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I'm lame when it comes to to computer parts, but.. What are some reliable notebook hard-drive brands? I've had 2 Hitachi Travelstar drives kill themselves within 6 months, and that's about my only experience in notebook HDs. I will be living in a little village in India and will not be able to replace any broken computer parts for months. Also, do larger size drives (500 GB) have a higher failure rate? Pardon my grandpa questions. Thank you. Edit - For a PC. Haier fucked around with this message at 03:32 on Jul 27, 2009 |
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Jul 27, 2009 03:24
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Ideally, you'd want as low-heat of a hard drive as possible - this means a slower spinning hard drive, which can also improve battery life. Most laptop hard drives have speeds 5200rpm, with some reaching 7200rpm. While you may experience a little less snappiness (very slight though) with the slower hard drive, the gains would be longevity and lower power consumption. I had a 7200rpm drive that would heat up to 90 degrees in my laptop and cause severe instability. I tried a 5400rpm, and was barely hitting temperatures around 60. As for brands, I work in a computer repair place. Most of our failed 2.5" drives are either Hitachi, Samsung, Toshiba, or Fujitsu - we rarely see failed Western Digitals or Seagates, but they do pop up with smart errors every now and again. In terms of capacities, all I can say is this: If the drive ever DOES take a poo poo, you'll sink a lot less money into recovering 100gb of pictures instead of 500gb of movies music and pictures. I can't vouch for the "shelf life" of the data on higher capacity drives, but 250gb seems to be the sweet spot at the moment for both cost effectiveness and storage space. (About ~$60.) Have fun in India! Otacon fucked around with this message at 05:27 on Jul 29, 2009 |
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Jul 28, 2009 08:26
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Otacon posted:Advice Thank you very much! Yes, my last problems were definitely heat related, it affected the whole system. I did not know that about the HD speed regarding battery and heat, I appreciate the information. I'll probably get a Seagate then. Thank's again!
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Jul 29, 2009 05:08
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Zorilla posted:I have a laptop with integrated GeForce 6150 graphics that I've installed Windows 7 onto. One thing I've noticed is that emulators that use DirectDraw to scale the image no longer filter the way they did in XP (i.e. they appear pixelated instead of smooth). I've had the same problem (only with video players) with a Nvidia 8800GTS and an ATI 4350. If you can change the renderer to EVR it works. Or you can run it in XP compatibility mode and it works.
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Jul 29, 2009 07:22
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This is probably a silly question, but can a mobo be slightly warped due to CPU heat? Maybe it's just my eyes, but it seems like the area on my mobo where the CPU has to be put in is slightly warped. I ask because I'm worried if this will/is affect(ing) my heatsink's ability to make full contact with my CPU. 780i mobo E6850 C2D Rosewill HSF
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Jul 30, 2009 21:12
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Ryuga Death posted:This is probably a silly question, but can a mobo be slightly warped due to CPU heat? Maybe it's just my eyes, but it seems like the area on my mobo where the CPU has to be put in is slightly warped. It's not due to the heat. The warping is from the pressure that the mounting mechanism of the heatsink puts onto the motherboard. Intel-style cooler mounts are notorious for warping the board, and few people have had problems with breaking the board because of it, even if it does freak some people out just by looking at it.
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Jul 30, 2009 21:17
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Mach420 posted:It's not due to the heat. The warping is from the pressure that the mounting mechanism of the heatsink puts onto the motherboard. Intel-style cooler mounts are notorious for warping the board, and few people have had problems with breaking the board because of it, even if it does freak some people out just by looking at it. Well, that makes sense, seeing as I used the stock intel cooler for about a year. The warp isn't that bad/noticeable I don't think, but will it be a problem for the Rosewill HSF that I have? Also, as a side question, how do you guys apply your thermal paste? Do you apply some of it to the heatsink itself or the CPU? How much? This is what I have. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835200034
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Jul 30, 2009 21:26
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Ryuga Death posted:Well, that makes sense, seeing as I used the stock intel cooler for about a year. The warp isn't that bad/noticeable I don't think, but will it be a problem for the Rosewill HSF that I have? Also, as a side question, how do you guys apply your thermal paste? Do you apply some of it to the heatsink itself or the CPU? How much? A nice paper thin layer to the cpu. After it is cleaned with rubbing alcohol.
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Jul 30, 2009 21:52
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Ryuga Death posted:Well, that makes sense, seeing as I used the stock intel cooler for about a year. The warp isn't that bad/noticeable I don't think, but will it be a problem for the Rosewill HSF that I have? Also, as a side question, how do you guys apply your thermal paste? Do you apply some of it to the heatsink itself or the CPU? How much? That thing looks exactly like the stock intel cooler, but with a different fan. In any case, the warp doesn't hurt the cooler's ability to transfer heat. As for mounting methods, I like the drop in the center method for intel coolers, as shown here: http://benchmarkreviews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=170&Itemid=1&limit=1&limitstart=3
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Jul 30, 2009 22:01
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Mach420 posted:That thing looks exactly like the stock intel cooler, but with a different fan. In any case, the warp doesn't hurt the cooler's ability to transfer heat. Do you have any recommendations for a CPU cooler? I don't have that much money to spare. 
