Hard Light Productions Forums

Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: aldo_14 on June 01, 2005, 02:48:47 pm

Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: aldo_14 on June 01, 2005, 02:48:47 pm: My motherboard seems to be fried (thanks to some form of dust+DIMM+burny event, as far as i can tell). And given that i'm currently using the worlds worst laptop, I probably won't be around for the next few weeks. Or doing any modwork :(

But... I have a question anyways. Seeing as my mobo looks to be doomed, I decided to do a ~£200 upgrade while I was at it. £100 will sort me out with a new motherboard and an Athlon XP 3000+.

So I'm looking at either a Radeon 9800 (128MB), or X700 (256MB). They're pretty much the same price, so I was wondering which was the better card..... oh,and I am searching google for this before anyone asks - but I'm not lying in saying this is the worlds worst laptop.... it's like stabbing myself in the eyes with sharpened, heated rods made of purest salt.

EDIT; or maybe a GF 6600; apparently they're not bad. I'm not really looking for cutting edge, just 'decent'.
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: redsniper on June 01, 2005, 08:13:21 pm: my Radeon 9800 Pro is nice. I'd reccomend it. :yes:
and I may soon be having a cpu/mobo 'burny event' so you're not alone :sigh:
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: Setekh on June 01, 2005, 09:16:01 pm: Yeah, what's with the sudden surge of hardware problems?

I have no idea about what arbitrarily-named graphics cards you should pick up... but I hope you're not out of action for too long. Then again, it might be good for your health. :p
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: Bobboau on June 01, 2005, 09:30:39 pm: Orrin Hatch must be on to us.
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: aldo_14 on June 02, 2005, 04:40:36 am: Quote
Originally posted by Setekh
Yeah, what's with the sudden surge of hardware problems?

I have no idea about what arbitrarily-named graphics cards you should pick up... but I hope you're not out of action for too long. Then again, it might be good for your health. :p

I dunno a bout that.... I'm waiting on an email about an interview I had yesterday :nervous:
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: aldo_14 on June 08, 2005, 12:13:29 pm: Crikey, that was painful. Found out I blew a DRAM voltage controller chip on the old motherboard, and the replacement I bought got sent ack because the IDE connectors were faulty (and it didn't detect my L2 cache).

but I'm sorted now. Did I miss much?
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: kasperl on June 08, 2005, 12:35:26 pm: In a week? Doubtfull.

Got to see you back, though.
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: vyper on June 08, 2005, 01:38:10 pm: Quote
Originally posted by aldo_14
Crikey, that was painful. Found out I blew a DRAM voltage controller chip on the old motherboard, and the replacement I bought got sent ack because the IDE connectors were faulty (and it didn't detect my L2 cache).

but I'm sorted now. Did I miss much?

I could tell you, but I'd have to kill everyone else in the thread.
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: Black Wolf on June 08, 2005, 02:17:13 pm: Quote
Originally posted by vyper

I could tell you, but I'd have to kill everyone else in the thread.

Actually, you'd only need to kill one person... not an impossible task really. Go ahead and tell him. ;)
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: karajorma on June 08, 2005, 03:37:30 pm: Quote
Originally posted by vyper
I could tell you, but I'd have to kill everyone else in the thread.

You could just PM him you know :)
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: Hippo on June 08, 2005, 04:27:44 pm: or drop overly vague hints
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: Grug on June 08, 2005, 04:45:20 pm: If your still getting a new vid card, I'd say the X700, or try and get the X700 toxic. They were giving out better performance than the 9800pro in one of the reviews I was reading.
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: WMCoolmon on June 08, 2005, 05:23:54 pm: The 6600 GT gives out performance equal to an X700, from what I've read. (This was in HL2, which is optimized for ATI cards, too.)

Other than that it's fairly durable and foolhardy. God knows how much mishandling my 6600GT has suffered, and it still works fine. (Ex: Not plugging in the extra-power cable, jostling the fan/heatsink around, hefty amounts of heat, getting yanked out while I was using windows)
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: Setekh on June 08, 2005, 07:17:38 pm: Quote
Originally posted by Black Wolf
Actually, you'd only need to kill one person... not an impossible task really. Go ahead and tell him. ;)

You guys have way too much fun. :p
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: Hippo on June 08, 2005, 07:25:27 pm: Quote
Originally posted by WMCoolmon
getting yanked out while I was using windows

Buwah? :confused: :eek2: :wtf:
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: vyper on June 08, 2005, 07:29:46 pm: You all have very valid points.

However, I'm too lazy for any of the options. :p
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: Liberator on June 08, 2005, 07:55:10 pm: aldo, you want teh Geforce 6600 GT. It is literally about 2x as powerful as the non-GT 6600.
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: Grug on June 08, 2005, 08:11:00 pm: No don't listen to the lies!
X700toxic comes with overclocking programs etc. You can overclock with the software and not void the warranty. :)
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: WMCoolmon on June 08, 2005, 08:39:07 pm: Quote
Originally posted by Hippo

Buwah? :confused: :eek2: :wtf:

Yep. For a bit, I had to have an external power supply for the thing while I got ahold of a better microATX one. One day I accidentally hit it with my foot, and apparently I hadn't gotten the AGP lock on all the way. Off goes my monitor.

Once I'd figured out what happened, I let loose a series of rather unpolite terms.
Title: Might be gone for a wee bit....
Post by: Grey Wolf on June 08, 2005, 09:08:48 pm: 9800. Best ATi card ever. High end parts are always better, even if they are a generation old. Build quality tends to be better.