Welcome to the Hardware Forum

    thanks to BP for making this forum, I think it´s something we´ve needed for a while now. OT, Modding/Editing and the other forums get filled up with hardware issues and because we all have a tendency to stick in certain forums requests for help often don´t get heard. now any hardware issues will be posted or moved to here, where they´ll get more exposure and people will get more help. after all, many of us really do know our stuff and some of us have been in the computer trade for years. I´ve been a pc technician & network engineer for 15 years now and i´ve been involved in computers/electronics for longer than that, 20+ years. Also you can use this forum to post your machine specs and tell us about anything you´ve just bought or you´re going to buy, largely so that I can laugh if its pants and get all jealous if its good and yes, we´ll talk about overclocking and cooling and system streamlining and tcp/ip networking and all the rest of it. ok here´s mine, not quite the beast it once was but still doing everything i need it do. Intel Pentium P4-3.4ghz Northwood o´c´d-->3.8 (i can take it up to 4 but it gets flakey) MSi Neo2-P 859PE mobo Akasa King Copper 901CU active cooler/heatsink (and I use Arctic Silver 5 and nothing else as thermal compound) Powercolor ATI Radeon 9800 Pro 256mb 8x AGP (after a lot of fiddling by me it runs almost as fast as an X800 and is just as stable) 2x WD Caviar SE 160gb SATA in zero-array 2gb Crucial Ballistix 466mhz DDR dual-channel memory Voyetra Turtle Beach Montego 8.1 Dolby Digital s/card I have a highly-tweaked system with loads of registry and system.ini changes, running my pagefile entirely in RAM. I´ll be putting a more-or-less definitive XP tweak guide up fairly soon. I dont have the fastest system in their world anymore in terms of pure horsepower but Windows does fly on it and I have no issues with speed in games at all. I know lots of people with better systems who have terrible slowdowns. it does everything i want it to and played Doom3 and Battlefield 2 fine, no frame rate issues, no slowdown. but a year from now its gonna be way behind, so within the next few months im probably gonna change to AMD 64, XP Pro x64-bit, 4gb of RAM and a PCI-Express motherboard, pssibly, although I havent convinced myself yet, with dual-SLi if nothing faster is ont eh market and ATi dont get their act together. hate to leave Intel too but what are they offering at the moment? overheating LGA775 and thats it. you´ll notice that Esquilax never posts his hardware specs? thats because he runs a 386-SX-20 with 1mb 30-pin SIMMS, 20mb HDD, and a 256kb ISA video card. he can´t even play Privateer or WC2! Edited by - Tawakalna (Reloaded) on 9/17/2005 9:43:14 AM

    "for once, i`ll actually tell you what i was thinking; but maybe i won`t have anything to say.."

    Lies! I have posted my specifications on more than one occasion! I just can´t be bothered typing them out, but I´ll look for them later on. Besides, my lack of RAM is embarrassing (512MB ). I had 768MB, but the computer shop that I purchased the RAM from was selling Samsung chips on a generic PCB, so the RAM was full of errors. Damn MSY *grumble*. And don´t call me a fool for not buying quality matched DIMMs! I was young and naive when I purchased my PC! The world was a happier place then... *Sniff* Edited by - esquilax on 9/16/2005 5:47:50 AM

    @Taw: After going through an exhausting bout of research with a buddy of mine recently (he just got back from the World of Sand, and wanted to build a super-gamer-PC)... I have come to the conclusion that dual-SLI setups are a complete waste of money.

    As I recall, two identical SLI cards only provide a 50% increase in speed (not 100%), and there also is a visible line that can be identified where the two cards meet when they each render half of a scene. They should fix that in a driver release though, but probably not for a while.

    well I´m not convinced about SLi myself, I remember back in´t old days when I had two Voodoo 2s on an SLi link, it was top of the tree but not by much and not for long. I´m holding out for a decent ATi release or if that doesnt appear I´ll go for a 7800 Ultra prob (goddam it ATi give us something!) - I hear what you´re saying Argh and generally I think along the same lines but I have built this year some schtonking SLi systems for people. awful lot of money for what you get though, innit? mis-matched RAM - *sigh* you won´t be doing that again Bunny-boy will you? all my RAM matches right down to batch numbers <img src=smilies/icon_smile.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> and my dual-processor server has exactly the same batches and steppings. Consistency &amp; Quality = stability!

