Talk Is Cheap

You might not get your TV back..

It’s not the end all, beat all benchmark for a computer.. (is there one?) but SuperPi mod 1.5 popular little program to gauge changes in the speed of your computer for overclocking changes you make, etc…

It calculates Pi out to however many decimal places you want.. 1 million is the one most of the overclocking community use when referencing SuperPi numbers..  It uses a long established Gauss-Legendre algorithm.  Don’t look at me.. there are lots of people that can look at formula like that and “read” it and understand it just by looking.. I ain’t one of them.  I haven’t known any of them for almost 25 years now either.  There are faster ways of calculating Pi to 1M spots but that’s not the point.

My current 1M Super Pi score.. 21.356 seconds.  It used to take 35 minutes to get 1M spots back in the days of 90MHz Pentium PC.

2.8 GHz E4300 Core2Duo (default 1.8 GHz) (the fastest I can get it to run 100% stable..boooo a <b>lot</b> of these CPU’s will clock up to 3.2 and 3.4 with minimal cooling and slightly bumped voltages.  I’m gonna need a fan on my motherboard’s northbridge though to get 3.0 GHz or above I’ve deduced.

2 Gb PC6400 RAM at 2T 4-4-4-12 at 311MHz

7200RPM 16Mb buffer WD 320G HD

Gigabyte 965P-DS3 motherboard.

Well, I finally decided to bite the bullet and upgrade myself. The problem was that I bought a new case for my “future” PC and when I received it, it was so damn beautiful that I couldn’t contain myself any further. I did go with an AMD processor even though I am a staunch Intel guy, but since I’m on a budget and I got a great deal, I went for it. All-in-all, I’m pretty happy with my choices since I spent just over $700 (just under $600 after all the rebates). Without further ado, here it is:

Thermaltake Tough Power 650W Power Supply
GigaByte SLI AMD Motherboard
AMD Athlon 64 X2 5000+ Brisbane AM2 65W Dual-Core BLACK Procesor – I can overclock this baby to 3.3 G very easily (and I will!!!)
G.Skill 2 GB DDR2 800 Mhz (PC2 6400) 240-pin Dual Channel Memory
Kingwin Revolution H.D.T. CPU Cooler – this baby is sweeeeeeeet
Seagate Barracuda 250 GB / 7200 RPM SATA (3.0 GB/sec) HD
EVGA 8800 GTS 320 MB GDDR3 PCI Express (x16) SLI Supported Video Card – sweet and with the mobo, I can upgrade to a second card later on (after I add more memory)

And that totally sweet-ass case I was telling you about…
CoolerMaster AMMO Aluminum ATX Mid Tower Case

All-in-all, I’m pretty happy with my purchase. I’m also giving in and bought Windows Vista Home Premium (32-bit), but did not include this in the overall price because this was not a necessity for the PC itself (I already have XP). While my system is not “top of the line”, it’s a system that I can easily upgrade in the future (the mobo accepts the new AMD Phenom chips, a max total of 16 GB of memory and is SLI ready when I want to add that 2nd video card to the mix). I also bought a 2nd case fan, but didn’t list it (why would I?). With the ability to easily upgrade, this baby should keep me up and running for quite a long time. I can’t wait to actually see what BF2 and CS:S look like on max graphics!!!

Just got the last of my parts and the O/S for my new PC in today. Got everything connected. Now it is time to head to work. Guess I will have to wait till after work tonight to install the O/S and finish everything up. Ugh, gonna’ be a really long night.

-Popcorn

(BTW, Jason, you are going to LOVE the Nine Hundred case and the P/S)

Mike, this is great memory at a great price now, $48.99 ($40 off sale-not rebate-and free shipping.. Gskill PC6400 2 gig memory pair.  Will work great for your build and has room to pump it up if you find the need to overclock your system a few years down the road to keep up.

160 gig hard drive is only like 7 bucks more than the 80 gig..I would spend the extra $40 or so on the 8600GTS over the GT on your video card too, Mike.. unless you are really stuck on the $500 budget.  The GT will get you under your budget.

Good luck!

What does this mean? A lot of the mods have been turned into full games. The full version of Urban Terror is available for free at urbanterror.net
Enjoy

OK, I have a conundrum.  According to my video card info, I have a Nvidia GE Force 7300LE card, 64 mb.  But yet, I run dxdiag, the approx total memory is 825 mb.  What the heck is the difference, and why can I run games at 128 mb if indeed my card is only running at 64mb?  What can I trust?

Jason.. if you haven’t bought a PS yet.. check this one out.  That’s not a $50 mail in rebate either, instant baby! It’s just $29.99!

I might buy one even though I don’t need one right now!  Modular! Blue! $30!  wow look.. patented technology too! What’s not to like? (I hope I don’t have a good answer for that soon!)

Ok Scott, and whoever else wants to give me feedback, I’ve been sniffing around the internet to find up all the parts to build my new machine so that I can join the online sensation that is World of Warcraft. I think I’ve come up with a solid machine that will get me through the next couple of years with little to no upgrade.

Asus nForce 650i sli motherboard $132
Intel core 2 quad q6600 2.4 GHz $280
evga GeForce 8600GT 256MB 128 bit sli video card $110
Western Digital Caviar 7200rpm 250GB 16MB cache SATA HD $70
4GB (2 2GB sticks) G.Skill ddr2 800 ram $155
Rosewill r5604-bk Mid-tower $60
Coolermaster Extreme PS 500W $50
Sony NEC SATA DVD+R Burner $32
Throw in Vista and I’m right at $1000. I could cut back $$$ a little by only getting 2GB ram and by settling for the e6750 core duo processor, but how much would I be saving to have to upgrade in a year anyway? If anyone has any feedback, suggestions, or ways to save me money, give me a shout!

My 2nd favorite Halloween computer wallpaper.. first is the picture of the razor blade in the M&M’s.