOD, it's probably a problem with either the card or the driver.  If the whole system reboots, it's probably the PSU.


As for myself, I'm continuing to assemble the beast.  I just now had to remove the motherboard (for the second time) because I discovered that the CPU cooler has a bracket that needs to be lined up UNDER the damn thing, and there was no way in hell of getting that to happen with everything in there.  On the plus side, the third time mounting the board went a lot faster and smoother than the first time, since I now know exactly what bits need to be wiggled to get everything to fit right.   :-P

/sadf

Which motherboard do you have? There are motherboards that do require the extra power input but those are typically for server motherboards that are ATX power supply compatible (there's a different power connector standard for normal server motherboards). E.g my Tyan server MB requires it and won't boot up without it.

The Intel D975XBX2 (http://support.intel.com/support/motherboards/desktop/d975xbx2/).

More power hookups may or may not be better. E.g. the molex power connector supplies 12V and 5V but if the extra connector on the motherboard wants, say, 3.3V it would be a very bad idea to plug that molex connector in there.

I wouldn't think it's the PSU unless that's faulty as well, it should be able to handle this gpu spec-wise, with 49 amps on the 12V.

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16817703005

By crash I mean the screen locks up and the system becomes completely unresponsive. No graphical anomalies, just the last frame it rendered before locking up.

Played FEAR for a few with all the options maxed out, even at stock GTX speeds, it's a damned nice card.

If your power supply has a 2x12 connector don't bother with the Molex 1x4. If it's a 2x10 connector and your video card has it's own aux power input you still shouldn't bother with the Molex 1x4 unless the card isn't running stable and then you can try it.

OK.  That's pretty much what I've been inferring from the Interwebs but none of the official material comes out and says it explicitly.   :-P  Thanks!

It does say that:

Check the GPU temp and make sure it's not overheating. Try updating the drivers as well if you haven't already done so. It does, however, sound like a power supply problem, assuming the card itself isn't bad.

It says it's required with 2x10 connectors, but not whether it's beneficial with 2x12, harmful, indifferent, etc.  And the printed manual more or less says to plug them all in.  I've actually been pretty appalled at the state of the documentation I've been reading... it's like they assume I know what I'm doing or something.  IKEA has spoiled me.

Hmm. Took the gpu fan off automatic control and cranked it to full speed, which is a bit loud imo. Ran 3dmarks and temps went from 50c-ish idle to just over 60c. But it didn't crash, leading me to believe it's heat-related. Folks have said teh card runs hot, it's disappointing the onboard fan can't compensate properly via monitoring.

Went back to stock speeds + auto-fan and it crashed in the second 3d test, freeze and reboot (hadn't been rebooting). Temps were over 70c. Seems like something is preventing the temperature monitor from cranking up the fans when it gets too hot.

I found this  (http://support.intel.com/support/motherboards/desktop/sb/cs-009007.htm) article on the board's pages. It seems that the 2x2 is required, but do not use a 1x4 converter for it, since it apparently causes system instability.

What confuses me is that in the graphic the board has, I see a 2x12 and a 2x4, but no 2x2.

What my board uses is a 2x12, a 2x2 and the on-board molex connector as auxiliary power to the PCI-E slot or some such. All of which can be plugged in safely. My board seems to operate just fine without the additional molex, but what the heck, in true 'motherboard on cinderblocks in the front yard' school of computing, I done plug it in fer more power! Yeehaw! Of course, I have no idea if it really makes any difference.

The 2x10 cable is for older boards. Sometime in the early 2000s boards started to come out with an additional 2x2 connector tacked on to the 2x10, making it a 2x12. PSUs compensated for the new development by simply providing a 2x10 and a 2x2 instead of a 2x12. That's what I thought was going on.

Which 8800 card did you get Sky? The EVGA? It sounds to me like you should RMA the card. Also, you dont by chance have an old card you could plug in and run the test with, to make sure it is the vid card?

