[Edit: As a beginning summary, if you are looking into any of these parts or curious how a build with these components went continue reading.
Motherboard: Asus A7V8X
Memory: Corsair CMX512-3200C2 x 2 = 1GB
Athlon XP 2100+ (1.73GHz) Socket-A OEM
Thermalright SLK800 w/ YS Tech NFD1281259B-2F + Artic Silver 3
Lian-Li PC70
Vantec Ultimate Hard Drive cooler
Enermax EG465P-VE(FMA) (431W)
Radeon 9700 Pro Retail
Hercules Gaming Theater XP 6.1 Retail
Seagate ST336752LW 36GB 15K RPM 68-pin 8MB
Tekram DC390U3W -> Adaptec 39160
Pioneer DVD-305S 10X SCSI DVD SLOT
Everything is a positive other than the Tekram DC390U3W. The Radeon 9700 Pro Retail is a positive with issues.
]
I built another computer from scratch 3 weeks ago and have been using it for long enough to be able to give good comments. I hope to be able to give some of the comments that one won't find in the reviews.
I will go through the system component by component and give my opinions.
Motherboard: Asus A7V8X
A7V8X/GBL/1394/SATA/R133-UAY
10839 10576
BIOS: 1004
This board is definitely fully loaded. It also seems to be quite stable non-overclocked. I have only had 2 lockups (in three weeks) both while booting Windows 2000 that I can not attribute to the Direct3D Radeon 9700 Pro issues (see below) or while playing with overclocking. When actually using my system with stable settings the system has been completely stable. The first two weeks I left my system on solid to test stability and generally had it doing something when I was not home.
BIOS 1005 and 1006 are available, but most people seem to still be running the 1004 because it is the most stable. Asus still has some work to do on the new BIOSes, but I am pretty happy with the 1004. As you will see below, I went SCSI and there is no way to disable the Serial ATA/RAID controller on this board.
The voltages that I am monitoring are not great, but seem consistent with other Asus A7V8X users. This motherboard seems to give .025 - .05 extra voltage to the processor (I.e. if Vcore is set to 1.75V in the BIOS, it really will be 1.775 - 1.8V). This is does not seem to depend on the power supply used.
Memory: Corsair PC3200 DDR 512MB CMX512-3200C2 x 2 = 1GB
I am running my system with these set at 333MHz, as the A7V8X performs better and is more stable than with 400MHz. On the Asus A7V8X the by SPD detects these as CAS 3-3-3-7, but I forced them to 2-2-2-6 without any issues.
Processor and cooling:
Athlon XP 2100+ (1.73GHz) Socket-A OEM
AX2100DMT3C
AGOIA 0216GPBW
Thermalright SLK800
YS Tech 80mm Speed Controlled Fan
Model NFD1281259B-2F
- Max Airflow: 48.70 CFM
- Max RPM: 3,700 RPM
- Noise Level: 39.5 db(A)
Artic Silver 3.
I own both Intel and AMD systems, and I support both companies as I like competition. It was AMD's turn.
I followed all the instructions for applying Artic Silver 3 on their Web site, which is a total pain in the butt. However, I understand why each thing is done, but I am not sure how much of a difference it really makes.
I have the YS Tech 80mm turned up all the way and my system still runs at about 49C/120F with a mobo temp of 35C/95F. I have placed an order for more fans for the system to get the mobo temp down, hopefully that will bring down the CPU temp some. I really don't think I will have much luck overclocking until I bring that temperature down a bit. This system is in the corner of a room between the wall and the computer desk, not an ideal place for airflow. I really don't want to move it though. The air behind the computer is quite warm (not just the air coming out). If I can't bring the temp down with out moving the system, I will just live without overclocking. I have had another system in this same location that ran much cooler and overclocked quite well, though.
I really would have preferred if the SLK800 screwed into the motherboard instead of using clips. The clips slightly cut up my finger tips when pressing them on. I am not coordinated enough to use a screwdriver without risking damaging the motherboard.
