what part of your computer has caused you the "biggest" headache?

[Mday]

just wondering

mine has to be the motherboard first, abit boards + different RAM modules = suck

now it's the HDD, RAID 0. one of the drives may be dying. =(

 

[Shu8]

making coasters on my old scsi smart and friendly 8x cdr...i'm glad i replaced it today with the iomega zipcd 12x/10x/32x for 99 bucks [w/ burnproof tech]

 

[duragezic]

My first two processors from Sunshinestar. It was a pre-tested overclock yet my first and then the replacement gave me hell.

 

[erub]

Diamond Viper V770 Ultra -- kept conflicting somehow with something whenever I updated the drivers to the detonators under win2k (the only OS I will use). I'm inclinded to think it was incompatible with the motherboard, an Asus K7M. Voodoo3 3000 is rock stable.

 

[RossMAN]

Windows ME - However a free upgrade to Windows 2000 Pro should remedy that.

 

[Jeff H]

Hard drives that fail. Now, to put this in perspective, I've only had two (fail) since 1991, but any hard drive failure is a pita<g>. First one was a WD 1.2G that developed bad sectors. Insight replaced it no questions asked. Second one was last year (1999) late December - an IBM 22GXP 13.5G, which developed this annoying habit of click - whirr, then lock up. My VAR was very cooperative in replacing the drive (which I'd had since August) and the replacement drive has purred along fine.

Otherwise, I've been very fortunate w/ hardware not failing (knock on wood).

 

[shiznut123]

hdrive

 

[Brandino]

getting those damn front panel lights plugged in correctly on the mb

 

[damien6]

SCSI cards but usualy due to bad bios flash (by yours truly), SB Live! + mobos w/highpoint controllers = fighting over IRQs, video cards overheating but haven't had that since upgrading to Hercules 3D Prophet II GTS 64mb/Matrox G400Max.

 

[Pyro]

i guess it would have to be my computer

 

[nickburns]

Its got to be hard drives, i have had countless bad experiences with WD in particular.....now i stick to IBM and Maxtor.

 

[snow patrol]

The first mobo I had on my current system was an Aopen AX63 and it caused me quite a bit of grief...I think that may have been behind my hard drive screwing up.

Quickly saw the light and swapped it for a P3V4X

 

[mrbios]

If software is included, definately WinME. What a POS. Once again back in good old Windows 98SE. Other than that, it would also be trying to hook up those damn LEDs on the front of the case.

Russell &quot;Mr.Bios&quot; Sampson

 

[toph99]

the OS. windoze is nothing but problems. i don't have many hardware conflicts as these silly Dell's aren't very tweakable

 

[subman]

Mains power switch on wall socket - I keep having to change them every 6 months or so. I have tried all sorts of switches upto 32amps handling load but no luck. Even my current switch is now acting up. All I have connected to this socket via a distribution box is my Computer/monitor/external modem/scanner/external CDRW/Creative Soundworks speakers. I switch off my system for 20 hours every day. My HP Lazer printer is on a seperate socket/switch which has not developed any problems.

 

[Vinny N]

Seriously? Software. Especially the operating system. Mostly because I'm obssessive compulsive about system stability.


Less seriously but still bothersome? My mouse. I hate cleaning mice so I want optical. However I also hate wheel mice, but all optical mice are wheel mice. Because everyone thinks wheel mice are fine and dandy. Well, I swear that all the wheels scroll smoother everyone but on my own mice no matter what brand or model I buy. It bothers me beyond belief. I wish I could just go back to a TRUE 3 button mouse but none of them are optical. I wish there were true 3 button mice that were optical. (Ideally, it would be the Logitech 3 button FirstMouse(no wheel!) in Optical form)

Oh, that mouse thing might have a little to do with obssessive compulsive disorder as well.

 

[MSNY]

Well, it's been copying data from 2 smaller harddrives to one bigger one. With a little Partition Magic and Drivecopy I finally did it in October and did not lose a byte ! No reformat or fresh install now in over 2 years. YIPPIE !

NOT easy but doable !

 

[Jhhnn]

Other than Windows, it's got to be sound cards, any of them, particularly Aureal (Gone and good riddance) and the SBLive cards. They just got to have 2 IRQ's and 2 sets of incompatible DOS drivers. Once sorted out they work great, getting there can be painful.

Actually, I recently installed a SB 128PCI in our newest machine, no hassle at all. Even a blind squirrel finds a few acorns.....

 

[damac]

here are some of mine.

1. usb kicking out on various setups, getting stuff to either not work or crap out for no reason in windows, sometimes getting a no mouse or keyboard found message on bootup. my current setup seems all good though with win98se.

2. kenwood 72x drive. I have had more than one game that wont install on this cdrom even with latest firmware. I had had some trouble getting certain cdr media to read from the drive without major slowdown or crapping out. I still have it in my rig though and luckily my burner has always allowed me to work around any nagging issues.

3. Recently the radeon 64mb retail video card. I had so many issues with my setup that I tried out some other video cards and parts and I swear like night and day my problems went away. Im now running a voodoo5500 until the new nvidia stuff comes out.

 

[Zorba]

SB 16 Emulation on my Live!.

 

[Spoooon]

The video card. If I had known that Radeon + KA7 equals nightmare, I would have gotten a GTS.

 

[Howard]

My case. The holes never line up damn it!

 

[Viperoni]

My Samsung -GH has never given me trouble with my kt7-raid

My mx300 is a different story....I love the sound but out it goes.
Lockups like a madman.
It's out now, and I'm maxed out on my Duron, @ 935

 

[Viperoni]

I've never had any trouble with my 64mb Radeon ES and my kt7-raid...

 

[BurnItDwn]

mmm headache .....

would have to be a 64mb SDram module that was DOA ... this was about 2 and a half years ago ... i had purchased 2 64mb pc66 sdrams ... and one was dead ... got it replaced ... but it was a terrible terrible few days