Slashdot Mirror

Right, I'm a sexually frustrated 15 year old because I've pointed out flaws in someones understanding. I hope you enjoy your troll mod.

CAN you play every game that ever came out for 360 without hardware upgrades? Do you HAVE TO upgrade your 360 in order to run (not play - run) the latest 360 games?

A bit irrelevant. When it comes time for updates, whether it be bug patches or content update, you're going to need that hard drive. Maybe you don't want updates? That's fine.

Assemble a "gaming PC" for ANY of those prices

People do it all the time. Hell, my old gaming PC can still max out L4D's settings. It has an X2 4800, 2GB DDR400 RAM, and a 7950GT. It's old by today's standards and can run games well into the future. But I'm sure you'll go on some long winded rant about Crysis, a game that is the exception, horribly developed, and certainly isn't the rule, right? Because no gaming PC can handle that game at max settings.

But wait, you guys on the consoles can't even change your graphical settings. So when a game is horribly designed and you get frame rate issues, there's not a whole lot you can do.

However I'll bite.
CPU - 99$
Motherboard - 55$
RAM - 38$
GPU - $150
Case (with PSU) - $50
HDD - $80
DVD Burner - 23$
Mouse - $10
Keyboard - 7$

Total Cost: $512

For the OS, they can easily install Linux and use Wine. You don't need an uber leet box to make sure you can play games at max settings next year, or even the year after.

The CPU is fine. Not top end, but it can hold it's own. The GPU is more powerful than a 3870, which can still max out every recent game so far, except for the exceptions (which none can max out). And 4GB of RAM will last a very long time.

I could have went cheaper on the Case, which would take out $14. I could have went with a 4670 with 1GB of RAM, which would take another $50 off. And that PC would still run games at max settings a year from now. That new price would be $448. More expensive than the 360 at launch by $50, but with greater backwards compatibility and room to do actual upgrades that mean something.

Let us for a moment live in an imaginary world where people play HD console games on old 15" TVs.

But people do. It may not be their old 15" TV, but those TV's probably don't have HD capabilities. Monitors inherently have it. A left over 19" monitor would be very acceptable.

Naturally... we are talking about GAMES games. Not your mom's solitaire or flash games, or some poor freeware game.

You are truly narrow minded. Those are still games. Would you toss Audiosurf into that mix as well? A game but really isn't a "game"? It's fun, it's cheap, and it can run without beastly hardware. How about any other awesome indie game?

Excuse me? Which game is that? The one that does not work with 100+ key controller and an additional 2+ keyed pointer device?

I don't know what you're smoking. I never said no game on the PC worked with that. I was just merely stating some genre's aren't going to be played with the optimal input devices with a mouse and keyboard. That doesn't make it any less doable.

Right, I'm a sexually frustrated 15 year old because I've pointed out flaws in someones understanding. I hope you enjoy your troll mod.

CAN you play every game that ever came out for 360 without hardware upgrades? Do you HAVE TO upgrade your 360 in order to run (not play - run) the latest 360 games?

A bit irrelevant. When it comes time for updates, whether it be bug patches or content update, you're going to need that hard drive. Maybe you don't want updates? That's fine.

Assemble a "gaming PC" for ANY of those prices

People do it all the time. Hell, my old gaming PC can still max out L4D's settings. It has an X2 4800, 2GB DDR400 RAM, and a 7950GT. It's old by today's standards and can run games well into the future. But I'm sure you'll go on some long winded rant about Crysis, a game that is the exception, horribly developed, and certainly isn't the rule, right? Because no gaming PC can handle that game at max settings.

But wait, you guys on the consoles can't even change your graphical settings. So when a game is horribly designed and you get frame rate issues, there's not a whole lot you can do.

However I'll bite.
CPU - 99$
Motherboard - 55$
RAM - 38$
GPU - $150
Case (with PSU) - $50
HDD - $80
DVD Burner - 23$
Mouse - $10
Keyboard - 7$

Total Cost: $512

For the OS, they can easily install Linux and use Wine. You don't need an uber leet box to make sure you can play games at max settings next year, or even the year after.

The CPU is fine. Not top end, but it can hold it's own. The GPU is more powerful than a 3870, which can still max out every recent game so far, except for the exceptions (which none can max out). And 4GB of RAM will last a very long time.

I could have went cheaper on the Case, which would take out $14. I could have went with a 4670 with 1GB of RAM, which would take another $50 off. And that PC would still run games at max settings a year from now. That new price would be $448. More expensive than the 360 at launch by $50, but with greater backwards compatibility and room to do actual upgrades that mean something.

Let us for a moment live in an imaginary world where people play HD console games on old 15" TVs.

But people do. It may not be their old 15" TV, but those TV's probably don't have HD capabilities. Monitors inherently have it. A left over 19" monitor would be very acceptable.

Naturally... we are talking about GAMES games. Not your mom's solitaire or flash games, or some poor freeware game.

