Posts by Coconut Monkey

Did you try bending the pin back into place? It's a common occurrence and nothing earth shattering, unless you've actually managed to snap it off.

If you're on your neighbour's connection without their permission, then what you're doing is quite illegal, no matter how you "justify" it. Such discussion is not permitted on these forums! If you can afford a PC with wireless capabilities then I'm sure a basic dialup connection is within your budget, however limited it might be.

Done. :)

Hey, don't you take the credit now! :p

Let's make that title a little more informative eh?

If you're up to the task, you can pop open the case and check the connections to the CD drive (wide IDE cable, power cable and maybe a thin CD audio cable). You could also try the drive in another PC.

If you have no luck in bringing back to life, then it's time for a new one. Perhaps a DVD burner, considering how cheap they are nowadays?

You might want to look into a 7800GS - might be just what you need to inject a new lease of life into your aging AGP system, provided you have the PSU to back it up!

Unless the motherboard is a super socket 7 type, I'm afraid you've hit the end of the road.

If it is a super socket 7 board, then you can try and find some AMD K6-2s or K6-3s.

What system do you have there drago865?

Yep, no worries. Depending on the motherboard chipset, you may need to load SATA controller drivers in order for Windows to detect the SATA drive, but this should be done for you when you install the motherboard chipset drivers after installation of Windows (or you'll have a native SATA controller and require no drivers at all).

I believe you can, but it's best to specify a custom configuration with a reputable manufacturer.

On the other hand, you shouldn't buy a gaming laptop. The added expense isn't worth it and you're rather limited in any upgrade path. Stick a with desktop for gaming and use the laptop for work.

Iam not misleading anybody, it just didnt work for me i used Pc-133 with Pc-100 SD Ram But it didnt work.

I'm not saying you deliberately are jaishanker. It's just that your comment was stating all modules of different speeds will not work together, regardless of type, which was a bit misleading, especially since you came to that conclusion based on a single past issue with SD-RAM (but thanks for clearing that up).

if the RAM's speed doesnt match, then u will see a blue screen with a message dumping physical memory

Bit misleading there jaishankar. You can mix modules of different speeds - the higher rated stuff will just run at the speed of the slowest module. See here for more information.

Just wanted to know. Wasnt thinking of using it for this card but I have a laptop with an Intel GMA 900 and wanted to know how to overclock it because the graphics are pretty much horrendous.

Heh heh, then I'm afraid no amount of overclocking will help you there! Onboard video is not the type of thing you want to be using for 3D gaming.

I sure wouldn't overclock a brand new several hundred dollar piece of silicon (Why? It's new, it doesn't need it and you're voiding the warranty), but if you insist, here's a guide.

I just remembered this topic, and came back for a look. No replies! Shockers. Time to rectify.....

I'm of the belief that drives should only share channels with devices of the same type. Optical drives on one channel, hard drives on the other. Now, I'm buggered if I can remember any benchmarks or official tests that prove what's best, and I'm buggered if I can be bothered looking anything up at this hour of the night.

That said, my "belief" stems from the (possibly horribly incorrect) knowledge that:

• Optical drives utilise a different transfer protocol from hard drives, so any sharing between the two could potentially slow things down with two different protocols in action.
• Two hard drives on one ATA100/133 channel have plenty of bandwidth to bandy around with - transfer rates rarely hit more than 30-40Mb/s.

Commonly printed between the white PCI slots, but it should be fairly easy to see.

Have you tried popping the case open and looking for model text printed on the motherboard itself? Regardless, a board from that period will only take SD-RAM, but be wary of using high capacity single-sided stuff (256Mb or higher).

Is this Windows XP? What model is your monitor?

It sounds like you've set a resolution and/or refresh rate the monitor cannot support so it is forced to drop into standby mode. Find out what refresh rates it supports (perhaps start with 60Hz for the moment - you can try out higher rates later with Windows switching back after 15 seconds) for the resolution you want and change the setting in safe mode (refresh rates are changed under Display Properties->Settings Tab->Advanced Button->Monitor Tab). If that doesn't work, try uninstalling the video drivers in safe mode, reinstalling after a normal Windows boot and then changing the display options before restarting.

Turn off simple file sharing under Tools->Folder Options->View (this may be WinXP Pro only).