    "for once, i`ll actually tell you what i was thinking; but maybe i won`t have anything to say.."

    cool to see this forum up. my own comp is home built ( I did it for the challenge, and what better way to learn about computers lol) I run it on a intel celeron half motherboard ( I know not much options for upgrade, but I didnt have much to spend at the time) 2 GHz intel celeron processor with 400 MHz bus ( yea its a bit slow but still does a good job) 1Gb of ram ( I can go up to 2Gb but alas I lack the funds <img src=smilies/icon_smile_sad.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> ) a nivida gforce fx 5500 grapichs card a sound blaster 24 bit ( with a creative 2.1 speaker system, I like the bass speaker playing freelancer lol) all this for under $1100, of cource I have a old vivitron monitor my friend let me have from his gateway 2000 comp lol, but my friend who works on and loves computers says its comparable to a $1300 comp setup so I figure I did a great job for not knowing a thing about computers when I started. what I would like to see here is some things on improveing processor prefromance without resorting to geting a new processor. Blessed Be to all those that still dream of the flight to the stars.

    Blessed Be to all those that still dream of the flight to the stars. quote " You wouldn`t like my Happy Place it is full of blood, carnage, and destruction" :ME :)

    Taw, I wish my system was nearly as fast as yours. I´m stuck with a crappy 1.7 prossesor that doesn´t even work right now. And I´m sorry I went off on you in my other topic. __________________________ 4 8 15 16 23 42 Twenty bucks to whoever can tell me what the deal is with those numbers. I´ll give you a hint: They have somthing to do with a guy named Hurley.

    __________________________ Okay, since someone who will remain nameless was offended by my last sentence, I`ve changed it. For those of you who just can`t wait, I`ve finally started a new fanfic, The Holocaust! __________________________ 4 8 15 16 23 42 Twenty bucks to whoever can tell me what the deal is with those numbers. I`ll give you a hint: They have somthing to do with a guy named Hurley. (Congrats to Taw, he was the first to get it right.)

    Those numbers refer to several different thing but I´m guessing.... Those numbers became an obsession a few months ago. They added, multiplied, divided and subtracted them. They turned each individual number into its corresponding letter of the alphabet. They tried to see if they matched anyone´s telephone number, or Global Positioning System coordinates. Someone even started a Web site: http://www.4815162342.com which posts its theories about The Numbers. Who would do stuff like this? Fans of the show ´´Lost&quot;, ABC´s drama about 14 people stranded on an island... Edited by - bakedpotato on 9/16/2005 5:57:18 PM

    Taw - I have learnt my lesson. Now it´s matched Corsair DIMMs all the way! As for ATI, the specs for the R520 look good, except that there are rumours that nV already have a better card that they intend to release if and when ATI release *their* new card. *Sigh* Housey - Have you investigated the possibility of overclocking your CPU?

    I will have to check......its been a while since I have been in my bios ( on my board I have to move a extreamly small breaker to get into bios) Blessed Be to all those that still dream of the flight to the stars.

