If the weight of your heatsink doesnât provide enough undue stress on your CPU for your tastes, you can always try compiling Firefox, Thunderbird, Xorg, and a few Linux kernels all at the same time. Remember, if it doesnât smell like somethingâs burning, youâre not doing it right!
yes itâs true building your own pc is better than buying one. but the problem for me is, iâm using a laptop⌠for sudden i thought of building my own laptop. previous night i made a surgery on my laptop try to understand the thing inside⌠but it useless⌠hahahahaâŚ
anyway, your entry inspire me to try work on my lappieâŚthanks
Hey now, the geek squad do a good service to old women everywhere⌠they allow them to look at their chest high pants and crotch high socks⌠$99 isnât to defrag⌠is the entertainment cost
Itâs amazing how many people are still intimidated when faced with the option to build their own computer. Ultimately, though, itâs not a âcheaperâ alternative for the everyday user anymore. Itâs definitely satisfying to me, though.
Re: comments about that HS. Does anyone have any references to the Scythe causing any CPU problems? Iâve thought about grabbing a pair for my box since I saw them in another of Jeffâs posts (possibly regarding quiet PCs).
Jeff: Iâm glad your cat could lend a paw. I canât wait for my fiancee to move out with the cats; they find a way to help you do everything better. Walking is much easier with a cat between your feet.
Like Simon though Iâm a bit confused with your dual 8600gts cards when a single 8800gts card is equivalent in performance to both of those, cheaper, takes less power, and possibly quieter.
OhâŚyou explain in a comment from that post by Scott Hanselman that you link to (also has the component list) that the two graphics cards are for 4 monitors. Makes a bit more sense, at least as much sense as having 4 monitors can make.
In reply to the comment by Adam above, I have a similar heatsink on the digital audio workstation I built. They work ridiculously well - I put the processor plate on my hand after taking the heatsink out of the box and felt like I was getting frostbite. In the PC, the processor idles at around 80 degrees, and even under full load the AMD dual core 5200 I have in this machine doesnât go much above 110 degrees. Thatâs Fahrenheit. I put a 120mm fan set to low speed on top of the heatsink when I built it just for some extra security, but it would probably do nearly as well without it.
The disadvantages to them are that they add considerable weight and are kind of a pain to bolt on. At least on Asus AMD boards the motherboard fan control system only works with the stock heatsink and fan, but with one of these things you wonât need it. Oh, and make sure your case is big enough! Mine is mounted inside a 4 unit rackmount server case, so there are no problems, but there might be space issues with some of the slimmer tower cases.
Dual monitors is nice, but whereâs the center? Right in the middle where the border between the two monitors is? With three monitors, thereâs a real center.
Iâll agree that four is pushing it, but thereâs a legitimate argument to be made for three monitors. (Says the guy who uses 3 monitor rigs at home and at work. Biased? Me? No.)
Yeah, I was also wondering about the two graphics cards⌠The hard drive choice seemed a tiny bit curious too, wouldnât it have been better to go for 2x 250gb (or more!) SATA drives and run them in a mirror RAID configuration for ultra high access speeds?
I also do zero gaming, so one of the great decisions I made was to purchase a motherboard that supported two monitors onboard, with todays processor speeds, etc the need for a dedicated graphics card is becoming less of a problem for your average programmer and even designers who arenât into 3D.
Mine seems to run everything quite nicely, even compiz fusion (beryl) runs smoothly and with no lag.
wouldnât it have been better to go for 2x 250gb (or more!) SATA drives and run them in a mirror RAID configuration for ultra high access speeds?
Mirror (RAID-1) doesnât improve performance. Perhaps you were thinking of striping (RAID-0)? Striping does not perform as well as most people think it does, plus it doubles your chance of data loss:
In general RAID [on the desktop] is a lot of complexity for dubious benefit. The only exception is mirroring for redundancy.
with todays processor speeds, etc the need for a dedicated graphics card is becoming less of a problem for your average programmer and even designers who arenât into 3D.
Even the crappiest, cheapest discrete video card crushes the latest onboard video. And CPUs replacing GPUs? Forget about it. Not for another decade at least.
Unless youâre on a laptop there is absolutely no reason to settle for the severe limitations of onboard video. Just pick up an entry level card, like the ATI X1550/X1650, or the NVIDIA 8400/8500.
Pretty nice article. Although along the years I got quite familiar with building PCs, your review of the used hardware is interesting.
I must still confess that I somehow hate you for it, cause now I feel that I canât hold much longer before to change my CPU cooling device, my case and my PSU. And you know the drill, while Iâll be at it Iâll for sure need new CPU, therefore new motherboard⌠And getting that close, buying a whole new computer would allow me to rotate my computers (secondary comp as server/sandbox, main as secondary, and server/sandbox in the closet).
Oh by the way, anyone got advice on how to get the 3d card(s) cool enough while gaming and silent? 3d cards fans I bought so far are pretty noisy, and not cooling all that much (I usually use a Zalman VF700-AlCu, but I live in a pretty warm area at times).
you might also dispel the rumor that building your own machine is more affordable. Well, there is one case where it can be.
IF you have a Fryâs close by, you can wait for an older motherboard/cpu/case sale. Sometimes these go for $100-200. Then use an old monitor, video card and ram. You MAY be able to build a pc for the price of a comparable off the shelf dell on sale ($350-450 w/ flat screen monitor).
Actually that is a little harsh, you could probably buy a new video card or flat-screen monitor or ram and still stay under price.
Oh, the other exception is if you are interested in having the absolute best performance for the next 6 months regardless of price. Of course YOU think YOU will NEED that performance, but trust me and everyone who has gone through the cycle a few timesâYAGNI.
After 6 months, of course, youâll have an average PC that runs really hot, uses a lot of power and is difficult to upgrade since bleeding edge components are often based on technologies that go out of styleâlike the video bus of the dayâI must have seen 8 different standards for high-throughput video buses so far. Oh, and itâll probably be drawing near the max comfortable amount from your power supply anyway.
I used to work for a small PC building company back when build-your-own computers were worth while. The computers were 8086/8 and 286 based. Since the 386, going to a custom building company or building your own just isnât worth it.
However, you should absolutely not be afraid to replace a componentâa t least video cards, hard disks and ram.