The computer and electronics super geek thread

[myk]

Although, buying used makes a little bit of sense if you're planning on abusing the system for whatever reason, if you can get the parts for really cheap or free.

Thaaaat's not a bad point. My 775 socket system is obviously Jurassic-Park ancient and a core 2 quad is just something that would allow me to play Battlefield 3 until I squirrel enough money away to go with the I series. I dunno though-a hundred bucks is a hundred bucks and if it falls on its face...........

BTW VF, I take it you're into model rockets; I was totally into that stuff as a kid and have started it up again with a vintage Estes mini-shuttle. I love it so much though that I may not want to launch it lol...

[pfunk]

recently got a dell, i5 (newer socket) 8gig,, BOY DID THEY SKIMP ON THE MOTHERBOARD only 2 dims and no USB3,, that will be the 1st thing to be replaced

[VF-19]

Thaaaat's not a bad point. My 775 socket system is obviously Jurassic-Park ancient and a core 2 quad is just something that would allow me to play Battlefield 3 until I squirrel enough money away to go with the I series. I dunno though-a hundred bucks is a hundred bucks and if it falls on its face...........

BTW VF, I take it you're into model rockets; I was totally into that stuff as a kid and have started it up again with a vintage Estes mini-shuttle. I love it so much though that I may not want to launch it lol...

Yup. I like model rockets... However, finding big enough fields to launch them from is a little bit of a pain. That, and I'm nearby the Ottawa Aviation Museum, so I need to do a sky scan before I hit the launch button. It won't do to spear a plane with a rocket.

I'm eyeing the Saturn V that was recently re-released. Dunno if I want to get it though.

[myk]

Yup. I like model rockets... However, finding big enough fields to launch them from is a little bit of a pain. That, and I'm nearby the Ottawa Aviation Museum, so I need to do a sky scan before I hit the launch button. It won't do to spear a plane with a rocket.

I'm eyeing the Saturn V that was recently re-released. Dunno if I want to get it though.

Oh man. I was a kid in Pennsylvania when I bought my first rocket, an Estes Challenger starter set. Now, as an adult I'm pretty clueless but as a child I didn't even belong out in the free world; I built up my rocket, set it up and launched it.........off of my front porch! LOL. Now, back in the late 90's my Pennsylvanian neighborhood had a lot of space per house-I remember nothing but lots of room to play, so when my rocket wwwwwwwwWWWWOOOOOOOOSHED up it eventually popped its chute and landed in my neighbor's cornfield across the street. I don't know what Pennsylvania's like now, but I know that in San Diego there's just no damn room to walk, let alone fly a damn rocket. The small town life has its own charms...

[mikeszekely]

I don't know what Pennsylvania's like now, but I know that in San Diego there's just no damn room to walk, let alone fly a damn rocket. The small town life has its own charms...

I'd say that depends on where in PA you are. Where I live in North Huntingdon (a little east of Pittsburgh), I can jump off my roof and land... on the neighbor's roof. But in 5-10 minutes I could be in Arona, which is pretty empty. To the east is Greensburg, which is full of commercial stuff, but further east you start to head into the mountains, and it's pretty quiet and full of open spaces at least as far as Breezewood. I've never been further east than that.

[myk]

I lived in Camp Hill; although most people who I tell this to have never even heard of it, Pennsylvania residents or not lol. I miss that place though-I remember Sunday morning drives to church and seeing nothing but green land. And horses. Also, nothing beats walking down the street in Fall with the leaves having turned different colors and stuff. Winters were a blast too...SIGH...

[mikeszekely]

I lived in Camp Hill; although most people who I tell this to have never even heard of it, Pennsylvania residents or not lol. I miss that place though-I remember Sunday morning drives to church and seeing nothing but green land. And horses. Also, nothing beats walking down the street in Fall with the leaves having turned different colors and stuff. Winters were a blast too...SIGH...

I think I've heard of it... it's close to Harrisburg, right? Like I said, I've never been farther east in PA than Breezewood (because that's where you turn to start heading down to Maryland and Virginia), but I've wanted to visit that area. I also wanted to drive Rt. 30 to Gettysburg. When we went to visit relatives in Maryland, we drove Rt 30 to Breezewood instead of the Turnpike, and it was so much more scenic and relaxing. PA, especially central PA, can be a really beautiful state.

Can't say if I moved to California that I'd miss the winters, though. The roads around here are lousy enough without six inches of snow on them...

[azrael]

Gents, stick to the thread topic or take it to PM.

[jenius]

So, when will i be able to buy a motherboard with the LGA 2011 socket and PCIE-3 expansion slots? Are we still like six months out before that kind of upgrade is realistic? I hear AMD is supposed to roll out PCIE-3 video cards in Q1.

[mikeszekely]

So, when will i be able to buy a motherboard with the LGA 2011 socket and PCIE-3 expansion slots? Are we still like six months out before that kind of upgrade is realistic? I hear AMD is supposed to roll out PCIE-3 video cards in Q1.

I thought the first LGA 2011 CPU and mobos were supposed to be out by the end of the month, but I'm not sure if/when they'll have PCIE3.

