Confessions of an upgrade addict

[VirtualLarry]

Help me. All I do is upgrade. For no reason at all.

First, let me list some of my previous computers.

I used to own a Pentium 166MMX, which I overclocked to 233. I used that machine for several years.

Then, I obtained a PII-300 SL2W8, and with the help of the awesome Abit BX-6 rev2 mobo, overclocked it to 450. Along with a nice ATI RagePro AGP 2X card running at 100Mhz memory/core and AGP bus speed, I had a decent rig, for programming, playing MAME, etc. It was the first machine that I owned that I could play DVDs effortlessly on too.

That machine lasted quite a few years, until the Tualatin Celeron 1.2Ghz chips (S370) came out, and I wanted to upgrade again. I failed in doing a slotket mod, and in the process, burned out the VRMs in my (favorite) mobo. So sad. So due to defective hardware, I had to upgrade again.

I was planning on getting a P3 rig, but a friend went with me to a computer show, and for the same price as a high-end P3, I got a KT4V-L mobo and a retail-box Athlon XP1800+ CPU, 1.5+ Ghz of goodness for under $150. Again, that mobo lasted me for quite some time.

Fast-forward to modern-day machines. When the C2D came out, I started eyeing them, and I managed to acquire a pair of Conroe865PE mobos, sourced from Germany because ASRock USA didn't carry them, thanks to a forum member here acting as the intermediary. I pair up one of them with an E4400 (2.0Ghz dual-core), and overclocked it to 2.8Ghz. That became my new main rig.

I still have that machine at a relative's house, running SeventeenorBust in the background 24/7. I have yet to move it into my apartment.

But at my apartment, I have an NV6150-based S939 3800+ single-core that is my effective main machine for day-to-day tasks, and I built two budget gaming rigs, with the plan for my friends to come over to my apartment and game on. They are E2140s @ 3.2Ghz (overclocked 100%!), Radeon X1950Pro/GT video cards, 4GB RAM, 320GB HD, 430W PSU, etc. I built those about 8 months ago.

This was the start of me building rigs without real need. I could survive indefinately on my E4400 or my 3800+ rigs, they are more than enough for day-to-day tasks, although the 6150-based video leaves a lot to be desired for gaming.

I have barely even used the E2140 rigs for gaming at all, and now I want to build two more monster gaming rigs. Q6600s, 8GB of RAM, WD 6400AAKS HDs, Crossfire 4850s (even though I'm only playing at 1680x1050), X48 chipset mobo, basically these fairly super-deluxe gaming rigs. I've already purchased all of the parts, I've just been busy and lazy and haven't built them yet.

So I've progressed with my upgrade-itis, from "need" upgrades", to "want" upgrades (in less than a year!), and now... I haven't even built those rigs, but now I'm considering how obsolete they are, and want to build more rigs. If the Q9650 dropped to $300 tomorrow, I'd buy two of them.

Somebody help me. I've got 5 grand worth of computer hardware in my apt., easily. Money that I probably shouldn't have spent on computers, but did, to feed my compulsion.

And now, I've ordered four 9600GSO graphics cards, and a AM2+ mobo with four PCI-E slots, to build a monster F@H rig. I almost ordered a Phenom to go with it, isn't that evidence of my sickness.

I've got more computers sitting in my apt. that I know what to do with.

I also have a P4 2.4Ghz, 2GB RAM, 40GB HD, DVD burner, that I'm trying to sell to a friend, I have another P4 2.8Ghz without RAM or HD, that I'll probably donate, an Opteron 165 rig with a 6600GT PCI-E and 2GB of RAM, no HD, that I'm trying to sell, probably hopelessly.

I forgot to mention the Foxconn 780G mobo with BE-2400 that I picked up, in order to upgrade my HTPC from the NV6150. I ended up buying another MATX case instead, so now I can have multiple MATX machines in the house too.

Is this normal for an AT forum member? Do any of you have this "sickness" too? Tell me your stories.

