Author: ACY3
Date: Jul 12, 08 at 3:28pm (PST)
Subject: ACY3's Gaming Build
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ACY3's Gaming Build
Index
System Specs
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Intel E8400
Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3
4GB (2x2GB) Corsair PC2-6400
Sapphire Radeon HD 4850
Seagate 250GB HDD
650W Corsair TX
Xclio 3060 Case
Zalman CNPS9700
Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit
Asus DVD Drive
Zalman ZM-MFC2 Fan Controller
System Pictures
Stock Benchmarks + Readings
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Will post when the thing is fully working. ;D
Initial Build
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This is my first time building a full PC, and it's been a fun yet frustrating ride. Being careful not to break anything just by touching it, I've been extremely careful when putting in items such as the CPU and RAM, thinking the amount of pressure I was using was on the verge of snapping the motherboard. But after a while everything was in place an I was ready for the first boot.
First time around, 3 of the 4 fans weren't working (only CPU fan was), which turned out to be partly my fault for not using some cables correctly (made a setup where it was expecting to recieve power from the fan) and partly for some unknown reason which was fixed with some re-wiring of the fan controller. With all the fans working, it was time to see how it POSTed.
It didn't, bugger. Fans were spinning, but no output to the monitor and no beeps. Checked all the connections, tried taking a few things out, all no good. So after seeking advice from The Slayer, I unplugged everything, stood the mobo on my desk (on an anti-static bag) and ran it with just the CPU, RAM and graphics card. POST successful, display on monitor. I carefully put this back into the case, tested again, still working. Put the hard drive back in, still working. DVD drive, fan controller and all fans went back into play, still working. Put the Wifi card in, and it stopped again. Took it out, and it worked. Therein could lie the problem, so I left it out for a while and went to set up Vista.
Sailed through Vista, got to the desktop. Installed Gigabyte motherboard drivers and software, still working nicely. Put on some new graphics card drivers (downloaded from the official website and ported with USB stick, not the CD), restarted and got a BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH! Booted again, and it went through OK, got to the desktop and all seemed well. Pushed up the resolution, restarted again just to be safe, got another BSOD. Booted into safe mode, all OK, booted normally again, also OK. Strange.
Went to sleep when I got too tired, woke up the next morning and tried the Wifi card again, didn't POST. Tried another PCIe x1 slot, still no POST. Took it out again, POSTed successfully, so something's definitely amiss there. So I left it out and focussed my attention on the graphics issues. Started out booting with a mixture of BSODs, unprompted restarts and successful boots, but after using System Restore to go back to before I added the drivers, all went to hell. BSODs left, right and centre, couldn't get into Vista normally. After a few tries to save it, I decided to re-install Vista.
That did not go well. At first it would freeze at the last stage of installation (after choosing username), then it would start to BSOD mid-way through installation, and I even got a couple of BSODs when booting from the disk! Spent hours trying to work out what was wrong with the help of Ren of Heavens, and eventually found the need to reformat the drive using a non-Vista disk (Vista doesn't format the drive properly, if at all). First tried a Ubuntu 7.10 disk, but that didn't help at all, resulting in 50 buffer errors followed by an unhelpful command-line which I knew naught about. Xubuntu had the same result, so I turned to a Windows XP Home disk. This was able to format the disks, but immediately afterwards it would begin installing XP files onto the partition, which is not what I wanted. Stopping this process caused just as much trouble as Vista on its own, so needed another way.
Help arrived in the form of my current Dell PC, standing on the floor but still plugged in as my window of communication to the Internet and helpful users (Ren ;D). I took the HDD out of my new build and put it in the Dell tower, and after enabling the SATA port in the BIOS (why the hell was it turned off?), I successfully managed to format the drive appropriately through the disk manager on Windows XP. Getting late, so went to sleep.
Woke up and started re-working my terrible cable management in the new build. Then took the new HDD out of the Dell tower and back in the new build. Installed Vista no problem, installed the mobo drivers no problem. Then came the graphics card drivers. This time I chose to install from the supplied CD rather than new downloaded drivers, but I stopped at the point where you choose your operating system. "XP/XP64" or "Vista". No Vista64? Worrying, so I dived onto the Internet to look for any useful info. Turns out that several people have had issues with this motherboard and graphics card combination, and that the ATI drivers are rather premature. Also turns out that the 4850's single slot cooler causes it to get rather toasty (I poked a temperature probe into the heatsink and it reads 71c on idle!). The advice given was a mixture of ATI drivers, Vista drivers, hotfixes and BIOS flashes, so I decided to halt on that for the time being until something stable was available.
Thinking things over with Ren of Heavens, I decided to flash the BIOS to the latest version. That went successfully, and Vista booted OK. I could see in the @BIOS software that the flash was successful, so then I tried downloading a new copy of the 8.6 Catalyst drivers. Installed them, everything seemed OK. Pushed up the resolution to native 1680x1050 and took a peak into the CCC (no fan controls unfortunately, the fan really needs a boost). Then went on to install Crysis and give the system a test run.
[size=1][color=#666666]This message was edited by ACY3 on Jul 12 2008.
Author: Pr3tzals
Date: Jul 14, 08 at 6:15am (PST)
Subject: re: ACY3's Gaming Build
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This seems like a huge hassle but does it seem like it was worth it seeing as you had those problems I'm scared of building my computer :S
Author: ACY3
Date: Jul 14, 08 at 12:41pm (PST)
Subject: re: ACY3's Gaming Build
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Don't think this happens to everyone; I think I just had some rotten luck putting this together. Plus as this was a first time build, solutions took longer to get to than they would otherwise. For example, I spent a whole day trying to get Vista on again and trying to format the HDD with various CDs, but in future that can be solved in an hour by plugging it into another PC. I had problems with the graphics card drivers, but that's because they are immature at the moment, and will improve in time. I think it's still worth it once everything is stable.