Seems to me like Intel's been going through a lot of sockets lately. Everything was 775 for awhile, but this is the fourth socket for the Core-i family.

[VF-19]

Aside from forcing you to buy a new motherboard (and possibly memory) when you buy a new CPU (most of the time), is there any practical reason as to why the socket has to be changed?

Could you take a modern intel chip, and put it in a LGA 775 package, and not suffer any performance loss?

[mikeszekely]

Aside from forcing you to buy a new motherboard (and possibly memory) when you buy a new CPU (most of the time), is there any practical reason as to why the socket has to be changed?

Could you take a modern intel chip, and put it in a LGA 775 package, and not suffer any performance loss?

Could you, as in "guy buying parts off Newegg"? Nope, the pins wouldn't match. Or could you, as in an engineer, like "does the next generation of high-performance Intel chips really need a different pin configuration? Could they have got the same performance if they designed the chip to fit in the LGA 1366 socket they hope to replace?" I have no idea.

[VF-19]

I mean the engineer hypothesis.

Personally, I have a sneaky feeling that they don't really HAVE to change the socket design as frequently as they do...

[azrael]

Engineering-wise? Could be due to the on-board memory controller of later Intel chips so those pins may be needed for the northbridge to access the momory controller on the CPU. The added pins could also be for the PCIE communication. Dunno. Those would be my guesses.

Could it have been backwards compatible? It probably could have. Unless you have the pin map of the Intel chips, it's hard to say what all the pins are for.

[David Hingtgen]

Seconded. Kind of like how they changed the Super Hornet's engine mounting points by 90 degrees solely so that you couldn't put Super Hornet engines into an older Hornet for a cheap upgrade. (they were originally designed to be perfectly compatible-then they realized that'd cut into Super Hornet sales if people bought JUST the engines, so there was a last-minute change to the design)

[myk]

Bastards...

[mikeszekely]

Well, the socket 2011 chips are out today, and the reviews I've read basically say that they're more to prove that Intel's the top dog in the CPU industry and less something we actually need to go out and buy.

[CoryHolmes]

So after realizing just how old my PC is (and the fact that TOR refused to run on it) I'm debating between updating my video card/power supply or just upgrading to a new system altogether.

Star Wars: The Old Republic requires a video card that has a minimum of 256MB of on-board RAM as well as support for Shader 3.0 or better. Examples include:

• ATI X1800 or better
  
• nVidia 7800 or better
  
• Intel 4100 Integrated Graphics or better
  

Unfortunatly, trying to read up on video cards and what can do what has left me all -like and utterly confused. Can anyone reccomend a mid-cost video card that fits that criteria? Or would it just be easier to update my system wholesale?

[mikeszekely]

So after realizing just how old my PC is (and the fact that TOR refused to run on it) I'm debating between updating my video card/power supply or just upgrading to a new system altogether.

Unfortunatly, trying to read up on video cards and what can do what has left me all -like and utterly confused. Can anyone reccomend a mid-cost video card that fits that criteria? Or would it just be easier to update my system wholesale?

Technically, we'd really need to know more about your computer's specs to make an informed decision (CPU? RAM?). But those requirements are pretty paltry (in addition to my gaming PCs, it looks like I could run TOR on just about everything but my Ubuntu laptop and maybe the wife's laptop). If you're failing to meet them I'd say you're due to for a whole new box.

[myk]

Agreed, I'm almost curious to see what your system specs are. You'll most likely need to build/buy a new system as opposed to just trying to buying a new video card. Besides, sounds to me like you might still be with AGP type video card slots; I think they only make PCI-e video cards these days, someone correct me if I'm wrong...

[CoryHolmes]

My box is an HP Media, m8020n, Intel 945G Express chipset @ 2.4 GHz, 3 gigs of RAM, 1 TB harddrive (with only 250 gigs left; might need to do some deleteing...), and a GeForce 7350 LE in a PCI-Express port. 300 W power supply.

[eugimon]

yeah... just upgrade the whole rig.

[azrael]

My box is an HP Media, m8020n, Intel 945G Express chipset @ 2.4 GHz, 3 gigs of RAM, 1 TB harddrive (with only 250 gigs left; might need to do some deleteing...), and a GeForce 7350 LE in a PCI-Express port. 300 W power supply.

TOR system reqs: http://www.swtor.com/info/faq#171060

Considering this machine dates back to 2007 and we're on the heels of 2012....You're probably due for a full upgrade. Any video card upgrade would would probably need more power, so you would have to get a better power supply. The 1TB hard drive is completely salvageable if it's SATA (and I'm guessing it is), so I would reuse it. Maybe as a spare drive.

[myk]

Alright, so after years of being a naughty Windows user I've decided to go legitimate and buy a copy of Windows 7. I just wanted to know how the licensing issue works if I were to say....upgrade my hardware, replace hard drives or build an entirely new machine; am I limited in how many times I can re-install my copy of Windows, do I have to buy additional licenses, etc? I know that the "OEM" software version of Windows is tied to the motherboard it's initially installed on, for example. Thanks in advance...