You are truly narrow minded. Those are still games. Would you toss Audiosurf into that mix as well? A game but really isn't a "game"? It's fun, it's cheap, and it can run without beastly hardware. How about any other awesome indie game?

Excuse me? Which game is that? The one that does not work with 100+ key controller and an additional 2+ keyed pointer device?

I don't know what you're smoking. I never said no game on the PC worked with that. I was just merely stating some genre's aren't going to be played with the optimal input devices with a mouse and keyboard. That doesn't make it any less doable.

Right, I'm a sexually frustrated 15 year old because I've pointed out flaws in someones understanding. I hope you enjoy your troll mod.

CAN you play every game that ever came out for 360 without hardware upgrades? Do you HAVE TO upgrade your 360 in order to run (not play - run) the latest 360 games?

A bit irrelevant. When it comes time for updates, whether it be bug patches or content update, you're going to need that hard drive. Maybe you don't want updates? That's fine.

Assemble a "gaming PC" for ANY of those prices

People do it all the time. Hell, my old gaming PC can still max out L4D's settings. It has an X2 4800, 2GB DDR400 RAM, and a 7950GT. It's old by today's standards and can run games well into the future. But I'm sure you'll go on some long winded rant about Crysis, a game that is the exception, horribly developed, and certainly isn't the rule, right? Because no gaming PC can handle that game at max settings.

But wait, you guys on the consoles can't even change your graphical settings. So when a game is horribly designed and you get frame rate issues, there's not a whole lot you can do.

However I'll bite.
CPU - 99$
Motherboard - 55$
RAM - 38$
GPU - $150
Case (with PSU) - $50
HDD - $80
DVD Burner - 23$
Mouse - $10
Keyboard - 7$

Total Cost: $512

For the OS, they can easily install Linux and use Wine. You don't need an uber leet box to make sure you can play games at max settings next year, or even the year after.

The CPU is fine. Not top end, but it can hold it's own. The GPU is more powerful than a 3870, which can still max out every recent game so far, except for the exceptions (which none can max out). And 4GB of RAM will last a very long time.

I could have went cheaper on the Case, which would take out $14. I could have went with a 4670 with 1GB of RAM, which would take another $50 off. And that PC would still run games at max settings a year from now. That new price would be $448. More expensive than the 360 at launch by $50, but with greater backwards compatibility and room to do actual upgrades that mean something.

Let us for a moment live in an imaginary world where people play HD console games on old 15" TVs.

But people do. It may not be their old 15" TV, but those TV's probably don't have HD capabilities. Monitors inherently have it. A left over 19" monitor would be very acceptable.

Naturally... we are talking about GAMES games. Not your mom's solitaire or flash games, or some poor freeware game.

You are truly narrow minded. Those are still games. Would you toss Audiosurf into that mix as well? A game but really isn't a "game"? It's fun, it's cheap, and it can run without beastly hardware. How about any other awesome indie game?

Excuse me? Which game is that? The one that does not work with 100+ key controller and an additional 2+ keyed pointer device?

I don't know what you're smoking. I never said no game on the PC worked with that. I was just merely stating some genre's aren't going to be played with the optimal input devices with a mouse and keyboard. That doesn't make it any less doable.

Right, I'm a sexually frustrated 15 year old because I've pointed out flaws in someones understanding. I hope you enjoy your troll mod.

CAN you play every game that ever came out for 360 without hardware upgrades? Do you HAVE TO upgrade your 360 in order to run (not play - run) the latest 360 games?

A bit irrelevant. When it comes time for updates, whether it be bug patches or content update, you're going to need that hard drive. Maybe you don't want updates? That's fine.

Assemble a "gaming PC" for ANY of those prices

People do it all the time. Hell, my old gaming PC can still max out L4D's settings. It has an X2 4800, 2GB DDR400 RAM, and a 7950GT. It's old by today's standards and can run games well into the future. But I'm sure you'll go on some long winded rant about Crysis, a game that is the exception, horribly developed, and certainly isn't the rule, right? Because no gaming PC can handle that game at max settings.

But wait, you guys on the consoles can't even change your graphical settings. So when a game is horribly designed and you get frame rate issues, there's not a whole lot you can do.

However I'll bite.
CPU - 99$
Motherboard - 55$
RAM - 38$
GPU - $150
Case (with PSU) - $50
HDD - $80
DVD Burner - 23$
Mouse - $10
Keyboard - 7$

Total Cost: $512

For the OS, they can easily install Linux and use Wine. You don't need an uber leet box to make sure you can play games at max settings next year, or even the year after.

The CPU is fine. Not top end, but it can hold it's own. The GPU is more powerful than a 3870, which can still max out every recent game so far, except for the exceptions (which none can max out). And 4GB of RAM will last a very long time.

