Pulled the trigger on a new system

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Well - I did it - just submitted my order to NewEgg for a new system.

I've been in the "planning stage" for about 2 weeks, trying to decide what I wanted. I was initially going to do a Core2 Quad system because the Core i7 is just too new (and expensive), plus I have 8GB of DDR2-1066 I just bought a month ago to try and breathe some new life into my old system and since the i7 is DDR3 based, that would have been useless...

Anyway - I've read nothing but good reviews about the AMD Phenom II Quad's - it seems they fixed pretty much everything that was wrong w/ the Phenom and made AMD a contender once again. Most of the benchmarks I've seen put the Phenom II 940 (3.0GHZ) ahead of most of the Core2 Quad's and I've actually seen some benchmarks where it either ties the Core i7 920.

I was a little skittish because the Phenom II is so "new" that most of the current AMD boards need a BIOS flash to even recognize the chip, and since I didn't have another AM2 chip lying around I almost didn't consider the Phenom II because of this, but a couple of days ago a nice ASUS board showed up on NewEgg that was Phenom II ready. The previous ASUS AMD boards started w/ M3A, and the new ones start w/ M4A...

Also, I'd always wanted a 10,000 RPM system drive, so I was initially looking at the new VelociRaptor, but I just couldn't justify that additional cost as it seems a lot of the newer 7,200 RPM drives are getting pretty close and making the 10,000 RPM less of a necessity, so I went w/ the WD6400AAKS which actually benches pretty close to the VelociRaptor...

Also, I went with a "mid line" video card, a Radeon 4830 since I don't do a heck of a lot of gaming, but still wanted something that would have some game too it if I wanted...the 4830's bench just a little better than the Nvidia 9800GT's...

Anyway - here's what I got, so I better be happy w/ it for the next two years :-)

AMD Phenom II X4 940 Deneb 3.0GHz Socket AM2+ 125W Quad-Core Black Edition Processor:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131361

ASUS M4A79 Deluxe AM2+/AM2 AMD 790FX ATX AMD Motherboard:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131361

ASUS EAH4830/HTDP/512MD3 Radeon HD 4830 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121289


Antec Three Hundred Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129042


Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136218


Antec BP550 Plus 550W ATX12V V2.2 SLI Ready CrossFire Ready Modular Active PFC Power Supply:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371016
(This PSU don't *look* impressive but seems to have plenty of power, get's good reviews and is modular, which is a plus...hope I'm not wrong about it).

Also got 3 extra 120MM fans for the Antec Three Hundred (Two for the front and one for the side panel).

Moving from my old machine:
8GB DDR2-1066 GEIL Black Dragon
320GB WD3200AAKS (sadly made before they moved to a single 320GB platter so performance sucks, but will be a good "catch'all data drive").
Samsung (I think) DVD+-R/RW/RAM drive.

I've also got 4GB of DDR2 that I thought I had sold (deal fell through) so I'm going to stick that back in my old machine and turn it into a VMWare Server host...should be able to get a few virtual machines humming along on it.

I never was happy w/ that machine because I pieced it together as old crap died, and usually when I didn't have enough money to do it right, so I'm just happy to have a system that I was able to really cherry pick what I wanted...first time I've had that in a loooong time!

So - what do y'all think?

[LA_MERC_th33_r00k]

I LOVE the Three Hundred Case. Waiting for more money to pull the trigger on a new video card. Using onboard video which will run L4D a lil choppy at full go. Hahaha. I still have the other rig I do my gaming on still.

I am looking at a GTX 295. http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-295-preview/

[LA_MERC_YellowDog]

Same here I like the Case :)

[LA_MERC_Drax]

I built this rig nearly, i think 2 years ago when march gets here, and I've still had problems with the motherboard. I built another rig for a friend with the same mobo, problems again...I hope ASUS has fixed whatever the problems were with p5NE i have been running and fighting. Still haven't completely figured out what the deal is, just been living with it.