[pfunk]

Replace the mother board and you have to call MS everything else is easy re key license (recently nuked a hard drive and I wanted to make sure it was keyd to the motherboard and it is). Friend of mine did the rebuilding of a system and called MS, only took like 20 minutes with them to release the license to the new motherboard (basically installed it and when it wouldn't verify, called MS)

Just to add the machine was a 6 core solid state drive,) boots right now))

Edited November 22, 2011 by pfunk

[myk]

Replace the mother board and you have to call MS everything else is easy re key license (recently nuked a hard drive and I wanted to make sure it was keyd to the motherboard and it is). Friend of mine did the rebuilding of a system and called MS, only took like 20 minutes with them to release the license to the new motherboard (basically installed it and when it wouldn't verify, called MS)

Just to add the machine was a 6 core solid state drive,) boots right now))

Hmm...was your friend using a full version of Windows or was it the OEM version? That'd be cool if MS allowed you to re-key your OS to another system using the OEM version which is half the price of the full retail version; of course, that would defeat the purpose of having different versions of the OS...

[pfunk]

Basically he built a "new" computer and stated he replaced a defective motherboard. Purchased version not preloaded

(new as in chipset, motherboard and harddrive same box)

Edited November 22, 2011 by pfunk

[BeyondTheGrave]

Hmm...was your friend using a full version of Windows or was it the OEM version? That'd be cool if MS allowed you to re-key your OS to another system using the OEM version which is half the price of the full retail version; of course, that would defeat the purpose of having different versions of the OS...

You would have to lie about the system being dead.

[myk]

You would have to lie about the system being dead.

I guess I'm just naive and don't know any better, but I'm starting to find that more people around me are using bootleg OS's. Every time I mention buying a copy of Windows people act like I just said I wanted to saw my own head off with a spoon. I dunno, I just wanted to go straight for once but $200 is a lot of coin. I mean, I can almost buy half of a 1/60 Roy-Strike for that much money...

[VF-19]

You could find a place that's selling an OEM copy of Windows 7. I paid $100 for my copy of Windows 7 home, with the purchase of a hard drive. It's exactly the same as a retail boxed copy, but you're required to buy the hard drive with it. Ask about it at the local computer shop.

[myk]

You could find a place that's selling an OEM copy of Windows 7. I paid $100 for my copy of Windows 7 home, with the purchase of a hard drive. It's exactly the same as a retail boxed copy, but you're required to buy the hard drive with it. Ask about it at the local computer shop.

True, but then I'd have to buy another copy when I change out motherboards. That sort of thing doesn't happen very often but I'd hate to have buy it again because of an upgrade. Also, I heard the OEM version requires a 2nd computer to help verify or write files or something during installation? I dunno...

[kensei]

Ok so these new 2011 chips have me interested. I was about to go out and buy the 1155 stuff, but now I'm at a crossroads.

I don't need the most expensive of the two new Intel processors if it came down to it, but both of these board feature the Intel chipset for SATA 3, which I need for max performance of my SSD. Would it be better to use the 2011 motherboards as in future they will truly allow longevity due to the ability to upgrade to CPUs with more cores and also more RAM in future? I really wanted to get a Rampage IV Extreme motherboard. If this will help me buy less in future I would like to go this route. Or should I get the 1155 stuff while it's cheap?

[VF-19]

True, but then I'd have to buy another copy when I change out motherboards. That sort of thing doesn't happen very often but I'd hate to have buy it again because of an upgrade. Also, I heard the OEM version requires a 2nd computer to help verify or write files or something during installation? I dunno...

I've been using an OEM copy of Windows 7 and I've never had any problems with switching motherboards. I'm on my 2nd motherboard with this copy. At most, I've had to re-activate Windows 7, but that was through an online reactivation. I've also never needed to use a 2nd computer either.

Since you're likely to be buying most of a new computer, you shouldn't have any problems getting an OEM copy of the OS.

[myk]

I've been using an OEM copy of Windows 7 and I've never had any problems with switching motherboards. I'm on my 2nd motherboard with this copy. At most, I've had to re-activate Windows 7, but that was through an online reactivation. I've also never needed to use a 2nd computer either.

Since you're likely to be buying most of a new computer, you shouldn't have any problems getting an OEM copy of the OS.

How did the install go? I'm assuming it's just a matter of putting in the OEM disc and booting it up, or is there more to it?

[pfunk]

Ok so these new 2011 chips have me interested. I was about to go out and buy the 1155 stuff, but now I'm at a crossroads.

I don't need the most expensive of the two new Intel processors if it came down to it, but both of these board feature the Intel chipset for SATA 3, which I need for max performance of my SSD. Would it be better to use the 2011 motherboards as in future they will truly allow longevity due to the ability to upgrade to CPUs with more cores and also more RAM in future? I really wanted to get a Rampage IV Extreme motherboard. If this will help me buy less in future I would like to go this route. Or should I get the 1155 stuff while it's cheap?

The only thing you cant use a is a 6 core processor otherwise the 1155 does the trick. If you plan to do heavy 3d rendering, then maybe wait till the 2011 comes down in price (might be a while)