How much space do you have around the card? I seem to recall you have a decent amount. I think my card runs at around 52 idle and up to 70 underload, with no problems in sight.

Try a non-OEM HSF.  Can't hurt, and if your card keeps getting put to sleep due to heat, it's not going to wake up one day.

So I finished putting my PC together, and unfortunately am having issues.   :-(  When I power it on with everything in, all the fans turn on and the CPU gets warm, but nothing else happens -- no video signal, and no POST beep.

I remove the video card.  Same thing.  (I would expect to get the "BEEEEEP BEEP BEEP" that means "I have no video card" at this point.)

I remove the CPU.  No fans turn on.  I put the CPU back in.

I remove the RAM.  Now I get the "BEEP BEEP BEEP" that means "I have no RAM."

Tried putting in each stick of RAM individually, figuring that maybe one of them was bad.  Same "fans on, no beep" situation.

My current best guess is that the POST is crapping out somewhere between the memory check and the video check, and that this means I have a bad motherboard.  Second opinions?

I know we went over this once, but what power cables do you currently have plugged into the mobo? Are you using the 4 prong molex?

Do you have another video card you can plug in temporarily?

Negative -- just the 2x12 and the 2x4.  The video card, as it turned out, had two 2x3 connectors that go right from the power supply to the card, so additional auxiliary power shouldn't be necessary.   :-P



Unfortunately, all of my old video cards are AGP.  I might be able to find someone who has an old PCI card, though.  My thought was that I could rule out the video card as the culprit since the motherboard never issues the "no video card" error code, and is therefore probably not even looking for it -- no?

I'm wondering if that molex on your motherboard is exclusive to video card use... Or if it is, its used as a preliminary video card power source before the video card's drivers are in play. Do you think it'd hurt something to try it?

As far as I can tell, it's dedicated to the PCIE slots, and shouldn't come into play at all if the PCIE cards have no significant power requirements (i.e. those with their own auxiliary connectors).  Probably wouldn't hurt to try it, but I don't think the odds are good that it'd fix anything.  I'm still a bit stuck on the fact that I can turn on the motherboard with no video card in the slot and it won't complain.  The lack of complaint is very troubling, especially since I'm able to elicit other complaints (e.g. no memory).

Is your power supply using a 2x2 to 2x4 adapter or is it 2x4 already? Is it seated properly? Also make sure your power switch connector *and* the reset switch connector are both connected the right way (not swapped around).

It was 2x4 already, and it's seated properly insofar as I can determine (it's firmly anchored, the little tab went "click", et cetera).

The power and reset switch connectors don't have any polarity, as far as I can tell; none was mentioned in the documentation for either the motherboard or the case, and assuming they do go straight through to a simple switch it wouldn't make any difference since a switch is polarity-agnostic.  (Polarity is indicated for the LED connectors, which of course makes sense since LEDs only allow current in one direction.)  On the off chance it mattered, I did make sure that the switch connectors were oriented the same way (label facing out) as the LED connectors.

I got an email back from Intel support, which suggested that I try clearing the CMOS by removing the battery for an hour and then replacing it.  If that fails, I'm to try updating the BIOS (is that even possible if the board never finishes the POST?).

Another thing to try is to take the motherboard out of the case and power it up from the outside. Back in the dark ages with the old school AT power supplies if you didn't install the standoffs properly and you shorted the motherboard by having it touch the case it wouldn't even power on but maybe these days some power can still get to the motherboard even if it's not "fitted" properly inside the case.

I was thinking the same thing. At one time in not too distant past I absentmindedly screwed the motherboard right to the case's plate, without the risers. If I recall correctly, it acted in a similar manner to Samwise's issue; the fans went on, but nobody was home.

Were you able to elicit error codes from it in certain cases (like the "I lost my memory" code) when that happened?

I suppose I'll end up having to take the motherboard out one way or another.  Sigh.  (This will make the third time since installing it that I've had to yank it back out.)

