Beaker

Also had a Plextor PX-716a go belly up on me a while back, great drive which put in many years of burning

still have two other plextor cd burners still going strong one a premium which i will never give up :-)

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.:Eyerex Blog:. .:Eyerex photo site:.

Jim

Team,

At Christmas my Misses surprised me with a Sony HDR-SR12 under the Tree. I had put it on my wish list but under the Dreaming title as it was quite expensive. Anyway, I forgot that an Intel® Core™2 Quad 2.66 GHz or higher is required for 1920x1080 AVCHD editing with Pinnacle 12 Ultimate.

I had to put in a Q6700 into my Brother's Box just before Christmas for the same issue (He has the same Camera. That's how I knew it was a good one!!)

I've spent the weeks since Christmas looking for a deal locally, on the Web, on eBay, => everywhere I could think of. (I told the Misses it would cost about $200 US + shipping & taxes, etc.,) So today I finalized a deal on the most powerful CPU my Motherboard would take => a brand new Intel Quad Core Extreme 3.0GHz, QX6850. Originally it listed for $1299 CAN. I'm buying it from a guy who works as a Computer Tech @ Best Buy (Geeks Squad?) for $300 (with receipt). Believe it or not I found his ad on Craigs List and we negotiated down from his $400 asking price; after another deal he had fell through today.

I pick it up (across town) tomorrow afternoon and hope to put it into this Box tomorrow night for a test drive. It's got lots of horsepower according to what I've read and being an Extreme QX chip is very tweakable. I've heard it would clock up to 4.6 GHz rock solid, but it then needs water cooling, and I'm not into plumbing.

I'll post how it goes...

__________________
Regards,

Jim

Jim

Folks,

The Intel QX6850 installed routinely except I contacted the SATA Data connect on the back of a StarTech Mobile Rack (for Hot Swapping) and shattered the plastic around the conductors. It was quite bizzare. I can't get the part so I guess I'll be buying a new Rack soon.

The new CPU really Rocks

I'd upload a file to show the Rack but the system won't allow it.

__________________
Regards,

Jim

Jim

Team,

It's been quite a while so I thought I'd update you on The Fridge.

I did buy a new mobile Sata Rack and installed it NP. I took out the old broken one and later I got a cable / adapter which I filed down and screwed / glued into place. I mounted it into a Box I built as a "Tester" Box out of bits and pieces I had about => and a few bits I purchased cheap.

I used the Asus P5N32-SLI Deluxe that finally came back from RMA, the original Intel Dual Core 3.2 Ghz. CPU, 4 Gigs of Corsair DDR2 RAM I got a real deal on, another $20 Samsung Burner, a new Corsair 500 Watt PSU I got for $50, and an E-Box Case with a Floppy Drive I got from a recycler for $10. I put in a 200 Gig Seagate Sata drive I had lying about. I borrowed a PCIE Video Card from a Buddy as I wanted to ensure it all worked before springing for a new Card. It worked great!

(I bet your are wondering how all this relates to The Fridge but I'm getting there...)

Well my son, who's Gamer Box was getting a little "old" for current games, was eyeballing the Tester box all the time as I was building it asking me what / who it was for. I told him it was for me to Test software and stuff. Ever since the Beta release I've been mucking about with Win7 on plug in drives into the racks mentioned above. I tried both the 32 and 64 bit versions. Quite impressive. So I was headed that way with this box. That all changed. He asked his Mom and I if he could have the Tester Box as a new Gamer Box for his Birthday present. So what could I do...

We couldn't give him the Box with my Buddy's Video Card installed so I looked about and finally got a deal on a EVGA GTX 260. (A very hot card at the time!). But (and here's the bit where it relates to The Fridge) after many, many attempts, I finally figured out why it wouldn't fit onto the Asus P5N32-SLI Deluxe motherboard. There was a capacitor sticking up and interfering with the long wide body of the GTX 260. (It's a full dual slot card. Square plastic surrounding the Card => like a Brick) So I took out the XFX Alpha Dog 8800 GTX that was in the Fridge (A very hot card it it's day as well) and it installed no sweat. Now we could give it to my son as a present. He loves it.

I may have lost my Tester Box, but I got to put the EVGA GTX 260 into The Fridge.

So now we jump forward a bit to November as I don't remember changing much hardware over the summer. I had to stop using the BenQ DW1655 as much as it was starting to make poor DVDs (Quality wise). It still burned good CDs and Read DVDs great but the burning suffered. I haven't tried to clean the lens yet but that's next on the agenda.

