The Computer with no name has passed...
 

After a vaillant struggle with old age, circuit rust, and dust my faithful computer with no name quietly passed away sometime during the night.

He leaves behind a fully functional SATA drive will all it's data intact, so he will be remembered fondly.

Please let us have a moment of silence for his cooling fans that will turn no more....

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Whew. That's over.

Now it's SHOPPING TIME!

I wanna build me a Frankenstein! ****-loads of RAM, Dual-Monitors, at least a TB of storage, VMware for windows and linux.... Ho, Ho Ho....

R-I-P for the PC with no name.

Have fun Moonie! Retail therapy and, remember, he with the most toys in the end wins the game.

How old was he? (Aren't all men's machines supposed to be chicks?)

Have fun at the electronics store :cheers:

Almost 4 years old.

Up until the end, he was quite stable and reliable. So I just assumed he was a he.

Hehe.

I wonder who here has the oldest operating computer. We have a Dell that's about 6 years old, I think, though we dont' really use it.

I highly recommend Newegg.com for shopping. When I built my TB RAID box, I spent a couple weeks shopping prices. Internet, Fry's, Microcenter. I ended up purchasing all but 2 components through Newegg.

RIP nameless. (But don't all computers have a name by default?)

I second the Newegg recommendation. I've used them quite a bit.

My Dell 8200 is still running and until I buy a new something-or-other is my PC that is currently in use. I bought it in 2000. After I replace the brakes in the car and buy a new bed to sleep on, this is next in line for replacement with a new model, notebook of some sort. I'm still on the fence, PC with Vista or covert to Mac?

I have a Compaq laptop with Windows Millennium Edition. It functions till the OS crashes (usually an hour to an hour and a half of internet use, then it starts hopping off line every 5 minutes until you restart it).

You meant operating as in "can" operate, not as in "on active duty", right?

I've had great luck with Dell (for my current and last computer) but I keep hearing these random horror stories about them.

Maybe this goes without saying, but I'll say it anyway - do not, I repeat DO NOT buy anything from a) Fry's. or b) Circuit City.

I have no problem with Fry's......as long as I never have to actually deal with anyone who works there.

Or return anything. I second (or third) newegg.

I've bought things from Fry's. Just don't count on any customer service.

But Circuit Sh*tty, that's another story. Never never never.

Which would require dealing with someone who works there (see rule #1). The caveat being cashiers of course.

I've got an Amiga 3000 thats still running, and a C64 (although I haven't used the 64 to hook up to the interwebs)

Here's a salute to your fallen friend- btw, did I mention that I just bought an Intel 6600 (G0 stepping, for good overclock/excellent tdp) quad core?

If you want a good, reliable setup, I'd recommend the following...

Q6600 G0 quad for processor

Mobo - ABit IP35V (or Pro if you can afford it- the ACBF 3.0 runs on an ABit mobo)

RAM - OCZ Gold 2GB kit

Excellent system right there- now if I can just get back on the "nice" list before Christmas.

Newegg.com is great, service is top notch- but I've recently found better deals at ClubIT.com- also ClubIT is a great place to find specific versions of things that Newegg might not carry.

Also, stay away from anything with the White Label of Death®.

Translation, please?

I have a pair of Apple //e's that still work. I pull them out from time to time for retro game night. I still love loadrunner.

NewEgg rocks.

I <3 my Dell laptop too.

Never buy a product from Fry's that has their white label on it. It is a smallish label (maybe 1-1/2" x 3") that says something to the effect that the product was returned to Fry's but checked by them to ensure that it is okay. Basically, just about everything that is returned to Fry's - even defective product and boxes with items missing - are put back on the shelf as "OK".

I have experienced this phenomenon myself (before I knew), have read about it on the web and discussed it with several people. It is not a proven fact, but there are enough documented instances to be reliable info.

I think if I had taken all the money I've spent with Newegg and used it to purchase their stock I'd be a majority shareholder by now.

So yes, I recommend them also.

However in this case I went with my local mom and pop computer store because they had all the parts I needed on hand for at close to the same price as Newegg and they warranty the entire system themselves which makes long term support a bit easier. Plus it's a funky old store with lots-o-weird stuff and it's just fun to visit.

