Brian Frank

Quote: DON'T BUY VIA more like I dont see anyone with non-via having these problems. Uhh, I run Via, and only the drivers after the 21.xx caused me problems. I've been able to fix my problem by installing the Via AGP 4.10 patch. I like Via (and am one of the few who will say it).

Download Xteq X-setup. It's been awhile since I used it, but I do believe you can change that OEM logo to whatever you want to (i.e. Michael Jordon, your face, etc.). It just has to be in a bitmap.

Well, we know what distro to avoid like the plauge now... ;(

If it wasn't for the gaming part, I would say go Compaq. Of course, I'm probably in the minority here...as usual.

I'd assume that if something like that were true, people would've heard of it by now. I'd kinda hope not as I'm running a couple 256 DDR sticks in my system. I would think Samsung would have a recall rather than a patch put out...

You can still get an Asus A7M266 and Abit KG7 with the AMD 761/Via 686B combo. Personally, I haven't run into Via problems, and I wouldn't rule them out. That is me though, so take it with a grain of salt. The P4 DDR combos seem pretty good, although there are somethings that the P4 won't do as well in as the XP and vise versa. If you want to be safe and not worry at all, I'd say go Intel. The P4 does have some advantages of keeping the heat under control and the CPU from being fried, but on a clock for clock basis, the Athlon is faster. I'm talking about the clock speed, no the performance rating either. I tend to lean toward AMD for most stuff, but that's because I'd like to do some overclocking and I've gotten better results from AMD than Intel. I haven't experienced any problems between Intel or AMD, so I won't say avoid ______ at all costs. I would personally lean toward the AMD side of things though. Do your research on reviews and benchmarks and prices, IMO, and go from there.

I'd never really thought about that one.

I've noticed that too. I've gotten better OC's out of the cheap chips from both AMD and Intel. I've gotten an extra 274MHz out of my Duron 800 and got 100 out of a 400MHz Celeron I. Currently, my 1.4GHz T-Bird, AHYJA-Y is running at 1.56GHz, and I have yet to be able to hit a 200MHz OC out of it. My dual P3's can't get much more than a 34MHz OC before my system will hose up--an my RAM is pretty decent too.

That's high-end stuff, so I'm not really surprised you're looking at a $500 board. I'm not sure, but you may want to check out Asus too. I know they have a few server oriented boards, and a few are ServerWorks. However, the SW are going to be very expensive, and I don't remember if they have 64-bit/66MHz PCI slots. You could try eBay or Pricewatch for one, but I'm not really sure you're gonna find one brand new for $300 or less.

ATI is actually having leaked drivers, like nVidia. I have had woes to no end with the 23.11's. I'm working on a little fix with my Radeon right now because it or my AK77 is bad, and I'm leaning more toward the Radeon. It is an extremely fast card, and ATI's drivers are actually good for once. Nvidia is still a safe bet if you're not sure. Other than the latest drivers, they seem to be doing very well.

I do it partially for speed and partially for the sheer hell of it.

I had it downloaded before. Haven't seen any problems with it. I know MS had pulled it awhile back for some reason, but I really didn't care. I wasn't hurting with it or without it.

Well, I just found out that at least one of my DDR sticks is PC333 DDR 8) I think I've gotten my fill of hardware upgrades for awhile. I'm just gonna wait for some new games, like Serious Sam 2 and Unreal 2 to hit the shelves.

Palos, as far as Macs go, I think we see eye to eye on it. I'd take OS X over *nix any day. I'm certainly hoping for the Darwin port to make it over to the x86, because it can be done, being very similar to FreeBSD...

I'm using the updates right off creative's site. No problems far as I can tell.

I personally think that the new iMac looks really dumb, but the SuperDrive they pack into some models kinda leaves me wondering when we'll see them as standard equipment on PC's. I think that Apple has many of the good ideas first (colored PC's), but they don't really appear on PC's till later on. Take the iMac, and go try to find a beige box at BestBuy, Circuit City, CompUSA, etc...the closest I've come is white on one compaq. Also, IMO, the Apple Cube was the best thing to come out hardware wise. There has been a rumor of a dual-processor iMac, but we shall see. If it does show up, I'd consider getting one. I would like a Mac, but I probably have enough PC's as it is.

The biggest mod I've done to my cases was drill a bunch of holes in one side of the case. Well, my two hdd's came back from RMA. After I exchange my Radeon 8500 for a new one, I'll be all set for awhile.

Also, make sure you have the latest version of Sandra.

Over at 2CPU they're are people that have had trouble running some games with dual processors. I don't remember all the fixes, but setting the CPU's to affinity seemed to work for some.

Does the BSOD list any files? If so, there's your problem.

I've run it just fine under 2k. What seems to be the problem? (oh, and btw, post in the proper forum next time)

Might as well take care of it now before it gets any worse.

I can't believe this guy is serious! It's scary to think that this ding dong is out there. I didn't read the comments, but I'm sure they are enlightening.

Hmm. Must've been why I couldn't log on today under uBB.

What a coincidence; so do I.