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Jul 30, 2009 23:15
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Ryuga Death posted:Do you have any recommendations for a CPU cooler? I don't have that much money to spare. Are you having problems with heat or want to do some big overclocks? If not, you don't need a new cooler.
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Jul 31, 2009 01:27
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Is it me or does Adblock Plus not work on this page on CNN? I'm really confused by that. Did they find a way to code around it somehow? (I wanted to block that goddamn car ad on the side of the page). Edit: Oh, for some reason it is a "whitelisted" page. WTF?
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Jul 31, 2009 13:55
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When applying a new VGA heatsink which has it's thermal paste already applied, do I need to remove the thermal paste which was pre applied on the video card when I bought it?
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Jul 31, 2009 14:38
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Mannequin posted:Is it me or does Adblock Plus not work on this page on CNN? I'm really confused by that. Did they find a way to code around it somehow? (I wanted to block that goddamn car ad on the side of the page).
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Jul 31, 2009 14:54
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Rookoo posted:When applying a new VGA heatsink which has it's thermal paste already applied, do I need to remove the thermal paste which was pre applied on the video card when I bought it? If the new heatsink comes with pre-applied thermal paste, it's okay to go ahead and plop that on. Otherwise it's better policy to clean everything off with some alcohol and put a little fresh thermal paste on the chip.
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Jul 31, 2009 15:27
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Mach420 posted:Are you having problems with heat or want to do some big overclocks? If not, you don't need a new cooler. I think I'm just paranoid, but it gets pretty hot here, since it's Summer, and my temps usually go up a bit. According to that thermal paste article, I think I applied a bit much over the recommended amount.
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Jul 31, 2009 17:20
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Ryuga Death posted:I think I'm just paranoid, but it gets pretty hot here, since it's Summer, and my temps usually go up a bit. According to that thermal paste article, I think I applied a bit much over the recommended amount. You can check out your temps using the RealTemp or CoreTemp programs. If you're hitting 65+ Celsius with CPU utilization at 100%, you may want to think about getting a new heatsink.
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Jul 31, 2009 20:18
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Ryuga Death posted:I think I'm just paranoid, but it gets pretty hot here, since it's Summer, and my temps usually go up a bit. According to that thermal paste article, I think I applied a bit much over the recommended amount. Keep in mind that too much thermal paste can actually hurt cooling. If it's just a bit over the recommended amount, no worries, the pressure will squeeze the excess out and things will be fine. If you really put a lot on, though, it can do bad things to thermal transfer. Thermal paste actually has pretty terrible thermal conductivity compared to copper or aluminum; it's good at squeezing into microscopic cracks that otherwise would just be filled with air, and better at conducting heat than air, but anything more than just filling those tiny crevices actually hurts thermal conduction. If you're not experiencing thermal-related throttling or slowdowns, it's not like the Macbook Pro horror stories (a batch left the factory with way, way too much thermal paste on the CPU, GPU, and northbridge, and they all overheated very easily). If you're feeling paranoid, it may ease that to open it up and do a textbook reapplication of the thermal paste, but I wouldn't expect temps to improve more than a couple of degrees. Mach420 posted:You can check out your temps using the RealTemp or CoreTemp programs. If you're hitting 65+ Celsius with CPU utilization at 100%, you may want to think about getting a new heatsink.
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Jul 31, 2009 21:08
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Space Gopher posted:Keep in mind that too much thermal paste can actually hurt cooling. If it's just a bit over the recommended amount, no worries, the pressure will squeeze the excess out and things will be fine. If you really put a lot on, though, it can do bad things to thermal transfer. Thermal paste actually has pretty terrible thermal conductivity compared to copper or aluminum; it's good at squeezing into microscopic cracks that otherwise would just be filled with air, and better at conducting heat than air, but anything more than just filling those tiny crevices actually hurts thermal conduction. According to realtemp, my system idles at around 43-48C during the day. Not sure how it is under load/when playing a game (TF2). My game plays alright, though. I have my CPU fan spinning at 75% speed, is this a problem?
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Jul 31, 2009 22:54
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Ryuga Death posted:According to realtemp, my system idles at around 43-48C during the day. Not sure how it is under load/when playing a game (TF2). My game plays alright, though. I have my CPU fan spinning at 75% speed, is this a problem? Run Realtemp and use the maximum temperature readout while playing a game, if your curious. In any case, you should be fine with those temps on a stock processor. It's when overclockers increase the speeds and overvolt the processor that stricter adherence to rules like 70C or less for Core2 processors start becoming important (The first temperature limit I ever think of since all the overclocker guides drill this into your head). As long as you aren't nearing the throttling temperature as space gopher said, you're ok. Just be sure to blow out any dust that has accumulated on the heatsink every once in a while to keep temps as low as possible without changing out parts.