I could have went cheaper on the Case, which would take out $14. I could have went with a 4670 with 1GB of RAM, which would take another $50 off. And that PC would still run games at max settings a year from now. That new price would be $448. More expensive than the 360 at launch by $50, but with greater backwards compatibility and room to do actual upgrades that mean something.

Let us for a moment live in an imaginary world where people play HD console games on old 15" TVs.

But people do. It may not be their old 15" TV, but those TV's probably don't have HD capabilities. Monitors inherently have it. A left over 19" monitor would be very acceptable.

Naturally... we are talking about GAMES games. Not your mom's solitaire or flash games, or some poor freeware game.

You are truly narrow minded. Those are still games. Would you toss Audiosurf into that mix as well? A game but really isn't a "game"? It's fun, it's cheap, and it can run without beastly hardware. How about any other awesome indie game?

Excuse me? Which game is that? The one that does not work with 100+ key controller and an additional 2+ keyed pointer device?

I don't know what you're smoking. I never said no game on the PC worked with that. I was just merely stating some genre's aren't going to be played with the optimal input devices with a mouse and keyboard. That doesn't make it any less doable.

Right, I'm a sexually frustrated 15 year old because I've pointed out flaws in someones understanding. I hope you enjoy your troll mod.

CAN you play every game that ever came out for 360 without hardware upgrades? Do you HAVE TO upgrade your 360 in order to run (not play - run) the latest 360 games?

A bit irrelevant. When it comes time for updates, whether it be bug patches or content update, you're going to need that hard drive. Maybe you don't want updates? That's fine.

Assemble a "gaming PC" for ANY of those prices

People do it all the time. Hell, my old gaming PC can still max out L4D's settings. It has an X2 4800, 2GB DDR400 RAM, and a 7950GT. It's old by today's standards and can run games well into the future. But I'm sure you'll go on some long winded rant about Crysis, a game that is the exception, horribly developed, and certainly isn't the rule, right? Because no gaming PC can handle that game at max settings.

But wait, you guys on the consoles can't even change your graphical settings. So when a game is horribly designed and you get frame rate issues, there's not a whole lot you can do.

However I'll bite.
CPU - 99$
Motherboard - 55$
RAM - 38$
GPU - $150
Case (with PSU) - $50
HDD - $80
DVD Burner - 23$
Mouse - $10
Keyboard - 7$

Total Cost: $512

For the OS, they can easily install Linux and use Wine. You don't need an uber leet box to make sure you can play games at max settings next year, or even the year after.

The CPU is fine. Not top end, but it can hold it's own. The GPU is more powerful than a 3870, which can still max out every recent game so far, except for the exceptions (which none can max out). And 4GB of RAM will last a very long time.

I could have went cheaper on the Case, which would take out $14. I could have went with a 4670 with 1GB of RAM, which would take another $50 off. And that PC would still run games at max settings a year from now. That new price would be $448. More expensive than the 360 at launch by $50, but with greater backwards compatibility and room to do actual upgrades that mean something.

Let us for a moment live in an imaginary world where people play HD console games on old 15" TVs.

But people do. It may not be their old 15" TV, but those TV's probably don't have HD capabilities. Monitors inherently have it. A left over 19" monitor would be very acceptable.

Naturally... we are talking about GAMES games. Not your mom's solitaire or flash games, or some poor freeware game.

You are truly narrow minded. Those are still games. Would you toss Audiosurf into that mix as well? A game but really isn't a "game"? It's fun, it's cheap, and it can run without beastly hardware. How about any other awesome indie game?

Excuse me? Which game is that? The one that does not work with 100+ key controller and an additional 2+ keyed pointer device?

I don't know what you're smoking. I never said no game on the PC worked with that. I was just merely stating some genre's aren't going to be played with the optimal input devices with a mouse and keyboard. That doesn't make it any less doable.

Right, I'm a sexually frustrated 15 year old because I've pointed out flaws in someones understanding. I hope you enjoy your troll mod.

CAN you play every game that ever came out for 360 without hardware upgrades? Do you HAVE TO upgrade your 360 in order to run (not play - run) the latest 360 games?

A bit irrelevant. When it comes time for updates, whether it be bug patches or content update, you're going to need that hard drive. Maybe you don't want updates? That's fine.

Assemble a "gaming PC" for ANY of those prices

People do it all the time. Hell, my old gaming PC can still max out L4D's settings. It has an X2 4800, 2GB DDR400 RAM, and a 7950GT. It's old by today's standards and can run games well into the future. But I'm sure you'll go on some long winded rant about Crysis, a game that is the exception, horribly developed, and certainly isn't the rule, right? Because no gaming PC can handle that game at max settings.

But wait, you guys on the consoles can't even change your graphical settings. So when a game is horribly designed and you get frame rate issues, there's not a whole lot you can do.

However I'll bite.
CPU - 99$
Motherboard - 55$
RAM - 38$
GPU - $150
Case (with PSU) - $50
HDD - $80
DVD Burner - 23$
Mouse - $10
Keyboard - 7$

Total Cost: $512

For the OS, they can easily install Linux and use Wine. You don't need an uber leet box to make sure you can play games at max settings next year, or even the year after.

