inselaffe on 1/5/2009 at 18:29

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Unfortunately, i didn't manage to do the upgrade at the start of the thread, as time ran out and i thought best to leave it until the summer.

Now we are here and my computer has magically died. I put it in stand by mode and turned it off and then the next time i tried to use it, it wouldn't come on. Got a new power supply and now it turns on - but it turns on as soon as you switch the power to the power supply on at the back. The front panel buttons don't appear to do anything anymore.


(Before, when it was working, it had got itself into an extremely odd state where in order to turn it on you had to press the button on the front and it wouldn't do anything, and then you would turn on the monitor and it would turn on - very odd?!).

So erm I think the motherboard might be broken - they have "repaired it many times now since the old old power supply exploded and took out it, the processor and keyboard and mouse. It seems like it is bust again due to this.

So I don't know what the best course of action is. I guess now really isn't the best time to get a new computer? or is it? If anything, I still want a computer that can play old games without issues.

Obviously, I can't tell if any other components are broken either (i hope not).

This means I would most likely be looking for a socket 754 motherboard of some sorts. Assuming everything else is ok it might be best to get a pci express on so that I can more easily get a (probably used) x1900 or 1950 or whatever it is. That said, if I end up getting a whole new computer, do the new ones cause problems with anything that would require greater than my current 9600 pro (256 ram)? (for example thief 3). Hmm.

So er yer im a bit lost about what to do now.

cheers, daniel.

inselaffe on 1/5/2009 at 23:07

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Yer, same as the beginning of the thread but with a new power supply (some 600w one "storm" or something er yer i hope it is ok - at least it has a fan haha):

asus k8n motherboard (broke it seems - since its been repaired so much this is not surprising).

amd 64 3200+ processor - hopefully not dead but you never know.

radeon 9600 pro 256mb agp

2 hard disks - one sata one old type (i forget what the old type is).

2 sticks of memory to a total of 1Gb - can get more detail if needed.

Stuff that can probably be ignored
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dvd/cd writer
dvd drive

floppy drive (hah, dont think that will be of use ever again but you never know).

some crappy tv card.

errrrr think that's about it but could be forgetting something - nothing important though.


cheers

inselaffe on 2/5/2009 at 12:21

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Probably so - though in the current state it's hard to know whether anything else is broken too.

Got a new power supply already. So just the motherboard.

Thinking it's probably best to get a pci:e one but i don't seem to know of any for 754 or at least are there any that aren't poo? I think i saw one but that was onboard graphics and had about 2 slots or something and I imagine was rather cack.

I imagine this will be an ebay or similar job.

Oh yer also if it had firewire too that would be nice.

inselaffe on 2/5/2009 at 17:25

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cool thanks. Out of those, which would you consider the best ones cos I really have no idea of what is the best?

It seems none have firewire but i am guessing that getting a card to do this wouldnt be too hard and its not so vital.

Thanks for the help :)

edit - how do you know that asrock one is pci express? It seems to only be AGP (both 4 and 8x, whatever that means but i guess hence to two slots).

(http://www.asrock.com/mb/overview.asp?Model=K8UPGRADE-NF3)

inselaffe on 3/5/2009 at 16:03

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Are you sure? From reading the reviews it seems to be a slot for an upgrade card to allow support for 939 or am2 processors?

(http://www.ciao.co.uk/ASRock_K8Upgrade_NF3__6276315)