LA_MERC_MadMAX
May 14th, 2008, 01:57 PM
Well, I actually did SOMETHING to kill my system...so I HAD to build new system...
Backstory: I got my present from Uncle Sam, so I decided I wanted a TV Tuner card for my PC - to start off with (not knowing anything about such things), I bought a USB card, but that did Software MPEG, and used up too many CPU cycles for my tastes, so I went to circuitcity.com (I bought the USB in the store), and saw they had one with hardware encoding, AND it said it was compatible with Vista's Media Center. w00t! (I thought). Anyway - on my lunch break yesterday, I by circuit, and do the exchange...I get off, go home, put the card in, Vista finds drivers, go to watch TV - No Signal!...ok, Update drivers manually - No Signal! - read some stuff online - apparently the card doesn't work correctly in Vista with more than 4GB of ram because of poorly written drivers - install beta driver that is supposed to fix that problem...No Signal! - ok - now I'd just bought the new RAM...I bought 2x2G and 2x1G so it would be no big deal to send back the 2x1GB and just run 4GB total if that would make it work...so I shut down, and take out the 2x1GB sticks, leaving the 2x2GB in - the machine hasn't booted since :-(
I did everything I could think to do - I tried the RAM in every possible...conceivable combination, and I couldn't even get any error beeps...
Anyway - I'd just bought the RAM (I had some cheap crappy generic stuff before), so I RMA'ed that.
What I have is all possibly bad, possibly good:
Biostar TF570SLI
http://www.biostar.com.tw/app/en-us/t-series/content.php?S_ID=181
AMD 64 x2 4600+ (2.4GHz) Socket AM2
Big A$$ OCZ Heatsink (I can't remember the specifics but pic is attached).
If you want any - or all - of this, let me know and make an offer.
Like I said, I don't know if it was the RAM or the Board, but I'm sure the CPU is still fine - and the board may be too - I dunno - gave me a good excuse to upgrade :D
Anyway I made sure this time everything I bought had a bunch of reviews and were all 5 "eggs" (assuming you can put ANY stock in those reviews)...hehe. This'll be my first Intel system (besides notebooks) once I get it built.
Backstory: I got my present from Uncle Sam, so I decided I wanted a TV Tuner card for my PC - to start off with (not knowing anything about such things), I bought a USB card, but that did Software MPEG, and used up too many CPU cycles for my tastes, so I went to circuitcity.com (I bought the USB in the store), and saw they had one with hardware encoding, AND it said it was compatible with Vista's Media Center. w00t! (I thought). Anyway - on my lunch break yesterday, I by circuit, and do the exchange...I get off, go home, put the card in, Vista finds drivers, go to watch TV - No Signal!...ok, Update drivers manually - No Signal! - read some stuff online - apparently the card doesn't work correctly in Vista with more than 4GB of ram because of poorly written drivers - install beta driver that is supposed to fix that problem...No Signal! - ok - now I'd just bought the new RAM...I bought 2x2G and 2x1G so it would be no big deal to send back the 2x1GB and just run 4GB total if that would make it work...so I shut down, and take out the 2x1GB sticks, leaving the 2x2GB in - the machine hasn't booted since :-(
I did everything I could think to do - I tried the RAM in every possible...conceivable combination, and I couldn't even get any error beeps...
Anyway - I'd just bought the RAM (I had some cheap crappy generic stuff before), so I RMA'ed that.
What I have is all possibly bad, possibly good:
Biostar TF570SLI
http://www.biostar.com.tw/app/en-us/t-series/content.php?S_ID=181
AMD 64 x2 4600+ (2.4GHz) Socket AM2
Big A$$ OCZ Heatsink (I can't remember the specifics but pic is attached).
If you want any - or all - of this, let me know and make an offer.
Like I said, I don't know if it was the RAM or the Board, but I'm sure the CPU is still fine - and the board may be too - I dunno - gave me a good excuse to upgrade :D
Anyway I made sure this time everything I bought had a bunch of reviews and were all 5 "eggs" (assuming you can put ANY stock in those reviews)...hehe. This'll be my first Intel system (besides notebooks) once I get it built.