Case: Lian-Li PC70 and Vantec Ultimate Hard Drive cooler
I would have gone with the PC75 if I could have found it locally, but Oh well. The window upgrade just isn't worth mail ordering for me. Overall, this case isn't bad. It really is pretty nice and light. I have a number of complaints about this case. First it would be nice if the motherboard tray came out (I know that the smaller PC6X cases do) and there is enough room that this isn't a serious issue, but it would be really nice especially with how the motherboard mount brackets work.
Compared to the other side opening cases I own, I find that the sides of this case are the most difficult to put back on. I love my Antec cases with the latch on the side, they come on and off very nicely. On the Lian-Li case one has to place the bottom groves into place and make sure it lines up before sliding it. Even then, it generally does not slide smoothly. Maybe I am doing something wrong.
The thumscrews on the PCI/AGP slots is a nice touch, but I have been screwing them in anyways to make sure the cards are in tight. The shape of the thumbscrews does not seem to guarentee that the cards are in well when I screw them in as far as I can by hand, but that is probably just me being paranoid.
I use Vantec Ultimate hard drive coolers for my SCSI drives. I have not had much difficulty getting them to work with most cases, but it took me almost an hour to get one mounted into this case. Whenever, I put the front cover on it would push in one of the cover plates. I am sure that this is because the Ultimate hard drive cooler front cover is not the best design in the world (an understatement), but I can install one in my other systems in under 10 minutes. I still like the Ultimate hard drive cooler, because I have looked a ton and have not found anything better.
Power Supply: Enermax EG465P-VE(FMA) (431W)
I like this power supply. It is pretty quite. Only time will tell whether it is reliable or not. The voltages I am monitoring are not great, but seem very consistent with other Asus A7V8X users.
Video Card: Radeon 9700 Pro Retail
This video card has been a mixed bag. After I ordered this card and before I received it I saw the 8X issue threads on the rage3d forums. Fortunately, my Radeon 9700 Pro would POST in my mobo so I did not need to RMA it like some people had to, but I was worried. For about the first week and a half, I could not play a number of Direct3D games, while OpenGL worked fine. I assumed that this was a driver issue and many other people on the rage3d forums seemed to be having the same issue. Then I came across a thread by WaltC that said raising the AGP voltage .1V solved this issue for him. I tried it, and it solved it for me too.
After solving the Direct3D lockups, the only issues remaining are the lack of a force vsync option (causing texture tearing in games that do not allow enabling vsync), the event log Cinemaster errors (not a critical problem, just an error message that appears in the event logs), and the Windows 2000 60Hz Direct3D issue (this is a Windows 2000 bug and not an ATI bug, but ATI should be able to fix it).
Sound Card: Hercules Gaming Theater XP 6.1 Retail
I am happy with this sound card. It seems to sound better than the Soundblaster Live! Platinum I have in another system in actual usage. When running the dxdiag on the Soundblaster Live! when using the Soundblaster Live! some of the tests sound like crap vs. the Microsoft Software driver. I can not distinguish between the Hercules GTXP and the Microsoft Software driver, this is a huge difference in dxdiag. I think the Creative drivers end up using the Microsoft synthesizer because their hardware sounds so bad, but I could be wrong. I do not own an Audigy, so I cannot compare it to that.
I was a little disappointed with what came in the box. There was not even a manual! The only cable that came in the box was the one that connects to the external box, and it came with a headphone adapter. I kept looking through the box to see if I missed anything, until I read the list of contents and found out that that is it. At a minimum it should have also come with CD audio cables.
I do prefer the internal box that comes with the Soundblaster Live! Platinum vs. the external box of the Hercules GTXP, but I do not feel it is worth the extra money for a card that I think sounds worse.
Hard Drive: Seagate ST336752LW 36GB 15K RPM 68-pin 8MB
I am quite happy with this drive thus far, and it seems to perform quite well. It is much quieter than my SCSI 10K drives in other systems.
