Musings on a new PC

[Mercutio]

Biostar's products are somewhat more reliable than Shuttle, in my experience. Not as nice as Gigabyte, but they're certainly high on the food chain of budget motherboard vendors.

 

[Santilli]

I think it's too close in price to some of the Gigabyte offerings, but, I don't know enough about the two of them to make a good guess...

S

 

[Mercutio]

Anyone have any thoughts on these budget PCIe cards?

The choices I see are: GF6200 ($35), X300SE ($45), GF6500 ($45), X550 ($50), GF7300GS ($70), and x1300 ($75).

$75 being my limit for a low-end card.
I'm not doing the building here, so I included the nvidia "options".

 

[mubs]

I'd say the x1300 would position you best for the future. I know nothing about nVidia cards, though.

 

[Bozo]

I have been installing these MSI/ATI cards. They even work on Vista 64 bit.

Have not used them in gaming though. Mostly used on computers that are showing manufacturing process's in real time (moving charts and graphs)
Excellant picture quality for this use. None have failed in about a year of use in an industrial setting.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814127196


Bozo :mrgrn:

 

[mubs]

Long post alert.

I fried something yesterday. Not deep-fry, shallow fry. In all these years of messing with PCs and components, I've never killed anything. Except maybe yesterday. sob.

After working flawlessly in overclocked mode for a while, and passing all the torture tests without a hiccup, it was time to re-install XP in its final form for production use.

I zeroed the disks first. Then installed this front panel I got fronm Newegg; my case doesn't have any ports in the front. Research showed this product was highly rated. I didn't connect the audio, preferring to use the ports in the back. All four USB ports in the panel were connected, as was the 1394 port. I also installed a second optical drive.

The side panel is still open. Power on, and the cpu fan has a small jerk, then doesn't start. No boot. I'm puzzled. A very faint pzzzzz is heard. Then the smell of burning silicon. I shut off power. Yank all front panel and optical data and power connections off. Boot. Same thing - faint noise, smell. Power off again.

Now I disconnect everything except CPU and video card. No joy. The DFI mb has four diag leds that sequence on boot up. They don't all go out like they should. In panic, I take off the CPU HSF and inspect the CPU. Looks good. Reseat, power on, bingo, it boots! Power off, wait a bit, power on, now it won't boot. etc. etc.

I pulled the power plug and the battery, set the "clear CMOS" jumper and let it sit for a few hours. Then it rebooted. Loaded BIOS defaults, rebooted, changed some BIOS settings, rebooted, wouldn't boot. Shit, it got confusing as hell.

It's working now, all diag LEDs off. But I wonder what fried. And how long it'll work before whatever the problem is dies for good. Power supply? The Seasonic 600 is supposed to not be very compatible with this board. I bought it anyway because it's supposed to be a very good unit. Motherboard? HIS PCI-E video card? Dare I try plugging in the front panel again? I checked the motherboard manual and the fronpanel documentation to make sure the pinouts were the same, and I'm pretty sure I plugged them in right. Some of them were keyed, so I couldn't have plugged them in wrong. Maybe one of the front panel cables is labelled right and wired wrong.

Sure was a bad day. :evil:

 

[CougTek]

Earlier this week, I had a system that would reboot one or two minutes after we power it. I tried to swap everything : PSU, RAM, graphic card, modem, motherboard...nothing fixed it, until I replaced the processor. For some reason, the old Athlon XP had its trip and would reboot the system as soon as it was asked to work a little hard.

You wrote that you overclocked your processor. Maybe you pushed it a little too hard for too long.

 

[mubs]

A 4400 X2 (2.2 GHz) pushed to 2.5 GHz, a total of less than 200 power on hours??? And it booted perfectly when I wiped the disks. Things sizzled only after connecting the front panel cables. :cursin:

 

[ddrueding]

A 4400 X2 (2.2 GHz) pushed to 2.5 GHz, a total of less than 200 power on hours??? And it booted perfectly when I wiped the disks. Things sizzled only after connecting the front panel cables. :cursin:

I feel your pain; I've done similar in the past. That's why I don't add crap to my system anymore. No expansion cards, no break-out cables, no small fans, no optical or floppy drives. All that stuff is on another pc that I don't care about (e-machine) that sits in the closet.

In my box their are a total of six cables: 2x PSU to MB, PSU to HDD, HDD to MB, 2x fans to MB.

