robm's "Hey look I'm buying a PC" thread

robm

robm

Billy Mays
Staff member
Looks like I'm getting a decent tax refund this year, so it's time to upgrade for the first time in 10 years. :dah:

My current PC is a 2.4ghz single-core Celeron from 2001-ish, with 768 megs of RAM and about 400 gigs of hard drive space. My video card is a 64 meg PCI unut.

I've done the whole Gigabyte motherboard thing in the past and haven't been particularly impressed, so I'm sticking with my old standby, ASUS.

Other than that, the most recent system I built (and it wasn't for me) was a dual-core, and that was not quite two years ago.

Therefore... thoughts on these pieces:

ASUS 775:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813131607

Intel Core 2 Quad 2.6 ghz:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6819115057

2 gb DDR3 RAM (server memory?):
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... -_-Product

Interesting Palit 1tb fanless video card:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... -_-Product

Western Digital 500gb hard drive:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822136358
 
snowpenguin said:
Jlee's told me before that caviar green sucks balls.
Click to expand...
'Tis a fact.
I've had awful experiences with 'em.
The reason they're the "Green" series is because they save power.
"IntelliPower - A fine-tuned balance of spin speed, transfer rate and caching algorithms designed to deliver both significant power savings and solid performance.
IntelliSeek - Calculates optimum seek speeds to lower power consumption, noise, and vibration."

It's a fancy way of saying "We're going to lock your drive at 2000RPM and limit your transfer speed so much you can't actually watch video off of it."
If at any time the temperature in your case exceeds Freezing, or if you let the drive idle for more than 4 seconds, it will rape you.
These things are rated at 7200RPM and I have literally never had one break 5000.


Avoid them.


Also: You can beat that video card.
For that same price, grab a 9600GSO from a real brand. (EVGA)
 
Thanks for the tips; if an eVGA card is the same price, I'll go for them.

How well do those SATA->IDE converters work?
 
Eh, the specs on that are okay, but not as good as it could be for the price. I'd elaborate more but I'm on an eee pc right now and the keyboard sucks.
 
Somehow, I KNEW that would be your post, Palmer.

PLINK AMD. WITH A CATTLE PROD.
 
Just how big of a refund are you getting? If it's enough, go for something like mine: viewtopic.php?f=41&t=1781&start=21 (And yes, you can swap out the Phenom II for an overpriced Intel if you want. :p) NOTE: I don't actually have it built yet, but that is what my rig will eventually be.

Great for gaming and lots of power: do everything you already do, but faster! It should last you a good long while, at least a few years as-is. Mine's also designed to be as upgradeable as possible, so if I find I'm lacking in a certain department (CPU, RAM, graphics, whatever), I can add stuff or replace stuff as I need.
 
Well, I'm getting about 10K back, but I need to use a majority of that to move and pay off stuff.

So yeah... 500 or so is my budget for the build.
 
Well, what are you gonna do on your PC? Are you gonna play flax like Dragon Age Origins on full settings or are you just looking for a fast, reliable, and pretty powerful PC?
 
Honestly, I'd just like to be able to play Doom 3, Prey, and this Crysis that everyone keeps talking about without too many problems.

And I like getting a big refund at the end of the year, it's like a savings account that matures once a year LOL
 
Re: robm's "Hey look I'm buying a PC" thread *EDIT: HELP!*

OK!

So like... seven months later, I finally built it!

Specs:

ASUS Socket 775 PQ5 Pro motherboard
Intel Quad Core, Q8400 2.66ghz
4gb Corsair XMS2 RAM
1tb hard drive (Western Digital)
2 Sapphire 1gb 128-bit HD video cards (Radeon 5500 HD)
19" widescreen, 1440x900

However, I have ran into a problem. My RAM wouldn't run unless I stepped up the voltage to 1.90v, and that's just so it'll run with ONE stick. Kicked it up to 2.0v, and the second stick wouldn't run. To top that off, anything over 1.90v renders the system unstable with just the one stick.

This is my first experience with overclocking since the time when overclocking was frowned upon by manufacturers, unlike today when the BIOS has a whole submenu for it.

Any ideas? Is it safe to try going much about 2.0v for two sticks?
 
Re: robm's "Hey look I'm buying a PC" thread *EDIT: HELP!*

robm said:
Intel Quad Core, Q8400 2.66ghz
Click to expand...

There's your problem.

:trollface:

Anyways, I'd say either your mobo or your RAM is defective... it should work, no matter how many sticks you put in, out-of-the-box and without changing settings. You should only have to adjust voltage if you're overclocking -- you shouldn't have to ramp the voltage up just to get ONE stick to run. :/
 
LOLno it's not RAM.

It's undervoltage.

If it were the RAM, it wouldn't boot with just the one stick.

If it were the motherboard, it wouldn't boot period, nor would it boot just fine with a Kingston module at standard 1.80v.

1.80v is DDR2's "standard" operating voltage, and happens to be what Corsair throws on their RAM when they ship it out, but, it's not uncommon to have to overclock RAM to get it to work. I just don't want to go over 2.0v, but I'm gonna anyway, screw it.

See you on the flipside.
 
Re: robm's "Hey look I'm buying a PC" thread *EDIT: HELP!*

robm said:
Specs:

ASUS Socket 775 PQ5 Pro motherboard
Intel Quad Core, Q8400 2.66ghz
4gb Corsair XMS2 RAM
1tb hard drive (Western Digital)
2 Sapphire 1gb 128-bit HD video cards (Radeon 5500 HD)
19" widescreen, 1440x900
Click to expand...

OH
GOD
NO
 
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