The CPU is fine. Not top end, but it can hold it's own. The GPU is more powerful than a 3870, which can still max out every recent game so far, except for the exceptions (which none can max out). And 4GB of RAM will last a very long time.

I could have went cheaper on the Case, which would take out $14. I could have went with a 4670 with 1GB of RAM, which would take another $50 off. And that PC would still run games at max settings a year from now. That new price would be $448. More expensive than the 360 at launch by $50, but with greater backwards compatibility and room to do actual upgrades that mean something.

Let us for a moment live in an imaginary world where people play HD console games on old 15" TVs.

But people do. It may not be their old 15" TV, but those TV's probably don't have HD capabilities. Monitors inherently have it. A left over 19" monitor would be very acceptable.

Naturally... we are talking about GAMES games. Not your mom's solitaire or flash games, or some poor freeware game.

You are truly narrow minded. Those are still games. Would you toss Audiosurf into that mix as well? A game but really isn't a "game"? It's fun, it's cheap, and it can run without beastly hardware. How about any other awesome indie game?

Excuse me? Which game is that? The one that does not work with 100+ key controller and an additional 2+ keyed pointer device?

I don't know what you're smoking. I never said no game on the PC worked with that. I was just merely stating some genre's aren't going to be played with the optimal input devices with a mouse and keyboard. That doesn't make it any less doable.

Right, I'm a sexually frustrated 15 year old because I've pointed out flaws in someones understanding. I hope you enjoy your troll mod.

CAN you play every game that ever came out for 360 without hardware upgrades? Do you HAVE TO upgrade your 360 in order to run (not play - run) the latest 360 games?

A bit irrelevant. When it comes time for updates, whether it be bug patches or content update, you're going to need that hard drive. Maybe you don't want updates? That's fine.

Assemble a "gaming PC" for ANY of those prices

People do it all the time. Hell, my old gaming PC can still max out L4D's settings. It has an X2 4800, 2GB DDR400 RAM, and a 7950GT. It's old by today's standards and can run games well into the future. But I'm sure you'll go on some long winded rant about Crysis, a game that is the exception, horribly developed, and certainly isn't the rule, right? Because no gaming PC can handle that game at max settings.

But wait, you guys on the consoles can't even change your graphical settings. So when a game is horribly designed and you get frame rate issues, there's not a whole lot you can do.

However I'll bite.
CPU - 99$
Motherboard - 55$
RAM - 38$
GPU - $150
Case (with PSU) - $50
HDD - $80
DVD Burner - 23$
Mouse - $10
Keyboard - 7$

Total Cost: $512

For the OS, they can easily install Linux and use Wine. You don't need an uber leet box to make sure you can play games at max settings next year, or even the year after.

The CPU is fine. Not top end, but it can hold it's own. The GPU is more powerful than a 3870, which can still max out every recent game so far, except for the exceptions (which none can max out). And 4GB of RAM will last a very long time.

I could have went cheaper on the Case, which would take out $14. I could have went with a 4670 with 1GB of RAM, which would take another $50 off. And that PC would still run games at max settings a year from now. That new price would be $448. More expensive than the 360 at launch by $50, but with greater backwards compatibility and room to do actual upgrades that mean something.

Let us for a moment live in an imaginary world where people play HD console games on old 15" TVs.

But people do. It may not be their old 15" TV, but those TV's probably don't have HD capabilities. Monitors inherently have it. A left over 19" monitor would be very acceptable.

Naturally... we are talking about GAMES games. Not your mom's solitaire or flash games, or some poor freeware game.

You are truly narrow minded. Those are still games. Would you toss Audiosurf into that mix as well? A game but really isn't a "game"? It's fun, it's cheap, and it can run without beastly hardware. How about any other awesome indie game?

Excuse me? Which game is that? The one that does not work with 100+ key controller and an additional 2+ keyed pointer device?

I don't know what you're smoking. I never said no game on the PC worked with that. I was just merely stating some genre's aren't going to be played with the optimal input devices with a mouse and keyboard. That doesn't make it any less doable.

Like this? http://www.ocztechnology.com/products/flash_drives/ocz_throttle_esata_flash_drive http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227390&Tpk=N82E16820227390 It's about twice the cost of most USB flash drives the same size and it still requires a USB connection to power the device on most computers. You get to carry around a cable to use it... Awesome!

If only such a thing existed.

Hot-swapping of SATA works just fine (at least for me).

There are some SATA controllers that specifically report the attached drives as being "removable", and these are easiest to work with, since any modern OS will optimize for removal.

I have a cheap add-in SATA card where the drives don't show up as removable, and all I do is make sure I manually flush the disk buffers (using "sync" from SysInternals) before removing it. I have the drives for this card hooked up using this Kingwin hotswap bay and have had no issues whatsoever in Windows 2003 Server.