But I hope you have better luck, looks like a good rig to me :)

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Hey Drax- did you get the Antec Three Hundred too? I didn't get a CPU cooler yet because I wanted to see the case first to be sure what would fit :-P

Besides, from what I understand AMD is actually shipping a decent HSF combo w/ that Phenom II...supposed to be heatpipe based, but a top cooler instead of a side...I'll see how my temps do...not much of an overclocker anyway - makes me nervous :D

Anyway - yeah, I remember the probs w/ the P5NE - did you have the Deluxe, Pro or Standard?

I've had good results w/ ASUS in the past, and I hope this board is good too me - like I said above -the only reason I got the board is that it was the *only* board on NewEgg guaranteed to work w/ the Phenom II out of the Box w/o having to first flash the BIOS to support the chip.

I've never had any technology so new before - I'm kinda excited :D

[LA_MERC_Spark]

Drax I have two of those boards.. one next to me and one at home.. BOTH of them are complete trash. Constant problems with mem.. total waste of money and the worst product ASUS has ever produced.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Will y'all quit - y'all are getting me worried :{

BTW - you are still taking about the P5NE aren't you? I know it had problems...

So far ASUS' latest AMD boards have been getting great reviews. The board I ordered is brand new - hadn't even gotten a review on NewEgg yet - so I'm hoping is a good one.

Time will tell though.

[LA_MERC_Spark]

dude.. all I buy at the office is ASUS and so far I've had zero problems... well till the POS P5N32-3 SLI... it is really just a pile. Good for 0

[LA_MERC_Drax]

I ended up buying a different heatsink (zalman 9500A) as per the ASUS tech support on this POS mobo. And yes, we're refering to the P5N-E, not the board you're speaking of.

This is the mobo i have thats pissing me off:

ASUS P5N-E SLI LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 650i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard

And one similar to that in a friends rig thats giving crap too.

As far as the power supply: Antec True Power Trio TP3-650 650W ATX12V SLI Certified CrossFire Ready Active PFC Power Supply with Three 12V Rails

[LA_MERC_Maverick]

Looks like a nice system Jayson. I keep debating on whether to get a computer based on AMD or Intel, and if Intel, whether 775 or 1366. Think I'm going to do the following, since the wife ok'd a nice spending limit (depending on taxes)

Case: COOLER MASTER HAF 932 RC-932-KKN1-GP (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119160)
CPU: Intel Core i7 920 Nehalem 2.66GHz (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115202)
MB: Foxconn BloodRage LGA 1366 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813186163) (yea, it says deactivated, they are just waiting on more stock)
Mem: G.SKILL 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231225)
Vid: EVGA 896-P3-1257-AR GeForce GTX 260 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130433)
PSU: COOLER MASTER UCP RS700-AAAAA3 700W (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817171032) (combo deal)
CPU Cooler: COOLER MASTER V8 RR-UV8-XBU1-GP (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103055) (this thing looks awesome)
DVD: LG 22X DVD±R DVD Burner (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136152) x2
Wireless Router: D-Link DIR-655 IEEE 802.11n
(http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833127215) (since I have a laptop for my wife and son to play with)

Can't go SLI now, but I figure in a few months, I can afford to add another gpu. No need for a hard drive because I am using my current WD 640, along with an older 36 gig raptor and another 200g sata drive. Also, thinking of putting in a network storage unit (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822155003) with 2 1 TB drives, since I got an XBOX 360 for christmas. Going to try to set it up as a extender, so I can play movie files stored on the network on my tv without having to convert them to dvds first (that will save me a lot of $$ in supplies.) This is the other reason for the wireless router, going to take one of the laptops (most likely my sons) and hook it up to share wireless network access, then hook a standard network cable from the XBOX to it, that way I can can get wireless access on the XBOX through the laptop. The thing is on the other side of the house from my current router, and no room for me to crawl under the house to run a network cable to it.

