My System
Well I'll start with my main work machine which wants to give way to a 64-bit box. It's working too well at the moment though and has been perhaps the most reliable computer I've built to date. Maybe it has something to do with the quality of components that I used for the build.
| Stealth | |
| Case | Antec |
| Power Supply | Antec 450-watt |
| Motherboard | Asus A7N8X |
| CPU | Barton 2500 (Running @ 3200) |
| Memory | 1GB Corsair |
| Video Card | NVidia geForce 5900 XT |
| Keyboard/Mouse | Microsoft Optical |
| Hard Drive 1 | Western Digital 7200 200 GB |
| Hard Drive 2 | Seagate 7200 40 GB (a spare) |
| Hard Drive 3 | Seagate 7200 80 GB (a spare) |
| CD/DVD | Teac off-brand (meant to get TDK... huh?) |
| TV Card | Hauppauge |
| Audio Card | Santa Cruz Turtle Beach |
| OS | Windows XP Pro |
| Lynk II | |
| Power Supply | Antec 350-watt |
| Motherboard | ECS K7S5A Pro |
| CPU | AMD 1700 w/ Cooler Master vari-speed fan |
| Memory | 512 MB Corsair |
| Video Card | nVidia geForce TI-200 |
| Video Card 2 | nVidia geForce FX-5200 (replacement) |
| Keyboard/Mouse | Logitech Cordless Optical |
| Hard Drive 1 | Seagate 150 GB |
| Hard Drive 2 | Western Digital 40 GB |
| CD | TDK 54-24-48 |
| Audio | SIS 7012 (Onboard) |
| OS | Windows 2000 |
Frankly, I've had problems with a few ECS boards but the bang for the buck has proven irresistable at times. This is the second one in this box. I like Windows 2000 more than XP in some ways, particularly when I'm in a folder with a number of HTML files using the preview web page feature. What I like about this computer is it gives me online TV guide from the couch (I don't have premium cable or the cable box) and is always ready for a quick search. Oh, it is also wired through my stereo for a sound that I can't even match with my Infinity subwoofer system which I use from the Stealth machine.
| Cobalt | |
| Power Supply | Antec 350-watt (2nd supply) |
| Motherboard | Epox 8K3a+ |
| CPU | AMD 2600 |
| Memory | 512 MB Corsair |
| Video Card< | nVidia geForce FX-5200 |
| Keyboard/Mouse | * |
| Hard Drive 1 | Western Digital 80 GB |
| Hard Drive 2 | Western Digital 40 GB |
| CD | TDK 48-24-48 |
| TV Card | Hauppauge WinTV |
| Audio Card | Creative Soundblaster Live! |
| OS | Windows 98SE |
Cobalt remained my favorite computer even after I built Lynk II. This despite numerous hardware changes (to replace failed power supplies, video cards, and memory) and the reboots common to Windows 98. I had tweaked the 98 system so much that I never contemplated installing XP on this machine. This computer was taken out of service and I was in limbo as to whether I was going to repair it but before parting it out I decided to take another look. I suspected some leaking caps on the mainboard but turns out the round IDE cable I was using for looks was bad. This may have been the cause of the severely corrupted operating system. It always ran warmer than I liked, even with Cooler Master fans; I replaced the CPU and it's back to normal (see LME notes below).
| Lynk I | |
| Power Supply | Stock 250-watt |
| Motherboard | Epox MVP3 AGP/PCI |
| CPU | AMD K6 2/450 |
| Memory | 256 MB |
| Video Card | nVidia Riva 128 2X |
| Keyboard/Mouse | * |
| Hard Drive 1 | Western Digital 10 GB |
| Hard Drive 2 | Western Digital 10 GB |
| CD | Lite-On 12-8-12 |
| Optical Drive 2 | Iomega Zip |
| Audio | Yamaha |
| OS | Windows 95 SR2 |
The old 450--rock solid, never broke once. Seems like a slow boot now of course but just tried it out and everything on it still runs FAST. Wouldn't put none of the new bloatware on it but beautiful at what it does. I dog-earred about 1000 pages of that "Windows 95 Secrets" tome while learning how to master the "new" Win-95 operating system. I wish I still had an excuse to use this one.
* Stealth and Cobalt (on the desk) are independently networked but share the keyboard and mouse through a KVM switch. Likewise, Lynk I and II (sofa) are independently networked but linked to the Logitech wireless keyboard/mouse combo via KVM. All add-on ethernet cards are D-Link and my router is a D-Link DI-604. My shared broadband connection is still running through the original Speedstream modem supplied by SW Bell (I am now a "legacy" member of that club).
| LME (LynMar Enterprises) | |
| Power Supply | Antec 350-watt |
| Motherboard | ECS K7S5A |
| CPU | AMD 1500 |
| Memory | 256 MB |
| Video Card | nVidia TI-4200 |
| Keyboard/Mouse | * |
| Hard Drive 1 | TBA |
| CD | Ricoh |
| Audio | Onboard |
| OS | TBA |
This is a test machine that I swap parts in and out of for testing. The box is all that remains from the first computer I built; the mobo was a PC Chips board and I believe it was a Cyrus 133Mhz cpu. My hard drive was a 6.4GB Quantum Bigfoot and suffered the most catastrophic crash that I've endured to date (knock on wood). Remember what I said about ECS mainboards? Well it was so cheap to buy a mobo and CPU combo that it didn't pay to just replace one of the boards. So the 'spare' chip I had went into Cobalt above. The 'warm' CPU I took out is now sitting on this board, happy with a stock AMD fan.