 

[lxskllr]

I don't have any stories, but computer building is as valid a hobby as any other. Other than gaming, a P3 would take care of all of my computer needs. I build computers because I enjoy sourcing parts, then putting them together. The physical computer is an end to itself for me, and apparently for you. As long as you aren't putting off more important priorities by buying computer parts, just enjoy your hobby. Maybe turn it into a part time business. You get all the fun of buying parts and putting them together, and you get paid for it too :^)

 

[videogames101]

Originally posted by: lxskllr
I don't have any stories, but computer building is as valid a hobby as any other. Other than gaming, a P3 would take care of all of my computer needs. I build computers because I enjoy sourcing parts, then putting them together. The physical computer is an end to itself for me, and apparently for you. As long as you aren't putting off more important priorities by buying computer parts, just enjoy your hobby. Maybe turn it into a part time business. You get all the fun of buying parts and putting them together, and you get paid for it too :^)

This.

 

[akugami]

IM me your address so I can go over to your house and slap some sense into you. Either that or join you in the upgrade party as I seem to be addicted to upgrading myself...I barely use the damn computer (mostly been on my laptop) and I have spent about $800 in upgrades last couple of months. Two 1.5TB Seagates (damn those Chinese TV shows the GF watches!) and upgraded from a C2D to a C2Q Q9550. Also changed my motherboard but sold my old one to someone else or it'd be closer to $900 in upgrades. To be honest, the laptop I've been using is probably overpowered for what I'm using it for.

 

[biostud]

just keep asking yourself why you want to upgrade?
Why do you want a F@H monster?
What does it give you?
Is that really important for you?
etc.

 

[AmberClad]

Like lxskllr said, it's a hobby. The building aspect itself, that is. It doesn't seem wrong to spend money on a hobby (as long as you're not going into debt or committing crimes to support it, in which case, that does seem more like an addiction :Q...).

Cars and import tuners are an accepted hobby, right? And usually a more expensive hobby at that.

 

[dbcooper1]

I feel you pain Larry; I'm in the same situation and searching for answers. # Part of my problem is that I subscribe to the local daiily newspaper and look forward to the ads every other day and live five minutes from Fry's..

 

[Ausm]

I have spent easily 40K on computer upgrades in the last 25 years so I feel your pain

 

[Denithor]

Hardware proliferation FTW!!!

I'm in the same boat here. I just "upgraded" my main gaming rig last night from an IP35E to a P5Q Pro. Will I see any difference? No. But it was fun swapping out the parts and tweaking the BIOS to get back to my old OC level. And now I have a second PCIe slot to play with, most likely I'll throw in a 9600GSO to up my Folding points.

Sitting next to my desk is my Folding rig. X38 motherboard, e3110, a G92 8800GTS and two 8800GS happily folding proteins all day. Next to that is a Shuttle with an Opty 165 and an 8800GT folding away. And I have a rebuilt Gateway system at my mom's house with an e4500 + 8800GS also running F@H.

And still "in the parts closet" I have an e7300, e6400, 4x1GB DDR2, two mATX C2D motherboards and some miscellaneous harddrives & DVD players & etc. Enough parts to assemble at least two more full systems.

Fortunately I've been doing "repair work" on the side for several years and have friends who will probably need upgrades in the next 6-12 months. So I can get rid of the old/spare parts that way without losing too much of my initial investment. But then I'll probably just buy more...

 

[rudder]

I bought a E6300 the first day they were available. My 3800+ I had a time the time was more than adequate and probably still is.... but now I have a q9450. Luckily I do not have time for gaming otherwise my 4670 would be replaced by a 4870X2.

 

[JujuFish]

It's a good thing I don't have money. That's probably the only thing vaccinating me against upgradeitis.

