main_trouble
Adept
guys these are the things that one must avoid at all costs for peace of mind.
sometimes we buys them just because they are cheap , or sometimes because of ignorance.
but experience teaches everything.
1. intel mobos if u want to overclock(no support for ocing).
2. via/sis chipsets especially u wanna run linux(no drivers available).
3. navtech/iball cabinets(and other indian brands too) very cheapo steel/plastic.prefer cm/antec . only good enough indian brand that come to our mind is zebronics.
4. samsung optical drives(complete horror stories of tray problems)situation is a little improved now a days though
5. cheapo rams like dynet/tamkor(will make u a constant visitor to their service centres)
6. cheapo optical media like writex etc. gofor ty for mission critical data , verbatim for all others. at present cost of verbs(15.5 by 200mph) there is no excuse to use any other media.
7. chepo speakers like promax , iball etc. now costs are down and always use good brands like creative , altec, logitech.
8. freebie smps that u get with the cabinets are a big no no.if u love ur rig a little bit then replace them at the earliest with good smps .
only two brands that come to mind are cooler master and corsair(corsair VX450W is a gem:hap2
9. antec psu. one of our frnds here has had nightmarish RMA experience wid it
10. avoid notebooks wid desktop processors like core2,athlon , athlon x2 etc.
maybe cheap but cause low battery life , overheating,and overall system instability in long run.
so gofor mobile processors only like AMD turion X@ or intel core2 mobile.
11. avoid WD portable hard disks as they are known to cause headaches(as reported by a lot of people here)
12. ddr ram grafix cards-> many cards come with 512 mb even 1 gb if ddr2 ram to take advantage of naive buyers. the fact is that card will pe pawned by same chip coupled wid gddr2-3 ram of only 256 mb.
thus always look for gddr ram in grafix cards
AVOID OVERKILL->
sometimes we have good money or hardware prices are too damn cheap.
so we go out and buy fatest , fastest and most "overperforming" hardware(to satisfy our ego) to do a job which could have saved us good amount of money to spend on other things. so here goes(more to added soon)
1.quad core proccy -> huge overkill if u just wanna do web surfing ,gaming , htpc . ur dual core proccy would be more than enough for it.quads are good for image/video editing , encoding , rendering,database apps, virtualization etc
2. amd phenom-> don't buy them unless u are diehard amd fanboy.(untill better phenoms arrive in india at better prices)
why
-> poor performance(some phenoms slower than even fastest athlon x2- the 6400+).
->tlb bug, it bios workaround will drop performance by 10-20%(b3 revision has removed it now)
->expensive (considering their performance)
->no overclocking(or poor) if u wanna overclock
-> and finally a gem of proccy from intel the core 2
3.nvidia chipset boards(intel )-> avoid them unless u are going to SLI, they have less stablilty , less overclocking potential than intel chipsets
4. 5.1 or above speakers-> unless they are good quality(read :expensive). as pointed out by gannu u are better off buying a high end 2.1 instead
5. 1Gbps lan card-> totally redundant as 10/100 Mbps is more than enough for general networking/multiplayer games. 1 gbps needs maybe 10 current hd's in raid 1 to use that much capacity. also there must be ur owned (home office lan) network with totally switched path(no router in between) utilizing 1Gbps links throught and the device u are communicating to shuld also be such a powerful machine.
ALL HISS NO VENOM->
this section will list the hoopla and weird terminology/technology used by hardware companies creating a lot of noise and FUD without creating any value for end customers.
1. sata-3GBps->well devices till today have not been able to fully exploit sata-1.5GBps 's potential after 4 years of it in mainstream. and then arrives sata-3GBps forcing many noobs to upgrade their mobos to support latest drives.however even todays 7200.11 disks will give max of bout 105 MBps. far cry from above 150 MBps promised by sata-3GBps. u can try to downgrade ur sata-3GBps to sata-1.5GBps o ur hd using jumpers. i bet u will not see any diff in hdtach scores.
2. ncq-> again all hoopla and no benifit to end customers . forcing noobs to upgrade their mobos(with ahci mode) to support those drives wid ncq. well it is a server tech and not a desktop tech.only time ncq will actually work is when u have(sarcasm intended)
-> u have highly fragmented drive
-> u are running utorrent at ur 2/8 Mbps conn
-> u are at same time playing halo3/crysis(multiplayer preferable)
-> u are also burning a dvd at same time(16x suggested)
-> u are sharing a movie collection on ur 100Mbps lan
-> u also are copying a 200 gb data to ur hd from a portable hd.
as u see u can see u may never run into above situation.
so ncq is good to have, but nowhere as good to demand an upgrade.
