Contemplating my first Build

[Enoch]

Better yet. You could buy me a new computer.

 

 

There are many other computer users on this board that could use a new computer more than you could. '

 

All I have is a poor and tired Sempron. A socket 754 CPU. It is so taxed but it tries. One day its Cache is going to give out and that will be it. Oh, poor Sempron CPU, poor Socket 754 Sempron! :sad:

 

 

Just off the top of my head, Astrocreep and I are both running >2GHz P4's, with >1GB of RAM and a Radeon 9600 series video card.

I think you meant to use the "<" symbol, not the ">".

[Sand]

Just off the top of my head, Astrocreep and I are both running >2GHz P4's, with >1GB of RAM and a Radeon 9600 series video card.

 

Okay, you win.

[Deraldin]

I think you meant to use the "<" symbol, not the ">".

 

I could have sworn I did. Edited now.

[Enoch]

Update:

 

I ordered stuff last weekend, and my apartment is now full of boxes. I'm going to try to put it all together tomorrow (after I clean off the desk). I have coaxed myself into some confidence regarding the physical assembly. Now I'm most concerned about mucking around with the BIOS, which I've never done before.

 

The basics of what I've ordered: EVGA 680i mobo, e6400 core 2 duo, 320GB Seagate HD, 600W Seasonic PSU, 8800GTS (320MB), 2 GB Patriot DDR2 800 RAM, 19" Samsung widescreen LCD, a new DVD read/write drive, Vista Home Premium, and some other odds & ends. Ended up costing more than I had hoped, mostly because I have too little discipline in holding back when the 'next best option' is only $40 or $50 more. So I ended up with a system that is probably well in excess of my current needs. Hopefully, it'll pay off in longevity.

[Bokishi]

BIOS is easy just set the location of your drives and then boot from the windows cd

[Enoch]

I am now posting from my new rig. Hooray! It was a bit nerve-wracking, and I was continually afraid that I was being too casual in touching some of the components. But everything seems to be working well.

 

I had one issue with the hardware I was sent-- one of the sticks of RAM had a bent heat-spreader. For about 20% of its length, the spreader on one side is just slightly bent away from the rest of the module. I plugged it in to see if that's the only problem, and it seems to be working fine (although I haven't pushed with anything more strenuous than installing a pile of programs). I've sent an email off to the manufacturer's customer support describing the problem, so for the moment I'm going to continue to use it until I hear what they advise.

[WITHTEETH]

Post the pictures dude!!! :(

[theslug]

Widescreen? Isn't that not good for gaming?

 

other than that it sounds cool. 8800 is probably super sweet.

Edited April 1, 2007 by theslug

[Bokishi]

Widescreen? Isn't that not good for gaming?

 

It's pretty well supported now. I say go WS when getting a new monitor.

[Enoch]

... And it appears that I spoke too soon. I was messing around a bit with Oblivion (it being the most graphically-intense game I own, I wanted to see how the new rig handled it), and the machine just shut off. When I try to turn it on again, lights come on, fans spin, etc., for about 2 seconds, and then nothing. I'm guessing that this means either PSU or Mobo problems. (Anything else I should be worried about?) I have a functional PSU in my old system that I can hook in to see if that's the source of the issue, but I'm not going to try that until tomorrow at the earliest.

 

This sucks. Things were going so well, too. :'(

[Bokishi]

Shutdowns = bad psu

 

Probably your graphics card requesting more juice and the faulty psu is crapping itself.

[Enoch]

Shutdowns = bad psu

 

Probably your graphics card requesting more juice and the faulty psu is crapping itself.

That's what I'm hoping. I have a functional PSU (either 450W or 500W) in my old box. (I considered just switching it to the new one, but I decided to go all-new with a little more headroom.) So I'll try the switcheroo after work tomorrow. Assuming that works, I should have a functional machine while I wait for the replacement.

 

Of course, that doesn't mean I'll enjoy myself dealing with customer service, shipping, etc...

[Rosbjerg]

I'm thinking about this build

 

P4 650 3,4 Ghz with a NorthQ 3312 Giant UFO cooler

 

AsRock 775Dual-Vsta Motherboard

 

Kingston ValueRAM 1gb DDR II

 

and a 250 GB HDD

 

and then I'm looking for a reasonable graphics card, but I don't know if I should go for an AGP or a PCI-E card.. what the difference? (aside from their location)

 

this build costs 500$ so far.. and I'm looking for a card at around the 100-200$ price range. Any good ideas?

[WITHTEETH]

AGP Is an endangered species, PCIE has a bigger bandwidth, newer, and the standard- Get PCIE.