SCSI Controller:
Original: Tekram DC390U3W
Switch to: Adaptec 39160
I orginally went with the Tekram DC390U3W that a lot of members of this forum have said they liked. It is much cheaper than an Adaptec 39160, and some people were claiming that they thought it performed better. I did some searching online, but I could not find anyone who had benchmarked the two. I decided that worst case I would yank a 39160 out of another system and put the DC390U3W in one of my older systems.
Well, as you might have guessed from my tone of writing, I yanked a 39160 out of one of my old systems. The DC390U3W is not a bad card. The only issue I had with it is when I first put it in the system, the BIOS gave a detecting PCI devices message and just hung. I tried forcing IRQs and moving slots. I ended up giving it one more try in the original slot, and then it started working. It worked from then on with out any problems. I have no idea what caused that initial problem putting the card in, but I would guess some sort of IRQ or address conflict.
I went to Tekram's site and grabbed the latest BIOS that said it resolved some issues with Cheetah drives. After flashing the BIOS, I started getting 'This drive should perform at 160MB/s after bootup' type messages.
The card did not seem to perform that bad, but it just didn't seem to be quite where I expected it to be. Then I started benchmarking it to confirm what I believed, and it turned out I was right. My filesystem benchmarks were just above a single 7200RPM IDE drive! That should not be the case with a 15K Cheetah drive on an Ultra160 channel.
I then yanked a 39160 and went through the pain of Windows 2000 changing SCSI controllers. Here are some rough results I got:
Tekram DC390U3W vs. Adaptec 39160. I ended up getting about a 6MB/s improvement after doing some defraging and swapping controllers. That is a huge difference. The difference between the DC390U3W and the Adaptec 39160 seems to be about 3.8MB/s according to SiSoft. I have some Iometer results there too, but ignore the MB/s given by that. I used the file based benchmarking. Keep in mind that I was actually using this disk. I closed all the programs in my tool tray and shut down all services that are not required, but these are not ideal benchmarks. They are not real world either, because normally all those programs would not be shutdown, but they would skew benchmark results. I ran the bencharks many times to give a more scientific technique. These are not good absolute benchmarks, but they should be good as relative benchmarks to compare the two cards as both cards were tested under as close to the same environment as possible.
[Edit: I would also like to add that the computer I moved the Tekram DC390U3W to would not post with the card in the original slot. After a few reboots I was able to get it to post and try forcing an IRQ to that slot to no success. Ended up moving slots.]
DVD ROM: Pioneer DVD-305S 10X SCSI DVD SLOT
I do not read a lot of DVD data disks, so the difference between DVD 10X and DVD 16X makes no difference to me. I care more about being able to read DVD disks and CD-ROM performance. All the drives that my research came down to were 40X CD-ROM readers. In theory and looking at benchmarks, the SCSI 40X reader will perform better than the IDE 40X reader and I have a SCSI drive to talk to, so that is the route I took. When having a SCSI hard drive it makes a lot of sense to have a SCSI CD drive, anyways. That way the CPU can tell the CD drive to copy data to the hard drive and let SCSI take care of the actual transfer (instead of IDE where the CPU has to take care of the transfer itself).
I am quite happy with this drive, it is a bit noisy though. But so are most of my DVD drives.
CDRW: Plextor CD-R PX-W4012A
I don't burn a lot of CDs, but I wanted to be able to. I really haven't used it much so I can't give it a fair review.
I picked this drive as it seems to be good about getting around copy protection. I am pretty hard against piriting and make sure to purchase my software legally. I even have paid for the little shareware stuff that I use (WinZip, BulletProof FTP, etc.) However, I am strongly against companies taking an involvement in what I do in my own home and thus heavily against the DMCA and copy protection. I get around copy protection in my own home just because I hate it. (FYI, I have done quite a bit of commercial programming so piriting may affect me.)
ZIP Drive:
Iomega Zip 250 IDE. I have to be able to read and write 100MB Zip disks for taking data elsewhere. Since the Zip 750 can only read 100MB Zip disks, it was not an option. I wanted internal rather than external, so SCSI was not an option.
