Pimp my rig thread

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Fri Mar 10, 2006 6:07 pm

  • Every techy forum has to have one of these. I'll start it off:

    Shuttle SN45G
    250W SilenX PSU
    Athlon 2400+ @ 135MHz FSB
    2x512Mb PC3200 dual channel GEiL memory
    Galaxy Geforce 6600GT AGP 128Mb (factory OC'd to 525/1050MHz)
    Seagate 160Gb 7200.7 8Mb cache EIDE HDD
    Lite-On CD-RW
    Iiyama Vision Master Pro 413 17" CRT
    Keytronics KT2001 Pro keyboard
    Logitech MX500 corded optical mouse
    Logitech SoundMan S-20 2.1 speaker set

    Windows 2000 Pro/Mandriva 2006

    At the moment the Shuttle uses an 80mm Coolermaster blue LED fan. This is because the Sunnon fan which it came with (and that Shuttle are still using) was rubbish. The CPU idles at 51C at this marginal OC. I'm going to dremel out the exhaust mesh to get better airation and will also try different fan configs to try and get better CPU and system cooling.

    I'm also intending to get rid of the Lite-On CD-RW and get an LG dual layer DVD burner. Further in future another graphics card upgrade may come. I don't see the point as yet as the only significant upgrade is a 7800GS AGP and that's £200+ here. It also suffers from all of the high end card problems like being big, loud, hot and drawing a lot of current. No doubt if theres a Geforce 9200 AGP it'll be way quicker. I can wait.

    I'll probably have replaced the whole system by then anyway but it would be nice to get it set up as a media rig so a cheap passively cooled card would be good then.
    Ed
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Fri Mar 10, 2006 8:52 pm

  • Athlon64 3200
    Radeon 9500 Pro 128mb
    Sound Blaster Live! 5.1
    160GB Seagate Barracuda
    512MB DDR400 RAM (corsair)
    Windows XP Professional x64 edition

    k.
    field hockey
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    leileilol
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Fri Mar 10, 2006 8:56 pm

  • Ive cut something out for better scrolling this thread ;)

    Windows XP SP2 Home Edition
    AMD Sempron 3100+ (1800MHz)
    448MB RAM (The other 54MB didnt count????!!! Dont know why)
    On Board (no plan what a graka)
    160 GB HD
    5MB second HD, yes 5 MB!
    Extern 500GB

    Some more details...
    Last edited by Tenn on Sat Mar 11, 2006 11:17 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Fri Mar 10, 2006 9:01 pm

  • Sry for doubble post, but the last post is too long for the database I think, its just the half of my computer listed ;)


    Anyway - anyone need more informations??
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Fri Mar 10, 2006 9:27 pm

  • Ed wrote:250W SilenX PSU


    I can't believe Your system works with that! Thats a joke isn't it???? 250W :?
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    Urmel
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Fri Mar 10, 2006 9:50 pm

  • Why not?
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Fri Mar 10, 2006 10:00 pm

Fri Mar 10, 2006 10:14 pm

  • Back 2 topic guys ;) lol
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    Tenn
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Fri Mar 10, 2006 10:19 pm

  • Urmel aus dem Eis wrote:
    Ed wrote:250W SilenX PSU


    I can't believe Your system works with that! Thats a joke isn't it???? 250W :?


    No joke. It's a Shuttle. Originally it had the 200W supply. It works perfectly fine. If you actually measure the power usage of a computer you get a lot less than the PSU's output. I would expect mine to be about 160W actually used. It is not all about power, tolerance is important. Mine gives me within +/- 0.04 V on all lines. You can't get that on most 500W supplies. The tolerance tends to get worse at the highend which is why most cheap power supplies can't actually put out their rated power reliably. Next time you're looking for a power supply don't go for the one with the big numbers, look for one with clean output instead,

    Lots of people have had Athlon 64's with highend graphics cards and multiple HDD's in a Shuttle on the same 250W.

    Never had any stability problems ever. Even when I've connected up multiple drives and extra fans for testing. Always rock solid voltages.
    Ed
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Sat Mar 11, 2006 12:39 am

  • 2.40GHz (Nexuiz PC) 2.26GHz (server) Intel Pentium 4
    .5GB RAM + 1GB swap
    ~80GB harddrive
    ATI Radeon 9100 (with free DRI drivers! - Nexuiz PC) nVidia GeForce4 MX 440 (server)
    Fedora Core 4, soon to be 5
    Got 'Nux? - GNU/Linux and other free software support.
    My little site
    idontknowctmwhatsthepointofcapitallettersorspacesorpunctuation
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    a thing
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Sat Mar 11, 2006 2:53 am

  • my work/play ;) station
    a64 2800
    512x2 kingston 400mhz cas 2
    msi 7030 mobo
    pny gf600gt /128
    2x120gm segate ncq sata cudas in stripe raid (240 gb array)
    60 gb segate udma 133 ide
    somekinda nec dvdrw
    zalman coolers @ cpu and gpu

    installing gentoo as i write this
    soon to come: xp pro, xp pro 64 (temp xp @ 60 gb drive)

    servers
    a few... linux on all o them. one slack pdc, ipcop for fw/proxy slack on dev server

    other clients. Another a64 like the one above, but single disk with just xp, ibook g4 something, compacq presario p4 1.8 ghz varios older clients.

