New PC Time i Think

[Kris Vickers]

OK, so after the recent debacle of my current PC, which is dying a slow death, i figured its time for a new one.

To clear up whats wrong with my current setup;

BSOD quite often. Things i`ve done to fix this are, OS re-install, GFX Driver testing of many different versions, a full PC deep clean including re-pasting of ALL processors with a heatsink (GPU,CPU, NB & SB). All of which have done absolutely nothing to help with my problem.

To make matters worse, when i came to take out the MoBo for the deep clean, i noticed it was warped to buggery near the CPU, so this cant be helping matters.
Either way, all my BSOD info points towards bad video RAM on the card. Or so i would believe after many, MANY hours of googling my fingers to the bone!
I can carry on as normal with my PC, until i stress it in anyway, then it laughs in my face before spitting a blue screen at me, then reboots.

So bugger it, i`m getting a new one.

Things i will be transfering over to my new build include;
E8400 @ 3Ghz - Never OC`d, so should have plenty of life left
1TB Seagate HDD
DVD-RW drive
850w PSU
Borrowed GFX card, not got it yet, so unsure of what it is. I`m told its a couple of steps up from my current XFX 8800GT 512MB, so it`ll do for now.
All the fans aswell

And thats pretty much it.

I do have 4GB of DDR2 RAM, but i want to upgrade to DDR3, so wont be porting that over.

So, i need a new Mobo and some RAM (and possibly a new case if i can afford one)

MoBo`s in mind are; (has to be socket 775, DDR3 compatible and have 4 DIMM slots)
Asus P5P41TD or
Asus P5P43TD-Pro

And the RAM? I`m going to be getting Corsair XMS3 2x4GB. Because i`ve had XMS2 in this PC and its been flawless for two years.

So after all that rambling, my question is, has anyone got any good/bad words to say about those two MoBo`s? Or can you recommend anything better based on my needs?

 

[Alexander Rhodes]

Well, I had an ASUS P5N32-Sli Plus, and it was a very, very good board in terms of features and compatability, although when it comes to overclocking it did run really hot, in fact the bridges and Vcore are dangerously hot, so if you are thinking of clocking it up, maybe look into cooling upgrades at the same time with those boards, better than getting to it later.

 

[Kris Vickers]

My current board is a P5N-D, and that runs abit warm too.Unfortunately, the board I wanted is discontinued, and everywhere seems to be sold out.So my next choice of board is the P5QLD Pro. It means sticking with DDR2, but at least it saves me some cash

 

[Alexander Rhodes]

Have you tried ebuyer.com? They normally have a lot of good stuff at very good prices. Other than that, try google shopping, if anyone does have that board it stock, google will know

 

[Kris Vickers]

I`ve spent two days trawling google shopping and various sites. Nothink.

eBuyer was one of the first places i checked, as i`ve shopped there many times before.
All they have is the P5G41T-M LX, which is not what i want.

I`m sorted now. The new board i want is only £54, and my mate's a manager at Scan, so i get extra discount

 

[Alexander Rhodes]

Sweet, nice one. Since you get extra discount, does that mean you get discount on Graphics cards too? I see an upgrade coming lol.

 

[Kris Vickers]

I can get a discount on anything sold there, as he puts it onto his 'tab'. So it`s staff discounted.

I`m sure how abused that is allowed to be if i`m getting orders through me for his discount though lol

Update anyways.

I`ve bought my P5QLD-Pro, but i`m not installing it yet, as i`m waiting to get a decent heatsink for my CPU (which i`m picking up tomorrow for free lol).

The GFX card i`ve been loaned is a Radeon 3600 series. The heatsink on this thing is HUUUUUGE, but fanless. I cant believe the noise my PC was making was ALL my 8800GT!!

Once i`ve saved abit of cash, which might be a while because me and the missus have just bought a house, my next purchase will indeed, be a GFX card

 

[Alexander Rhodes]

If your card is not motion cooled, please refrain from overclocking it, I have seen fanless tech before and it is fine for normal operation, but in my experience the slightest voltage increase could be bad news. Good news is though, upgrades are available for such things

As for the noise, at least I bet it doesn't sound like my old one or the current one, the current one sounds like a jet engine, the old one sounds like a hoover lol.

 

[Kris Vickers]

Well, i ended up getting one of THESE for free, woohoo. Its a Gelid Tranquillo.

Not quite a MegaHalems, but a similar size and does the same job.

I can already see a massive temp drop from the cr4ppy Intel stock job that was on in the first place.
After 15/10 minutes of a brutal Prime95 test, it was only just reaching 50 degrees on Core#0. Before it used to idle at around 47 lol

I did notice though, that the fan slightly interfered with the RAM in DIMM socket 1 on my new motherboard, but the fan only clips onto the heatsink, so there was enough movement to get past that.

With my money saved, i`ll be buying some dominator RAM soon

 

[Alexander Rhodes]

Tower coolers are amazing aren't they. I have one of these http://www.arctic.ac/en/p/detail?sArticle=4.?.

Not only is it 90% quiter than a stock job, but cooler too. My CPU loves it, had overclocked to 30% lol

Only 1 issue, because of the way the fan blows air through the heatsink, the leading edges will clog with dust. when using compressed air to clean tower coolers, blow from the back (with the fan taken off) that way the dust doesn't get trapped in the middle.