 

[roid450]

i too am addicted to upgrading. i just recently bought everything in my sig (except the gtx vid card, i've had it for 2 months)

but i went form a socket 939 2.6 ghz Opteron and 2 gb DDR400, to the Q6600 and 750i and 4 gbg ram. i was running my GTX card in my old system, when i upgraded it wasn't a enormous jump in performance, so in reality i didn't have to spend almost 1000$ on a almost completely new system. i know that video cards are pretty much the only thing that helps in games or decides whether or not you can run a game. but i couldn't stand having 2-3 yr old mobo and CPU. now im almost 1200$ in debt and wondering how im gonna pay it off like i said, most of what i got was not needed but feels good to have a bad ass rig

 

[Texun]

I hear ya man. Welcome! :beer:

I have a similar sickness. It's not that I often upgrade to the latest and fastest - I upgrade in stages and never throw anything away. The result is that I have 4 computers in the LR of my one BR apartment and a closet stacked with switches, fans, 3-5 boards, a box of CPU's, gigs of worthless memory, modems, routers, and wads of various cables and wall warts. At least I have maintained a limit on monitors. I only have two. The computers are networked and all have a specific function. One is for backups, one is for news groups\torrents, one is for media and the other is my primary email\CS:S\HL2 machine. I won't upgrade my 7600GT card because I know that will result in more games and eventually a new board with DDR3 ram - rendering my 6 gigs of DDR2 worthless.

It started when I took a look in my closet a few years ago and figured I could have a "free" computer by piecing together a Junk Yard Dog out of old parts. I did, and then began upgrading the Junk Yard Dog which ended up with more spare parts in the closet and more scrap hungry dogs. I never sell anything, because to me, it no longer has enough value to post, pack, and ship out. I check out NE daily and hit the Hot Deals forum on weekends. I wish I could say I have slowed down a bit but I haven't. I recently ditched one of my perfectly good S754 Win-XP rigs that I used to burn DVD's, and built a new 780G machine with Vista. All I really gained was the ability to watch video without needing a card. There's more..... I once built and gave away a PC to a young lady who was in her last year of college and still using a 486. I built a PC for my sister who has no idea how to do anything but play cards, and another one as a graduation gift for the daughter of a good friend. I used to get kick out of piecing one together and hitting the switch. Once it's tuned and tweaked up solid the high fades away and I start looking for something else to rip apart. The high is not as good as it once was so maybe that's good, but l Let's not even talk about hard drives. I go through them like M&Ms and have about 10 in my living room right now, but I have a feeling the economy will take care of my impulse buying pretty soon. :frown:

 

[WT]

So I guess this is the HA (Hardware Anonymous) virtual meeting room ? Hi all, my name is WT, and I am a hardware junky. If you don't mind, I will join your small group and admit to a serious compulsion that has me now maintaining 9+ PCs at any given time.

If you think the Rigs link in my sig is all that I own, I assure you I have many more that aren't worth posting, but they still inhabit a dusty corner of my work room, awaiting either a project or a casual PC buyer who doesn't need the higher end stuff that I buy.

Once I finish upgrading one of those 9 rigs, the parts that come out of that build then go into the next rig in line. I replaced an 8800GTS card last night, and damned if I can find a PC that would benefit from it !! It has effectively slid from #1 status all the way to #4 at this point, so to the OP, I feel your pain. Nobody knows why we do what we do ... other than to admit that it is indeed an obsession, and we try and keep it in check from time to time.

I find myself jotting down upgrade paths and parts lists on my Palm notes while I am doing nothing else, and hitting up the Hot Deals even when I realistically don't need a damn thing. I even gave away a nice PC to a co-worker who was stuck with a piece of junk PC at home and was leaving us to work elsewhere .. just because I could, and I knew it would help him out.

So, to my hardware obsessed friends .. I say we organize our own little FS/FT thread and continue our compulsion and clean out the closets at the same time.



PS edit: Larry, post some pics of that AM2+ board (MSI I assume) with those 4 9600s !! Sounds sexy as hell !! I might .. no, ... nooo, I can't do that ... don't make me even THINK about it ..

 

[WT]

Anybody buy any new hardware this weekend ?? I'm holding off on hardware buys to catch up on software. Fallout 3 gets installed tonight and Left 4 Dead demo goes on tomorrow in preparation for a LAN party this weekend.

See, I > DO < have a reason for building a lotta PCs !!I host a LAN party and nobody has to bring their own rigs !