I don't think it was your OC'ing that did it, as that is a pretty minor one (I've got mine at 2.8Ghz). I'm willing to bet a short in your USB box, and I'd say it likely did in your MB, not your CPU.

 

[P5-133XL]

I agree with ddrueding, a short in the front panel frying your motherboard. Even if the MB works now, I'd classify it as unreliable at least untill there is some other more definative problem identified. And, no, I would not be trying that front panel on other MB's unless they are classified as disposable.

 

[mubs]

Thanks guys.

The system's been on all day without a hiccup (default speed, not overclocked). No diag LEDs on, no sizzle, no frying silicon smells. But Mark's right, don't know when something's going to fail.

I just spent a fortune (for me) on this, and can't buy spares without being sure as to exactly what's wrong. That was: $200 motherboard, $160 power supply, $170 video card and $230 RAM.

I have another problem that could make it very hard for me to source the failed part(s) after the first week of May. My next newest system is 5+ years old, and none of the suspect parts are interchangeable. This also makes troubleshooting very difficult.

If something is going to fail, I hope it fails now.

 

[Buck]

I recently picked up a batch of LG GSA-4120B DVD burners. They're advertised for 12x DVDR burning. Well, I've tried two with the accompanying Nero 6.5 PowerDVD installation and I can't get them passed 4x. I sold two to a customer and he is the one that encountered the problem. He's using S*ny 16x DVD-R media. I tried the same media on another machine with the same burner and encountered the same problem. Then we tried his media on a S*ny, LiteOn, and NEC burner . . . all three burned at 16x. I'm going to swap these LG units out for another brand. pfft!

 

[time]

Ack! Don't tell me that, I just started using them!

The 4166 and 4167 rather than the 4120, though.

 

[Santilli]

Isn't S*ny famous for shipping with outdated firmware?
I know I had to download, and install, the current version of their firmware to get the burner to burn at 8X, which was on the box. Otherwise, the old firmware it shipped with only went 4X.

Costco is a great place. Returns without many questions...

S

 

[timwhit]

They are talking about LG drives, not Sony.

 

[Santilli]

My bad. :wink:

 

[CougTek]

I don't know about the GSA-4120, but we used the GSA-4167B for a while and the GSA-H10A for the last two weeks and I have yet to see a customer return and complain about them. I recommend them over the Pioneer DVR-110 to customers (although we now sell the DVR-111 and I have not yet tested it). The GSA-4167B apparently had a better error-correcting algorythm because it read and ripped scratched disks faster and with less unrecoverable errors than the Pioneer DVR-110.

 

[CougTek]

But DON'T ever use LG's firmware burning software. I tried it twice and both times, the P.O.S. program froze while re-flashing the ROM, resulting in two RMAs (and a case front panel to replace).

 

[Mercutio]

I think the better answer is just to avoid LG completely.
I like LiteOn (still). I like NEC. I have been punished when I have purchased anything else.

 

[Buck]

I think the better answer is just to avoid LG completely.
I like LiteOn (still). I like NEC. I have been punished when I have purchased anything else.

I think I might go back to NEC, or switch to using the S*ny/LiteOn variety.

 

[Bozo]

There was a survey of trusted companies out recently. LG and MS were ranked the same.

http://news.designtechnica.com/article9959.html

LG is Phillips, right?

Bozo :mrgrn:

 

[Mercutio]

$235.

It's a POS, sure, but I can build a $235 box today using all name-brand, new parts.

Celeron 315 (2.2GHz/533MHz bus)
512MB of OCZ RAM
Asrock P4VM800 motherboard (S3 graphics included)
Foxconn TLN436-C4002 chassis with 350W Sparkle PSU
20GB 5400rpm Seagate Hard disk (U-series X)
LiteOn 52x CD-RW

And that price includes shipping.
If I went to $260, I could have a proper 7200rpm, 80GB drive.

Vomit box? Or bargain for the money?

 

[Buck]

$235.

It's a POS, sure, but I can build a $235 box today using all name-brand, new parts.

Celeron 315 (2.2GHz/533MHz bus)
512MB of OCZ RAM
Asrock P4VM800 motherboard (S3 graphics included)
Foxconn TLN436-C4002 chassis with 350W Sparkle PSU
20GB 5400rpm Seagate Hard disk (U-series X)
LiteOn 52x CD-RW

And that price includes shipping.
If I went to $260, I could have a proper 7200rpm, 80GB drive.

Vomit box? Or bargain for the money?

Vomit . . . you included a U-Series drive.