Floppy: TEAC 3.5 1.44MB FDD White
It's a floppy drive.
Motherboard: Asus A7V8X
Memory: Corsair CMX512-3200C2 x 2 = 1GB
Athlon XP 2100+ (1.73GHz) Socket-A OEM
Thermalright SLK800 w/ YS Tech NFD1281259B-2F + Artic Silver 3
Lian-Li PC70
Vantec Ultimate Hard Drive cooler
Enermax EG465P-VE(FMA) (431W)
Radeon 9700 Pro Retail
Hercules Gaming Theater XP 6.1 Retail
Seagate ST336752LW 36GB 15K RPM 68-pin 8MB
Tekram DC390U3W -> Adaptec 39160
Pioneer DVD-305S 10X SCSI DVD SLOT
Everything is a positive other than the Tekram DC390U3W. The Radeon 9700 Pro Retail is a positive with issues.
]
I built another computer from scratch 3 weeks ago and have been using it for long enough to be able to give good comments. I hope to be able to give some of the comments that one won't find in the reviews.
I will go through the system component by component and give my opinions.
Motherboard: Asus A7V8X
A7V8X/GBL/1394/SATA/R133-UAY
10839 10576
BIOS: 1004
This board is definitely fully loaded. It also seems to be quite stable non-overclocked. I have only had 2 lockups (in three weeks) both while booting Windows 2000 that I can not attribute to the Direct3D Radeon 9700 Pro issues (see below) or while playing with overclocking. When actually using my system with stable settings the system has been completely stable. The first two weeks I left my system on solid to test stability and generally had it doing something when I was not home.
BIOS 1005 and 1006 are available, but most people seem to still be running the 1004 because it is the most stable. Asus still has some work to do on the new BIOSes, but I am pretty happy with the 1004. As you will see below, I went SCSI and there is no way to disable the Serial ATA/RAID controller on this board.
The voltages that I am monitoring are not great, but seem consistent with other Asus A7V8X users. This motherboard seems to give .025 - .05 extra voltage to the processor (I.e. if Vcore is set to 1.75V in the BIOS, it really will be 1.775 - 1.8V). This is does not seem to depend on the power supply used.
Memory: Corsair PC3200 DDR 512MB CMX512-3200C2 x 2 = 1GB
I am running my system with these set at 333MHz, as the A7V8X performs better and is more stable than with 400MHz. On the Asus A7V8X the by SPD detects these as CAS 3-3-3-7, but I forced them to 2-2-2-6 without any issues.
Processor and cooling:
Athlon XP 2100+ (1.73GHz) Socket-A OEM
AX2100DMT3C
AGOIA 0216GPBW
Thermalright SLK800
YS Tech 80mm Speed Controlled Fan
Model NFD1281259B-2F
- Max Airflow: 48.70 CFM
- Max RPM: 3,700 RPM
- Noise Level: 39.5 db(A)
Artic Silver 3.
I own both Intel and AMD systems, and I support both companies as I like competition. It was AMD's turn.
I followed all the instructions for applying Artic Silver 3 on their Web site, which is a total pain in the butt. However, I understand why each thing is done, but I am not sure how much of a difference it really makes.
I have the YS Tech 80mm turned up all the way and my system still runs at about 49C/120F with a mobo temp of 35C/95F. I have placed an order for more fans for the system to get the mobo temp down, hopefully that will bring down the CPU temp some. I really don't think I will have much luck overclocking until I bring that temperature down a bit. This system is in the corner of a room between the wall and the computer desk, not an ideal place for airflow. I really don't want to move it though. The air behind the computer is quite warm (not just the air coming out). If I can't bring the temp down with out moving the system, I will just live without overclocking. I have had another system in this same location that ran much cooler and overclocked quite well, though.
I really would have preferred if the SLK800 screwed into the motherboard instead of using clips. The clips slightly cut up my finger tips when pressing them on. I am not coordinated enough to use a screwdriver without risking damaging the motherboard.
