PC Discussion Thread - All PC related in here.

[Messiah 2]

the best cases i've come across are the Coolermaster Centurions - essentially the whole front of the case is a mesh, allowing a large amount of cool air intake - although all the coolmasters are very good.

i can only find the thermaltake cases at overclockers, so i assume the others are region specific (i.e. not available normally in the uk) - they look very overpriced for what seems a shiny black cock extension... and you could pick up an equally good antec (for instance) for half the price...

up to you though, but why people insist on 'pimp my pc' is beyond me - it sits on the floor/desk for its entire life and only a few people ever see it.

[VictorTroska 0]

...but why people insist on 'pimp my pc' is beyond me - it sits on the floor/desk for its entire life and only a few people ever see it.

Hehe,true......but if u often have LAN party or yearly Case Moding Contest u must have nice case and there are much more than a few people to see your rig,so.....

And again,its a challenge to build a nice ,good looking rig....so u can admire later at the hard work u put in it....

[Messiah 2]

well, yeah - ok if you have the money and time and need to, then i guess you can advocate it - but i rather save a few hundred pounds on pimping my pc and spending it on the hardware inside.

its like taking a 1.2 vauxhaul nova and adding skirting, neon lights, spoliers and a big exhaust in it... it may look and sound sportier and faster (i'm refraining from using the word 'better', but at the end of the day, my 1.4 run of the mill car will be better... same goes for pc's - its whats under the 'hood' that counts.

[echo1 0]

My desktop fried, so I'm gonna order parts for a new rig this coming week, I would like an opinion on the case though.

What exactly fried? Would it not make more sense for you to replace the fried parts, or did you plan on upgrading anyway?

[AOCbravo2004 0]

My desktop fried, so I'm gonna order parts for a new rig this coming week, I would like an opinion on the case though.

What exactly fried? Would it not make more sense for you to replace the fried parts, or did you plan on upgrading anyway?

I planned on upgrading within the next 6months, this just sped up plans. What fried? My video card, and the northbridge on my motherboard also fried, and the CPU was starting to die, damn P4's. I figured, why spend about 200-300 for something I am gonna toss out in a couple of months.

The only case I listed that was over $100USD was the Aspire X-Navigator, it is an aluminum case and it comes with about 5 fans already built into it. All the others are in the $50USD class range. I don't want anything fancy, just stuff to keep it cool. I completely agree with you Messiah on the whole "pimping issue".

[Messiah 2]

5 fans? sheesh...

lol, at the moment im running a front and rear 12cm zalman, and a vapochill system on my P4... and im running prescott processors (very hot) - my case rarely goes about 30 degrees, and its just a standard antec.

to be honest, the best way forward is to buy a decent case for $50, make sure it has space for front and rear fans (be it one 120mm, or dual 90mm front and rear), and then buy the fans seperatly (120mm zalmans, one of the best brands, cost $7 each) as you need them...

essentially, there's no reason to pack your case with 40 fans if it doesnt require it.

[JdB 151]

Also fans built into cases are usually of inferiour quality and sound like a miniature chainsaw.

[Messiah 2]

hehehe, that too

zalmans are meant to be one of the quietest fans around, and no complaints from me so far

[VictorTroska 0]

hehehe, that too  

zalmans are meant to be one of the quietest fans around, and no complaints from me so far

Nope, Papst eat them for lunch....

[GoOB 0]

My whole world just fell apart... After not having used my primary desktop for quite a while I booted it up today. Whilst logging in to my XP-profile the screen goes black... After waiting a few minutes I do a manual reboot.

After the reboot I get the safe mode dialouge we all know and love. I press "reboot in safe mode"... But, the computer reboots again giving me the same dialouge. I try a second time, same result. It's time to crack open the BIOS... Here's the funny part, there are no harddrives to be found! I have seen no signs that would indicate a harddrive crash, but this certainly seems to be one... Any other takes on this? And more importantly, if my drives/system did crash, how do I retreive the information on the drives?

The drives are two Maxtor 5200 160GB that run, or should I say used to run on XP with none of the service packs installed.

