Re: OT: New PC!
 

If only things worked like that over here. The ATI 1900 series came out a month or so over here, and the prices of other cards hasn't gone down yet. In fact, they've gone up. I think the only place where I'll be spending an less money is on the RAM, if I can find somewhere over here selling Crucial PC3200, since I've no real need whatsoever for PC4000, having no intention of doing any overclocking on this system.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Even better, buy quadruple 7800's.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

I know that quote was from one of the first few pages of this thread and I'll admit I haven't read past that post...

I just have to disspell some myths about overclocking:

1) 80% of the time (or more) chips from the same architecture come off of the same piece of silicon. The manufacturer then tests the stablilty of the chip and the voltage requirements for each chip... the chips are then coded by these tests and binned (separated into model #'s i.e. the difference between lets say an A64X23800 and a 4200)

2) In the first production runs of a certain architecture i.e. right when the chip comes out, the above process IS important when determining the durability and stability of the higher clock speed chips. BUT once the fabrication kinks are ironed out, most chips are exactly (i hate using the word exact, of course they're not identical, but for turning the chip up to a higher 'stock' speed and other overclocking purposes, it's the same) the same pieces of silicon, just multiplier locked from the factory.

3) AMD and Intel sell vast more amounts of mid ranged and lower chips than their bleeding edge models

4) All processors 'wear out.' Lets say stock speed it'll last 50,000 hours at 100% usage (purely hypothetical number for the hours, it's a large number) And let's say that same chip with a good heatsink and fan or other properly designed cooling system is clocked up 300mhz will run 45,000 hours at 100% usage. The key is 100% usage... most computer users will have periods of 100% and then their CPU's will idle... Not to mention most of the upper end chips wear out faster than the lower end chips of the same architecture... see where I'm getting to?

4b) All processors are designed to go through cycles of hot and cold just like an engine is designed to go through cycles of hot and cold.

5) If your computer catches fire: well you didn't take care of your dust bunnies EVER, or something was way more wrong with the computer than overclocking. (I know this wasn't in the quote, BUT it was in a post preceding it)

With proper chip selection and timing, it is possible to buy the same qualtiy chip. With proper cooling you can insure a long lifetime of the chip. And with proper knowledge of overclocking the chip can be absolutely 1000's of hours prime 95 stable (that means it ran prime95 constantly and never had a false calculation, good test for CPU and RAM stability)

I have no problem with people that spend more money for the upper end processors... but I usually choose to buy the low to mid range model solely due to economics and let my knowledge of overclocking turn that hundreds of dollars cheaper piece of (the same) silicon into the high end chip or beyond. It's the same thing as a person who buys a 911 to go fast versus someone who modifies a cheaper car (not a pinto mind you) let's say an Rx8 or a G35. Both can achieve the same level of performance but it takes expertise, trial and error, and sometimes a little scientific method to do it effectively.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

I remember finding a hidden overclock mode on one of my graphics cards. I think it was an NVidia, but I'm not sure.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Despite my misgivings about overclocking (that was me who posted about the fire, and I know it's an extreme case, if one person can find one other person that's happened to, I'll give you a lot of money), I haven't any issues against it, aside from one thing: I know absolutely nothing about it. Well, I know what it is, but that's as far as my knowledge goes. I might one day spend a couple hundred euro on a cheap system that I can tinker around with and learn about overclocking on, but I'm not going to risk anything on my €3,000 system.
Especially because when it comes to computers, I am the embodiment of Murphy's Law. If you ever see a review or a note on a website saying 'Some users experience [insert something negative here]', you can be pretty much guaranteed that I'll be one of those users. And that, in a nutshell, is why I ain't gonna be overclocking this system.
I have enough knowledge to assemble a system, and I'm willing to spend a bit extra so I know all I have to do is assemble it correctly and it'll work.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

If you want to be careful about it, do it very, very, slowly. Only increase clock speeds by 5 every time. When there's errors or it gets too hot, then reduce the clock by 25 or so, giving you good buffer room.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

With that ASUS board, you don’t need to know how to over-clock. It has a little app that let’s you oc from the desk top.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Thought I'd just resurect this thread on account of me heading back to Canada, the new machine will likely be bought over there. So, can any fellow Canucks recommend a good Canadian website for me to buy all my bits & pieces from?

Re: OT: New PC!
 

This website is generally considered the best:
http://www.tigerdirect.ca

Re: OT: New PC!
 