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Jul 31, 2009 23:34
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Haier posted:I'm lame when it comes to to computer parts, but.. If you need more storage space then you could have a normal drive and an external USB enclosure. Saukkis fucked around with this message at 22:26 on Aug 1, 2009 |
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Aug 1, 2009 22:23
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Are PCI-E 2.0 cards backward compatible for motherboards made to work on PCI-E 1.0 cards? I'm thinking about buying a better video card but I don't know if I have to buy a newer motherboard or something
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Aug 4, 2009 02:13
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PauseAction posted:Are PCI-E 2.0 cards backward compatible for motherboards made to work on PCI-E 1.0 cards? I'm thinking about buying a better video card but I don't know if I have to buy a newer motherboard or something In general, yes, it's compatible both ways (PCIe 2.0 cards work in a PCIe 1.0 motherboard, and vice versa). There were some specific issues with early PCIe motherboards supporting PCIe 2.0 cards. As I understand it, Via's chipsets were the major offender, and the dual AGP/PCIe boards tended to have a lot of trouble in particular. If your board is back from when PCIe first hit the market, you might want to google the model number and "PCIe 2.0 compatibility" to make sure.
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Aug 4, 2009 03:26
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Can anyone recommend a great wireless / bluetooth mouse? Not concerned about price. I can't seem to find one that has both a great feeling form factor, and the functions that I want (at least 2 extra buttons for browser fwd/back). (Crossposted from the less-active Laptop thread)
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Aug 4, 2009 06:14
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Jolarix posted:Can anyone recommend a great wireless / bluetooth mouse? Not concerned about price. There's always the popular Logitech models. I am a huge fan of Microsoft's mice, though. I'm currently using the Microsoft Wireless Mouse 5000. They also have a new notebook mouse with the BlueTrack stuff that has a nano receive that isn't too bad.
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Aug 4, 2009 09:16
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When I was looking through the Logitech Nanos a while back, I couldn't find a single one that didn't have some lovely gimmick. I just got the 5000 in the end. It's great though. It only has four buttons, but really. Just spend the extra 300 milliseconds and press the GUI button.
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Aug 4, 2009 15:18
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Sorry if something like this has been answered already; this thread is huge! Anyway, I live in a two story townhouse which is on the old side;wiring in a new access point downstairs is next to impossible. I am currently using a Netgear WPN824 V2 wireless router. It is located upstairs with my desktop. The wireless works OK for things like surfing the net but is not great for gaming on my 360 (which is downstairs in my living room) or for streaming video clips. What suggestions would you give me for either boosting my wireless range or for a wireless router that would give me a stronger signal downstairs?
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Aug 4, 2009 18:11
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I bought my hard-drive, but my kit for transferring the files is not compatible. Can anyone tell me what kind of cable I would need for this type of drive connection?: I don't know the name of this. I would like something that goes into the USB. /confusion Thanks in advance.
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Aug 5, 2009 02:39
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Haier posted:I bought my hard-drive, but my kit for transferring the files is not compatible. Can anyone tell me what kind of cable I would need for this type of drive connection?: That's SATA.
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Aug 5, 2009 02:49
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Haier posted:I bought my hard-drive, but my kit for transferring the files is not compatible. Can anyone tell me what kind of cable I would need for this type of drive connection?: You can get one of these SATA/IDE to USB Adapters to transfer files from hard drives to a computer via USB. I have one and it works fine. Also, note that in the hard drive you posted, there are two power connectors. One SATA power connector (far left in picture) and one 4 pin molex connector (far right in picture). Only use one power connector, don't try and hook up both. One with better reviews: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812232002 Ceros_X fucked around with this message at 11:25 on Aug 5, 2009 |
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Aug 5, 2009 11:22
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Largejaroalmonds posted:Sorry if something like this has been answered already; this thread is huge! Try this stuff: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/8-tips-to-boost-the-signal-from-your-wireless-router/
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Aug 5, 2009 11:44
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Ceros_X posted:You can get one of these SATA/IDE to USB Adapters to transfer files from hard drives to a computer via USB. I have one and it works fine. Haha I bought one from Inland Pacific or whatever the manufacturer/rebrander is called and it set my 2TB WD Caviar Green drive on fire. Literally.