[Messiah 2]

assuming the hard drives have gone screwy (and you havnt used them in a while), it could be a problem with the read arm (the needle(?) of sorts that essentialy swings across and reads/writes things to the disc) given the lenght of time it hasnt been used for.... but dont quote me, im grasping at probable causes.

as for retreiving info, any decent computer service guy will be able to retrieve info off a HD disk, assuming it hasnt been smashes into pieces, set on fire, or formatted... the guy i used last time, got everything off my HD when it decided to screw up.

[JdB 151]

assuming it hasnt been smashes into pieces, set on fire, or formatted...

You should see the amount of porn I managed to retrieve off a corporate pc that had been formatted 3 times during messed up Win 2000 installs

Huge loads of.....files (though of course inevitably some where corrupted and too far gone to actually open). Still, it was enough for the guy to get fired

[AOCbravo2004 0]

Messiah, thanks for the heads up on those coolermaster, I think I have found my case, and I looked at some fans, and gonna put a Zalman CNPS9500 on the CPU, looks like it will drop the CPU temp quite a bit, have seen nothing but rave reviews for it.

[Messiah 2]

no worries - vapochill cpu fans are also very very good - use some clever thingy method of heat conduction through liquids or god knows what to cool the cpu... have on installed on my cpu and it runs under load at about 52 degrees

[VictorTroska 0]

Seamless Displays presented Radius 320, a monitor that is every mans dream. Featuring three 20.1" LCD panels, Radius 320 is the perfect monitor for you.

This baby will make you need no longer a PC monitor. The three LCD panels are incorporated into a continuous display system that has a resolution of 5.76 million pixels. Imagine this. The three panels are arranged in a way that makes you believe that you have a 50" monitor. Why? Because is wrapped around you creating a special feeling.

You dont have to worry about the boundary between the three panels because you will never even guess it is there. Seamless Display created a special technique to cover the margins by placing a lens in front of each panel to stretch out the borders. Therefore, the extended borders generate the same clear and unremitting picture.

Radius 320 is independent of operating system which means that it can be used with Windows, Linux or Mac. All you need is to have enough video cards to support 3 DVI outputs at 1600 by 1200 resolution. No special drivers are needed beyond those provided by your video card manufacturer.

.....wow,this is one beautifull baby

[JdB 151]

And one more expensive then most cheap cars too

[VictorTroska 0]

Nah,it is quite cheap..... only 16 000$

[shinRaiden 0]

and it want's three DVI's, so unless you can find reverse gendered DVI<>VGA adaptors and plug it into a Matrox TripleHeadToGo it's useless for the most important tasks like playing OFP.

[general 0]

processor: AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+ 2.2GHz / 2x512kB Socket AM2

motherboard: Asus - Socket AM2 - ATX nForce570 SLI (M2N-SLI DELUXE) - PCI-E / SATA / DDR2

graphiccard: Asus GeForce 7900GTX 512MB (EN7900GTX/2DHT/512M) - TV-Ut / Dvi (PCI-Express)

http://www.webhallen.com/prod.php?id=56555

soundcard: Creative SoundBlaster X-Fi XtremeMusic

chassi: Deltaco Miditower LA-110 - Black/Silver

RAM: Kingston DDR2 1024MB 750MHz CL4 (4-4-4-12)

harddrive: Western Digital Raptor 74GB SATA (10000RPM / 16MB Cache / SATA)

PSU: bZerk PowerSupply 500W ATX 2.2

is it any good?

[berghoff 11]

Go for a better CPU like the new E6600.

[EiZei 0]

Go for a better CPU like the new E6600.

.. if you can actually find them.

[CameronMcDonald 146]

<Ignore this post, eh?>

[blackdog~ 0]

Go for a better CPU like the new E6600.

.. if you can actually find them.

I have one sitting right next to me!

I ordered my 6600 like three weeks ago though. Still waiting for the Asus P5BVM mobo to come out before I put everything together though...

I got a 2U server case today and I was very happy to see that it would appear that the default cpu fan would fit (looks like it) with a few mm still to spare!

[kegetys 2]

I have waited for my E6600 for a month now, there hasn't been a single one shipped to any Finnish importer yet which is quite crappy as, for example, german stores seem to have had them in stock for quite a while now... I have my Asus P5W DH Deluxe, GF7900GT, 2GB of memory and a 320GB HD sitting here and I can't do anything with them      

[j w 0]

We've had the Conroes in Sweden for a month or so.. Seem to be able to get a hold of pretty easy.