Right click the folder in question->Sharing & Security->Security Tab->Add. Type in either your username (with admin access) or "Administrator" and click the "Check Names" button. It should complete the proper user for you. OK out, then give the new addition full access rights.

If there are numerous sub-folders you will need to go into the advanced section and look into the "Permissions" and "Owner" tabs (e.g. Replace owner on subcontainers and objects checkbox for the Owner tab).

For that kind of money, I'd consider a 7800GT. There appear to be at least 2 within your price range ($299 that I could find - phoawr, $1 under). A very good chipset that will perform faster than a X850XT in most situations.

Water cooling isn't all it's cracked up to be. Read through some reviews and what not and you'll find a water cooled setup isn't much better than something on air. Overclockers may get better results, but for a stock system it isn't worth the trouble. I've got a fairly high end system here running just fine on air cooling.

Repliers, please direct comments to the duplicate thread in Troubleshooting Dead Machines.

You heard the man. ;)

No, it would be better to hang onto your still-stupidly-powerful card and maybe sacrifice a bit of image quality for a smoother gameplay experience.

Mind you, if you've got the money to toss around, don't let me stop you! I just think a step from a 6800GT to something in the 7800 range is a total waste of money.

thanks for teh link

So I should get another Nvidia 6800 GT

Would that make is about as good as a Nvidia 7800 GtX or better? I would assume better, but I just recently got into video cards ...

Why you really shouldn't bother unless you have nothing better to do with your money. ;)

Can I Sli a 6800 and a 7800 or not?

No.

SLI explained

Hmm, still can't paly F.E.A.R. on full settings >.<

I think ill get the GeForece 7800 GTX 512 when the price lowers to about $500.

I can't play a fully tricked out F.E.A.R. at what I think is a decent framerate, and that's on a 7800GTX!

I really think you should wait for another generation before considering an upgrade. Otherwise you're just throwing money away. ;)

What is the game in question?

In the first place, I really want to upgrade my video card and to experience how to install this kind of pci card into the pc.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to force anything upon you. I'm just concerned that your upgrade may not be warranted - from what I can see, you have a very low end system, so I have wonder if you'll achieve the performance boost you're expecting. Is there an application or game that's running slow? Is it just Windows in general?

So, either of the two can be used. One more thing, is it possible to install 64, or 128, or 256MB pci video card to my pc? Thanks!

No problem with any of those memory sizes. However, I don't know of any PCI graphics cards with chipsets that would make use of 256Mb of onboad memory, so I wouldn't bother with such models.

Enhance what exactly fren? Is there a particular application in mind?

Also, the type of RAM used on the card has no connection with the type of RAM used on your motherboard. Either type (SDR/DDR) will work fine.

What's graphics overclocking like?

What exactly are you looking for in a system joelynx? Are you a regular gamer or just an office user? If you're just using the PC for a bit of word processing and internet surfing then you might want to look into a fresh start with a Windows reinstall.

Also note that your system is made up of many other components that affect performance - perhaps a simple RAM upgrade can make life that much easier.

Two options are generally available for dual monitor setups - extend desktop and clone. Extend desktop gives you extra desktop room, extended across 2 monitors. Drag a window from the primary display to the TV and you'll see what it's all about. However, it appears that you want "clone". The option for this should be available in the Nvidia control panel (click the advanced button under Display Properties->Settings). If you do not have the Nvidia control panel, make sure you have the latest (or a more recent set of) drivers installed from Nvidia's website (remove the previous drivers first from Add or Remove Programs under the Windows Control Panel).

Did you reinstall Windows (a clean install, not an "over the top" or repair) as part of the upgrade? A motherboard replacement constitutes a serious hardware change and it is highly recommended you follow up with a fresh install.

Consult your warranty guide - there should be information concerning Dell's warranty stance on bright pixels and whether or not you have a valid claim for a replacement.

You have a 6800GT? You're better off than most! It's still a great card that's more than capable of handling whatever you throw at it.

Ensure no other drivers are currently installed (check Add or Remove Programs under Control Panel). Are you attempting to install the latest drivers available from Nvidia?

Good heavens, your CPU is running very hot. chrisbliss has eliminated the possibility of overclocking as far as I can tell (resetting BIOS to defaults), so now you have to work on your cooling! If the PC is no longer under warranty (and if it is, you should take it back!), have a read of this article for cooling assistance. You may want to enlist the services of a technically inclined friend if you don't feel up to the tasks outlined.