I concur with Kwok. I've bought a couple items from them, they have good prices, good shipping and a very wide selection.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Well, I'm sold. Priced my computer out on their site & it came out €500 cheaper. €700 if you count the fact that since I have a huge big room with loads of space back home, I'm going with a 21-inch CRT instead of the 19-inch flatpanel.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Well, the order has been placed, and this is what I'm going with:
Processor AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4400
Motherboard Asus A8R-MVP Crossfire
Ram 2 GB PC3200 DDR
Hard Drive #1 Seagate 80GB Sata HD
Hard Drive #2 Seagate 400 SATA HD
Optical Drive LG 16X Dual Layer DVDRW
Video Card Sapphire Radeon X1900 XT 512MB Video
Sound Card Creative Labes SB X-FI Platinum
Speakers Logitech Z5300 Speakers
Keyboard Logitech G15 Illuminated Keyboard
Mouse Razor Diamondback Plasma Mouse
CPU Cooling Zalman CNPS9500-LED Aero Flower
Power Supply Enermax Liberty 620W ELT620AWT
Monitor 21" NEC CRT
Case Thermaltake Tsunami

Now, the important part, is all the new software to load onto the system since I won't be getting it hooked up to the internet for the first weeek. So far, I've got:

Tweak UI
AVG Anti-Virus
Ad-Aware
Azureus
Directory Opus
DivX Codecs
Firefox
Foobar2000
Irfanview
Java Runtime Environment
Limewire
Media Player Classic
Open Office Suite
Photoshop
Spybot
Thunderbird
Trillian

Any other recommendations/things I'll be kicking myself if I forget?

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Floppy drive. I like floppy drives.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

I’d make one change to the software, you should try the Windows Defender Beta from MS. It’s free and works well.

You moght also want to try the IE7 Beta2, if for no other reason than to see how much IE has changed. I'd keep the Firefox as primary. Also didn't see Adobe reader, I have the corp re-d of 6 if you want it.

PS: What about RAR?

Re: OT: New PC!
 

I'd recommend utorrent over Azureus, personally. 4 MB ram usage is hard to pass up. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif Its got most of the important features of Azureus, with more being added every update.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Not software related, but I was suprised to not see a second optical drive. The ability to copy discs on the fly from one drive to another is a beautiful thing. I suppose if you don't make copies of all your music that doesn't matter so much. I also agree with Narf that a generic floppy drive is worth the insignificant cost you'll pay for it, and both your case and MB will have room included for it.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

He has 2 gigabytes of memory, a little less ram usage isn't going to matter...

Send your computer to me when you get it... Or at least take screenshots of your games.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Actually, there is a second optical drive & a floppy drive too, I just forgot to stick them on there. And I've already got a few 'before' screenshots saved somewhere, so once the machine is up & running I'll do a few 'After' shots.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

NullAshton said:
He has 2 gigabytes of memory, a little less ram usage isn't going to matter...

More RAM usage makes the RAM chips run just that much hotter. It also makes for more disk access due to swap file, causing more strain on the hard drive. Sure its not a great effect, but over time, it adds up.

Of course, my recommendation of utorrent is more about the general feel of the app, which is similar to Azureus, but better in subtle ways. You've really got nothing to lose by trying it out. If only they would write a decent tracker for utorrent...

Re: OT: New PC!
 

I agree. The only feature that I know of which Azureus has and utorrent doesn't is password protection for torrents. This is a special 'high security' feature that most people won't need. There may be other features that utorrent doesn't have, but I don't even know what they are, which shows you how important they are... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif because I am a fairly regular user of Bittorrent networks for various things.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

A 'little' less? the difference is almost an order of magnitude, and there is also a major difference in CPU usage to get the same work done since Azureus runs under the JRE. It's really amazing, and shocking, that all those features can be implemented in a program so tiny compared to all the others that do the same things. Plainly, disregard for efficiency of programs is what has got us to the point of needing a gigabyte of RAM in a standard desktop computer. (Yes, Windows 'Vista' will need close to a gig since the standard 'minimum' system recommendation is always about 1/2 of what you need to use a program properly...)

If more people would program in C++ and not Visual Basic or Python we might not need so much computer power for our ordinary usage. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Filezilla is a good dedicated FTP client. Sometimes the FTP features of a browser are not enough.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/filezilla/

You are aware of the 'alternatives' for Real Player and Quicktime?

Both Real Alternative and Quicktime Alternative can be downloaded from http://www.free-codecs.com/

Lots of other good stuff is available there, too. ffdshow, for example, which is a really nice replacement for about a dozen seperate codecs like DivX and XviD. (And faster than all of them, and with more user controls!)