[LA_MERC_T4rg3T]

I've always liked the Artic Cooling cpu coolers
http://www.tcmagazine.com/comments.php?shownews=23408&catid=2

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Looks like a nice system Jayson. I keep debating on whether to get a computer based on AMD or Intel, and if Intel, whether 775 or 1366. Think I'm going to do the following, since the wife ok'd a nice spending limit (depending on taxes)

Case: COOLER MASTER HAF 932 RC-932-KKN1-GP (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119160)
CPU: Intel Core i7 920 Nehalem 2.66GHz (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115202)
MB: Foxconn BloodRage LGA 1366 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813186163) (yea, it says deactivated, they are just waiting on more stock)
Mem: G.SKILL 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231225)
Vid: EVGA 896-P3-1257-AR GeForce GTX 260 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130433)
PSU: COOLER MASTER UCP RS700-AAAAA3 700W (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817171032) (combo deal)
CPU Cooler: COOLER MASTER V8 RR-UV8-XBU1-GP (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103055) (this thing looks awesome)
DVD: LG 22X DVD±R DVD Burner (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136152) x2
Wireless Router: D-Link DIR-655 IEEE 802.11n
(http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833127215) (since I have a laptop for my wife and son to play with)

Can't go SLI now, but I figure in a few months, I can afford to add another gpu. No need for a hard drive because I am using my current WD 640, along with an older 36 gig raptor and another 200g sata drive. Also, thinking of putting in a network storage unit (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822155003) with 2 1 TB drives, since I got an XBOX 360 for christmas. Going to try to set it up as a extender, so I can play movie files stored on the network on my tv without having to convert them to dvds first (that will save me a lot of $$ in supplies.) This is the other reason for the wireless router, going to take one of the laptops (most likely my sons) and hook it up to share wireless network access, then hook a standard network cable from the XBOX to it, that way I can can get wireless access on the XBOX through the laptop. The thing is on the other side of the house from my current router, and no room for me to crawl under the house to run a network cable to it.

I started to do a Intel 920, but I just couldn't justify to myself having to buy 6GB DDR3 when I'd just bought 8GB of DDR2...

Just put the system together and got Vista loaded - running great so far. The Video Stress test in CS:Source peaked at 770FPS and averaged 350...on my old system I can't remember the "peak" but my average was about 200fps...

Also scored all 5.9's in Vista WEI.

That's all the testing I've been able to do so far.

[LA_MERC_th33_r00k]

Mav, you will love the V8 cooler. Had my hands on one today and it was sweet. It was also in a Cool Master case. An all aluminum bigger than a college apartment case though.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

OK - Finally got around to playing around w/ that Unlocked Multiplier :-)

Wound up getting 3.4GHz out of this baby w/ stock cooler, stock voltages and 56C after 4.5hrs of Prime95 (64-bit).

Also used the "Auto-Tune" thing in the ATI drivers to get 700 GPU/1189 MEM (2378 effective) out of that HD4830.

Here are my 3D Mark Results before and after OC:

Stock speeds:
11722 3DMarks
SM 2.0 Score 4426
SM 3.0 Score 5160
CPU Score 4174
http://service.futuremark.com/compare?3dm06=9819847

OC'ed Results:
13917 3DMarks
SM 2.0 Score 5310
SM 3.0 Score 6227
CPU Score 4648
http://service.futuremark.com/compare?3dm06=9892411

Not bad for a ~$900 build huh?

[LA_MERC_YellowDog]

The links are Borked, but the results are sweet... You need to game it up now that you have a system witch will run anything out their wide open:)

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Well, since 3.4 was so easy w/ the stock HSF, I decided to yank my OCZ Vendetta out of my Intel rig (I just put the stock Intel HSF back in - it's not going to be OC'ed any longer), and I put the OCZ on the AMD along w/ some Arctic Silver...

My temps dropped 5C right off the bat (and that should only get better as the AC "sets")...

Right now I'm at 3.6 w/ a small 0.1V injection - running prime to test for stability - still mid to upper 50's w/ full load on all 4 cores...

3.6 is the highest I've read of without voltage injections higher than I'll be comfy with (stuff in the 1.5-1.6V range) - the stock for this chip is 1.35, and I'm at 1.45 now, and that's as high as I'm comfortable going for long term use.