Case: Lian-Li PC70 and Vantec Ultimate Hard Drive cooler
I would have gone with the PC75 if I could have found it locally, but Oh well. The window upgrade just isn't worth mail ordering for me. Overall, this case isn't bad. It really is pretty nice and light. I have a number of complaints about this case. First it would be nice if the motherboard tray came out (I know that the smaller PC6X cases do) and there is enough room that this isn't a serious issue, but it would be really nice especially with how the motherboard mount brackets work.
Compared to the other side opening cases I own, I find that the sides of this case are the most difficult to put back on. I love my Antec cases with the latch on the side, they come on and off very nicely. On the Lian-Li case one has to place the bottom groves into place and make sure it lines up before sliding it. Even then, it generally does not slide smoothly. Maybe I am doing something wrong.
The thumscrews on the PCI/AGP slots is a nice touch, but I have been screwing them in anyways to make sure the cards are in tight. The shape of the thumbscrews does not seem to guarentee that the cards are in well when I screw them in as far as I can by hand, but that is probably just me being paranoid.
I use Vantec Ultimate hard drive coolers for my SCSI drives. I have not had much difficulty getting them to work with most cases, but it took me almost an hour to get one mounted into this case. Whenever, I put the front cover on it would push in one of the cover plates. I am sure that this is because the Ultimate hard drive cooler front cover is not the best design in the world (an understatement), but I can install one in my other systems in under 10 minutes. I still like the Ultimate hard drive cooler, because I have looked a ton and have not found anything better.
Power Supply: Enermax EG465P-VE(FMA) (431W)
I like this power supply. It is pretty quite. Only time will tell whether it is reliable or not. The voltages I am monitoring are not great, but seem very consistent with other Asus A7V8X users.
Video Card: Radeon 9700 Pro Retail
This video card has been a mixed bag. After I ordered this card and before I received it I saw the 8X issue threads on the rage3d forums. Fortunately, my Radeon 9700 Pro would POST in my mobo so I did not need to RMA it like some people had to, but I was worried. For about the first week and a half, I could not play a number of Direct3D games, while OpenGL worked fine. I assumed that this was a driver issue and many other people on the rage3d forums seemed to be having the same issue. Then I came across a thread by WaltC that said raising the AGP voltage .1V solved this issue for him. I tried it, and it solved it for me too.
After solving the Direct3D lockups, the only issues remaining are the lack of a force vsync option (causing texture tearing in games that do not allow enabling vsync), the event log Cinemaster errors (not a critical problem, just an error message that appears in the event logs), and the Windows 2000 60Hz Direct3D issue (this is a Windows 2000 bug and not an ATI bug, but ATI should be able to fix it).
Sound Card: Hercules Gaming Theater XP 6.1 Retail
I am happy with this sound card. It seems to sound better than the Soundblaster Live! Platinum I have in another system in actual usage. When running the dxdiag on the Soundblaster Live! when using the Soundblaster Live! some of the tests sound like crap vs. the Microsoft Software driver. I can not distinguish between the Hercules GTXP and the Microsoft Software driver, this is a huge difference in dxdiag. I think the Creative drivers end up using the Microsoft synthesizer because their hardware sounds so bad, but I could be wrong. I do not own an Audigy, so I cannot compare it to that.
I was a little disappointed with what came in the box. There was not even a manual! The only cable that came in the box was the one that connects to the external box, and it came with a headphone adapter. I kept looking through the box to see if I missed anything, until I read the list of contents and found out that that is it. At a minimum it should have also come with CD audio cables.
I do prefer the internal box that comes with the Soundblaster Live! Platinum vs. the external box of the Hercules GTXP, but I do not feel it is worth the extra money for a card that I think sounds worse.
Hard Drive: Seagate ST336752LW 36GB 15K RPM 68-pin 8MB
I am quite happy with this drive thus far, and it seems to perform quite well. It is much quieter than my SCSI 10K drives in other systems.