That alone is worth paying a small premium!

And I have had great experience with New Egg as well.

Yeah, and then there are people like me who are very afraid to open up a cpu/tower/container to even dust the motherboard for fear of dislodging something. When I took the Dell 8200 for a RAM upgrade and the guy opened the case, he was shocked it was running with all the dust/cat hair that was in there. There were dust bunnies the size of armadillos in there!

So I will order from Dell or Mac or whomever for a ready out of the box when the time comes.

I build systems to order for a reasonable price, too :)

They claim they have low prices but they can be MORE expensive if you haven't done your research on the exact product you're buying. And if you need help from anyone there, forget it. They don't know what they're doing. You'll be lucky if they can point you to the correct quadrant of the store where your item will be located.

One morning I tried to buy a gift certificate at the register there along with other merchandise. The guy didn't know how to do it, kept having to go back and forth, kept asking for other people, etc. etc. I was literally standing there for 20+ minutes, as he'd bring my check card back and then ask for it again, saying the transaction had to be voided and redone, verifying my address and phone #, etc. etc. Long story short, I was so happy to get out of there I didn't realize that he still had my card when I left.

I realized this in the evening, called the store, no live person could pick up the phone, and by the time I would have arrived there it would be closed.

Went the next day. Group of people standing around, chatting behind the register counter (this is the Burbank store, by the airport, btw). I stand there, looking at them. They look at me, and keep talking. I keep standing there, finally saying "excuse me?". One of the girls makes an audible "ugggghhhhh" noise and walks over, asking "what do you want?". (Obviously, doing work interrupted her 8-hour break shift). I tell her I left my card there and needed it back. Another "ugggggggghhhh".

She looks around, comes back with the card. Says that they called my bank to cancel the card. Say WHAT?

Yes, that's right, they had my address and telephone number, they couldn't be bothered to call ME to say that I left my card there, but they called my bank and cut off my card. I pointed this out to the lady and she launches into a tirade against me about how I need to be more careful and about how dumb I was, ending in a real loud "fu** you" from me, storming out of there.

All she had to do was say "sorry for the inconvenience".

My dad had massive problems there getting them to honor a warranty he purchased on a defective television until he literally caused a scene and started screaming at them (and my dad is NOT the type to cause a scene).

More on topic, I had a Fry's bought-and-assembled computer. It was the type of computer where I had great components, but they never EVER EVER worked all at the same time. Like, you could get the floppy drive to work, but then the DVD drive would go out. You'd get the DVD drive to work, and the CD-R would die. You'd install anything software-wise and hold your breath that each DirectX update (or ANY program software, even games) wouldn't completely fry your computer, or render components of the computer inoperable. This is the computer that I literally had to kick sometimes to get it to work. I wouldn't wish that piece of crap on anyone, except maybe Nadelberg.

At least with Dell, there's a 95% chance the parts they've assembled are compatible. I had one problem with a burner once, and they sent me a new one (only one call to India that time). I lost my windows xp disc, and they sent me a new one. Besides that, no problems at all.

Out of curiosity, for those of you who dust the inside of electronics -- is there a product that's good to use? Do we just bust out a dustbuster, open up the CPU, and go to town?

Name a store where that isn't true. In any industry. If you're buying a variety of items, you will always get a better deal if you shop around and find the individual stores that specialize in each individual component. I know what Fry's is good for, I go there for that.

See rule #1

Yeah, those are crap.

Safest bet is compressed air.

Fair enough :) It's just that I usually find that Fry's DOESN'T have the lowest prices, when all is said and done.

But doesn't that just blow the dust around instead of actually removing it? Plus I'm always afraid that those things will produce moisture which will get on the circuitry.

So here we are with specs for the Son (or possibly daughter) of The PC with no name:

(Note you non-geeks might want to back out of this thread at this point...)


Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 CPU

4GB of DDR2-800 SDRAM

20x Samsung DVD Burner

2 - 750GB Segate barracuba SATA drives w/32mb cache

Asus EN8500GT PCI-Express viedo card

XP-Pro

and it all fits in a nice small/quite Shuttle PC barebones w/ Intel G33 + ICH9DH chipset

I hope you mean canned compressed air and not a shop compressor. Shop compressors do not dry the air and can spray water (unless you have an inline drier which is usually very rare in a home setup). Also, there can be a tendency to have the PSI set too high.

Yes, I meant the canned compressed air, readily available at any electronics store.

I use DustOff.

I second that. I have also tried a 3M brand version but it had something in it that made me gag. :(

Spray it on the computer :)

From that product that CoasterMatt uses, the description says:

"NOW CONTAINS A BITTERENT TO HELP DISCOURAGE INHALANT ABUSE." haha

So what about Moonliner's compy? I've never heard of that video card, but the 4GB of SDRAM is making me drool.

Don't drool on the computers - that's one of the big rules around here :D

Well, I priced a Dell Vostro laptop yesterday (lusting) and put one together with a 2.0 dual core chipset and 4Gb of RAM for just over 1200....

The video card is an Nvidia Gforce 8500 card (if that helps). It's a middle of the road graphics card that I selected becuase it is a silent/fanless version that fits well with my Shuttle PC.

Wow is that all??? I think I am gonna finish paying off the TV tho before even thinking of getting another computer.... perhaps I should just see if I have the ability to upgrade my SDRAM (I currently have 2GB).

That actually is quite nice!!! Much better than the PC I got like a year and a half ago (which only has the Nvidia Gforce 6800... and runs quite well, even on newer games like Bioshock which is very graphically intensive).

And at most office stores (Office Max, Office Depot, Staples).

Doe anyone know if there is a difference in canned air? Is the product purchased from Office Max inferior to Dustoff in a significant way?

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One other note on cleaning the insides: I have been told to NOT use a vacuum because you can run into static electricity issues which can zap components and render them DOA (assuming that you are using a standard household vacuum and not one that the copier repair people use with special static control).

You can get high huffing air? Well I expect that explains a lot of the seemingly dazed and confused people I meet daily (now if I just knew why they are always in front of me at the grocery store? )

One more thing I'd recommend for that system, Moonie- be sure to get a different heatsink/fan - the stock one on those chips can be horrible to install.

I've had great experience with the Zalman 9700LED (but certainly not anything for a Shuttle case- it looks big in my full tower case), but a heatsink/fan I've recently used for a couple builds is Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro (probably too big for Shuttle) and the one I'm using for the new Beast, the Thermaltake Max Orb.

For a Shuttle case, you might want to consider this, the Zalman CNPS8700 NT

The Shuttle inlcudes a cool little heatpipe that when combined with the (relatively) low power Duo Core e6750 means I can get away without a Zalman type cooler. Most of the time the unit will run fanless, if I start editing video or blasing zombies then a small fan on the heatpipe kicks in.

Awesome, looks like you're gonna have a fun machine.

I have no idea when I'll be able to build my new rig, but I'll have the processor in the next 2-3 days.

I'm considering wiping Vista off our new laptop and going back to XP. I need to do some experimenting with XP to see how well it works with the Vista file server (that is working out great and I have zero reason to change) I've got set up, and I may hold off until SP1 is released, but so far the few convenient bells and whistles of Vista (and there are a few that I'll miss) just aren't worth the crappy performance.

The good news is that since I've set things up so that everything is served from the file server, switching OS's on the laptop is no big deal.

Ya know, those file servers are going to catch on one of these days.

I'm still running Windows server 2003 at home. I guess I'm behind the times again.


Oh, and speaking of being behind the times... The PC with no name was one of them snazzy all-in-on PC's. So now I have to get a new monitor to boot.

Exactly when did the standard PC monitor get phased out for those idiotic wide screen models? All the stores around here carry exclusively wide screen monitors. What's up with that?

I'm still surprised it's working out as well as I had envisioned. And having gone with ultra-low power components, having it on 24 hours a day has barely put a dent in our electric bill even.