In December I put a Corsair TX750W PSU on my Christmas wish list as my "spare" PSU I use for testing is too old for newer motherboards (20 pin not 24 and I don't like to use the adapter cable I have). I thought if I got one as a present I'd swap it for the Antec TruePower2 550 in the Fridge, as it was almost 3 years old, but would still make a great test rig. Well my Sister blessed me with one.

This week, after months of testing I decided to go to Windows 7 64 Ultimate on the Fridge. My old Asus TV Tuner Card is not supported so I bought a Diamond HD 650 Dual Tuner PCIE-X1 Card with wireless remote. (A steal at $60 )

I also decided to bite the bullet and go Blu-Ray => when I bought the Tuner Card. I'd been waiting for ages for the hardware to dip below $200 and the media to get reasonable (Vs. DVD). I've got a Sony HD-SR12 high def camcorder so the plan is to burn my home movies in HD onto Blu-Ray Disks, and play them on the PS3. I grabbed an LG BH10LS30 Super Multi Blu-Ray Internal Writer. It will burn 25Gig BD-R disks at 10X. I went back and bought a 20 pack spindle of Verbatim LTH type 2X BD-R which are specified to burn at 10X on this Burner.

So I assembled the Blu-Ray and TV Tuner Card into the Fridge before swapping out the PSU. The Blu-Ray took the BenQ Slot for now. I'm contemplating putting the Blu-Ray into an external case =>with USB and Esata connections if I can find one for reasonable $$. Then I may put back the BenQ or a Samsung SH-S243 I grabbed for $18.99 last week (I couldn't resist )

Anyway, the TV Tuner works great with the bult in Media Center software and windows downloaded the driver. I played part of a Blu-Ray Movie (Superman Returns) and read a CD and DVD burned on other Burners => so it works well. I haven't burned anything on it as I still wanted to swap the PSU before editing a home movie to burn. (That takes ages...)

So I spent a few hours cleaning up The Fridge, removing the Antec PSU and figuring the new cable routing for the Corsair TX750W. It installed okay and powered up right away. I ran The Fridge that night (mostly surfing the web and doing email) and the next morning before it crashed. It took me a few hours this morning to positively ascertain it was the new Corsair PSU and not somthing else. (Lots of variables to check out.)

Then it took me a couple more hours to swap back the PSUs and test. I guess I'll be learing how to do a Corsair RMA starting tomorrow.

I realised to today that the only item left of the Original Fridge are the Case and Floppy - at least as soon as the Corsair PSU is RMAd.

__________________
Regards,

Jim

RoryTate

Floppy? What's that?

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JoeLouie

Your "build" threads always make me want to build a super PC

JoeLouie

I can't think of the last time I've had a floppy drive in my computer. I don't even own a floppy drive anymore.... come to think of it, I'm not really sure what ever happened to mine. I never had one in this PC, but I know that I had one in my previous at some point.

Jim

Floppy Drives are "Vintage" hardware but still usefull from time to time - at least on Boxes before Win7. I sometimes use them for Bios Updates, and RAID Drivers, but newer motherboards have other methods like USB that work.

I just can't bring myself to pull it as I find the odd use from time to time - even though I haven't bought a floppy disk in probably 10 years.

__________________
Regards,

Jim

RoryTate

format a: /s/q/u/v:dosrules

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Jim

Feb 10 update:

It took a couple days for me to get motivated and work through the RMA process, but I shipped the RMA'd Corsair PSU back last Wednseday to Corsair. (Cost me $33.30 to ship UPS their mistake back to them in California ) Their email with the RMA number advised:

Once your package is received, Corsair will process your replacement order in 3-5 days.
All replacements within Canada will be shipped UPS Standard. Please allow 3-5 business days transit time for delivery.

So I expected it back in about 2 weeks. Yesterday I recieved this:

Dear Jim,

We wanted to let you know that we have received your return package for RMA number 1148272Your returned product is staged for review by our returns department, and we will be contacting you shortly regarding repair or replacement. Please note we are currently experiencing delays with warranty replacement shipments, please allow for an additional 5 business days for processing.

Sincerely,

Corsair Returns Department

Thank You!



I'd certainly be pissed if I didn't have another "good" PSU to use and this was my only one. But there's no sense in banging your head against a wall.

On the Blu-Ray Front, I burned a DVD+R in the LG but wasn't satisfied with the Quality of the Burn. (Only ~50% in Nero ) so I used the Automatic Firmware software and it found a new version and installed it. I'll re-test and advise.

Here's a couple of photos for your enjoyment

Attached Images

   

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Regards,

Jim