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Aug 6, 2009 13:53
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I'm thinking about building a new gaming system soon, and something that I've thought about doing is having several hard-drives in the machine and at least attempting to partition them intelligently for performance. So far, the plan is to install two hard drives with three total partitions. The configuration would be basically this: HDD 1) partition a) OS only. maybe around 20 gigs for expandability. partition b) Applications, documents, work, basically everything besides the OS and games. HDD 2) Games. Also, I have a third, external 750 gig HDD that I use for backup disk images, music, and movie storage. Also, for the way I'm using it, it doesn't really require fast input and output so I don't mind that it's external. That's basically it. Does this plan seem solid enough? I've never really partitioned my drives before, but I'm guessing that anything has to be better than the configuration I'm running now, which is the external HDD as backup / storage, and an unpartitioned 320 gig for everything including OS, games, work, etc. Also, should I consider moving the page file to somewhere besides the OS partition? Should I relocate it to another drive? I think a separate HDD for just the page file would be stupid, and relocating it to the first drive's 2nd partition wouldn't do any good because it would still shard the same heads as the OS, right? What abotu the games HDD? I'm guessing that, because games use huge amount of memory, placing the page file on the games HDD would be counter productive. GreatGreen fucked around with this message at 18:31 on Aug 6, 2009 |
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Aug 6, 2009 18:14
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Okay, so I have an old-rear end computer - Athlon 1800+ on an Abit KR7A motherboard with a gig of RAM, a GeForce3 Ti200 video card and a one-year-old low-end SoundBlaster PCI sound card from Wal-Mart. I'm running XP. I had purchased a used AGP card from a local computer store to put into a used Shuttle XPC I bought for my parents, but it didn't work in there, so I tested it on my computer. My computer wouldn't even turn on with that video card in it, either, so I took it back. Ever since I put my old video card back into my computer, I have no sound. It doesn't even show my sound card drivers in the Device Manager anymore! I took the sound card out, turned the PC on, rebooted, shut down, and put the card back in, but Windows didn't recognize any new hardware. It's like it's not there at all. Any ideas as to what could have happened here?
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Aug 6, 2009 18:27
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I started playing GTA IV for PC and I have noticed that the game is using the 512 RAM of my Geforce 9600 GT, no problems there, the game runs ok, but the thing is, I also have in my PC a 2GB of RAM. Is there a way to "force" the video card or the game to also use these 2GB of RAM? I was in doubt if I posted this in Games or in SH/SC, but since it's memory related, i posted here. Please excuse my English.
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Aug 6, 2009 20:24
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I want a card that can capture the video from my monitor. I want it to be able to capture and be uploaded to youtube as HD video. I don't care if it can get TV or cable or anything, all I want it to do is capture from the monitor (24" with DVI ports) and not slow the computer down while doing this. What is the best/cheapest way to do this especially considering that I don't need TV features or anything like that?
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Aug 6, 2009 20:25
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systran posted:I want a card that can capture the video from my monitor. I want it to be able to capture and be uploaded to youtube as HD video. I don't care if it can get TV or cable or anything, all I want it to do is capture from the monitor (24" with DVI ports) and not slow the computer down while doing this. What is the best/cheapest way to do this especially considering that I don't need TV features or anything like that? http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/intensity/
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Aug 6, 2009 20:30
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frajaq posted:I started playing GTA IV for PC and I have noticed that the game is using the 512 RAM of my Geforce 9600 GT, no problems there, the game runs ok, but the thing is, I also have in my PC a 2GB of RAM. The RAM on the video card and the RAM the computer uses are used for two different things. Your computer is using the 2GB of RAM that is installed in the motherboard as well as the 512MB of RAM on the video card. Also the 9600GT is a pretty weak card so upgrading your card would probably help your framerate if you're having trouble with choppiness.
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Aug 6, 2009 21:20
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GreatGreen posted:I'm thinking about building a new gaming system soon, and something that I've thought about doing is having several hard-drives in the machine and at least attempting to partition them intelligently for performance. I guess you can put the swap file on the secondary drive if you feel like you must; games only do a lot of drive reading when they're loading levels, typically. I may get voted down here, but in my opinion, separate partitions on a single drive for an operating system and then all of the applications, etc, is stupid. If you have to reinstall the OS, you're going to have to reinstall all of your programs and games, anyway, since most probably won't just run from their respective directories. I don't see how this second situation is any better than your first, honestly. An external drive is easy to back things up with. If you really want to build a gaming system, buy a reasonably-priced SSD to load the OS and main apps on, and put games on a secondary hard drive. Keep the external to back up important documents.
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Aug 6, 2009 21:50
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Sir Nigel posted:The RAM on the video card and the RAM the computer uses are used for two different things. Your computer is using the 2GB of RAM that is installed in the motherboard as well as the 512MB of RAM on the video card. Also the 9600GT is a pretty weak card so upgrading your card would probably help your framerate if you're having trouble with choppiness. Heh, I bought that video card in mind for playing games like this (Hey, its almost a 9800 GT right?  )Thanks for the help anyway.
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Aug 6, 2009 22:38
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