3. DVI/HDMI -> we have known since time long time that digital is better than analog. thus dvi/hdmi must be better than vga.
all grafix card today have at least a dvi port , but dvi port lcd are expensive than vga only lcd by about 1500-2000.
a noob(digital is better than analog) would surely gofor dvi one .
to tell u truth i am yet to see any diff b/w them . i have seen lcd's upto 24" and i couldn't notice any(any at all) diff in text/ games clarity etc b/w vga and dvi.
4 hypertransport 3.0 -> a joke again.
ht1 has a limit of 12.8 GBps and ht3 has 41.6GBps
the thing going around is "u shud buy phenom to take full advantage ht3 in am2+ socket in ur 780g chipset mobo. if u use athlons u will downgrade u mobo to hypertransport 1.0"
well athlons never fully exhausted hypertransport bandwidth. and then creating all the FUD with ht3. man it is a joke. phenoms are poor proccys anyway(sell above) they wont benefit anything from ht3.
so if u want to enjoy 780g go ahead an buy athlons. no need to worry bout ht3
5. ddr3 and 1066 mhz ddr2.
well this hoopla has not been made by manufacturers but by "enthusiasts"
well they are super expensive. need expensive mobos. but alas no/little benifit to user except maybe satisfying his ego.
if u really wanna overclock then overclock those sweet c2d proccy's . oc ing ram has little effect on c2d architecture.
A1 STUFF!!->
here i list a1 stuff among all hardy segments. these products may not be top of the line but they have fan following of satisfied users.
1. seagate 7200.11 series hd-> simply too cool to ignore.
ultimate transfer rates(above 100 MBps)
quiet and cool(temperature i mean)
seagate brand reliability
5 yrs warranty
really good price
2. 780g -> the king of igp's
dx 10 onboard wow!
perfect for occasional gamers , htpc
3. corsair 450 watts
active pfc(80% efficiency)
only for 3600/-
4. trancend jet ram
ultimate price to performance ratio
good performance , reliable , stable
not for oc' ing
5. verbatim dvd+r
really good price(200mph)
xlent quality
6. logitech peripherals
all of them (keyboard/mouse/speakers) are xtremely reliable
priced reasonably too
(thought abit p35 mobo shud also be here but only for its usb problems)
more to added to this later
guys plz ad ur entries here too.
base them on YOUR experience.
NO hearsay.
NO fanboyism.
sometimes we buys them just because they are cheap , or sometimes because of ignorance.
but experience teaches everything.
1. intel mobos if u want to overclock(no support for ocing).
2. via/sis chipsets especially u wanna run linux(no drivers available).
3. navtech/iball cabinets(and other indian brands too) very cheapo steel/plastic.prefer cm/antec . only good enough indian brand that come to our mind is zebronics.
4. samsung optical drives(complete horror stories of tray problems)situation is a little improved now a days though
5. cheapo rams like dynet/tamkor(will make u a constant visitor to their service centres)
6. cheapo optical media like writex etc. gofor ty for mission critical data , verbatim for all others. at present cost of verbs(15.5 by 200mph) there is no excuse to use any other media.
7. chepo speakers like promax , iball etc. now costs are down and always use good brands like creative , altec, logitech.
8. freebie smps that u get with the cabinets are a big no no.if u love ur rig a little bit then replace them at the earliest with good smps .
only two brands that come to mind are cooler master and corsair(corsair VX450W is a gem:hap2
9. antec psu. one of our frnds here has had nightmarish RMA experience wid it
10. avoid notebooks wid desktop processors like core2,athlon , athlon x2 etc.
maybe cheap but cause low battery life , overheating,and overall system instability in long run.
so gofor mobile processors only like AMD turion X@ or intel core2 mobile.
11. avoid WD portable hard disks as they are known to cause headaches(as reported by a lot of people here)
12. ddr ram grafix cards-> many cards come with 512 mb even 1 gb if ddr2 ram to take advantage of naive buyers. the fact is that card will pe pawned by same chip coupled wid gddr2-3 ram of only 256 mb.
thus always look for gddr ram in grafix cards
AVOID OVERKILL->
sometimes we have good money or hardware prices are too damn cheap.
so we go out and buy fatest , fastest and most "overperforming" hardware(to satisfy our ego) to do a job which could have saved us good amount of money to spend on other things. so here goes(more to added soon)
1.quad core proccy -> huge overkill if u just wanna do web surfing ,gaming , htpc . ur dual core proccy would be more than enough for it.quads are good for image/video editing , encoding , rendering,database apps, virtualization etc
2. amd phenom-> don't buy them unless u are diehard amd fanboy.(untill better phenoms arrive in india at better prices)
why
-> poor performance(some phenoms slower than even fastest athlon x2- the 6400+).