    Blessed Be to all those that still dream of the flight to the stars. quote " You wouldn`t like my Happy Place it is full of blood, carnage, and destruction" :ME :)

    AthlonXP 2500+ (Barton core, not overclocked) with AMD-supplied heatsink/fan Asus A7N8X 1 gig DDR (2 x 512, not matched, but running in Dual Channel mode) Sapphire ATI Radeon 9600 Pro Advantage (256 meg) Using integrated motherboard sound (which isn´t half bad since the chipset is nForce2) Maxtor 160 gig and 200 gig HDs <img src=smilies/icon_smile.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> This is running XP Pro, somewhat tweaked and so on, but more with an eye to security than to performance. I just recently bought a nice 2.1 set of speakers and I´ve got to say since getting them the sound I´ve gotten out of Freelancer has been a lot more realistic feeling because of the bass from the woofer. <img src=smilies/icon_smile.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> My next upgrade won´t be for some time yet, and will be comparatively modest.. likely an Athlon64 of some kind, new motherboard, PCI-E video card, and as much of the remainder of my hardware will transport across as possible. Incidentally, I play Freelancer on my laptop as well, so here´s the specs for the Compaq R3215CA: AthlonXP 2800+ Geforce 420 Go 32 meg (dedicated, not shared) 512 megs DDR 60 gig hard drive Laptop speakers and whatever sound chipset the laptop has. <img src=smilies/icon_smile.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> Surprisingly the graphics quality isn´t too bad for the particular graphics chip and the fact that the aspect ratio is a bit distorted at 1024x768 because of the widescreen 15.4&quot; LCD. Edited by - Hahukum Konn on 9/17/2005 12:28:37 AM

    ok heres my specs...as of 9/5/05 lol <img src=smilies/icon_smile_tongue.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> AMD FX-55 CPU attatched to a MSI K8N Neo4 Sli Mobo (MS-7100-020) 4gb DDR400 Kingston RAM 2 MSI GeForceT 7800 GTX PCI-E GPU´s in SLI config. (MS-V801-010) Turbo Stream Powersupply (500W) Koolance Exos-2 Liquid Cooling System (its a decent cooling system) 21´´ LCD monitor 2 160gb HDD (i have no idea what they are <img src=smilies/icon_smile_tongue.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> ) its not the best pc in history, but hell its good enough for a few years. But msi was cool about one thing...they offer to anyone who has the socket939 an upgrade to the new dual core thinggy...the AMD Athlon XP-2 dual core <img src=smilies/icon_smile.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> I haven´t decided yet...any thoughts? &quot;To live is to die....but living is to die slowly..why waste time on trivial things just play as hard as you can&quot;

    "To live is to die....but living is to die slowly..why waste time on trivial things just play as hard as you can"

    haven´t had any feedback yet on the X2, but that sounds like q a good offer from MSi. and you´ve got 2x 7800GTX in SLi and 4gb of RAM - it may not be the <i>best </i> PC in history but it´s better than almost everybody else´s! &lt;gnashes teeth in jealousy at DS´ top-specs&gt;

    "for once, i`ll actually tell you what i was thinking; but maybe i won`t have anything to say.."

    the big reason i went so high up in the food chain with the pc is for longivity. I figure this setup will be good for about 3 or more years so i can just not spend another dime on the thing for a while and concentrate on games <img src=smilies/icon_smile_tongue.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> But yeah the MSi deal is pretty sweet...but like i said, i am reluctaant to trade up to that X2 thing....ihaev NO knowladge in the realm of Dual Core processors and also i am not even sure if it is worth the upgrade mainly because i don´t know if anything really will benifit from that CPU. BTW....Taw, what is the safe range boost the memory and the core of my 7800´s? Core Clock Speed = 430mhz Ramdacs speed = 400mhz memory (not sure if it is the clock speed) =1.2ghz 32.43gb/s mem bandwidth Also, is 8 pipes good or kinda blech....cause my old FX5500 had i think 4 pipes. ( i am GPU illiterate <img src=smilies/icon_smile_tongue.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> ) Edited by - Dark_Shadow2004 on 9/17/2005 11:36:59 AM

    "To live is to die....but living is to die slowly..why waste time on trivial things just play as hard as you can"

    if they run at 430mhz then you should be able to safely overclock them to 460-466mhz, memory you can take up about an extra 100mhz to 1.3ghz, taking the bandwidth up to 40. Those cards should be able to take that assuming you´ve got a decent cooler on each. don´t take em over about 7-9% increase and they´ll stay very stable. unless you´ve got a full Vapochill system in which case, you can crack ´em way up. however you might find that 500W psu output is the <i>minimum </i> safe requirement for the 6800GTX in a dual-SLi config, and if you´re o´cong you might want to put 600W in, just to be on the safe side. The Tawakalnistan Ministry of Pious Computer Advice takes no responsibilty if you toast your system! <img src=smilies/icon_smile.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> &lt;wants vapochill&gt;

    "for once, i`ll actually tell you what i was thinking; but maybe i won`t have anything to say.."