Anyway - I'm gonna let it run prime some more (it's been at it about 3 hours now), and then I'll probably stop it and run 3DMark and Cinebench again to see what differences it made.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

@ 3.6GHz:
14037 3DMarks
SM 2.0 Score 5321
SM 3.0 Score 6222
CPU Score 4865

Looks like I'm finally GPU bound...So I'm probably just going to step back to 3.4GHz where I can run @ stock voltages - I'd feel much safer that way.

[LA_MERC_YellowDog]

Well... I'd say your good to go man... Its fun to see what it will do, but then back that sucker down just a hair for stability :) not to mention you dont want to spend another 500 bucks fixing what you killed.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Yeah - she's nice and stable (not to mention fast as HELL) at 3.4GHz, so why risk it?

So...what are y'all playing these days?

I have CS:Source, Unreal Tournament 3 and BF2 loaded up ready to go!!!

:-)

[LA_MERC_th33_r00k]

tittley winks

[LA_MERC_DocSparky]

There are still a couple people playing BF2 and a few more than that playing CS. Left 4 Dead has a little following as well. I've been getting into COD:WaW and TF2. Doesn't seem that there is any one thing that people are playing (FPS-wise). Jump on anytime and try that new rig out.

[Daedelus]

sounds good. i have been researching new comp sience summer probably but with the wife out of work and my video card died i had to put it off i finally talked her into letting me get a new 9500gt i think my dell power suply should be able to power it. haha also snuck in 2 gigs of gskill ram it slower 667mgz pc5400 that max this computer will go.
I do think when i get building the new comp though ill go with intell quad core and start with one diamond 4850 then cross fire down the road. i am very tossed up weather to go with antec 900 or antec 1200 cases. also tossed up on power suply's i read great reviews for PC power and cooling. and i think a goog review on toms hardware for the corsair power supply? ok better go still got like 400+ post to read threw lol.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Hey Daedelus - if you're torn between the Antec Nine Hundred and the Antec Twelve Hundred, be sure to check out the Nine Hundred Two - it looks like the Twelve Hundred, but is the size of the Nine Hundred...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129058

Personally - I wouldn't want a case as big as the Twelve Hundred...also it may seem like you get better airflow, but sometimes, you can be less effective than with a "Mid-tower" because you create "whirlpools" of air inside the case...

[LA_MERC_YellowDog]

I like the improved layout of the 900-2 case.. I have the 900, its worked out to be a great case, but their are a couple things on the 900-2 that or more user friendly IMO.. like the 45 deg. I/O panel.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

When I built mine, I was torn between the Three Hundred (which I bought), the Nine Hundred, the Nine Hundred Two and the P182.

I decided that I didn't want LED's and a Window, so that ruled out the 900 & 902...I know a couple of people w/ PC's in the P182, and I like the internal layout, but I hate the "door" (it feels flimsy), so I went w/ the 300.

The 300 isn't actually *much* smaller than the 900, just lacks the "glitz". I think it looks pretty awesome though - cools like a Mofo too :)

I do have all the fan slots full though - 2x 120's in front, 1x 120 side, 1x 120 back and 1x 140 on top...sounds like a small vaccum cleaner though :-D

[LA_MERC_Maverick]

I was going get to the full tower HAF, but after reading some reviews and hearing from people that own one, I've decided to step back to the mid tower Coolermaster RC-690 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119137).

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Finally got around to taking some pictures...

[LA_MERC_th33_r00k]

Nice Max.

I like my 300 case also. I will get to see how the GTX285 fits in it tomorrow.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Update:
After running @ 3.4GHz for a while, (letting the AC5 “set”), I tried the push up a half-multi and also bumped the FSB by 2MHz (just for good measure) and I’m sitting at 3.53GHz, prime stable at stock voltages…

I’m not running “extreme” cooling by any means - just a midrange 92mm heatpipe tower (OCZ Vendetta) and under full Prime load, I’m at 50C.

I did end up "un-overclocking" the graphics card...I only play 2 games, UT3 and CS:Source, and I play both of those w/ VSync tunred on (looks better too me), and even at highest settings, I don't even come close to dropping below the 60FPS sync rate...If I wanted to sit and watch 3DMark over and over, I'd leave it OC'ed, but what's the point? :-)

[LA_MERC_th33_r00k]

That Phenom seats into a AM2+? I may have to get that CPU if you are having a good time with it. It will fit in the same board I bought to house the CPU I got from you.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Yup - they are *supposed* to be a drop in on an AM2+ -- might need a BIOS flash though.