Thought about it, but I don't own a copy. So my choice was to steal a license for server 2K3 from work or *gasp* buy Vista Ultimate. I wasn't going to spring for the cost of a true server OS for my 1-node home network. For some bizarre reason I felt like doing this one on-the-level, so I went with Vista. And on that system, for that purpose, it's been ideal.

About the time game designers started designing with wide screen monitors in mind.

So, if I still have an option by the time I buy (and I go with Dell), do you think there are any serious ramifications for picking XP rather than Vista?

Oh, and Cherny, Dell is having a sale on the Vostro notebooks, I customized it to upgrade the chip and the RAM and it still came out to be a real bargain. I believe I configured the Vostro 1700. Maybe it was the 1500, I did not save it. But, it was just over 1250

The 2003 license wasn't too bad, what killed me was the Exchange enterprise license. (at one point I was hosting mail for multiple clients)


Damn gamers. There outta be a law. Shameful I say shameful!

Check with your vendor. Some are offering "XP-Downgrades" free with all Vista PC's (so you get Vista and XP). That way you can use XP for now and switch to vista later on if, for example, you happen to go completely daft.

A couple of months ago I received the "downgrade" gratis on a couple of dozen Dell PC's I purchased.

Our experience might not be representative of Vista. We've got it set up to be doing HEAVY network operations on the laptop. Plus, we sorta cheaped out and went with an AMD processor. So I can't tell you how it would run on an Intel box without having several network volumes mounted.

I don't use the file server for general computing a whole lot, but when I do, it definitely is running Vista much more efficiently than the laptop is, for whatever reason. I'm perfectly satisfied with Vista there.

Okay, this obviously comes from a biased source, but I just found an early review of SP1 beta:

So, that would be a precise list of the issues we have on our laptop. So I'll be definitely trying SP1 when it releases (actually, I have access to the beta, but no thanks).

ETA: Oh hey look, RC1 was made available publicly yesterday! That I might be willing to give a whirl.

It should boot just fine without a monitor.

Bah da *crash* :D

We've got an old PIII-500mhz machine running Ubuntu playing print server for the other computers in the house (my system dual boots Ubuntu Gutsy 64bit and Vista Home Premium 32bit) and Rose's runs Vista Home Premium. They all play together really nicely.

I say stick a fork in the PC and buy an 8-Core Mac Pro that will last you for a decade. ;)

So far, my experience with the 8 core Pro hasn't been very good.

Apple put WAAAAY too much thermal compound between the heatsink and the processors on many units, and it literally oozed out on to the motherboard.
I saw (and got to correct) the problem on a friend's system, but I wonder how many out there will be working along, and right in the middle of a big rendering project gonk out because of thermal issues? Pro system, with some seriously amateur construction issues.

I've been inside 2 other 8 core mac pros, and they had airflow issues that might not be a big deal now, but give a year or 2, and if that's what they all look like inside, I wouldn't doubt we see a bunch of Apple forums going crazy.

Interesting.

Although, I'm very anal retentive with opening my case and blasting it with an air duster at least once a month, and it sits on an elevated shelf, with all 4 sides and the top completely exposed. So, airflow might not be too much an issue on mine.

Damn you Moonliner, you've got me shopping again.

I'm eying a more reliable external hard drive. I've currently got a 300GB USB 2.0 drive. It's serviceable, but I did kinda buy it on the cheap. I have no idea what the specs are, but I'd be willing to be it's 5400rpm. It'd be nice to replace it with a 7200rpm firewire drive.

Firewire drives are awesome. :D

I'm pondering the idea of another hard drive myself, but I'd probably want an internal because I'm out of USB ports lol. I'm at that stage where I'm having to delete programs to add programs and burn porn onto DVDs.

I'm gonna git me an air duster tho next time I'm at office depot, I wanna get my ps3 dusted as well -- and I need a new printer anyway because, like clockwork, my HP Printer's paper feed mechanism died. Every two years, I swear I am buying a new printer because the old one's paper feed mechanism conks out and just starts shredding stuff. Freshly printed items look like they spent a week on Not Afraid's floor ;)

Costco has 4-packs of 'em for $10. We also use them on collectibles. Those things are lifesavers. :)

Humm... Obsessing over the specs for Son-of-no-name I wonder if anyone knows....

