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Forum: Rants Topic: Stuff you shouldn't buy. started by: BlackFlag Posted by BlackFlag on Jan. 09 2002,02:01
1. anything manufactured by Abit. Ill never forget the week of hell not having a computer when the capaciters on my BE6-II v2.0 started leaking corrosive red colored crap.2. EUPA motherboards. The BOIS of the EUPA motherboard consisted of badly pirated Award Software® software, and contained numerous errors. can you imagine a slot 1 MB that thinks its socket 462? or thinks it has 1 DIMM bank more than it actally has? Good luck trying to find an BIOS update. I drove myself nuts for weeks combing the web for one before i said "fuckit, ill just go get myself an ASUS." 3. anything bearing the logos of Gateway or Acer. overpriced and prone to breaking 2 days after the warranty expires. (though i must admitt there is one thing i LOVE about Gateway....... when you need a replacement part, they just send it to you and you put it in yourself, and after that, you can do any damn thing you want to the computer, cause the warrenty sticker is already broke and they know about it.) 4. Pentium processors. AMD chips of the same speed process slightly faster, and are signifigantly cheaper. Gotta love the dancing nerds in multicolored enviro-suits though=) 5. Any I/O devices from a company you've never heard of. Example: KDS monitor. Picture quality: beautiful, almost up to Sony Trinitron standards. Life: 4 months. (im currently using a AcerView 34T that will probably explode if i set the wrong vertical or horizontal refresh in powerstrip.) 6. Anything made in china. I won't bore you with a list of examples. 7. DSL service that uses a WinPoet connection. PPPOE sucks ass. Please respond to this post with additions to the list, or comments about items on the list that we may learn from each other and not buy crap. Posted by Spydir on Jan. 09 2002,03:37
... right. moving on...
Posted by damien_s_lucifer on Jan. 09 2002,03:45
I love Athlons. My 850MHz Slot A has never let me down. Unfortunately AMD is shipping a lot of crappy ones from the factory lately. Also, they run so hot that if your super turbocharged fan dies, your CPU is fubar'ed... so for the time being, I'd a. skip the Athlon and get a P4 instead or b. wait for the next die shrink before getting an Athlon.
PPPOE is a decent protocol. WinPoet is shitty software. So is EnterNet, for that matter. Use RASPPPOE (google it yourself, I'm too lazy) and you'll be OK. Posted by CatKnight on Jan. 09 2002,05:30
well i got a 3 year warrantee + credit card 3 year warantee, they have good customer service and advanced replacement, so ner! Posted by BlackFlag on Jan. 10 2002,08:17
yeah, gotta agree about the athalon running hot thing, but its only really bad if you get ripped off (like getting sold a 750/100FSB when you thought you were buying a 1g/133FSB.....)As much as i hate to admit it, i've never been ripped off by english-as-second-language retailers. Americans suck =( Aslo of note, if you buy a 256+ block of ram for $40, you might want to question the quality....... Posted by CatKnight on Jan. 10 2002,17:36
you can get 256 of crucial for 35...
Posted by BlackFlag on Jan. 10 2002,20:48
i meant in a store, not online =p
Posted by DeadAnztac on Jan. 10 2002,22:50
Our previous KDS 19" were quite awesome, we bought them 3 years ago, and they still work well, we bought 2 of the XP's recently (19", $250, .25mm vertical pitch, etc) and I'm already questioning them greatly. On the 9300K color setting my monitor randomly turned purple one day and I can no longer un that high with out it being purple. Also they seem to have come with magnetic problems (darker spots, yellow spots, all in subtle sections you wouldn't notice except on all white).
Posted by Rshias on Jan. 11 2002,01:14
Memory is dirt cheap. Why buy generic when you can get high quality, name brand memory for nearly the exact same price?Now, about the Athlon thing. Yes, the first systems did run very hot, but why that is still brought up as a mark against them is beyond me. I've built seven Athlon Thunderbird and XP systems (all above 1ghz) and every one of them was running at a max of 36 Celcius for stock speed. Even overclocked, and under max load, they have never once exceeded 52 Celcius. I'm pretty sure this is warmer than Intel chips, but the thing is, Athlons have no problem running perfectly stable at higher temps, so it's not really an issue. Just adding a better heatsink, and improving case air-flow will do wonders if you still feel that's to warm for comfort. KDS monitors are 50/50. When they work, they're fantastic. When they don't, they just flat out suck. Abit motherboards seldom have serious problems except for a bit of unstability at high overclocks. Sounds like you just got unlucky. Iwill, and Epox boards are outstanding alternatives. Posted by Neophyre on Jan. 12 2002,02:59
uhh.. my XP 1600 is running at 60 celcius..... bad??
Posted by Rshias on Jan. 12 2002,06:01
They can safely run at up to about 60, but I honestly wouldn't want to go higher than that under full load.The only reason for a lower end XP to be running that hot is poor cooling, or a bad connection between the CPU and heatsink. Air flow through the case may be a problem, or simply a smaller heatsink than is optimal / no thermal paste between CPU and cooler. EDIT: You may also be running a higher VCORE than you need to be. Some motherboards overcompensate, and lead to excess heat production. Posted by BlackFlag on Jan. 12 2002,11:47
my athalon is running too damn hot. 64c. vcore is 1.81, i think that might be a little high. i dunno. ill try 1.75, maybe even 1.7its probably inadaquate case airflow. i don't like this cases design. looks nice on the outside, but has shitty airflow. need to get a new one anyway. power supply doesnt have enough wattage. gonna go try changing vcore now. Posted by BlackFlag on Jan. 12 2002,12:02
ok that helped.before, the vcore was set to auto in bios, and running at about 1.81 now its set to 1.7, and running at about 1.74 (think i could get away with setting it lower?) temp already dropping a little. will probably level out at about 59-61c. less horrible than 64-65, but i still need to bring it lower...... i'd be comfortable with it in the 50-55c range. stupid god damn caase. 140W piece of shit. Posted by BlackFlag on Jan. 12 2002,14:17
after more screwing around, found out the case fan i have was pointing the wrong way. fixed it, now cpu temp hovers around 60c at full load; before 65c while not doing anything.58c is the "not doing anything in particular" base temp. still a little high, but not frying eggs down there. vcore is set to 1.65 and running at about 1.7 now btw. no aparent loss in preformance or stability. |