SCSI Controller:
Original: Tekram DC390U3W
Switch to: Adaptec 39160
I orginally went with the Tekram DC390U3W that a lot of members of this forum have said they liked. It is much cheaper than an Adaptec 39160, and some people were claiming that they thought it performed better. I did some searching online, but I could not find anyone who had benchmarked the two. I decided that worst case I would yank a 39160 out of another system and put the DC390U3W in one of my older systems.
Well, as you might have guessed from my tone of writing, I yanked a 39160 out of one of my old systems. The DC390U3W is not a bad card. The only issue I had with it is when I first put it in the system, the BIOS gave a detecting PCI devices message and just hung. I tried forcing IRQs and moving slots. I ended up giving it one more try in the original slot, and then it started working. It worked from then on with out any problems. I have no idea what caused that initial problem putting the card in, but I would guess some sort of IRQ or address conflict.
I went to Tekram's site and grabbed the latest BIOS that said it resolved some issues with Cheetah drives. After flashing the BIOS, I started getting 'This drive should perform at 160MB/s after bootup' type messages.
The card did not seem to perform that bad, but it just didn't seem to be quite where I expected it to be. Then I started benchmarking it to confirm what I believed, and it turned out I was right. My filesystem benchmarks were just above a single 7200RPM IDE drive! That should not be the case with a 15K Cheetah drive on an Ultra160 channel.
I then yanked a 39160 and went through the pain of Windows 2000 changing SCSI controllers. Here are some rough results I got:
Tekram DC390U3W vs. Adaptec 39160. I ended up getting about a 6MB/s improvement after doing some defraging and swapping controllers. That is a huge difference. The difference between the DC390U3W and the Adaptec 39160 seems to be about 3.8MB/s according to SiSoft. I have some Iometer results there too, but ignore the MB/s given by that. I used the file based benchmarking. Keep in mind that I was actually using this disk. I closed all the programs in my tool tray and shut down all services that are not required, but these are not ideal benchmarks. They are not real world either, because normally all those programs would not be shutdown, but they would skew benchmark results. I ran the bencharks many times to give a more scientific technique. These are not good absolute benchmarks, but they should be good as relative benchmarks to compare the two cards as both cards were tested under as close to the same environment as possible.
[Edit: I would also like to add that the computer I moved the Tekram DC390U3W to would not post with the card in the original slot. After a few reboots I was able to get it to post and try forcing an IRQ to that slot to no success. Ended up moving slots.]
DVD ROM: Pioneer DVD-305S 10X SCSI DVD SLOT
I do not read a lot of DVD data disks, so the difference between DVD 10X and DVD 16X makes no difference to me. I care more about being able to read DVD disks and CD-ROM performance. All the drives that my research came down to were 40X CD-ROM readers. In theory and looking at benchmarks, the SCSI 40X reader will perform better than the IDE 40X reader and I have a SCSI drive to talk to, so that is the route I took. When having a SCSI hard drive it makes a lot of sense to have a SCSI CD drive, anyways. That way the CPU can tell the CD drive to copy data to the hard drive and let SCSI take care of the actual transfer (instead of IDE where the CPU has to take care of the transfer itself).
I am quite happy with this drive, it is a bit noisy though. But so are most of my DVD drives.
CDRW: Plextor CD-R PX-W4012A
I don't burn a lot of CDs, but I wanted to be able to. I really haven't used it much so I can't give it a fair review.
I picked this drive as it seems to be good about getting around copy protection. I am pretty hard against piriting and make sure to purchase my software legally. I even have paid for the little shareware stuff that I use (WinZip, BulletProof FTP, etc.) However, I am strongly against companies taking an involvement in what I do in my own home and thus heavily against the DMCA and copy protection. I get around copy protection in my own home just because I hate it. (FYI, I have done quite a bit of commercial programming so piriting may affect me.)
ZIP Drive:
Iomega Zip 250 IDE. I have to be able to read and write 100MB Zip disks for taking data elsewhere. Since the Zip 750 can only read 100MB Zip disks, it was not an option. I wanted internal rather than external, so SCSI was not an option.
Floppy: TEAC 3.5 1.44MB FDD White
It's a floppy drive.
