Re: OT: To the PC buffs in here

Erm, they do... :)

Didn't your incident with a kenwood car stereo teach you anything?

Pretty much, or a Celeron based on Pentium Blagh technology, or on the Blagh blagh core.

Isn't that Asus's budget "we clame to not know who they are" brand?

I'll second that. I've built budget computers for loads of people in my=20 spare time using ASRock boards and they've always been brilliant -=20 stable, no driver problems, well spec'ed for the price, etc.

Oh, and the fact they're made by Asustek's (it's their 'budget' brand)=20 is also a big plus when you're trying to sell them :)

--=20 Lordy.UK

Indeed it is. They're not /bad/ but represent good value for money.

Anyone who buys AMD based systems does so either because they're cheap, or because they're lying tothemselves that they're "better"

Pentiums are bought by snobs who are lying to themselves they havn't just paid over the odds :) AMD's are better for games.

...or because they would rather spend the money saved on something more useful, like, say, an ALPINA B10 V8. :)

A(MD user)

Or they're gamers. AMD trounces Intel in every gaming benchmark. In addition to that Intels dual core CPUS have been trounced by AMDs.

How can someone with such exquisite taste in motors have such s**te taste in processors?

AMD's what?

Pentiums have better thermal protection making them better for DIY systems. Intel chipsets have the best thermal management making for quieter and more efficient PCs. Reliability wise I've never seen an Intel CPU fail in the field, had very few DOA and the only returns have been from abused units (bent / broken pins, thermal abuse) unlike AMD who have about a 3% failure rate. Current (LGA) Intel chips don't even have pins.

I have an AMD machine running as a media encoder - it's stable but not much is asked for it (runs at >40% utilisation ALL the time, more than the same apps running on my Intel Laptop). I am yet to be shown in real application usage that an AMD is a better CPU choice than an Intel, only that it is a cheaper one.

And I would also say that as most AMD machines are self builds on cheap motherboards with cheap PSUs that they are also less reliable than most Intel machines.

Benchmarks exist to be ignored. You've been on the Karoo CS server - the No1 player runs Intel (as does the no 21 player...), don't know the rest.

:)

Mines a home brew, seems reliable, except the hard drive is fubared...

Ah the Intel AMD debate :) Will it ever end :) ?

Well, yea, when Intel people accept AMD's are better ;)

Horses for courses.

I tend to build boxes for specific uses and users and it's quite rare for machines to be compute bound; i/o and internal bandwidth tend to be the limiting factors, so it often makes sense to spend less on a processor and more on disks and RAM.

I'm currently sat at a 2xPIII@600MHz machine running a 2.4.26 Linux kernel with non standard scheduling which makes a very responsive workstation/terminal as all the heavy computation takes place elsewhere...

I also actively lobby IBM to make 64bit PPC ThinkPads :)

... per minute - lol

TBH I'd make the dell work again. They're very reliable IME, and the cooling on them is always surprisingly quiet. The heatsink on one my mum's just bought would be considered pretty flash by overclocking types, but it's running a big (90mm?) fan through ducting, which means it's very quiet for a modern system. OTOH, most AMD systems I've seen, even when people have tried to build a quiet machine, have been pretty noisy and filled with fans.

in news:7 snipped-for-privacy@pipex.net, "Vamp" slurred :

Heh. Solder melts at 300+ C, depending on the type. The maximum junction temperature for silicon is 125C, and the case/lead temperature will be less than that. So no, it won't melt the solder by a long shot.

Just got a 19" Lcd after years of having a 50 kilo 21" CRT on my desk. It's great. You can move it about one handed without a hernia. I still don't think the picture is as good though.

Fraser