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My new build...kinda geeky

binary visions

The voice of reason
Jun 13, 2002
22,092
1,132
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On an unrelated note, this is about the coolest thing I've ever seen:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16821104104

I had no idea such devices existed and I've got one shipping to my house. I was planning on going without a floppy but as it turns out, Giga-Byte's windows based BIOS flasher is not particularly reliable so I'm switching back to the floppy based method.

Floppy drives seem like such a waste of space now, but this incorporates a card reader into it. What a great idea!

I don't know about the longevity of it, as there seems to be sporadic complaints of them failing, but for $25.00 I'm willing to take a chance. Someone should get a pat on the back for dreaming up this little dealie.
 

ftlrider

Monkey
Oct 30, 2003
111
0
Spokane
yeah, my next machine will definitely be a Dual-core Athlon64 (when they're affordable). Right now I have a Mobile Athlon XP 2400 (yeh its outdated) thats overclocked to 2.2 GHz. Highest I got it was 2.4GHz. Did you guys try raising the vcore that much? Its best to stay close to stock voltage, I've noticed the temps skyrocket when you start raising the vcore past default. My RAM timings are 2-3-3-11. If the last number is too low it can have a negative effect on performance. I haven't overclocked my 9800 Pro yet, I might be tempted to when the next generation of games come out.
 

binary visions

The voice of reason
Jun 13, 2002
22,092
1,132
NC
ftlrider said:
Did you guys try raising the vcore that much? Its best to stay close to stock voltage, I've noticed the temps skyrocket when you start raising the vcore past default.
I bumped it up .025v to ensure stability. My system runs very cool (the more reading I do, the more I find that these 3000+ Winchester cores tend to run cool), so there doesn't seem to be a problem.
My RAM timings are 2-3-3-11. If the last number is too low it can have a negative effect on performance.
Hmm... Those are latency timings. Higher latency is always bad. Why do you say it can have a negative impact on performance? I'm not completely up to speed on the nuances of the RAM timings (just a basic understanding); do you have a reference or a link to back that up?
I haven't overclocked my 9800 Pro yet, I might be tempted to when the next generation of games come out.
I'm getting 60+ (typically hovers around 65) FPS in Doom3 with 1280x960 and high quality settings. I haven't tried turning the hardware anti aliasing on yet, I'm sure I'll get to that one of these days just for giggles.

I would love one of those new 7800GTX cards, though :drool:. Anandtech benchmarked it running Doom 3 at 62fps, 2048x1536 resolution, and 4x AA turned on.

On a side note, Doom 3 is sweet! id Software definitly wrote a winner. Scary, great sound effects, graphics are phenominal, and it even has something of a story line to tie the pieces together - something all previous id games have been lacking. I like the video disks and voice messages you can get on your PDA, they add a little bit of flavor. The first time you see one of the huge dog creatues is probably the best character entrance in a video game I've seen.

I, of course, warped to the last level to be amused at the return of the Cyberdemon. It was amusing but I almost wish they had come up with something new and more creative.
 

ftlrider

Monkey
Oct 30, 2003
111
0
Spokane
Some hardcore overclockers use 11 for the tRAS. But it doesn't have to be that high. It just has to be >= tRCD + CAS + 2. You can see why if you read
http://www.ocfaq.com/article.php/overclocking/63

I never got into Doom 3 all the way. I was running 1024x768 at Medium Quality.
Half-life 2 is more my style. Driving the boat through the canals was awesome. I'm looking forward to playing Battlefield 2 and F.E.A.R.
FEAR is supposed to push even the mighty 7800 GTX. That card costs more than what I paid for my whole computer. :(
 

binary visions

The voice of reason
Jun 13, 2002
22,092
1,132
NC
ftlrider said:
Some hardcore overclockers use 11 for the tRAS. But it doesn't have to be that high. It just has to be >= tRCD + CAS + 2. You can see why if you read
http://www.ocfaq.com/article.php/overclocking/63
Thanks. I needed to poke around a bit, since the link in that article is dead. Here's the real information:
http://www.mushkin.com/doc/techSupport/papers/latency.asp

Scroll down to "What is tRAS and why is it backwards and important at the same time?"

I never got into Doom 3 all the way. I was running 1024x768 at Medium Quality.
Graphically, Doom 3 is phenominal. The physics module is a little unrealistic like all of id Software's games, but I like it like that. Things move a little too fast, you can jump a little too high, rockets blow up a little too much, etc. I've always liked id's physics over, say, Halo.