The motherboard has a single SATA chain with 3 connectors. The first two will go to the Segate 750GB SATA 3gb/s drives. The third will be for the Samsung SATA DVD burner that runs at the older 1.5gb/s spec.

Will having the DVD burner on the same chain drag down the speed of the drives to 1.5gb/s or can SATA deal with different speed devices on the same chain? So far Google is letting me down on this one.


EDITED TO ADD:

From this knowledgeable sounding post, it looks like I do have a problem.

If you have the option, take a look at eSATA over Firewire.

SATA controllers will address the device at the speed it supports, so it would communicate with the DVD drive at the 1.5gb/s rate and the hard drives at the full 3.0gb/s rate.

According to Wikipedia:
I did some tests with my own system, using SiSoft Sandra and Everest, and even when burning a CD, the HD (a Sata/300 160gb 7200rpm drive) performance didn't drop off during benchmarking.

YMMV :)

In other news, I've been drafted to build my first 8 core machine - of course, it won't be for my own use, but it'll be fun putting it together.

Were the burner and the hard drive on the same SATA cable? The info above does not contradict the info Moonliner posted. A SATA cable/controller may be able to handle a single device that's rated at a higher speed, but that's different than speed negotiating between multiple devices on the same link. It may not suck all the bandwidth, however it may only be able to handle a single clock rate.

Damn. Perhaps I should have stayed with the SATA DVD burner. Oh well, I have the IDE version now and I'm sure that will do.

Sata devices use individual cables, not chained cables like pata.

Smacks forhead. Oh yeah, duh.

And the knee bone connects to the thigh bone...

And you flap your arms, and your legs start kickin'
That's how you know, you're doin' the funky chicken!

You put your hard drive in
You put your hard drive out
You put your hard drive in
And you shake it all about

Moonie: If you haven't already purchased your memory, Fry's has an excellent offer right now - 4gb Patriot Extreme PC6400 DDR2 for $89 *without a rebate*

The computer with no name is back!

The base install on Son-Of-No-Name is complete. I installed the VMware so now I have The-Computer-With-No-Name running as a virtual PC inside Son-Of-No-Name (err, perhaps I better make that Daughter-Of-No-Name) :D

So now I am typing this using remote desktop from work to access a virtual PC on Daughter-of-no-name.

I'll be adding additional virtual machines for Vista and Ubuntu. Life is good.


My inner-geek is shining bright today.

That sounds cool - but what does it mean? Why would I want it too? Tell me, so that I can envy you more.

Moonie, what version of VMWare are you running?

VMware is an operating system that lets you run multiple "virtual machines" on a single computer. So he can have the equivalent of 3 (or more) different computers running the same time on the same hardware. Among other advantages, you can screw up one of the "virtual" operating systems all you want and easily revert back without effecting your main operating system at all. So, since I know Moonie hates Vista, I presume he's installing a Vista Virtual Machine for the purpose of seeing how badly he can break it without worrying about reinstalling his entire OS.

I'm so happy for you Moonie, as for me :confused:

In essence VMware is a program like Microsoft word is a program

Word lets you load and work on multiple documents

VMware lets you load and work on multiple PC's

So Daughter-Of-Computer-With-No-Name runs Windows XP. I then run the VMware application (just like starting word) and that loads an entire new PC.

As long as you have disk space and memory it all goes along swimmingly.

Workstation 6 at home, I also use ESX on work servers.

Basically. I'm hoping, as you have alluded to, that SP1 will fix up some of the issues Vista has. I also have clients that are starting to use Vista so I need a playground to work with no matter what my personal feelings about it are.

Oooh, I wanna learn how to do that! :)

Here's a fun use for virtual machines. :)

So what's everyone using for benchmarking software? I'm thinking of updating my PCmark software.

I love xkcd when it doesn't fly completely over my head :)

I use VMware for folding@home.

BTW, I'm running Vista SP1 RC1, and so far, it's eliminated an annoying lockup I had at startup (at seemingly random times), and I've gotten better results in UT3.