Solved Just built a PC for my neighbor...

[alphanumeric]

lol, my first home PC had 7 ISA slots on it, there was no PCI then. The only connector other than for the power cord was the big old 5 pin keyboard connector. Serial mouse on a multi IO card. The multi IO card also had the floppy and hard drive controller on it. Then there was a video card, sound card, modem, NIC, etc. A 486DX2 66MHz CPU and 4 1 meg SIMMS. Windows 3.11 running on MSDOS 5.2 or something. You'd have to exit out of windows and reach around the back to turn the power supply off.

 

[pcRat]

alphanumeric▬ you threw me off guard there for a second when I read "there was no PCI then." At firsat I thought you meant PCIexpress but as I read along, I knew I had to start over and read slower.
This time I didn't browse over "had 7 ISA slots on it." I didn't get into computers until 2002 but my first 3 pcs had ISA
Thanks for waking me up.

 

[Tepid]

Azasandy,

I don't want to be a buzz kill or anything, and I think it is great what you did for your neighbor.
But I do like to point out certain things when I see them.
And over kill on Ram is one of them.
So, I hope this doesn't come across the wrong way....

I really wouldn't have spent that much money on ram for a PC like this.
It really is WAY over kill. as an example, 4G is plenty for a system like this and you could have saved approx 75 to 80$ to put into something else....

Newegg.com - Computer Hardware, Memory, Desktop Memory, DDR3 1333 (PC3 10600), 4GB (2 x 2GB), $10 - $25

Just my 2 cents. I don't see a problem with putting that much ram into a PC that is actually going to utilize it for stuff like Virtual PC's, Photo, Video Editing and the like. But on a simple media center, it really can be a huge waste of money, better spent elsewhere on other hardware.

 

[azasadny]

Tepid,
I appreciate your viewpoint, but there are a few things you don't know about my neighbor (because I didn't mention them). He really wanted "lots of RAM" and the local store didn't charge us the full $50 for the 8GB stick. He'll likely never add RAM and doesn't want to touch the box again, so I tried to build it so he wouldn't have to do anything but add a video card (he's not a gamer) and perhaps put in an SSD or larger/faster hard drive. I'll create a RAM disk out of some of the RAM so he can use it for burning DVD's, etc... Thanks!!

 

[Tepid]

That's cool. That could come in handy.

I just hate to see people waste money on ram they don't need. If it really is needed or can be used, then I say go for it.
But I see a lot of this going around. And even in a gaming system, 4G is plenty 6 if you really want to just say you have more than 4G, but you want a really good Video card, 16G of ram isn't going to do that much for a gaming rig either.

Anyway, good luck with the rest of the build.

 

[pcRat]

If I only have onboard graphics; much effect does more RAM have on buffering when I'm watching youtubes, hulu etc?

 

[Tepid]

If I only have onboard graphics; much effect does more RAM have on buffering when I'm watching youtubes, hulu etc?

It can. but it depends more on the Onboard Video Hardware. How efficiently it utilizes RAM for it's video card requirements.

To give you an idea... My laptop is a Dell Inspiron 1764...
This is what I have in my Laptop with 4G of Ram. I don't ahve any issues with watching Hulu, Netflix or YouTube or any videos anywhere online for that matter.

View attachment 14261View attachment 14262

 

[azasadny]

On my neighbor's motherboard, he can assign up to 1GB of RAM for the onboard video, so that helps. Also, the 8GB sticks of RAM weren't that much more than the 4GB sticks and the local store didn't have any 2 or 4GB sticks of RAM in stock, so they gave us a great deal on the 8GB sticks. I buy a lot of gear from them and they always give me a killer deal. Now, If I could only find a good deal on PC2-6400 DDR 4GB sticks!!!!

 

[Tepid]

I meant to say earlier,, that, yeah, if you got an excellent deal on it then it's worth it.

This really isn't a bad deal at all for any of these...

Newegg.com - Computer Hardware, Memory, Laptop Memory, DDR2 800 (PC2 6400), 4GB (2 x 2GB)

 

[azasadny]

I need desktop RAM, unfortunately... I have an Intel DG43GT motherboard with an Intel Q6600 CPU. I can use 16GB of RAM, but I'm only running 6GB because I can't find 4GB sticks for a reasonable price...

 

[Tepid]

Ok, yeah I took a looka round,, not sure why I got SODIMM. anyway, wow that's pricey

 

[azasadny]

Yeah, it is. I was told it's because MacPros use the same RAM and supply/demand thing keeps the prices high and that the cost to mfg DDR3 is much lower than DDR2, so it makes sense.

 

[jimbo45]

Hi there
I'd suggest you save money by NOT installing 2 DVD drives -- Windows 8 can mount a DVD ISO as a virtual DVD which windows explorer can directly access files on , or programs like VLC can play it the same way as a "Physical" DVD drive.

If you need 2 DVD's at the same time --use a program like AnyDVD to create an exact ISO image so you can then mount the second DVD as a virtual ISO.

In fact IMO unless you use DVD's a lot why not install NONE and just use a cheap external USB DVD drive when you need to extract data from a DVD. -- It will also keep the footprint of the PC smaller too.

If the Mobo doesn't have USB3 slots then I'd also suggest adding a cheap USB3 card -- USB3 for external devices makes a HUGE HUGE difference in speed --nearly 10X faster than a USB2 device. USB3 PCI express slot (the small one) card will cost around 25 USD -- but IMO well worth every cent --USB3 external HDD's are decently fast these days too.

Cheers
jimbo

 

[azasadny]

My neighbor is very "old school" and he wanted 2 DVD drives so he can burn DVD's and copy them the way he's used to doing it. I usually put 1 DVD drive in the case, but he insisted on 2. The drives were $25 each, so it wasn't a big expense. He just ordered an SSD for it, so I'll be setting that up for him when it arrives this week...

 

[alphanumeric]

That's all personal choice stuff and you know what they say, the customer is always right. Me I don't have any optical drives in any of my desktops. I have a USB DVD Lightscribe drive that I plug in when needed. I have everything on USB thumb drives these days so I hardly use it anymore. Usually to burn a disks for someone else.

 

[azasadny]

Yep, I mostly use USB thumb drives (32GB) these days, but the DVD RW drive comes in handy, too. I burn a system restore DVD with my drivers, etc... on it and I burn DVD's with family pictures, etc... for other family members, so the DVD RW drive is still used.

 

[pcRat]

All my pcs have a DVD rom + a DVD burner with crazy logic.
Not knowing what MS will do, I never insert a genuine OS disk in the burner . For fear it will be altered in someway by a 'first-run script' or something similiar making it unusable in some form.
As long as I have a DVD roms & burners on the shelf, why take chances?

 

[mbratch]

OEM OS DVDs are nonvolatile, aren't they?

 

[alphanumeric]

OEM OS DVDs are nonvolatile, aren't they?

Yes as far as I know they are read only.

 

[azasadny]

They are read-only, no need to worry about writing anything to them...