 

[lxskllr]

I bought a thumb drive. I guess that counts :^D

 

[Knavish]

Ouch, man. Addict is right. I guess if you got the money, why not build for fun. Some people blow it in Vegas or on cars or whatever. You ever thought about saving up for a big vacation or something instead of buying computers?

 

[nerp]

I recently went through a bit of an obsessive/addict style cycle and upgraded all my machines, built new, sold off old parts, replaced components, etc. I'm basically done now and when I think about what to upgrade next, I'm running out of ideas. I just bought a new 22 inch monitor to replace my aging 19 inch dell 4:3. I already have a kickass sound system, great video card, awesome CPU, plenty of memory, all machines are running Vista, my MCE box doesn't need anything and I still have some serious free space left on it. . . my work machine is more than fast enough for what I do in the office and I've already bought a new mouse and keyboard for it recently, so there's really no possible way for me to upgrade without regrets.

So I think it's time I call it a day and let these machines age gracefully. I'm at a point where I don't forsee getting a quad box anytime soon. Maybe I'll build a nehalem or deneb system in two or three years. By then my existing machines will make solid file servers, etc. We'll see. I have a feeling my current spread of rigs will sit around for some years now. When I can't play games anymore on the main box and upgrading the GPU won't work, then I'll consider something new.

It kind of feels good to be done. There was a long stretch of time where every small upgrade to one machine meant a chain reaction of upgrades on the others. Little more ram here, faster quieter HD there. .. Now I'm at a point where there is absolutley NOTHING left for me to upgrade without a serious boot in the butt from the woman. I've spent enough.

Then again, a new laptop might be nice. . . Or a netbook for meetings. . . naaaa.

 

[lxskllr]

Originally posted by: nerp
Or a netbook for meetings. . . naaaa.

You need a netbook ;^)

I've been having a lot of fun with my daughter's EeePC, and assuming I didn't get ripped off, I have one of my own coming from Ebay. I like the limitations... Small screen, small SSD HD, and best of all, the small footprint. It's also cool running Linux on hardware that "just works". It's hard to beat for $200-$300 :^)

 

[ku]

This was me half a decade ago, but I've been clean since.

Well, I was still in high-school so funds were short, but I'd still get whatever I can to throw in my computer with whatever money I can get my hands on.

I was lucky enough to have my friends intervene. They saw that I was poor and this addiction was very unhealthy, especially to my wallet. So they, being the good friends they are, got me addicted to alcohol and nicotine and drugs instead. I've been PCB-free for 5 years now.

 

[nerp]

PCB free. Hahah. I like that.

 

[WT]

got me addicted to alcohol and nicotine and drugs instead

Seems a wash to me ... either a new GTX280 or hookers and booze ... quite the conundrum !!

:beer:

I'll go with the hardware. It doesn't act needy the following day. It just does its job.

 

[Speedwagon]

Finally a place to talk about my obsession.
I am not so much into upgrading but buying old used stuff (athlon and sempron). Even gone so far as to build a test bench out of scrap alum parts laying around. Thank god I don't spend a lot of money on this but I get a rush from buying the parts and piecing together old machines.
I did finally upgrade to a AMD x2 motherboard and processor this summer. But I bought the processor off this forum because it was $10 cheaper than new. The most fun I have is searching for an old motherboard that was a good overclocker and then not even use it for overclocking. I have lost count on the number of motherboards and processors I have lying around. Believe me I wish I could stop but it's too much fun. Once one of my motherboards didn't work and I spent a good 2 weeks looking for the problem online and computer repair shops and after all that time and effort found a bad diode. Did I throw that motherboard away no I went out on ebay and bought another exact same model. Did I need it no but I wanted it for a backup.
I don't think am the only one out there that likes working on old computer either. My kids think I should start a small business but I tell them that I would go broke because I wouldn't charge them enough or do it for free.
That's it for now, maybe I will go over to the For Sale forum and look for more parts.

 

[lenjack]

For casual users who upgrade a lot, the fact is, someone could sneak into your house, boot into bios, and drop your clock speed 50%, and there is a good chance that you wouldn't notice!