What board do you have?

And yes, it's an awesome chip. It will hit 3.8 on air easily if you don't mind pumping some V-core too it - I'm just sticking w/ what I can do at stock voltages, and I think I'm there. I just tried going to 3.6, and after 30 min or so in Prime95 Core 3 errors...If I pump it to 1.4 V-core it's stable, but the temps creep into the upper 50's under load, and I really don't want to run it out of spec voltage-wise anyway...that's what has always made me nervous about OC'ing in the first place...not too mention these CPU's have only been around less than a full month, so even the "hard-core" guys can't decide on what voltages are "Safe" for 24/7 use (outside of stock)...

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

BAH!

Well, I ended up "un-overclocking" the whole dang thing. I left it running Prime last night, overnight, to verify stability at 3.53 and apparently my UPS got overloaded as it woke me about 3AM screaming bloody murder - all I can figure is all four cores, fully loaded at that speed was pulling too much juice.

Well, at least now I can turn my fans down to "low" :)

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Well, I picked up a decent quality surge protector on the way home, and I seem to be ok running off of it - back to 3.53GHz! w00t!

[LA_MERC_th33_r00k]

Good to hear.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

I've actually been playing w/ it some more tonight - Finally more stuff is showing up online about what is safe, etc (voltages and stuff), since the CPU's been out for a few weeks now.

I'll start a new thread once I get things fully dialed in...

Hey, Free Speed!!! This is fun!!!

[LA_MERC_FragFood]

Well, all of my parts are on the way (finally), so I should have a new toy to play with this weekend if all goes well. Of course, it shipped BEFORE I started finding the posts about possible clocking issues with all four DIMMs filled. I may have ended up paying for DDR3/1333 and end up with them clocked at DDR3/1066 until I get a BIOS flash or swap it for a new stepping. Either way, it'll be faster than what I've got by a long shot.

[LA_MERC_FragFood]

BAH!

Well, I ended up "un-overclocking" the whole dang thing. I left it running Prime last night, overnight, to verify stability at 3.53 and apparently my UPS got overloaded as it woke me about 3AM screaming bloody murder - all I can figure is all four cores, fully loaded at that speed was pulling too much juice.

Well, at least now I can turn my fans down to "low" :)

Max - You don't happen to have a laser printer plugged into that UPS, do you? Also, a battery change may be in order. As someone I'm too lazy to look up already mentioned, a low battery state causes APC UPSs to screech and shut down, even with a fairly mild voltage sag.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Frag - no laser printer, but it is getting old.

I just need to get a new one, just can't right this second. I'm good to go for now though. I checked the bottom of the ups and it says 375W - I just assumed that was the problem - I tried to pull more than 375W through it.

I'm good for now though - I did back off of the OC some - back to 3.4 - I think 3.53 was going to end up needing voltage to be prime stable. I also did a more mild OC on the Graphics card than what I had - I just took the reccomendations of the ATI overdrive util in the drivers which put me at 690/1189 (which is higher than a stock 4850, but lower than a stock 4870).

I'm curious to see what you get out of that Triple.

[LA_MERC_FragFood]

Wel, the PSU and RAM are in Houston tonight, the mobo, CPU and video card are somewhere in UPS land. Hoping to have all of the part Thursday and start the build Friday or so. Gonna get everything loaded up and run it for a bit before I start playing with OC. I WILL lap the heat sink first. That's usually good for around 5 degrees C right there.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

I WILL lap the heat sink first. That's usually good for around 5 degrees C right there.

Temps will *not* be your barrier with the Phenom II...it runs cool as crap...

You wall is going to be voltage, and deciding if you are comfortable overvolting the CPU - I'm not - it's a 45nm chip, and the last thing I want to do is fry it by sending too much juice into it.

