My friend just got his new "awesome" comp

[Mrvile]

Well my friend's old comp Dell a couple months ago and his parents were supposed to replace it by Christmas. Anyway he has this uncle that is a PC tech in college, and was supposed to compile a big list of parts for his parents to purchase, and his uncle was building. Anyway, I was bugging him all last month for a list of the parts, so I could critique and post and ask you guys. Well anyway he finally receives him comp (yesterday?) without giving me a list (he's lazy and his uncle is lazy) and I throw a fit and do what has to be done.

"Now I want you to right-click on my computer, then hit properties."
"Ok what do you want to know."
"What processor you have."
"3.2 Pentium 4ghz, 2GB of ram."
[insert fit here]
"What?"
"First, [explains why AMD is better than P4], then [explains why 2GB is a waste of money since he will only be gaming]."
"Oh."
"Anyway now go over to devices, then device manager. Click on Display Adapters."
"Where the [explitive] are you??"
"My computer > Properties > Devices (or one of the tabs) > Device manager."
"Oh."
"Now go to Display adapters and click the +"
(Braces self)
"I CANT LOOK!"
(closes eyes)
"All-in-wonder 9800 series, and the second one is the same but secondary."
[insert fit here]
"Damn dude. 2000 bucks.. I feel so bad."
"Hey it's not my money."
"Yeah but wasted money is wasted money."
"True."

Anyway, I was so pumped to see his awesome uncle build him a sweetass Athlon64 FX, X800XTPE or 6800 Ultra comp, and all of a sudden I see this bs. I feel so bad for him, he's gonna have to use that comp for the next three years.

Oh well at least he could OC the complete shi7 out of his first 9800 then when it fries use the second one. I guess there's a meaning to this madness.

 

[magomago]

wow... 2000 dollars and he gets a P4 3.2 with RAdeon 9800PRO and 2 gigs of ram?

With 2k ii'd be expecting FX55 or P4EE (lol dunnow why anyone would pick the EE..but i'm sure tehre are uses) paried with a 6800U..hell with a budget that high i would've be suprised if you could squeeze in 2 gigs of ram.

Lordy...what kind of "uncle PC TEch" is this? Lol...

see this is why you should be happy you know things.

edit:

now that i thikn about it, a 9800AIW with a 3.2P4 isn't that bad..but for the MONEY...OUCH. You know that uncle pocketed quite a bit of cash..unless your friend has dual LCDs or somethng.

 

[Mrvile]

Hey hey hey now I spent 2k on my comp. 3500+, 6800GT. The one thing that completely set me back was my case. 270 bucks baby. (290 including shipping)

 

[Pixle]

The price is way too high for those parts.

Did the uncle keep a thousand or what?

 

[jterrell]

the paretns bought the parts if i read correctly so my guess is the ram was very high end. that could be 700 by itself. figure 500 for the 2 vid cards and thats 1200 without anything else.

He shoulda went with a PVR-250 and a 6800 ultra as the vid cards.

 

[Mrvile]

His uncle probably picked out some very high-end DDR2 PC-5400 ram. And I noticed something, you can't have two 9800's plugged in at the same time, so maybe he only has one and he read it wrong?

 

[jvarszegi]

Originally posted by: Mrvile
His uncle probably picked out some very high-end DDR2 PC-5400 ram. And I noticed something, you can't have two 9800's plugged in at the same time, so maybe he only has one and he read it wrong?

Could it've been installed twice, with different drivers or something?

 

[Mrvile]

Who knows. Anyway as long as he likes his comp, its cool (I have to admit his parents are rich forks.)

 

[Sid59]

ATI shows up twice because it also occupies SECONDARY display functions.

2 GRAND!? Prolly very expensive retail costs and ill advised shopping. Oh well. Faster rig than mine.

 

[dc5]

Originally posted by: Mrvile
His uncle probably picked out some very high-end DDR2 PC-5400 ram. And I noticed something, you can't have two 9800's plugged in at the same time, so maybe he only has one and he read it wrong?

the ati cards are like that. it shows a primary and a secondary.

 

[Mrvile]

Oooh teh suxor. Now he can't even waste a card.

EDIT: Now I want to know what kind of insane 4x 74gb Raptor RAID5 array he has.

 

[Okazaki Fragmenter]

nothing

 

[DrCool]

I started chuckling as soon as you said he had 2 (TWO) video cards..

I don't blame you though, as ATI has always had very strange practices such as this.. one of the MANY reasons I refuse to purchase ATI hardware, they always defy logic..

driver updates (nvidia updates their drives like every week)
hardware that actually supports games for longer the 3-6 months (i have a TNT2 that can still run most games out today, horribly slow, but they run.. lol)
working drivers

 

[imported_Computer MAn]

Wow, what a ripoff.

Like others have said 2000 bucks for that system is a ripoff. I spent half of that and have a faster system than that

 

[jvarszegi]

Originally posted by: Mrvile
his parents are rich forks

So you're saying he was born with a silver spoon in his mouth?

 

[Mrvile]

And something about a cat's cradle?

 

[NautikaL 8]

all radeons will show up as a primary and secondary. you cant have 2 ati's in one system...

 

[Mrvile]

Yes noted a while ago.

 

[flexy]

Joke of the month:

Q: Why does the graphics card show up twice in device manager ?

A:
Oh well at least he could OC the complete shi7 out of his first 9800 then when it fries use the second one. I guess there's a meaning to this madness.


Sig material

But seriously...he very likely does not have two pysical cards..just the usual primary/secondary entries in device manager like everyone else....


Edit: Ok, $2k for this PC is high...but...the system is not THAT bad..there is worse out there. Its a decent PC. IMHO. And he can always upgrade the card later if he feels like it.

 

[Philippine Mango]

Why would you want a Raptor raid 5 array when you could have a raid 5 SCSI array? SCSI kicks the sh!t out of IDE/seriell, only reason I don't have even a SCSI drive is because I don't have the dough.

 

[Mrvile]

Or that

 

[imported_Salvatore]

My cousin's few-month-old computer. He was in love with, describing it as the latest technology that could play anything very, very well. I didn't have the heart to tell him the truth. Oh, and when I told him I was planning to build, he told me not to waste my time or money.

Pentium 4 2.8C
512MB PC-3200 RAM
15 inch LCD
nVidia FX 5200 AGP - Gag
CD-RW
The HP name - Ouch

And what was the price? $1700. It recently went up to $2100 in all because he bought a Sony 19 inch LCD. Like I stated before, I didn't have the heart to tell him he could build an AMD/6800 GT/1 GB RAM/ 19 inch LCD/ etc. rig for under $1700.

 

[Mrvile]

WHOOOA what the FFF??? 2100 for that?? AAAHHH!HH!H!H!!

This is why I don't like dealing with computers outside of these forums and my house.

 

[nortexoid]

That is a very good deal for that computer since it comes with two device manager entries for a single video card. Most computers only come with a single video device entry in the device manager, and that is why they cost much less.

 

[BW86]

too bad for him