Hot-swapping of SATA works just fine (at least for me).

There are some SATA controllers that specifically report the attached drives as being "removable", and these are easiest to work with, since any modern OS will optimize for removal.

I have a cheap add-in SATA card where the drives don't show up as removable, and all I do is make sure I manually flush the disk buffers (using "sync" from SysInternals) before removing it. I have the drives for this card hooked up using this Kingwin hotswap bay and have had no issues whatsoever in Windows 2003 Server.

Something with South bridge 750, so ether a 790GX or one of the newer 790FX/SB750 mobos, the earlier models had SB600, and don't overclock as well and lack a few features that SB750 added like Advanced Clock Control. I'm personally looking at this Asus http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131339 , though the DFI 790FX/SB750 also looks good. The Gigabyte DS4 seems to have mixed results though, while AMD used it for their demos to get the Phenom 2 to 6.2Ghz on LN2 others have had trouble with it in over volting stability, Which is kind of important since if I remember right AMD said that the Phenom 2 is rated safe to overvolt by them up to 1.55v. Most of the overclocking forums are already geared up in anticipation, if you plan on clocking it, take a look http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=591256 Here's to hoping I can afford to build out an all new box for Phenom 2 4-4.5Ghz on water, 8Gb of DDR2 1066 or better and an HD4870 1Gb, maybe one of those nice new XFX made black PCB ones, and see if I can get that up to 860Mhz Core/4.8Ghz ram on the water as well. Hello HD video editing, gaming and running 6 OSs in VMware at the same time without slowdowns.

If you are just wanting to use it as a router/torrent box maybe you might want to look at this? Atom CPU, gigabit ethernet, dual SATA 300(so you can have plenty of room for torrents), has a CF slot in case you want to run the OS from SSD.

If that one doesn't tickle your fancy they have many of the little router sized boxes to choose from. And since it is using desktop parts it will be cheaper if you decide you need more space later.

If you are just wanting to use it as a router/torrent box maybe you might want to look at this? Atom CPU, gigabit ethernet, dual SATA 300(so you can have plenty of room for torrents), has a CF slot in case you want to run the OS from SSD.

If that one doesn't tickle your fancy they have many of the little router sized boxes to choose from. And since it is using desktop parts it will be cheaper if you decide you need more space later.

If you do your research, you'll see that:

a) It's based on an improved 260 core design (not 280 as indicated by the memory bit width), so it is for gaming (and work)
b) It's MSRP'd at $500, and currently available for $500ish ( http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130439 )
c) What is your source that it'll only use 10% of the available resources?

I find your conclusions laughable at best.

The problem seems to be that many video cards ship with inadequate cooling systems. At least that's been my experience. Back in the day, custom cooling solutions were pretty much reserved for those doing serious overclocking. Now cooling requirements have gone up, but manufacturers generally use the bare minimum, such that the GPU doesn't overheat as soon as it's powered up, and nothing more.

I've only got a 7900GTX, but after having it replaced once, and then getting more jaggies, slowdown, and stuttering, I decided to check the core temperature. I don't remember the number but it was quite high. I shelled out for a Zalman VF1000, and installation was fairly straightforward. After a brief heart-stopping moment when my PC wouldn't boot (I had negelected to reconnect the PCI-E 6 pin power connector), I got the system powered up, and found that all of my issues had been resolved.

Note also that if you live in a dusty environment (especially if you're a smoker), your fan/heatsink will need to be cleaned regularly. Dust is a good insulator, and will wreak havoc with your cooling if not removed.

I didn't say anything "didn't exist", and you linked to DDR3 which is completely different. This is what I was talking about. Or maybe this, for the american consumers. $33.99 and free shipping seems like a pretty sweet deal. You can get ram with even lower latency for the same price, but it'll be a lower rated speed.

I've never had problems with OCZ. I've built 4 different systems in the last year, all using OCZ RAM. They all run perfectly. My personal comp even has the memory overclocked by about 30%. Haven't had any issues at all.

I agree that the article missed lots of easy performance boosts. RAM is so cheap, they definitely should have maxed out the board. As far as the hard drive goes, they should have added a RAID controller card with 128 megabytes of on-board cache along with a bunch of 1.5 GB hard drives in RAID configuration. Multiple screens is the credited response. At the very least, they could drive a Dell 30" Ultrasharp and two 24" screens on the side.

Skip the wear leveling fs and just buy a 2.5" SSD. The cf card + adapter will yield slower performance and capacity compared to a cheap 2.5" SSD.

and why exactly would a linux admin of equal skill get more done? greater l33tness factor or something?

This is always the counterargument, but it is consistently true. I'm guessing it's got to do with Linux being easier to admin, particularly easier to script, but I don't know a lot about Windows admin.

windows typically utilises standard gui management tools. linux admin's typically utilise cryptic scripts that take even experienced admin's an hours to decypher.