 

Nvidia is about to releace their 8600 cards, your probably looking at a 8600GT for $200 bucks. ATI is also going to release their new cards within the month i believe, could be wrong. ou could always wait to and look at the benchmarks.

 

 

I checked your asrock motherboard out, its PCIE slot is only good for 8X it looks like, the current standard is 16X, and it does make a difference if your going to play graphic intensive games.

 

GIGABYTE GA-965P-DS3 LGA 775 Intel P965 $122 - This one is much more expensive but the reviews have only been excellent.

[Rosbjerg]

hmm thanks Withteeth, I've been slacking on my madz computer skilz .. good to know that there is a place where I can get some sound advice!

[Enoch]

Shutdowns = bad psu

 

Probably your graphics card requesting more juice and the faulty psu is crapping itself.

That's what I'm hoping. I have a functional PSU (either 450W or 500W) in my old box. (I considered just switching it to the new one, but I decided to go all-new with a little more headroom.) So I'll try the switcheroo after work tomorrow. Assuming that works, I should have a functional machine while I wait for the replacement.

 

Of course, that doesn't mean I'll enjoy myself dealing with customer service, shipping, etc...

Okay, I pulled my new PSU out of the box, and tried hooking it to my old machine. It worked like a champ. I tried hooking my old PSU to my new computer. It did not work.

 

I also noticed that, when I push the power button and fans spin & lights flash for 2 seconds, the one exception is the GPU fan. It takes a minature lurch at power on and stops, well before anything else in the box stops working. Unfortunately, my old GPU is AGP, so I can't swap it out to test it.

 

Long story short, I think my motherboard is the problem. I poked around the EVGA forums for a while and found this thread, which tells me that this could be either a PSU or Mobo issue. I'll put a call in to EVGA customer support after dinner (they made both the mobo and the GPU), although I think the RMA has to go through newegg. Luckily, both companies are based on the west coast, so it's easy for me to reach them after work.

Edited April 2, 2007 by Enoch

[WITHTEETH]

>_<

Tech problems can be hell huh?

 

See any capacitators that look like this? ah, there could be many things wrong with your motherboard. But have you tried unplugging everything, and hooking it all back together? For instance After i was all done, and had my computer on all day, the next day i went to turn it on and... Nothing, all it was was a unfastened main power connector. You probably already checked this.

 

The best solution is always to grab your computer, one hand on the front of the case the second on the back, open the nearest window(but the second floor is recommended), and twirl a couple times to get some momentum and let her fly! hahah!! 11!1!!!

[Bokishi]

*remembers his first 8800*

[Enoch]

But have you tried unplugging everything, and hooking it all back together? For instance After i was all done, and had my computer on all day, the next day i went to turn it on and... Nothing, all it was was a unfastened main power connector. You probably already checked this.

 

The best solution is always to grab your computer, one hand on the front of the case the second on the back, open the nearest window(but the second floor is recommended), and twirl a couple times to get some momentum and let her fly! hahah!! 11!1!!!

Ha! My apartment is on the 5th floor. Although pitching it into the now-empty swimming pool below would be impressive, I'm not ready to give up just yet.

 

(And, yes, I have retried every connector I know of.)

 

I ended up putting off talking to EVGA until this evening. I find it's better if I take the frustration in small doses (accompanied by larger doses of fine imported ale).

[Enoch]

In case anybody still cares, I've figured it out (with some excellent help from EVGA customer support). It was the power supply. The key clue I had been overlooking is that the amount of time the machine actually ran when I switched it on was dependent on the number of components I had plugged in. With nothing but the 2 Mobo plugs, it would run until I switched it off. If I hooked in the video card, it died as soon as it tried to check the GPU memory. If I then added a hard drive, it died even before that point. Ergo, I and the EVGA dude became convinced that the PSU was crapping out once a particular draw level was reached.

 

My mistake earlier occurred when I tried to use my old PSU with the new machine. I neglected to hook up the dedicated GPU power line, because that PSU lacked a pci-e connection. When I tried to boot it up like that, the GPU screamed at me and I shut it off in a panic. I have since discovered that my mobo came with a dual-molex to pic-e converter. Using that, I was able to wire my old PSU in completely, and the machine booted normally.

 

I don't have a lot of trust in the old PSU (a 500W Turbolink), so I'm not going to push it with anything strenuous until the RMA on the Seasonic comes through. But it's a huge load off my mind to finally know what's causing the problem (and to know that it wasn't my incompetence).

 

 

So, in summary, EVGA Customer Support, Seasonic for sending me a short-lived PSU.