->tlb bug, it bios workaround will drop performance by 10-20%(b3 revision has removed it now)
->expensive (considering their performance)
->no overclocking(or poor) if u wanna overclock
-> and finally a gem of proccy from intel the core 2
3.nvidia chipset boards(intel )-> avoid them unless u are going to SLI, they have less stablilty , less overclocking potential than intel chipsets
4. 5.1 or above speakers-> unless they are good quality(read :expensive). as pointed out by gannu u are better off buying a high end 2.1 instead
5. 1Gbps lan card-> totally redundant as 10/100 Mbps is more than enough for general networking/multiplayer games. 1 gbps needs maybe 10 current hd's in raid 1 to use that much capacity. also there must be ur owned (home office lan) network with totally switched path(no router in between) utilizing 1Gbps links throught and the device u are communicating to shuld also be such a powerful machine.
ALL HISS NO VENOM->
this section will list the hoopla and weird terminology/technology used by hardware companies creating a lot of noise and FUD without creating any value for end customers.
1. sata-3GBps->well devices till today have not been able to fully exploit sata-1.5GBps 's potential after 4 years of it in mainstream. and then arrives sata-3GBps forcing many noobs to upgrade their mobos to support latest drives.however even todays 7200.11 disks will give max of bout 105 MBps. far cry from above 150 MBps promised by sata-3GBps. u can try to downgrade ur sata-3GBps to sata-1.5GBps o ur hd using jumpers. i bet u will not see any diff in hdtach scores.
2. ncq-> again all hoopla and no benifit to end customers . forcing noobs to upgrade their mobos(with ahci mode) to support those drives wid ncq. well it is a server tech and not a desktop tech.only time ncq will actually work is when u have(sarcasm intended)
-> u have highly fragmented drive
-> u are running utorrent at ur 2/8 Mbps conn
-> u are at same time playing halo3/crysis(multiplayer preferable)
-> u are also burning a dvd at same time(16x suggested)
-> u are sharing a movie collection on ur 100Mbps lan
-> u also are copying a 200 gb data to ur hd from a portable hd.
as u see u can see u may never run into above situation.
so ncq is good to have, but nowhere as good to demand an upgrade.
3. DVI/HDMI -> we have known since time long time that digital is better than analog. thus dvi/hdmi must be better than vga.
all grafix card today have at least a dvi port , but dvi port lcd are expensive than vga only lcd by about 1500-2000.
a noob(digital is better than analog) would surely gofor dvi one .
to tell u truth i am yet to see any diff b/w them . i have seen lcd's upto 24" and i couldn't notice any(any at all) diff in text/ games clarity etc b/w vga and dvi.
4 hypertransport 3.0 -> a joke again.
ht1 has a limit of 12.8 GBps and ht3 has 41.6GBps
the thing going around is "u shud buy phenom to take full advantage ht3 in am2+ socket in ur 780g chipset mobo. if u use athlons u will downgrade u mobo to hypertransport 1.0"
well athlons never fully exhausted hypertransport bandwidth. and then creating all the FUD with ht3. man it is a joke. phenoms are poor proccys anyway(sell above) they wont benefit anything from ht3.
so if u want to enjoy 780g go ahead an buy athlons. no need to worry bout ht3
5. ddr3 and 1066 mhz ddr2.
well this hoopla has not been made by manufacturers but by "enthusiasts"
well they are super expensive. need expensive mobos. but alas no/little benifit to user except maybe satisfying his ego.
if u really wanna overclock then overclock those sweet c2d proccy's . oc ing ram has little effect on c2d architecture.
A1 STUFF!!->
here i list a1 stuff among all hardy segments. these products may not be top of the line but they have fan following of satisfied users.
1. seagate 7200.11 series hd-> simply too cool to ignore.
ultimate transfer rates(above 100 MBps)
quiet and cool(temperature i mean)
seagate brand reliability
5 yrs warranty
really good price
2. 780g -> the king of igp's
dx 10 onboard wow!
perfect for occasional gamers , htpc
3. corsair 450 watts
active pfc(80% efficiency)
only for 3600/-
4. trancend jet ram
ultimate price to performance ratio
good performance , reliable , stable
not for oc' ing
5. verbatim dvd+r
really good price(200mph)
xlent quality
6. logitech peripherals
all of them (keyboard/mouse/speakers) are xtremely reliable
priced reasonably too
(thought abit p35 mobo shud also be here but only for its usb problems)
more to added to this later
guys plz ad ur entries here too.
base them on YOUR experience.
NO hearsay.
NO fanboyism.