    Thanks for the advice. I will definately tweak my cooling systems minimum temperature to a crisp 12c insted of the 20c it is at now...(i have had it below 12c before lol) Tomorrow afternoon i will definately upgrade teh power supply for added insurance with the voracious appitite for power these little guys have ( i am assuming that over clocking raises the power consumption a bit...i am pretty mew to OC stuf) Either way, the cooling will be boosted with minor adjustments to the system and i will purchace the 600w or a larger one if the store has one <img src=smilies/icon_smile_wink.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> tomorrow. Thanks again and we´ll see what happens <img src=smilies/icon_smile.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> &quot;To live is to die....but living is to die slowly..why waste time on trivial things just play as hard as you can&quot;

    "To live is to die....but living is to die slowly..why waste time on trivial things just play as hard as you can"

    12 deg C. I hate you so much! <img src=smilies/icon_smile.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle>

    "for once, i`ll actually tell you what i was thinking; but maybe i won`t have anything to say.."

    *recovers slowly from deep faint after having read <font size=1 face="trebuchet ms"><BLOCKQUOTE><hr size=1 noshade> AMD FX-55 CPU attatched to a MSI K8N Neo4 Sli Mobo (MS-7100-020) 4gb DDR400 Kingston RAM 2 MSI GeForceT 7800 GTX PCI-E GPU´s in SLI config. (MS-V801-010) <hr size=1 noshade></BLOCKQUOTE></font><font face=´trebuchet ms, Verdana, Arial, Helvetica´ size=2> * wow - but why on earth do you even <i>consider </i> to overclock such a system ? Does your monitor have more than 1600x1200 ?

    Dark_Shadow, don´t even think of overclocking that. One card pretty much cost more than my entire system. Anywho, here´s my specs: Athlon 64 3500 (2.2 Ghz) 2000 mhz FSB 1 GB Ultra 400mhz RAM Geforce 6200 256 mb PCI-Express (soon to get a 6600 for like, $20) 200 GB Maxtor something-or-other hard drive (cost me $40) SoundBlaster Live! 24 bit Built the whole thing for $700 earlier this summer. Not too shabby, considering I have craploads of software and get paid by other people for doing something so simple as removing spyware. I once got four movie tickets (excellent seats, saw Star Wars and several other movies with the gf on them, thanks to the &quot;I´m already in the theater&quot; discount) just for installing a video card. And Esky, I have a 486 you can upgrade with. It´s only a year or so older than myself.

    [img=http://www.sloganizer.net/en/image,Eh-unl-Steve,black,lgreen.png]

    I wanted to OC the cards just to see if it really affects the preformance. BUT with these cards no game i have played yet on my system experiances ANY form of lag even on their most highest settings. So i will save the OC stuff till a few more installations of the Geforce series come out and my cards are a few releases behind lol But i did buy 600watt power supply a day ago just so that the power sonsumption was´t ever gonna be an issue so its all good... and i am not sure what the monitor is rated at for its highest resolution but i do &quot;believe&quot; is is highrer than 1600. I´ll look at it later <img src=smilies/icon_smile_tongue.gif width=15 height=15 border=0 align=middle> (i am at work right now) &quot;To live is to die....but living is to die slowly..why waste time on trivial things just play as hard as you can&quot;

    "To live is to die....but living is to die slowly..why waste time on trivial things just play as hard as you can"