Thanks. Now I know clearly. A lot people also say cannot. I will upgrade my RAM .

Take note of the article I linked earlier - more importantly mixing different brands.

Will it? But if the mobo doesnt support PC3200 RAM, will it still run it at the speed of the slower RAM? I mean, will the PC3200 RAM even work on such a board? I'm not clear on this...

Yep, it's backwards compatible - it'll just run at the slower speed. I've got a PC3200 stick running happily alongside PC2100 sticks in a KT266A system.

The motherboard doesn't have to support the higher rated modules - the RAM will just run at a lower speed.

See here for more information.

Actually, you might that the Opteron is the overclocking king. ;)

Best to look up overclocking websites (such as OCAU here in Australia) for more information on this.

Otherwise, considered dual core lately?

My motherboard does not support IDE hard drives.

That's a curious one! Might I enquire as to which board or, failing that, PC brand/model you have?

MEMORY: When it comes to graphics memory, you can never have too much, especially if you're a hard core gamer. More RAM means better performance, inproved 3D texturing, and higher display resolutions. More memory also allows for smoother game play,,though anything above 256MB won't make much difference currently. You should consider moving up from a 128MB card to a 256MB card.

More memory isn't necessarily better rogue. For many lower end cards, anything more than 128Mb worth is rather pointless (and, sometimes, the model with more memory actually has lower clockspeeds). Should a game actually require that much, chances are the GPU won't be able to keep up anyway.

I would definitely look for a better card, perhaps something along the lines of a 6600GT/9800 Pro/X800GT/X700 Pro. However, your video card isn't everything (although it is the primary performance factor in today's gaming). What's the rest of your system?

Well, Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I still crash. It is now more sporadic than b4. I'm running Memtest86 right now. I am %70 through and no errors. My RAM is being listed as 198MHz for FSB DDR 397. Is that normal to be plus/minus a few hertz? Thanks for the info. Will post the results of Memtest.

It's highly recommended that you run memtest86 for quite a while, say overnight (8hrs+).

AGP is faster than PCI. PCI-E is faster than AGP, but because of the speeds of todays games, there isnt much performance difference between PCI-E and AGP. But if you are making a new system, or replacing your mobo, go for PCI-E for the simple reason: It will be cheaper (hopefully) to upgrade in the future.

Let's just stick with that eh? ;)

Pete, you haven't mentioned your motherboard or emachines model. You may not have an AGP slot at all, so we need to know a little more about your system.

Unfortunately, the rest of your specs are none too flashy. For a game like Battlefield 2, I would recommend a 2Ghz+ machine with 1Gb of RAM and at least a 9800 Pro/6600GT/X700 Pro/X800GT (phoawr, what a mouthful) graphics card (I would not buy an FX5500). You might be able to get away with your Celeron, but the rest of your box is still lacking.

I can't say much about your other gaming choices, but needless to say, take minimum requirements with a grain of salt. I'd throw on 300 more megahertz, double the RAM and another video card generation on top of any game requirements these days (if you want decent gameplay!).

I had the same problem. My Dell 15inch Flat Panel just went black and would not turn on 1 week after getting the product. All thought I got another one from Dell free of charge I still would like to see how I might get the one that stopped working fixed to use on another system.

LinkWithUs, your problem is actually different. The original poster had a problem with his PC (motherboard, CPU, power supply - any number of things) - his LCD screen still functioned correctly (as proven by testing on a laptop). Your problem was a faulty screen, which you've replaced. The only way to get the faulty screen working again is to take it in for repairs, which may end up costing enough for you to think twice about it and just buy a brand new model instead.

It is highly recommended that you completely reinstall Windows when you swap out the motherboard. While it is possible to keep an install (either by removing all drivers before swapping or, I believe, an over-the-top install/repair), such a drastic hardware change is best met with a fresh start.

SATA will most likely give you headaches when you try to install Windows to it.

That depends on the controller implementation. Many motherboards these days utilise chipsets (Nvidia nforce4, Intel since i865/i875 and possibly earlier) with native SATA - driver disks are no longer required (unless you use the "extra" SATA controller located on some boards).

Hi kingofpower,

It depends on your budget - gaming laptops can be very expensive. If their main purpose is for schoolwork, then that's what you should aim for. You can purchase rather basic models for under $1000 these days, but they're far from being gaming beasts.