Archive for the ‘Computers’ Category
My New Rig
For some reason, some people call their computer *rigs*… so I am going to tell you what’s in my new rig. 
I put together my new computer a couple of months ago, but I thought I wouldn’t blog about it until I get some benchmarks… turns out I am more lazy than I thought and have delayed until now… so I thought I would write this without benchmarks.
CPU – Intel E6420
I don’t know why spent more money to get the 6420, could have spent less to get a 6320 and get a same deal – overclock to 3GHz. Both are 4MB cache.
Motherboard – Gigabyte GA-965P-DS4
DS4 and DS3P is very similar but DS4 cost more. MSY ran out of stock and I wasn’t willing to wait…. Wasn’t prepared to step up to P35 boards as at the time, they only started to come out, I liked the more matured boards that has bug fixes fixed in revisions.
DS4 only has 1x IDE port, I was trying to reuse my IDE Optical drives and 2x IDE drives from my old computer. A normal IDE cable has 2 sockets for 2 IDE devices, but in reality, the cable wasn’t long enough for me to connect both a IDE HDD and a IDE optical drive.
Buying an extra PCI-IDE card cost money, might as well buy one more SATAII HDD and give the IDE drive to someone else.
Disk Drive – Seagate SATAII 320GB
Not much to say here – Seagate is the brand of choice for me.
Memory – OCZ 2GB-800 DDR2 Kit
Come on… you know you want it! *evil*. I am not running Vista yet.
Graphics Card – Gigabyte 320MB 8800 GTS
This one took me the longest time to decide. This card is the first card that’s coming out that supports DX10, and the price to pay is steep ($400-$500). One model down is the 8600, but if you take a look at various reviews e.g. tomshardware, you will find the 8600 is performing worse than the 7900. So the question comes down to 1). how much can you pay 2). what does DX10 entry level support mean for you. 3). your bragging rights…
After using this new computer for a while, the graphics card is the noisiest component. I have chosen other components based on low noice, except this one I have no control over.
When warranty is over, I might get a Thermalright HR03 Plus… Time will tell how noisy it will eventually get when summer comes. I might also give RivaTuner a go…
Case – Cooler Master Centurion 534 RC-534-KKN2
Good cheap case without power supply. Very good construction, fans at the front and back, plus one on the side panel for the graphics card… but I chose to not use the side fan.
Power Supply - Seasonic S12-430
This one I am proud of… it was a toss up between Seasonic and Zalman ZM460-APS. Nobody was stocking the Zalman when I was trying to gather the parts, so I went for the Seasonic. The one I got had sleeved cables and it is quiet [silentpcreview]
Case Fan – Noctua NF-S12-1200
I wanted to use my own case fan – quiet, silent and moves good amount of air to keep my case inside cool. So I used silentpcreview.com recommendation. I used the extra adapter to lower the fan speed and used the rubber thumb screws instead of metal screws for noise dampening. Look online to see how it is installed, I found it hard to install the rubber screws, but it is good once it’s in.
Mouse – Razer DeathAdder + eXactMat + Armadillo
I bought a Wireless Logitech MX110 and the charger died after less than 6 months. I didn’t have warranty on it since I bought it from HK. I hate mouse that needs recharging and/or batteries. Period. What’s more annoying than during a game, your mouse is dead!?
Off I go shopping for a wired gaming mouse. Razer came highly recommended by several internet reviews, so I gave it a go… well… at the same time, I also bought the eXactMat and Armadillo.
The mouse itself is nice, but it consumes some CPU when I was testing it on my Centrino laptop (open Task Manager and move your mouse, you will see some CPU spikes). Maybe that’s normal… but the jump is not noticeable with my other M$ Wireless IntelliMouse. The mouse itself is great, read reviews if you want to know how well it performs. I noticed some dust do get inside the mouse after awhile and is hard to clean – the gap between the when you rest your palm and the base of the mouse.
The mat itself is good and wide… but a bit too wide for my desk, so I ended up placing it sideways. I am not a hardcore gamer, so the dual surfaces doesn’t mean much to me, but I got it because I was sick of foam mats.
The armadillo is interesting, it acts as a rest for the mouse cable. The mouse cable is actually quite long, and the weight can sometimes drag and inhibit movements of the mouse. The armadillo is there to stop the dragging. It’s good in general but some times I find the cable were pushing against the armadillo when I move it up and down.
Extra cooling
I might get a Scythe Kama Bay [ocmodshop] at some stage… the basic idea is to keep air intake from the front of the case, and out the back exhaust fan (which I have a Noctua), keeping the air around graphics card and CPU cool. Will see how it goes in summer… I don’t want either the CPU heatsink fan or the graphics card fan to spin up.
Coolness
Thanks to the Rosh, I have discovered a few cooling fans that fits in the 5.25″ drive bays. These fans would occupy 3 optical drive slots, with a 120mm fan that sucks air from outside the case to inside the case – improving air flow inside the case.
I found 3 products available on the market so far:
Scythe Kama Bay
http://www.scythe-usa.com/product/acc/008/sckb1000_detail.html
SilverStone
http://www.silverstonetek.com/products/p_contents.php?pno=cfp51&area=usa
Cooler Master 4-in-3 Device Module
http://www.coolermaster.com/products/product.php?act=detail&tbcate=65&id=2542
The latter two converts 3 5.25″ drive bays into 3.25″ HDD drive bays with a 120mm fan at the front.
The Scythe Kama Bay is purely a fan with an air filter to which it can be removed and cleaned.
The question is, why can’t I just have the bracket without a fan, so I can stick a Noctua NF-S12 in there myself?