Just an update on my build: it's apparently a gpu card defect. I read somewhere about a possible defect with the RAM heatsinks, my guess is that is this. This is that. Whatever. Seems like an uncommon problem, but several people have cropped up in the thread about it, so it's not unique to me alone. CS is going to cross-ship. Brownie points for evga, I love me cross-shipping. I built the machine a month ahead of my vacation in case of RMA, not having a card or whatever for a couple weeks. Nice to know I shouldn't need it. (the 8800 /is/ an amazing card, and despite problems with the individual card I have, I highly recommend it zomg)

RMA'ing back the Creative Elite Pro today, goddamned Creative. Time to do digital 5.1 from the card. Only solution right now is to DAC on the card, send the analog 5.1 to the DTS-610, ADC on the DTS-610, digital to the receiver, DAC on the receiver. That's fucking hamfisted. And I still have my doubts because Creative told me the stupid 'elite pro'  :roll: would do EAX digital 5.1 in games. Dicks.

I, however, withdraw my complaints in light of Sam's situation   :|

Sam, do you maybe have a different PSU you could try? Also, I would triple check ALL power conenctions.

After getting my email describing the problem in detail (as opposed to the one-line summary of "it don't work" that their online form gave me room for), they're shipping me a replacement.  Not as good as if there were a magic button I could push to make it all work, but about as good as I expected.   :-)

And at least the next time around I'll know to install the CPU cooler bracket BEFORE screwing the motherboard to the standoffs.   :-P

Are you sure it's the MB though? (Assuming that's what you are replacing). You can just go down to Fry's and buy all the "substitute" parts you need (e.g. another PS and video card) and return them after you figure out which part is actually not working.

we need a separate hw thread

I also want to build new box and need feedback

So create a new thread.

You know that big Asus HSF unit that was being passed around here a bit ago? The big tower one that glows blue?

Yeah, I set up a new system for a buddy using that thing. Trying to install the backplate After bolting down the MB is decidedly NOT FUN. It took two of us to do it, but we managed to do it.

I was amazed how fucking quiet the thing is. It's not even a whisper, and even under load the air it blows out is noticeably cool.

I'm about 95% sure it's the MB, and the Intel guy must be pretty sure too or he wouldn't be shipping me a new one.

I hate buying stuff with the intent of returning it.  I don't know why.  But I suspect if I tried it I'd end up not returning it and then be out the money.   :-P

I'm impressed you got it installed with the MB in place.  I just bit the bullet and unscrewed the MB after I realized my error.   :-P

Took the plunge and got a new monitor.  I had an old 19" CRT (6 years now?  More?) and tried using my HD TV for a bit but decided I really wanted just a dedicated monitor for the computer.

Ended up picking this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16824116060 (though it was 30 dollars less when I ordered it.)

Pretty happy with it so far, Oblivion look awesome on it.

Could mean that the heat is not getting out of your CPU and you are due for a meltdown.  If you have a sensor, I'd check the CPU temp.  Of course, I'm somewhat paranoid.

Nope, this was almost a month ago, and I have not been told that the guy has had any problems with the system. From what I know, he runs CAD stuff a lot, also Company of Heroes and Medieval 2. We also ran Doom III on max settings on the machine before I left, with no problems.

I have that thing. It works REALLY good. But your right, installing the backplate is OH MY GOD FUCKING HORRIBLE. The instructions where terrible, I got to step 2, and then just had to wing it cause the instructions didnt match the hardware at all. Once I got it working, its quiet, cool, and beautiful.

Or how about that thing they call a "sticker" in the instructions? It looked like a fucking pad to me, with a plastic covering. I had to rip the thing off, and analyze the plate and compare it to the picture to determine that is what they meant me to do.

"Oh, well...Now, it does kind of look like the plate in the picture, I guess. And I guess bolting a piece of metal to the MB is not a problem anyway..."