FEAR is supposed to push even the mighty 7800 GTX. That card costs more than what I paid for my whole computer. :(
Mine, too. :dead:
 

biggins

Rump Junkie
May 18, 2003
7,173
9
yeah well i have a 4 year old compaq laptop with windows xp pro service pack 1, an external purple colored cd burner and a card i have to put in the side to hook up my cable modem. i also have a super dope optical mouse with a wire that plugs into the back of my computer and a speaker from an old gateway.


i have never been so excruciatingly lost in a thread on ridemonkey in my entire life.
 

Pau11y

Turbo Monkey
biggins said:
yeah well i have a 4 year old compaq laptop with windows xp pro service pack 1, an external purple colored cd burner and a card i have to put in the side to hook up my cable modem. i also have a super dope optical mouse with a wire that plugs into the back of my computer and a speaker from an old gateway.


i have never been so excruciatingly lost in a thread on ridemonkey in my entire life.

LOL! You were warned in the title of this thread... :dancing:
 

ftlrider

Monkey
Oct 30, 2003
111
0
Spokane
biggins said:
yeah well i have a 4 year old compaq laptop with windows xp pro service pack 1, an external purple colored cd burner and a card i have to put in the side to hook up my cable modem. i also have a super dope optical mouse with a wire that plugs into the back of my computer and a speaker from an old gateway.


i have never been so excruciatingly lost in a thread on ridemonkey in my entire life.
If you're not a computer geek then its a good idea to stay away from this thread so you don't risk becoming one :D

In some games I like unrealistic Physics, like Unreal Tournament, but I love the Physics in Half Life 2. Having more interaction with the world is great, picking up saw blades or other objects and shooting them at zombies is lots of fun.
 

binary visions

The voice of reason
Jun 13, 2002
22,092
1,132
NC
Well, you've gotta love a gun that will turn any movable object around you into a weapon :D

I received my card reader/floppy drive last night. OEM packaging, so it was just the drive in a bag, but I got it all hooked up in no time and it appears to be a decent piece of hardware. Cards fit in nice and snug, data transfer rates are good. It's funny, the spring in the eject device is so strong you can fire the card out of the drive 3-4 ft.

I also bought a copy of Unreal Tournament since it was a paltry $10.
 

binary visions

The voice of reason
Jun 13, 2002
22,092
1,132
NC
Pau11y said:
The Og in the deathmatch mode is really fun. I've played Q2 online w/ 0g enable and it was a complete hoot! I've gotta get back into some online plays, maybe Q3 :D
I used to play deathmatch in the original Quake's Ziggurat Vertigo. Grenade launchers are so much fun :D - they just fly straight like slow rockets except they bounce off walls and ceilings.

Hey, anyone else here used to play Qtest with their friends? That was friggin' revolutionary. Was Quake actually the first game based on polygons or simply the first mainstream one? Even if the grenade launcher did look like a cardboard tube...
 

Pau11y

Turbo Monkey
I think Quake was based off of Doom, but not 100% on that. I played Quake for a bit too back in the day of the Voodoo II SLI cards. But to play it online and have it smooth, you'd go to the basic colors (256 at 480x640). I'm hoping w/ the current crop of cards, Q3 can be played smoothly at 16 bit and 1024x1280. I like pretty pictures :D
 

binary visions

The voice of reason
Jun 13, 2002
22,092
1,132
NC
Pau11y said:
I think Quake was based off of Doom, but not 100% on that. I played Quake for a bit too back in the day of the Voodoo II SLI cards. But to play it online and have it smooth, you'd go to the basic colors (256 at 480x640). I'm hoping w/ the current crop of cards, Q3 can be played smoothly at 16 bit and 1024x1280. I like pretty pictures :D
Nope, Quake wasn't even remotely based off of Doom, actually. Doom was a sprite-based 2D game, Quake was an entirely new engine - new phyiscs, new models, new everything. Sorta like saying that the latest 3D zombie shooter at the arcade is based off Duck Hunt ;)
 

gigapower

Monkey
Jul 10, 2005
160
0
Tulsa, OK
Quake originally was ment to be this huge departure from DOOM, for instance you were to only have one weapon, "thor's hammer", and pretty much all the game was to be melee combat, but thankfully id realized that Quake wasn't turning out to be fun like that so they went back to make it a shooter.

Paully, by Stargate I think you are talking about Defender 2? If so you could go two different ways with that, the shump or the space combat. For shump your best bet is in the emulation scene, now for space combat there are some gems out there and they are cheap as most of them are old, Freespace, Freespace 2, Starlancer, and even Freelancer was pretty good.