Plus, if you do have any problems with the build, post a thread in the hardware forum here and someone should be able to help you out.
Author: Pr3tzals
Date: Jul 14, 08 at 1:18pm (PST)
Subject: re: ACY3's Gaming Build
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well we learn from our mistakes right? So experiencing new problems or everything's fine....for now
Author: Vanhishikha
Date: Jul 14, 08 at 7:50pm (PST)
Subject: re: ACY3's Gaming Build
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Seem's like a very good build, i wouldn't of gone for the 4850 personally, but it's a nice build.
I absolutly lovely that case btw, it's awesome. Definatly want one for myself, need to update a few parts myself.
I absolutly lovely that case btw, it's awesome. Definatly want one for myself, need to update a few parts myself.
Author: The Slayer
Date: Jul 14, 08 at 11:40pm (PST)
Subject: re: ACY3's Gaming Build
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Great build! Everything looks so nice, new and pretty
I like that heatsink. I have similar one thats a bit smaller, and its great how it pushes the hot air directly to the rear fan, instead of pushing it around the case.
I had a few problems with my first few builds, but after playing around with them, and learning I've gotten a lot better at fixing the few problems and making everything work right. Overall its a pretty fun experience, and you get the satisfaction that you built your own computer.
Author: courgan
Date: Jul 16, 08 at 10:23pm (PST)
Subject: re: ACY3's Gaming Build
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I agree with slayer about the build.
great rig.
Author: ACY3
Date: Jul 17, 08 at 12:37pm (PST)
Subject: re: ACY3's Gaming Build
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Seems that fingerprints show up on this case pretty well, so I'll need to give it a good clean when I'm done pulling it around. At the moment it's partially sitting on the PSU box, because if it's pushed back as in the pics in the first post, I can't get the side of the case off, nor will the Ethernet cable be long enough to connect it to my Dell PC. I may get rid of my stereo system to give it more room, but it's a very good stereo, and the current speakers wouldn't be usable going straight to the PC.
For the most part the new build is stable now. I've completed Crysis mostly in High detail mode with x2 AA, though things started to slow down in the latter levels, and the final level was unplayable without switching to Medium with no AA . To be honest, I was expecting a little better performance in Crysis, but then again it is Crysis and I probably put my expectations too high.
Contacted the e-tailer (Scan), GigaByte and Abit about the problem with the Wifi card. Scan concluded that there must be compatibility problems and have offered to RMA the card, and GigaByte asked for a few more details, then said they'll grab a card from Abit and do some compatibility tests, which will take time. Unfortunately, I picked this card because, of those sold by Scan, it was the only one with PCIe x1 interface, and one of the few that had a wired antenna, as opposed to having it stuck on the back of the card. I'm not sure what I'll do with this yet, whether to try another card or get an extra-long Ethernet cable to go up into the roof and down into the room with the router.
I do have another wireless USB adapter that came with my router, but while using it was going to be a last resort anyway, it turns out I can't use that either; no drivers exist anywhere for Vista 64-bit either from the supplier or from Microsoft.
With advice from Ren I put an Ethernet cable between the new build and my Dell computer so I can steal Internet that way, which has allowed me to get updates done and go on the Internet (am sending this post on the new build).
I'm scared to touch the Catalyst Control Center at the moment, since it's blown up on several occasions (fan speed goes up to max and I lose the signal to the monitor). I may tweak it a bit in future to see what else it can do, but it runs hot enough idling as mentioned previously. Will give it a run with some other games soon, and then probably do some benchmarks.
Author: The Slayer
Date: Jul 19, 08 at 12:00am (PST)
Subject: re: ACY3's Gaming Build
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How far away is the wireless router and how many walls does it go through? I recently went with wireless in my house, and I have a computer with a wireless card with the built in antenna connecting fine. Its one floor up and going through about 3 walls, and is partly blocked by a brick wall. I think it gets about 3 or 4 bars of signal too.
Author: ParanahJoe
Date: Jul 19, 08 at 3:01am (PST)
Subject: re: ACY3's Gaming Build
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HD 4850... Ahhhhh Yeeeaaahhhh! Bitchin' fast card, I love mine. Nice clean build.
Author: ACY3
Date: Mar 05, 11 at 2:11pm (PST)
Subject: re: ACY3's Gaming Build
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Wow, did I really build this thing nearly three years ago? It has lasted well.
However, I finally decided that the graphics card needed upgrading. Besides only being able to play modern games at medium settings, the 4850 idled at ~80°C and the memory would reach 100°C under load. Besides that, the fan makes a light grinding noise as if it's off-centre. Time to bring the graphics department up-to-date, at least for a few months.
My choice of replacement is the MSI nVidia GTX 560 Ti. Released in January of this year, mild factory overclock, excellent cooling system and one of the cheapest 560s available; it seemed like the perfect fit. Unfortunately I didn't get any photos of the package or installation; I was too excited installing it to get a camera. The packaging does feature a quote from Neoseeker though, which was a nice surprise.
First impressions; this thing is damn quiet. The fan span up when I first booted after installation and then slowed down to unnoticeable levels (the 4850 always did that). Since then, I haven't heard a peep from it. I'll bring up a game or two later and see how it copes under load, but it's definitely quieter now.
Second impressions; this thing is damn cool. It's currently idling at 27°C, probably because it's underclocked itself to just 50MHz. Again, some gaming will see how hot it can get, but it's an ice cube compared to my old 4850 already.
I feel I am ready to tackle the big games being released later this year, namely Crysis 2, The Witcher 2 and Mass Effect 3. Bring it on!