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Username?
Green-Pilgrim
Age/Occupation/Location?
35/Warehouse Supervisor/Medway, Kent in the UK
How long have you been a member of Guru3D forums?
Sept'03
What did you first come here for?
Driver issue for my old MX440 and advice on the TI4200.
What do you mainly use the system for?
Games(online mostly)/photo editing/surfing the net.
How much did you spend on the rig?
£1170 approx -- bargain really for the componets used. Best 2 buys were the CPU at £140 off Ebay & the mobo which I got as a B-grade item (to me it looked brand new boxed etc) from Overclockers.co.uk for £60. Biggest buy was the gfx card at £352 brand-new.
How often do you update/buy a new rig?
This is my 3rd rig I've built since Feb'03. Then I was worried about sticking in an extra 256MB RAM and breaking what was a brand new PC! Now 2 and a bit years later I've got 3 complete rigs built from scatch!
What components are used?
- CPU skt 478 3.4ghz(Northwood core)@ 3.89(v-vore at 1.6v)
- Abit IC7-Max3 Mobo
- HIS X800-XT-PE gfx card
- 1GB of 3500 rev.3 OCZ ram (timings 2.5-3-3-8 @ 2.8v)
- Tagan 480w whisper-quiet PSU
- Plextor 712a DVD-RW
- Sony DVD ROM
- 1x 74 gb WD Raptor HD
- 1x 80gb Samsung HD
- Audigy 2 soundcard
- ASUS Star-ice HSF
- Extra 120mm case fan, lights, case badges etc
- Antec P160 case.
Why ATI or NVIDIA, why Intel/AMD?
When building this rig I had a budget with OC'ing in mind and went for the Intel CPU because of the overclocking potential especially with the P4c CPU which runs cooler then the skt 775 with video encoding in mind too. ATI for the graphics card because of the HIS model which is fitted with the Artic Cooler as standard and I think ATI cards give better graphics textures and picture quality and it has VIVO as well with the benefit of running very quietly.
Does the system work as expected?
Yes, it actually surpassed my expectations with a 3d2001se score of 25941. The previous rig I built had an FX53 CPU and a 6800 GT @ 400/1100 and that scored just over a 600 points more (enclosed the score if people are interested) and I paid £600 for the FX53 in Oct '04 and for that this time round I bought the CPU, gfx card and mobo with £50 change, and in real world terms the difference in scores doesnt mean anything.
What's the best part of your rig?
The case! Because of the temperatures! 25c inside the case and the CPU idles at 35c going to a max of 50c when encoding video. 2x 120mm fans fitted and where the Star-Ice is fitted the heat from the CPU is blown straight out of the case. A brilliant build design by ANTEC. For me the CPU HSF position is perfect and allows such a good overclock of the CPU.
What sucks and should not have been bought?
To be honest, nothing. I did a lot of reseach on all the products I bought, i.e. compatibility, price v performance etc. But what was a pain was fitting the Star-Ice HSF - very difficult due to the lack of room around the power supply of the mobo because of the extra cooling fan and plastic covering Abit used next to the CPU mount. But the outcome was worth it. For an air cooled system the temps I think are great. Good buy.
Modified cases/video cards/other? Did you do it yourself? Walk us through it.
I did have the hard disk badge custom built from a guy on Ebay who specializes in case badges and is always welcoming new ideas for badges. I asked him to design me a Raptor/Western Digital badge and I was very pleased with the result. The other major thing I did to improve airflow was to use simple white electrical tape and enclose as best as I can all the leads inside the case and create a blue/white colour scheme. At night when the leds are on, the white tape reflects the light around the case to good effect.
3DMark scores?
3d2001se: http://service.futuremark.com/compare?2k1=8529004
3d2003: http://service.futuremark.com/compare?2k3=4036633
3d2005: http://service.futuremark.com/compare?3dm05=926233
Future upgrades?
TFT monitor. I currently use an iiyama 19' MasterPro CRT. Also want a second Raptor to create a RAID array. When I win the lottery I'll get a Pentium extreme dual core SLI based system!