That might be part of the above point on efficiency, then. If you're not scripting repetitive admin tasks, you're Doing It Wrong. And by doing it right, you free up some time to actually document what you do -- which is important no matter how many GUI tools you use.

Now, if you are scripting things, there's not really a difference here -- on Linux, you've got standard commandline management tools; on Windows, they're standard GUI management tools. Do you script that GUI? If so, I'll bet your scripts are even more cryptic and fragile than the worst Linux admin script. If not, you're wasting a lot of time on repetitive bullshit you shouldn't have to do.

well, i can pick up the phone and have MS tell me exactly what my volume license costs me and what i get with it. can you do the same with linux?

No, MS doesn't do Linux.

But seriously, yes, I can call Canonical, or I can call Redhat, or even Novell. Or, I can do the support in-house, if needed. Or I can hire a contractor and get vague estimates.

Point is, there's a choice. If you're doing Windows, you pick up the phone and call MS, full stop. If there's something the OS doesn't do that you want it to do (even a simple security hole), you call MS and grovel, or you pay through the nose for "Shared Source" and someone to code it, assuming the parts you want are even available that way.

why is it moronic? if you lose network connectivity what do you intend on doing? serial terminal?

Why not? Plug it into a neighboring machine, and hook that up to the network. Much faster than doing the same with a capture card of some sort.

If it's unbootable, pull the hard drive, put it in another machine.

you may as well have a video card since you can't buy a mobo without one these days.

Doesn't have to be bare metal -- what about a virtual machine?

Supposing it is bare metal, you apparently weren't looking. Why should I have to buy a video card on top of that?

and why exactly would a linux admin of equal skill get more done? greater l33tness factor or something?

This is always the counterargument, but it is consistently true. I'm guessing it's got to do with Linux being easier to admin, particularly easier to script, but I don't know a lot about Windows admin.

windows typically utilises standard gui management tools. linux admin's typically utilise cryptic scripts that take even experienced admin's an hours to decypher.

That might be part of the above point on efficiency, then. If you're not scripting repetitive admin tasks, you're Doing It Wrong. And by doing it right, you free up some time to actually document what you do -- which is important no matter how many GUI tools you use.

Now, if you are scripting things, there's not really a difference here -- on Linux, you've got standard commandline management tools; on Windows, they're standard GUI management tools. Do you script that GUI? If so, I'll bet your scripts are even more cryptic and fragile than the worst Linux admin script. If not, you're wasting a lot of time on repetitive bullshit you shouldn't have to do.

well, i can pick up the phone and have MS tell me exactly what my volume license costs me and what i get with it. can you do the same with linux?

No, MS doesn't do Linux.

But seriously, yes, I can call Canonical, or I can call Redhat, or even Novell. Or, I can do the support in-house, if needed. Or I can hire a contractor and get vague estimates.

Point is, there's a choice. If you're doing Windows, you pick up the phone and call MS, full stop. If there's something the OS doesn't do that you want it to do (even a simple security hole), you call MS and grovel, or you pay through the nose for "Shared Source" and someone to code it, assuming the parts you want are even available that way.

why is it moronic? if you lose network connectivity what do you intend on doing? serial terminal?

Why not? Plug it into a neighboring machine, and hook that up to the network. Much faster than doing the same with a capture card of some sort.

If it's unbootable, pull the hard drive, put it in another machine.

you may as well have a video card since you can't buy a mobo without one these days.

Doesn't have to be bare metal -- what about a virtual machine?

Supposing it is bare metal, you apparently weren't looking. Why should I have to buy a video card on top of that?

Even accepting your price that's a cost of about 12.7 cents per gigabyte and you can get 800GB native LTO-4 tapes for about $50, which comes out to about 6.3 cents per gigabyte.

You're conveniently ignoring the cost of the tape drive. The cheapest LTO-4 drive on Newegg is $2230. That makes a tape backup solution much more expensive per TB than hard drives, at least until you have a *lot* of tapes.

Agreed. I loooooooove my Saitek. Had a solid feel to it, and it is nice and slim. I hate keyboards with a crapload of multimedia buttons on them.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16823175104

AMD offer very competitive bang for the buck these days. Even better (as far as I'm concerned) they have excellent bang per watt.

I have bought nVidia exclusively since my Riva 128, until I recently bought my son a low-end AMD card (4650). I was very impressed with its performance and low power consumption compared to what nVidia were offering.

The only issue I had was lack of Linux 3D support, but this was fixed recently. I'm even more confident in my purchase after this news.

For around US$160, this 4850 would be a good choice, IMHO.

The LITE-ON SK-1788U is arguably one of the best inexpensive generic keyboards ever made.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16823107127&Local=y

Sure enough it has been discontinued.

They have to store it without losing any of it. That means redundant storage distributed geographically. The cost of doing this is pretty significant.

