"Rate my Rig" thread

[Napoleon the Clown]

Even though you probably can't order anything off it, NewEgg is a good place to get reviews on products. Cheap-ass SSDs tend to die young on you. Which means you're out a fair chunk of change and you lost any data you didn't have backed up.

Unless you plan on doing fairly hardcore gaming you can scale back the video card to 1 gig of memory instead of 2 gig. 1 gig is enough to run anything out there on respectable settings, 2 gig is just going overboard. It'll be more than five years before you need 2 gig to run a game at a reasonable framerate, I'm guessing. I'm using a 1 gig card and it meets my needs very admirably.

[Executor32]

Yeah, I've got a 1GB Geforce GTX 560Ti, and it'll run pretty much anything at a good framerate at high settings with AA, AF, etc. at 1920x1080. I used to have a 1.75GB GTX 275, but I never played a game that came anywhere close to filling the framebuffer, not even GTAIV.

[Zixinus]

Quick question: What does this do excatly?

Is this essentially a replacement for your average 3G dongle? Or does it do more? For example, can it receive GPS data and allow my laptop to function as a GPS navigator?

[phongn]

Quick question: What does this do excatly?

Is this essentially a replacement for your average 3G dongle? Or does it do more? For example, can it receive GPS data and allow my laptop to function as a GPS navigator?

It replaces a dongle, yes, and can use a built-in antenna for better reception. It does not include GPS.

[Zixinus]

Is there a module that can give me GPS signal reception?

[phongn]

Is there a module that can give me GPS signal reception?

Yeah, if you look on eBay there's tons of mini-PCIe WWAN modules with GPS reception (but you'll need to figure out the antenna situation depending on your laptop). You can also just get a USB GPS unit.

EDIT: that ThinkPad WWAN module might have GPS functionality but it doesn't list it in the technical specs; many WWAN cards do.

[Zixinus]

Is there a module that can give me GPS signal reception?

Yeah, if you look on eBay there's tons of mini-PCIe WWAN modules with GPS reception (but you'll need to figure out the antenna situation depending on your laptop). You can also just get a USB GPS unit.

EDIT: that ThinkPad WWAN module might have GPS functionality but it doesn't list it in the technical specs; many WWAN cards do.

I'm looking at cards. There is only one WWAN module made by Sony Ericsson that supposedly has GPS capability. So I don't understand it.

[phongn]

Don't understand what?

[Zixinus]

Don't understand what?

Well, the module should be the same one that I linked previously. It has the same picture and part number (0A36186).

So, overall, I'm confused about the sub-second detail. I think I'll just ask Lenovo Support or the seller personally.

[Zixinus]

What hungarian support companies I could reach, they refused to take any sort of stand.

However, the seller of the points to the part's GPRS capability and that with it I can recieve GPS signal. Is this true? Because I had a phone that also had GPRS and could receive data. Is it true for the modem as well?

[Executor32]

No. GPRS stands for General Packet Radio Service, and it's basically one of several methods a GSM device can use to connect to the Internet. The only way you can receive a GPS signal is if the device contains a GPS radio. If it doesn't, it may still be able to at least get an approximate location using GSM localization.

[XaLEv]

How are Asrock boards these days?

[Dominus Atheos]

Same as they've always been? Towards the lower end, but still better then ECS or Biostar.

[Starglider]

Customer who had that demo machine ordered a second system plus upgrade of existing machine with dual 10GBASE-T (10 gig) ethernet. Unfortunately AMD just pushed back the 7990 indefinitely again, at this point I have serious doubts they will ever release it. This means I am going to have to mess about with PCI-E extenders and splitters to try and cram 8 x watercooled AMD 7970s + 10gig NIC into motherboards with only 7 slots each.

[Darth Nostril]

Installed Intel 330 120 gig in render beast, currently reinstalling everything, demoting OCZ drive to page file only.

[Starglider]

Finally managed to order some PowerColor 7990s ('Devil 13' edition). Had to go direct to the UK distributor, apparently the whole of the UK only had two allocated. Have ordered four to start with, will be putting them all into GPU Compute Prototype #2 with eight custom waterblocks. Should be fun.

[Starglider]

Quad Radeon 7990s turned up:



These are the 'workstation edition' of the Powercolor 7990 Devil13; to the best of my knowledge we are the only customer to have these. Currently testing them with the original air coolers prior to fitting the custom nickel-copper waterblocks and integrating them all into the same machine;



I can happily confirm that the 'impossible to disable crossfire on dual-GPU cards' bug that made the 5970 and 6990 unusable for GPGPU has been fixed for the 7990.

[atg]

How I wish I had the cash for that. Not that I'd actually have a use for it...

ePenis FTW!

[Starglider]

How I wish I had the cash for that.

Enterprise computing operates on a different level; these cards are quite cheap by workstation standards, which is part of the appeal. The four 7990 cards combined cost less than the CPUs + motherboard and are about 20% of the total components cost (25% if you include the custom waterblocks). Even with the max-spec no-compromise components these 8 GPU workstations are still less than half the price of the 8-CPU Nehalem-EX database servers, which are themselves go for small change compared to the large scale IBM POWER and zSeries machines. Plus in all cases, hardware acquisition costs are usually dominated by software, integration, rackspace, power and support costs.

Not that I'd actually have a use for it...

There are AFAIK no consumer / gaming or even media workloads that would come close to achieving decent utilisation on this sort of machine; it would make about as much sense as using an 18-wheeler for your daily commute.

[atg]

While most of my work has been in the SMB space I have had some exposure to the enterprise world so I know what you mean when it comes to pricing.

I know there is no consumer use for it, hence the ePenis comment, as that is all it would be if I got one

[Starglider]

This is why three slot coolers are a bad idea;



The Devil 13 brackets are custom and pretty much integral to the card, so I'm going to have to truncate them with the bandsaw before mounting the waterblocks.



Had to remove the backplates to physically fit the top card into the slot; the clearance on the ASUS Z9PE-D8 WS is very tight. Will mount individual passive heatsinks on the rear memory chips. Seems a shame to throw away all this carefully engineered copper and aluminium, but alas Powercolor didn't want to ship bare cards;

[Starglider]

Following application of bandsaw, cards now fit into chasis;





When doing this kind of modification it is essential to wear appropriate safety gear.

[Darth Nostril]

I know there is no consumer use for it, hence the ePenis comment, as that is all it would be if I got one

Well there is a use if you are using a GPU based renderer.
Alas I use Vue 10.5 Infinite which is CPU based so my Quadro 4000 sits idle whilst a pair of networked i7s do all the hard work.

[Starglider]

Fit-testing the liquid cooling components;



There is more tubing on the other side of the case (to reduce the amount over the motherboard). This is a single-loop setup, albeit a fairly complex one.



I've used a mix of 3/8th and 1/2 inch ID tubing and barb and compression fittings, as appropriate for different bits of the loop. It's fairly restrictive but that problem is solvable simply by using two of the most powerful pumps available.

[Zixinus]

Ok, Stargrlider: what the hell are you using that for? Some sort of server machine or something?

Oh, and I was being bored while I discovered this: A GT630 card with 4 gigs or VRAM. Which sounds pretty good from where I can tell: that 4 gigabytes of VRAM is pretty rare (other 4-gig cards go for ten times as much as that) and the 630GT seems fairly new. Is it worthwhile for the price of roughly 74$ (56 euro)?