Yeah, that "sticker" part is where I got stuck. There was no possible way to remove it, so I just left it on.

I pried the sticker off, which seemed to match the pictures in the instructions, and it didn't seem like it was going to fit under the motherboard with it on anyway, but I was thoroughly confused by the whole thing -- why was the sticker on there in the first place?

I'm also wondering now if the stupid backplate was the cause of my motherboard problems.  When I took the motherboard out to RMA it, I found that the backplate had gotten itself wedged into some of the pointy metallic bits on the back of the board.  That doesn't seem good.   :|  Next time around I'm going to attach the backplate to the board first thing and make sure everything looks kosher before going any further.

Suspect that was the problem right there. RMA it anyway; can't hurt to start off with a fresh board.

Yup.  Just wondering now how to make sure it doesn't happen again.  I could maybe try putting the sticker between the backplate and the motherboard (on the opposite side of the backplate that it was originally stuck to)... it's squishy, so it might compress itself down when the motherboard gets screwed in.

Blah.   :-P  Whose clever idea was it for that thing to be metal, anyway?

Usually for those "under" the motherboard braces the padded side goes against motherboard and some have a sticky surface (covered with a piece of plastic as shipped) so you don't have to hold it in place while trying to get the screws into it. I usually just leave the plastic on there since it makes it easier to remove the brace if I need to in the future.

Oh, was that plastic piece the actual "sticker"? When I think of stickers, I think of shit that Actually Comes Off. I thought I might need the "padding," so I tried to get that piece of plastic off...

No fucking way it was coming off. The whole padding/sticker thing came off the plate pretty easily, and the uncovered part of the plate had a "finished" look, which I would think would not be neccessary if the padding or whatever was to stay on.

Still, trying to line up the screws and mount the thing with the MB mounted to the plate was....interesting.

Might it have been insulation, without which a short occured?

No idea. There have been no problems with the system I set up (that I know of), and the instructions appeared to show a plate with no "padding."

I don't have this heat sink so I can only make an educated guess about this but going by this picture:

http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/35-101-002-05.jpg

That white thing on the brace on the left looks to be your standard plastic/Teflon coated paper which peels off to reveal a sticky pad that's stuck onto the metal brace itself. Peeling off the pad as well means you now have metal on metal contact with the contacts and traces on the underside of your motherboard. Now if that brace doesn't have a pad then I don't know what that paper is there for. If the white paper didn't want to come off I would've just left it on (which is what I normally do anyways like I said above).

Here's a more obvious example of that peel off paper from the Ninja 1000P (http://www.newegg.com/Product/ShowImage.asp?Image=35%2D185%2D001%2D02%2Ejpg%2C35%2D185%2D001%2D03%2Ejpg%2C35%2D185%2D001%2D04%2Ejpg%2C35%2D185%2D001%2D05%2Ejpg%2C35%2D185%2D001%2D06%2Ejpg&CurImage=35%2D185%2D001%2D05%2Ejpg&Description=Scythe+SCNJ%2D1000P+120mm+Sleeve+CPU+Cooling+Fan%2FHeatsink+%2D+Retail).

That all makes sense.  It completely contradicts what's in the manual, though.   :-P  The manual says "peel off the sticker" and then has an illustration showing the bracket being mounted upside down and padding-less (with the "unpadded" side facing up into the motherboard so that the padding wouldn't have functioned as insulation even if you'd left it on). 

Fortunately, I was suspicious enough of the manual that I saved the "sticker" just in case it turned out to be wrong.

But it wasn't paper at all - it was a thick piece of plastic. And try as I might, I could not remove the "padding" from the plastic.

I just followed the manual. Stupid manual. I'll say something if I ever hear of a problem concerning the system. It's been about a month, and no problems have cropped up.

Yeah, I had the same problem. I ended up leaving the padding and the "sticker" on the metal plate and just screwing the whole thing to the bottom of the mobo. So far no problems.