My machine is DEAD

[LastChanceHotel]

God damn it.

I suspect my motherboard has gone south...

Won't POST, power button doesn't work, machine turns on all by itself. No heat at all.

Thank god it's all still inside warranty... I shall try testing and then RMA-ing my motherboard.

But really - damn.

I am pretty sure it's my reluctance to upgrade my power supply that got me. It started squealing...

Time to upgrade I think. :(

Does anybody want any of the following components?


1x BFG 7800GT 256MB PCI-E x16
1x DFI NF4 Ultra-D motherboard (this will probably be brand spanking new, as it'll be from the RMA)
1x 1GB pair GEiL Ultra-X Nforce4 edition DDR PC3200 RAM. Clocks to 245Mhz at 2-3-2-5, or 235 at 2-2-2-5.
1x SI-120 heatsink
1x AMD Opteron 146 - Clocks comfortably to 2.8GHz, rock solid at stock volts at 2.75GHz (see old overclocking thread for more)
1x Antec case (you've probably seen it at the LAN - side window, silver, chieftec dragon-y looking front)

[LastChanceHotel]

Now, the question is... Should I bother upgrading to Core 2 duo and 8800 goodness, or stick with my currently pretty-good system?

Current System:

2.8Ghz single core Athlon 64 (with double the normal amount of cache, as it's an Opteron)
7800GT PCI-E graphics card
1GB GEiL RAM, 2-5-2-2 @ 235Mhz
DFI Ultra-D Nforce4 motherboard (can be modded to SLI)
Twin 200GB WD Caviars in raid 0

Current 3dmark score: 6881 (unclocked), 8363 (clocked) - 3dmark05

Prospective new system:

Intel Core 2 Duo E6600
Asus Striker Extreme nForce 680 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit
BFG GeForce 8800 GTS 640MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express)
£1,059.80 inc VAT (Excluding power supply)
A similarly specced benchmark machine got 12,213 3dmarks unclocked, and 14,845 clocked (3dmark05 again)

Let's break that down a second...

For the £1,059.80 inc VAT it'll cost (Excluding power supply), I gain 6482 3dmarks, assuming I clock the nuts off it, and 5332 3dmarks if I leave it as stock (comparing like for like).

Should I in fact bother at all?

Should I just RMA my motherboard, and use the oppurtunity to put everything into my dinky little Amstrad case? (I just checked, the mobo fits nicely)

In fact, can anyone think of something better to drop a grand on, or less? Like... a 24" 1920 x 1200, 1000:1 Contrast Ratio, 6ms response time, 450 cd/m2 widescreen monitor, at £693.24 inc VAT?

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-009-DE

Hell, how about a car?

Great, now I'm getting ideas :(

LastChance

[Strings]

Invest it!

But yeh, I'd just fix your old rig and dangle on until Vista/DX10 etc is established.

[Fyndir]

Current 3dmark score: 6881

Mine's about the same.

I still prefer 3DMark03 though, it gives me higher numbers. =P

[Phizz]

I'll take the AMD off your hands if it fits in where my ancient P4 sits.

[LastChanceHotel]

Speaking of which, I have two 2.8ghz *multiplier unlocked* Intel P4s sitting around. Would you be interested in one of these, Phizz? I'm told they do 3.6 comfortably.

I also have four Xeon 2.8ghz, 800FSB with 1MB cache. Anybody interested? I could do with the money :)

LastChance

[Phizz]

If you're offering it for free yeah as well as help with set up. Otherwise I'm skint. :-(

[DAve]

I also have four Xeon 2.8ghz, 800FSB with 1MB cache. Anybody interested? I could do with the money
What happened to the idea of using them as a games server?

I'm sure ebay would take them if no-one else will ;)

[LastChanceHotel]

What happened to the idea of using them as a games server?
When the committee can afford a quad processor board, I'd imagine. I was either going to keep the Xeons or the P4s for the club.

The P4s are more likely to be used (simpler, £30 motherboards, etc)

LastChance

[DAve]

When the committee can afford a quad processor board, I'd imagine.
What about selling 2* Xenons and buying a dual motherboard to house?

I'm not entirely sure what the quad/dual mobos cost though :D

[LastChanceHotel]

Quads cost about £80 more than doubles - and considering duals cost upwards of £150 I'm not sure if there's any point in "only going half way".

Anyhow, I'm RMA'ing my motherboard tomorrow, and hopefully will recieve a nice shiny new one!

If not, I'll pick up an identical one on Fleabay for £50. eh, this motherboard depreciated fast...

LastChance

[CaNNoN_FoDDa]

Anyone know anywhere i can get a list of windows XP blue-screen error messages and what they mean (for free)?

[Bluepixie]

Not sure were you'd find that. What's happening exactly?

[CaNNoN_FoDDa]

I had a probelm previously that i thought was something to do with the interaction of the Nvidia chipset drivers and SATA drivers (or the computer shutting down too quickly) that caused parts of my system32 folder to be deleted on shutdown resulting in me having to reinstall windows.

It happened again last week, but when i try to do a system repair or installation by booting from the xp disk, it blue-screens and garbles something about ntfs.sys. The error number isn't on the windows support site, and apparently i'm not entitled to free support. Guy on the phone seemed to think i had a pirate copy (which it isnt, just slightly dodgy).

If i try to boot the OS (in any mode) it goes into a boot cycle and when i select safe mode with command prompt (and get the list of functions loading) it fails while trying to load a347bus.sys.

I suspect it may be fucked.


Gonna try installing windows on an IDE drive and connecting my current SATA drive as additional storage to recover my documents. Just need to buy a drive.

[Sid]

Anyone know anywhere i can get a list of windows XP blue-screen error messages and what they mean (for free)?

Just google the error code.

[CaNNoN_FoDDa]

Thought i tried that, but clearly not. Ta for the reminder, my stoopid.