The cost for 100 TB of data storage from Newegg is currently $9322. So the cost for 100 backup systems, distributed geographically, would probably be less than a million dollars, after government bulk purchase rates are figured in. When we are giving 7,000 times that amount to the banks, etc., and hoping that they will be able to survive and pay the loans back, I don't think the cost is too much to worry about, when the figure calculated is an obscene amount of redundancy.

Sure if you want HD content the 733mhz P3 in the XBOX ain't going to cut it.

$400 http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=9999386 an MCE remote, and a little work with Ubuntu will have you with the times. HDMI audio\video capable of 1080 display. You'll want to overclock to about 3ghz though.

More here -> http://xbmc.org/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=33 Can you say MAC, Linux, AND Winders ports?! :-O it will even run on an aTV just don't expect it to play too much more than your old XBOX :-( All of this still being tweaked mind you but it's looking pretty good.

Oh and Plex is a good MAC fork http://elan.plexapp.com/ and Boxee is a good fork on most every platform http://boxee.tv/

Your missing that it won't be powerful enough to do HD with the XBMC interface. You'll be forced to run some Windows thing on it in order to get accelerated drivers in hopes of having a prayer of playing HD. Of course Netbooks mostly come with a really crappy Intel video chipset so even then it will be a stretch.

Better you should look into the threads on the XBMC forums about putting together a 1080 capable PC. The last one I built was about $400 and I could have done it a bit cheaper if I'd tried...

http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=9999386 - needs an MCE remote to be complete, oh and a display!

These are pretty good choices, with solid capacitors in the power supply section. 128M sideport memory is optional.

Bottom line, you want a 790GX northbridge and a 750 southbridge.

Or, to get significantly cheaper and still really quite decent, you can go with one of these. 780GX northbridge, 700 southbridge. Way south of $100.

These are pretty good choices, with solid capacitors in the power supply section. 128M sideport memory is optional.

Bottom line, you want a 790GX northbridge and a 750 southbridge.

Or, to get significantly cheaper and still really quite decent, you can go with one of these. 780GX northbridge, 700 southbridge. Way south of $100.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Order=BESTMATCH&Description=Shanghai&x=13&y=32 [newegg.com]

The opterons were already available at much higher prices of course.

Why haven't you converted them yet? You can pick up a video capture card for as little as $15 nowadays. Just pick you up a cheap VHS from any pawnshop(you can usually find the really good models there cheap) run your tapes through the capture card, and voila! You never have to worry about tape breakage, rewinding, etc.

I do VHS to DVD conversion on the side at my shop and have made some decent cash doing it, but the cards have gotten so cheap now and easy to use that I have been selling more and more of those cards to my customers. After they see how easy it is to do themselves they are quite happy to pay me to put in a capture card and do the initial setup and then convert their mounds of VHS movies to a format they can easily use again themselves. The last one I sold was to a 67 year old gentleman who very quickly got the hang of it and is now converting all his old VHS home movies(which are actually pretty cool as he helped to build the NASA mockups of the shuttle) to DVD to preserve. So just get you a capture card, set it to record when you go to bed, and let the PC do the work. So much easier than dealing with those aging VHS tapes.

still next to impossible to find any cards for

Huh? You can get serial ports, firewire,eSATA,parallel ,or a converter to PCMCIA

still next to impossible to find any cards for

Huh? You can get serial ports, firewire,eSATA,parallel ,or a converter to PCMCIA

still next to impossible to find any cards for

Huh? You can get serial ports, firewire,eSATA,parallel ,or a converter to PCMCIA

still next to impossible to find any cards for

Huh? You can get serial ports, firewire,eSATA,parallel ,or a converter to PCMCIA

still next to impossible to find any cards for

Huh? You can get serial ports, firewire,eSATA,parallel ,or a converter to PCMCIA

1) Because then people would buy XP instead of Vista.
2) You can buy XP - here

While I have built MANY a PC with Abit motherboards over the years here at the shop, for me my fav would have to be the SG80-SG81 boards. Rock solid,plenty of options in the BIOS, Dual IDE+2 SATA, just a good solid reliable board. It was truly a great budget board for just about any use. I have been using Foxconn lately to build the budget machines, but it looks like they are in trouble and are in talks to give up motherboards in return for Asustek's manufacturing business.

So does anybody know what other manufacturers make good budget boards? I have to do a lot of repair work on machines a couple of years old and Foxconn was the only one I found that still sold boards with DDR and AGP. Sadly Newegg just quit selling the board I was using so it looks like I'll end up having to chunk a bunch of machines that could otherwise have been easily fixed. And as for Abit /places hat over heart/ This old PC builder will miss you.

The high-end market has shrunk for sure, but it's still fairly strong. It's just that there wasn't enough room for all the brands anymore. Asus and Gigabyte both still make some high dollar feature rich motherboards, and the folks buying those are gamers & people who build their own HD video editing workstations (or people who just have money burning a hole in their pocket...). A couple examples: Here's an Asus board, and also a Gigabyte board.

