Early Morning Coffee

The gaming machine needs mass configuration of wiring. The power supply is modular so only the needed cables are included inside the case. It's amazing how there is still a rat's nest of wiring everywhere. It's just that I've enjoyed using it and have not reopened it to clear up the mess. I will. Pictures will be made and posted. Meanwhile, here are some of the component parts:


This computer includes a dual core Opteron 180. Yes the heat sink does look like that and it is massive. Since this machine is approaching a year of evolution the 939 socket set has been superceded by the AM2. I don't care. This processor is perfectly happy with its MSI motherboard. It is manually clocked to run factory shipped speeds and that suits me fine. It replaced an earlier Athlon 3500 which did a great job, but was single core. This CPU will run Guild Wars and multitasks just fine. As with most games Guild Wars is a processor pig and the Opteron hums at about half load compared to the previous 3500. Having 3 gigs of memory doesn't hurt either.

What more can I say about the Antec 900 case? It is SWEET! There are six case fans in this build, 5 120mm and 1 200mm. They all have 3 speeds and are presently set on the lowest speed. The cooling is awesome. Does it make a lot of noise? No. It sits on top of the desk and purrs. The 500W power supply (power supplies are optional for this case) is designed to fit this case and sits on the bottom instead of the top. It is more than ample to run the components. There is a DVD/RW loaded in a front bay. I opted not to use a floppy for this build.

The latest addition to this machine is the PNY 8600GT 512mb video card. It comes from the factory overclocked to 576mb. It replaced two XFX 7600GT 256mb cards set to SLI mode. I have had two of them fail in less than a month. XFX has nice support people, but two failures in such a short period of time made me look elsewhere. So far, so good. The PNY card was a great buy and will support DirectX 10. The 7600GT series will support up to DirectX 9. When going for a new PCIe video card stick with the GDDR3 memory instead of DDR2. You won't regret it. Even in non SLI mode this new card blows the previous SLI configuration away. Now to save coinage for the second PNY 8600GT and return to SLI mode. This video card requires no extra power input and has been reported to work comfortably with 300W power supplies.

I've owned this 22" Viewsonic monitor for almost a year. It is still a current model and can be found at local retailers. Read the reviews. This unit is awesome. I run most settings somewhere around half and it is cool, crisp, vivid, easy on the eyes and huge! Lotta' bang for the buck here. Advice for LAN party goers; save the box. It makes for easy transport. This is no doubt the best monitor ever resident at the beach house. Of course it does not compare in size to Red Dragon's 37" screenzilla, but is a nice size for my use and pocketbook. If you are shopping for a new monitor definitely get the LCD flat panel. There are many consumer models available at different prices. Be sure and shop. Your better value may not be at Wally World. Then again it just might reside there. Don't forget office supply retailers. They have great specials during the holiday season.

Two Seagate 160 gig SATA hard drives are installed. They are RAID and striped. Supposedly, this gives more speed and combines the drives total storage space. Some folks agree, some don't. Anyway, this configuration is simple and installs in minutes. It has been in use for some time and I've had no problems. I do back up critical data to the server so a disk failure is an easy recovery. Here is the most important info in this post: BACK UP YOUR DATA! Get external hard drives, use a jump drive, burn it to CD or DVD, use a PC dedicated to backup, mirror your drives, just be sure and do back ups!

Not being a man of wealth and fame, this combination of equipment has been a labor of love and patience. There's a bucket that fills with change on occasion that is cashed in and it has helped move this project along. Advice from many of my cohorts has helped me with decisions and it is pleasing to be so close to completing this machine. Yes, guess there is a bit of bragging today and yes, I know there are wayyyy more powerful machines around. I am just glad to have this particular one. Enjoy Sunday!

"The system of nature, of which man is a part, tends to be self-balancing, self-adjusting, self-cleansing. Not so with technology."
~Schumacher