    100 base tx sheelded network, single collision domain.

    and so on ;)
    HOF:
    <Diablo> the nex is a "game modification"
    <Diablo> quake1 never had a weapon like that.
    <Vordreller> there was no need for anything over 4GB untill Vista came along
    <Samua>]Idea: Fix it? :D
    <Samua>Lies, that only applies to other people.
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Sat Mar 11, 2006 3:00 am

Sat Mar 11, 2006 7:58 am

  • Ed wrote:7800GS AGP and that's £200+ here. It also suffers from all of the high end card problems like being big, loud, hot and drawing a lot of current. No doubt if theres a Geforce 9200 AGP it'll be way quicker. I can wait.
    I wouldn't expect to see AGP after the GF7 series.

    Anyway, my Deathmask:
    AMD Opteron 175 (Dual-Core) @ 2.625ghz w/ Zalman 9500 Cooler
    Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe w/ onboard Realtek AL850 Sound
    2GB (2x1GB) PC4000 G.Skill 3-4-4-8/1T Ram
    2x XFX 7900GT Extreme (520Mhz/1500Mhz)
    Dual Dell 2405FPW 24" Widescreen LCDs (only 1 used for gaming generally)
    2x74GB WD Raptors in Raid0 (Main OS & Games)
    400GB WD Caviar Storage
    80GB WD Caviar Linux/Vista test drive
    Lite-On CD-RW/DVD-Rom combo drive
    NEC ND3550A DVD+/-RW
    Antec SLK3000 Case with 120mm intake & outtake fans
    Rosewill 500W ATX 2.01 Power supply (120mm silent fan)
    Microsoft Internet Keyboard Pro
    Razer Diamondback mouse
    Logitech Z-640 5.1 Speakers
    Intel Pro 1000/MT Desktop NIC
    Windows XP Pro x64 (and Ubuntu 5.10 rarely used)

    *edit* And this system is nearly-silent, the video card is by far the loudest component while gaming... waiting to see how the 7900GTs do */edit*
    *another edit* 7900GTs are in and they are annoyingly loud in idle, will have to find an after-market cooling solution for them */another edit*
    Last edited by Willis on Sat Mar 18, 2006 7:08 am, edited 3 times in total.
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Sat Mar 11, 2006 8:22 am

  • I think Willis wins for the moment. :wink:

    Willis wrote:I wouldn't expect to see AGP after the GF7 series.

    I doubt they can kill it off that easily. Although the OEM and new market will dissappear, they will still be able to sell many cards to the upgrade market.

    AGP was introduced in late 97. 18 months later the TNT2 was available on PCI, I'm sure forums at the time would have been full of noobs saying "PCI is dead, I'm upgarding my whole system right now and throwing away everything else just to get AGP" as they are now for PCI-E. The TNT2 was the last high end card available on PCI, much as the 7800GS is likely to be the last highend-ish AGP card. It is also roughly 18 months after the introduction of PCI-E.

    nVIDIA then made loads of PCI Geforce 2 MX's (2000 onwards), some Geforce 4 MX's (2002 onwards) and even Geforce FX 5200/5500 PCI's from 2003. OK, none of those cards were ever high end but a Geforce FX5500 128Mb on PCI is way faster than any of the cards introduced on AGP in 1997.

    Bandwidth limitations do seem overrated. Try switching an AGP8x machine down to PCI speed and run some benchmarks. Nothing like the 16x difference in performance at all. Still managing over 50% would be expected and that's with an interface that was replaced in 1997.

    I've seen a Chinese site recently suggesting that a 7600 AGP will come in July. I would expect this to be only for the GS model as the GT would come to close to the 7800GS.
    Ed
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Sat Mar 11, 2006 9:21 am

  • The GF7 line was going to be PCI-E exclusive, but it was a bit too soon to have just 1 transitional line (GF6). The problem with AGP vs PCI-E as opposed to AGP vs PCI is that PCI-E is a universal format, so it will be better supported in systems that do not strictly have a focus on video, where AGP was a one-use-only dead-end. Even PCI-E is flawed in its design (IE, the trouble they are having getting multiple full-bandwidth lanes), but it is far better than AGP.

    No, AGP isn't dead, and bandwidth is only a part of the problem, power is the bigger issue. There will still be some low-end AGP cards, but the 7800GS is really pushing the limits in just about every way, and the Next Generation (GF8?) likely won't have a PCI or AGP solution at all.