ASSUS boards are super hackable and i built a desktop out of one, it beeped fifteen times and the hard drive sparked out. Anonymous lololoid

Anonymous Coward

The high-end market has shrunk for sure, but it's still fairly strong. It's just that there wasn't enough room for all the brands anymore. Asus and Gigabyte both still make some high dollar feature rich motherboards, and the folks buying those are gamers & people who build their own HD video editing workstations (or people who just have money burning a hole in their pocket...). A couple examples: Here's an Asus board, and also a Gigabyte board.

ASSUS boards are super hackable and i built a desktop out of one, it beeped fifteen times and the hard drive sparked out. Anonymous lololoid

Anonymous Coward

I was recently at a presentation where one of the speakers demonstrated some Siemens PLM software - high detail 3D CAD models, stuff like that. One of the benefits they pointed out was that it ran well even on the demonstrator's laptop computer - you didn't need a big workstation to run it on.

However, the demonstrator's laptop was a huge 17" desktop replacement thing.

That's the market I see for these things - mobile workstations that let you run workstation software at client sites and trade show booths, without needing to muck around with carrying and powering a second monitor along with your laptop.

Furthermore, computer companies derive some benefit from holding the "performance crown" even if it's with a product hardly anyone would buy. For example, you can load your computer with two $500 graphics cards or an "extreme" $1600 CPU but probably few people do. I think the idea is to get news coverage for your product line and demonstrate how cutting edge your product line is.

I was recently at a presentation where one of the speakers demonstrated some Siemens PLM software - high detail 3D CAD models, stuff like that. One of the benefits they pointed out was that it ran well even on the demonstrator's laptop computer - you didn't need a big workstation to run it on.

However, the demonstrator's laptop was a huge 17" desktop replacement thing.

That's the market I see for these things - mobile workstations that let you run workstation software at client sites and trade show booths, without needing to muck around with carrying and powering a second monitor along with your laptop.

Furthermore, computer companies derive some benefit from holding the "performance crown" even if it's with a product hardly anyone would buy. For example, you can load your computer with two $500 graphics cards or an "extreme" $1600 CPU but probably few people do. I think the idea is to get news coverage for your product line and demonstrate how cutting edge your product line is.

The high-end market has shrunk for sure, but it's still fairly strong. It's just that there wasn't enough room for all the brands anymore. Asus and Gigabyte both still make some high dollar feature rich motherboards, and the folks buying those are gamers & people who build their own HD video editing workstations (or people who just have money burning a hole in their pocket...). A couple examples: Here's an Asus board, and also a Gigabyte board.

The high-end market has shrunk for sure, but it's still fairly strong. It's just that there wasn't enough room for all the brands anymore. Asus and Gigabyte both still make some high dollar feature rich motherboards, and the folks buying those are gamers & people who build their own HD video editing workstations (or people who just have money burning a hole in their pocket...). A couple examples: Here's an Asus board, and also a Gigabyte board.

Why settle for a ratio near infinity when it can BE infinity? Video cards with fans are for chumps only. Vote with your wallet.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125097

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814134050
(Look at the size of the heatsink on this motherfucker!)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161266
(A bit more elegant than the last)

Why settle for a ratio near infinity when it can BE infinity? Video cards with fans are for chumps only. Vote with your wallet.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125097

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814134050
(Look at the size of the heatsink on this motherfucker!)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161266
(A bit more elegant than the last)

Why settle for a ratio near infinity when it can BE infinity? Video cards with fans are for chumps only. Vote with your wallet.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125097

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814134050
(Look at the size of the heatsink on this motherfucker!)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161266
(A bit more elegant than the last)

Easy--they're deaf. After years of working on building (near) silent PCs, I've learned that what many people/reviewers consider to be 'quiet' is nowhere near my definition of 'quiet'.

Sing it brother Evil! Sheesh.

I ordered this 9800GTX from the egg because of the numerous reviews stating how quiet it was. Bullshit. The thing generated a faint high pitched whine that about drove me insane. Back it went.

I ended up with this 9600GT since it's passively cooled. Yes, I dropped some performance... but it's serviceable and quiet. When I'm not attempting to be a one-man pwnzer division online I tend to program and work with network simulations. Excess noise is unacceptable.

Easy--they're deaf. After years of working on building (near) silent PCs, I've learned that what many people/reviewers consider to be 'quiet' is nowhere near my definition of 'quiet'.

Sing it brother Evil! Sheesh.

I ordered this 9800GTX from the egg because of the numerous reviews stating how quiet it was. Bullshit. The thing generated a faint high pitched whine that about drove me insane. Back it went.

I ended up with this 9600GT since it's passively cooled. Yes, I dropped some performance... but it's serviceable and quiet. When I'm not attempting to be a one-man pwnzer division online I tend to program and work with network simulations. Excess noise is unacceptable.