I don't know about the X3, but for the X4, I hit a "wall" at 3.4 @ stock v-core...seems to be echoed around the web as well. There are folks running in the 1.4-1.5 range that are hitting up to 3.8...some even 4.0 on air, but I'm not willing to risk stability and/or HW failure to do some ridiculous OC like that.

I'm at 3.4GHz, stock voltages on everything (just changed the Multi from 15 to 17), and I'm stable in 64-bit Prime95 over a 24-hour run. My temps have never gone above 53C under full prime load. I idle at 29C-31C most of the time, and when running something like 3DMark, my temps will get into the mid 40's.

To give you an idea of speed, in a Single threaded Cinebench10 run (I used single threaded as the comparison since the Core i7 has 8 threads due to hyperthreading), I score 4151, in comparison, going by a chart at Anandtech, a Core i7 920 gets 3846 on the same single threaded test, a Core i7 940 gets 4171...so I'm happy with the performance.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Final overclock decision:
http://jaysonrowe.wordpress.com/2009/02/19/un-overclocking-the-phenom-ii-final-conclusion/

[LA_MERC_FragFood]

Parts are all in. No bumps, bruises, etc., everything looks pristine.

First impressions as I look at the stuff:

1 - Um, I spent some money.
2 - That's the heaviest friggin' mobo I've ever had, and 10 SATA ports and eight USB2 just in the back should tide me over for a while...
3 - Bigass video card looks weird without a fan on it
4 - I probably got 'way more PSU than I needed, but I don't think any problems will be traceable to it not providing enough power
5 - Heat sink on the Phenom II 720 BE looks kinda iffy. Gonna lap it anyway, because it really doesnt look like it'll be adequate, but I could always see if my big copper Thermaltake (http://www.thermaltakeusa.com/Product.aspx?S=1137&ID=1572) will fit it. (UPDATE - Don't think so...) May have to go HSF shopping tomorrow at (ugh) BestBuy, since there's nowhere else to get one since DumpUSA went out of business. Dunno. Have to look into the other opinions of the stock HSF beforehand.
6 - That RAM looks damn spiffy

Backups begin tonight, build (hopefully) begins tomorrow...

Gonna try to go Win 7 Beta 1 x64 on it, since all of my critical apps have tested OK in VMWare, and I like it better than Vista. (Anyone have RC1 and key? MSDN?) That doesn't work out, then I'll back it down to Vista 64.

Pics as it goes along, posted once it's running... ;-)

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Frag - I wonder if they shipped the same HSF w/ the X3 as they did w/ the X4 - if they *did*, I agree - it's crap - that's why I yanked my OCZ Vendetta out of my Intel Rig and put the stock cooler back in that box...

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

May have to go HSF shopping tomorrow at (ugh) BestBuy

Good luck w/that - BBY was my first stop when I discovered the stock HSF wasn't going to work for me - all they had was a odd-looking Thermaltake: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835106102

Perhaps you'll find something better in your local store...

[LA_MERC_FragFood]

No, I'd have been happy with the stock 940 HSF. This was a pure aluminum extrusion. No copper core, no heatpipes, nothin'. Looks like the HSF from an old K6-2 or something. You'll see it once I post pics. Definitely going to replace, and since I'm going to do so, I'm not even going to bother lapping it. Just see what it'll do completely stock from the box.

I'll lap the new one, though.

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

No, I'd have been happy with the stock 940 HSF. This was a pure aluminum extrusion. No copper core, no heatpipes, nothin'. Looks like the HSF from an old K6-2 or something. You'll see it once I post pics. Definitely going to replace, and since I'm going to do so, I'm not even going to bother lapping it. Just see what it'll do completely stock from the box.

I'll lap the new one, though.
Do you want my 940 HSF?

[LA_MERC_FragFood]

I certainly wouldn't turn it down... :-)

Yes, please. This other one's crap. I'm either surprised that they'd put something like this on one of their newest processors, or impressed that this is all it takes to coo one of these... I'll post a pic of it once I get Vista loaded/configured/patched and under control...

Thanks!

[LA_MERC_MadMAX]

Hey Frag -
Shoot me a PM with your address and I'll send it off Monday.