    And btw, there are at least two other Nex players who have an equal or better system than mine, I'd be curious to see their full specs as well :)
    --Willis
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Sat Mar 11, 2006 11:06 am

  • Willis wrote:The GF7 line was going to be PCI-E exclusive

    I do wonder about this. When the 7800GTX was launched there was an official FAQ in which they said that they had no specific plans for an AGP card but that if there was a market they would make one. The HSI chip allowed them to do this and everyone knew that's what they'd do. Interestingly, nVIDIA has not launched a card with the same specs on both PCI-E and AGP other than the standard 6600. I am convinced that this is because they do not want the general public to be able to see that the AGP interface is not actually limiting performance in most cases.

    Willis wrote:The problem with AGP vs PCI-E as opposed to AGP vs PCI is that PCI-E is a universal format, so it will be better supported in systems that do not strictly have a focus on video, where AGP was a one-use-only dead-end.

    Yes, AGP is a dead end format but that doesn't mean that there isn't a market for AGP cards for upgrade. There are many posts from some very confused people who seem to think that nVIDIA doesn't want to sell AGP cards as it wants people to buy an nFORCE4. If that was the case, why would they have been selling so many PCI cards? A lot of those will have gone to people with motherboards with onboard graphics, hence to AGP slot.

    Willis wrote:There will still be some low-end AGP cards, but the 7800GS is really pushing the limits in just about every way, and the Next Generation (GF8?) likely won't have a PCI or AGP solution at all.

    The 7800GS probably pushes the power limit less than the 6800Ultra did. After all, that had 2 Molex connectors compared to the 7800GS's one. It's not really a proper high-end card but it's still the fastest AGP card. Even if there are only budget models available in future, they still will be faster than the cards that people will be replacing. It has already been said that the 7600GS will be 10-15% faster than the 6600GT, plus it's passively cooled. If an AGP versions is made, which seems fairly likely, then it would be a fantastic final upgrade for a lot of AGP systems. Not everyone has an up to date card or is looking for enormous speed, just the new features. A 7600GS would perform a lot better in modern games than a Geforce 4 Ti 4800 for instance.
    Ed
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Sat Mar 11, 2006 4:30 pm

  • Ed wrote:
    Urmel aus dem Eis wrote:
    Ed wrote:250W SilenX PSU


    I can't believe Your system works with that! Thats a joke isn't it???? 250W :?


    No joke. It's a Shuttle. Originally it had the 200W supply. It works perfectly fine. If you actually measure the power usage of a computer you get a lot less than the PSU's output. I would expect mine to be about 160W actually used. It is not all about power, tolerance is important. Mine gives me within +/- 0.04 V on all lines. You can't get that on most 500W supplies. The tolerance tends to get worse at the highend which is why most cheap power supplies can't actually put out their rated power reliably. Next time you're looking for a power supply don't go for the one with the big numbers, look for one with clean output instead,


    Well, I always thought my ENERMAX PSU 350W was a really good one. Now I'm still into hard times with the problem posted in the support/bugs "game runs perfectly - without other players", There's not so much left to try. I suggest my PSU is the problem source...

    What about the voltage in the UK? Is it still 110V ??
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Sat Mar 11, 2006 4:54 pm

  • Windows XP Pro
    Case: DTK, something old+ugly from the 9tees :)
    350W Enermax EG-365AX-VE-FMA PSU
    Athlon 2600+ w Thermal take radial cooler
    ASUS A7V8X-X
    2x Kingston 512Mb PC3200
    ASUS Geforce N6600 AGP 128MB
    Soundblaster Live player 5.1
    2x Maxtor 40GB 7.2K 8Mb HDD
    LG DVD-RW ML
    edit: Samsung Symcmaster 940B
    Cherry G81 PS/2 keyboard
    Logitech cordless klick! optical mouse (or sometimes an old cordless wheel mouse)
    Wavemaster MX Subwoofer system (old but gold!)
    Last edited by Urmel on Mon Apr 03, 2006 8:24 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Sat Mar 11, 2006 5:48 pm

  • Urmel aus dem Eis wrote:What about the voltage in the UK? Is it still 110V ??

    It's 230V 50Hz. It used to be 240V but that was changed in 1995 to bring us inline with the rest of Europe.

    I suggest my PSU is the problem source...

    If it was the PCU then you would see a drop-off in the voltage that causes the instability. If using Windows, download Speedfan (http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php) and set it logging your voltages. Start a game up, let it go down then restart and examine the log file that gets created. If the voltages go low, it's the PSU. I've heard of 12V lines going as low as 10.5V.

    Speedfan will also log temperatures (and fan speeds) so you could tell if it's an overheating problem too in the same way.