 

[Mercutio]

Where else do you get a brand-new $30 hard disk?

 

[ddrueding]

Merc,

Although that is certainly an incredible price, I'm a bit of a snob about certain things. Here's the cheapest system using parts I'd touch without gloves (and even be willing to support)!

AMD Athlon 64 3000+ Venice Socket 939 ADA3000BPBOX
Gigabyte GA-K8N51GMF-9 Socket 939 NVIDIA GeForce 6100 Micro ATX
BUFFALO 1GB 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400
SAMSUNG SpinPoint P80SD HD040GJ 40GB 7200 RPM SATA
LITE-ON 16X DVD±R DVD Burner
Antec Solution SLK1650B Black w/ 350W Power Supply

Shipped for $446 (Including ~$30 CA Tax)

-Socket 939
-SATA 7200RPM w/8MB Cache
-Onboard nVidia video
-1GB RAM
-DVD Burner
-Antec Case & PS

Hell, I'd be happy with that for most purposes.

 

[Mercutio]

That $450 machine you're talking about would be a mid-high end system for the people I deal with, ddrueding.

 

[timwhit]

That $450 machine you're talking about would be a mid-high end system for the people I deal with, ddrueding.

I agree. Some entry level computers still only have 256MB of RAM.

 

[ddrueding]

Don't ask me why, but I felt like doing this:

 

[timwhit]

Wow. You must be bored.

 

[ddrueding]

That $450 machine you're talking about would be a mid-high end system for the people I deal with, ddrueding.

I agree. Some entry level computers still only have 256MB of RAM.

That is a sin the that Dell, HP, and others will have to pay for in hell.

 

[ddrueding]

That $450 machine you're talking about would be a mid-high end system for the people I deal with, ddrueding.

The problem with giving people that cheap systems that are that cheap is that they try to make them run for 5 years, and then try to upgrade them using used parts from E-Bay.

 

[ddrueding]

Wow. You must be bored.

I really don't feel like going to work today. It's my least-favorite part of being self-employed: collections. :evil:

 

[timwhit]

I didn't know that a corporation could go to hell? Learn something new everyday.

I was just looking through Dell's offerings and most of their entry level and mid-level systems only come with 512MB.

512MB is usable though if you don't have a lot of programs running in the background. Hell, my system has been running on 512MB of RAM ever since I had a 512MB DIMM die on me. (I'm just too cheap to replace it)

Anyone have any DDR PC2100+ laying around?

Someone gave me a $40 Best Buy gift card and I decided to use it on a 512MB stick of DDR. I ordered it online and then picked it up in the store. I didn't look at it until I got home and then I noticed that it was an SO-DIMM. I was also dumb enough to open the package before I realized this.

I still don't know what to do with it.

 

[Mercutio]

I can probably find you a 512MB PC3200 part, timwhit.

Anyway, I know all about U-series drives and their vomit-box connection. Some of the PCs I support here have U-series drives, or Maxtor DM8s, which are probably just as bad. Given enough RAM, a slow drive can be made tolerable.

Not having enough RAM, on the other hand, is just idiotic.

A "decent" 80GB, 7200rpm drive costs about $60. A "crappy" drive costs $30.
A "decent" amount of RAM, 512MB, costs about $35 at the moment. A "crappy" amount of RAM still costs $20.

Just something to consider.

 

[timwhit]

Do you want to trade for the SODIMM?

 

[CougTek]

Celeron 315 (2.2GHz/533MHz bus)
Asrock P4VM800 motherboard (S3 graphics included)

That's the same combo we use for our cheapest system. That ASRock board is truely wonderful for the price.

 

[Buck]

Where else do you get a brand-new $30 hard disk?

My customers have no need for a hard drive like that, even if it was free.

 

[Mercutio]

If the choice is between someone who only has $250 having a computer and not having a computer, I think I'd be a little less picky.

Not only that, I think it's the right place to cut a corner. That system has a motherboard that's several steps up from PC Chips/Jetway/ECS. It has enough RAM. It has a solid case and decent power supply. It's a slug with a Celeron and a slow hard disk, but there's no parts in that machine that would make me think the computer as a whole is a POS.

 

[P5-133XL]

They still need an OS and that should be included in the price.

At that price point, I really think you've done good. Think of the reality, when people are pricing machines down there, for the most part they are looking at used P2-P3's. As slow as these are gonna be, they still are much better than their competition.

 

[Mercutio]

SuSE is free and quite usable. Good OSes don't have to cost money.