Other than these, you will definitely want some sort of archiver software sooner or later. Win XP does 'zip' natively now, but as usual the corporations are years behind the times. You need something like WinRar or IzArc or 7Zip to handle all the new formats.

http://www.rarlab.com/
http://www.izarc.org/
http://www.7-zip.org/

I also notice the lack of a firewall in your software list. The native Windows XP 'firewall' is not worthy of the name. I will not stain this forum with any of the words that people who know about security use when speaking about it.:D You need an independent firewall product. The now famous Zone Alarm is not necessarily the best. Kerio Free/Personal is supposed to be fairly good. I recommend Agnitum's Outpost, myself.

http://www.agnitum.com/

The only thing is, the 'free' version is rather old and not updated for Win XP. I think you'd want the latest on an XP system. That means $40 instead of free. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif But there is still Kerio, or you can buy the full version of AVG and get the built-in firewall. Even that is better than the native Win XP firewall.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Actually, I was thinking of going with something along the lines of this for my firewall. From the looks of it, it seems pretty secure. Any thoughts from anyone?

Re: OT: New PC!
 

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. You need to have your firewall between your system and the WAN (Internet). Having it on your workstation is a last resort. Look around and see if you can find an RO 318 by Netgear. They are about the best personal firewall ever built. They went for $95 when in production and will bring as much as $250 new in the box today. They last basically forever and you should be able to find one used for around $125. There is something of a market going on used ones. You can advertise for a used one at Amazon. RO 318
This was one of those products that was way too good for the price, so when the new owners took over they killed it right off, rather than have it compete with their branded products.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

You forgot about C#, the bloatiest of all. A simple calculator I made needed 25 MB of RAM. Yikes!

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Is bloatiest a word? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Re: OT: New PC!
 

When it takes 25 MB to draw 16 buttons and a text box or two, yes, it is.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

It is constructed according to the rules, such as they are, of the english language.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Well, I'm going to be connecting the new machine via a D-Link 524 wireless router (on a wired connection), and it's got a built in firewall so that should be fine.
I just have to wait until Saturday when my dad gets back, since mother dearest can't remember the passwords for it.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Well, I've got the machine, and it's up and running nicely. I'm still getting all the applications etc set up, but the basics are there, and I found enough time to fire up Half-Life 2. I have to say, that warm, pleasent sensation didn't last long. But only because pee-soaked trousers go cold fast.
Holy CRAP! I had no idea things could look this good! It's one thing to look at screenshots, but to actually SEE it. Wow.
Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to spend the next few hours shouting "Holy crap! Lookit that!!!"

Although there is one thing I'm wondering. I went to download the free version of 3DMark, and it was about 570MB. Is that normal or did I do something wrong? And why the devil does it need to be so big?

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Because it's basically a video game, without the game? That's mostly the graphics engine, textures, blah blah blah...

Re: OT: New PC!
 

I see... Well, once I get it down, I'll be sure to come back and gloat.
In the meantime, I seem to be suffering from a variation of the Half-Life 2 stuttering bug. Video as well as audio is affected and the 'stutters' last on average 4-6 seconds, but every now & then I get one that's 20-30 seconds. The closest I could compare it to would be as if it's trying to read from a CD that's skipping (it doesn't run from CD, and the disc isn't even in the drive). I've tried every single offered solution on the Steam forums & elsewhere, and nothing works. Using the ATI Omega drivers got me about 5 minutes of flawless play time, but after the first loading screen, the stuttering came back.
I suffered through the audio stuttering on my old machine, and it was annoying but I still got through the game, but it's unplayable on my new machine, which is just bloody irritating.
Somehow, I don't think there's a solution for me, but if anyone can think of anything, that'd be great. Otherwise, Sin: Episodes looks kinda cool, anyone know if it uses the Source engine?

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Well, you should have the rough edges rubbed off by now, so it's time for some benchmarks http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: OT: New PC!
 

Well, only benchmark I know of is 3D Mark, and I scored 5328 on that with no tweaking done and I think it was Trillian still running in the background, so I don't know what effect that would have had. If you have any other benchmarks, or suggestions on tweaking, I'd love to hear em.

Re: OT: New PC!
 

CPU-Z
Sandra 2005
3D mark 01
Super Pi
All of the newer future mark stuff
Cinebench 2003

That should keep you busy for a few hours.