    For Linux there are a multitude of logging programs, you'll need lmsensors on a 2.6 kernel.
    Ed
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Sun Mar 12, 2006 11:42 am

  • Hey Ed that sounds really nice :D

    I'll be able to check my PC tomorrow evening, mean while I'll check the tool w my girlfriend's PC.

    Great help, I love You!
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    Urmel
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Sun Mar 12, 2006 8:31 pm

  • OS: Ubuntu 5.10, Ubuntu 6.04, Fedora Core 4, Gentoo 2006.0 (I mostly use Ubuntu 5.10, the rest are just for experimenting with new stuff)
    Mobo: ASUS P4C800 E-Deluxe, northbridge cooled by Zalman N32BK
    CPU: Intel Pentium 4 Xeon Foster, 3,2GHz @ 3,8GHz, cooled by Zalman 7700Cu
    Graphics card: Leadtek Geforce A6600GT TDH, GPU 500Mhz@ 630Mhz, ram 900Mhz@ 1100Mhz, cooled by Revoltec VGA freezer
    Memory: 1024mb DDR400, unoverclocked (shame on me)
    HDD: Maxtor 6L300R0, 300GB, 7200RPM
    Case: AeroCool Jetmaster Silver (air sucked in by one 120mm fan and one 80mm fan, pumped out by two 90mm fans, all completely silenced)

    Idle CPU temp: ~50C
    100% CPU temp after 30 minutes: ~65C

    Mobo temp: average around 30C, generally never goes above 50C

    Graphics card temp: Idle around 50C, max up to 80C
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Sun Mar 12, 2006 11:34 pm

  • K.. The only comp that makes sense to post here would be the one I play with.. so:

    Nexuz silent tower with 400W PS
    Asus A8V Deluxe mobo
    Athlon64 3200+
    2x512MB RAM (I think.. if its not 2x1G)
    Asus N6600 (GForce 6600 128MB) (silent)
    200G Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 PATA Drive.. i dont like SATA
    In addition to the on-board SoundCard I have a SB Live! Gold 2.0
    HardSID Quattro PCI http://www.hardsid.com/

    Total running noise: 14dB

    The stupid BIOS disabled the on-board soundcard when i added the HardSID, wich is not very good for gaming :) so i added the SB.

    http://www.apario.org/bilder/index.php?gallery=%2Fgalleries%2Fcomputers%2Fwolverine
    the spice extend life!
    the spice expand conciousness!
    the spice is vital to space travel!
    sooooo.. tell me what you want, waht you really-really want
    I will proceed directly to the intravenous injection of hard drugs, please.
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Mon Mar 13, 2006 5:41 am

  • Some stuff that's outside of the rig, but is still worth mentioning:

    SAMSUNG SyncMaster 204Ts, 1600x1200@65Hz
    Creative Labs P380 sound system (2 satelites+subwoofer)
    Logitech MX1000 mouse
    ~10 years old IBM keyboard
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    pol pot
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Mon Mar 13, 2006 8:25 am

  • pol pot wrote:~10 years old IBM keyboard


    Oh, isit the one with tha sound like "pling pling pling" when typing ??? :)
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    Urmel
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Mon Mar 13, 2006 9:56 am

  • Urmel aus dem Eis wrote:Oh, isit the one with tha sound like "pling pling pling" when typing ??? :)


    That would be a buckling-spring keyboard, which it's rather unfortunate that they are now massivly under-produced.
    --Willis
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Tue Mar 14, 2006 6:20 am

  • Urmel aus dem Eis wrote:
    pol pot wrote:~10 years old IBM keyboard


    Oh, isit the one with tha sound like "pling pling pling" when typing ??? :)


    No, the one that goes "tap tap tap" (think knocking on a wooden table with your index finger)

    Also, it's so old that the signs on the buttons have mostly washed out (the letters and other buttons I use commonly) that I had to write them again with a marker :lol:
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    pol pot
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Tue Mar 14, 2006 6:47 pm

  • My keys are laser etched. It'll take many decades of tying to wear away that much plastic.
    Ed
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Tue Mar 14, 2006 7:20 pm

  • Ed wrote:My keys are laser etched. It'll take many decades of tying to wear away that much plastic.


    Yeah well, in my case, the guy who owned that keyboard before me was typing stuff atleast 6 hours a day( minus weekends and an occasional holiday), for six years. And I mean typing heavily, like a constant 3-4 keys per second.
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Thu Mar 16, 2006 2:38 am

  • Shuttle SN45GV3
    Barton 2500+@3300+
    2*512 CAS 2.5
    6600GT
    120Go Seagate
    NEC ND2500A
    IBM Keyboard year 1991 :shock:
    dway
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Fri Mar 17, 2006 9:54 pm

  • cpu 3.2 (no clocking) ghz intel p4 mobility w 1024kb cach..
    512mb ram
    some bad radion mobility card...
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