I can't seem to find an AM2 motherboard with integrated Nvidia graphics and an S-Video output connector that rates well.

Look for reviews on the Nvidia 6150 and 7050 chipset boards. I've read about them some time ago and was not left with the impression you have.

Someone who learned to drive in San Jose should put the better tires on the rear. A Finn can put them on the front.

Driving on snow at an early age teaches you car control. It's no accident that Finns are over represented in F1 and the WRC.

Earthwatts power supplies are surprisingly good. Antec switched to Seasonic as their OEM of choice for these particular units. While they're not as good as Seasonic S12s, they're still much better than the Sonata II's "Smart"Power PSUs. Antec's SmartPower and TruePower psu's are made by CWT, Channe...

I believe it's possible to undervolt a socket A AMD cpu with the wire mod -- shorting across specific pins with wires across and into the holes in the socket. Haven't done it yet but I've seen the guides. Does this trick also exist for the P4 socket 478 cpus? In my case I have a Cel 1.7 Willamette i...

I've just acquired a Celeron 1.7 Willamette ex-office computer. Generic case, Asus P4S333-VM mATX board with SiS 650 chipset, Sparkle (Fortron) 250 watt psu, WD 80G, and both intake and exhaust 80mm fans. My intention is to make it a quickie rather than ultimate HTPC, by adding an older Hauppage tun...

If you have a table saw - chances are good that a typical "combo" or crosscut blade will do a decent job.

A carbide blade, and the more teeth the better.

1. table saw with fine tooth blade

Or a circular saw. It works very well. There is a correct feed speed that gives you a clean edge. I think it was slow, but it was about 30 years ago.

Exactly what makes you think it's made in the US? If it isn't made in Asia for Memorex, I'd be highly surprised. Their cassette tapes and floppy disks were inferior to other major brands. Not exactly a synonym for quality.

Some USB flash drives are bootable, some not. I found one test only online that reported on that. I still like a floppy for diagnostics and repair. That's what old dead Pentiums and 486' are for. :) However, you can download and burn The Ultimate Boot CD to get a bootable cd full of dos diagnostics.

I love the psu/central fan/hard drive duct. They can put it in more of their cases. As soon as I saw that I thought "no fan in the psu". Now if case manufacturers would only make the hdd drive cages convertible between 3.5" and 5.25" so I can use stretchy cord without modding, I'd be happy. To the m...

If you use a finger, you put it in plastic bag first, to keep the oils from your skin on your skin.
A credit card or something similar is recommended for spreading the paste.

I've seen people report temperature reductions of up to 10C from cleaning the dust out of their case and hsf. And I heartily agree with looking at case airflow, particularly at intake openings at the front. If you haven't already, cut out metal grilles, enlarge the opening at the bottom of the front...

To clean off the old paste, use isopropyl alcohol (rubbing alcohol).

For excellent installation instructions, with pictures, check at the Arctic Silver website.

It's not a grounding wire to ground the drive. They are shielding wires. Shielding the other wires from each other. They are grounded, because otherwise they are less effective. (Don't ask me the exact science behind this.) Some similar science is used in professional audio cables and devices, call...

I really dont see how undervolting the fan gives you comparable CFM.. :? Fans don't start out at the same rpm. For example, 80mm fans commonly come in L (low, 1900-2000rpm), M (medium, abt 2500rpm), and H (high, abt 3000rpm) versions. Undervolting a faster fan can give comparable cfm to a slower fa...

Also in agreement with ferdb and bomba. Electrons fired at the screen are deflected by the yoke to make the image. The magnetic pulses from the fan motor are now doing that also. Only magnetic shielding will help. Perhaps a steel (has to be magnetizable material to shield) shroud around the neck mig...

Or give it really tall feet.

There's a market crying out for product. Replacement tall, vibration absorbing feet should find a clientele amongst the members of this website. Acoustifeet have the vibration part down, but are missing the other part. They seem proud of the low profile of their feet.

But why do you say, "willing to sacrifice performance"? I thought the 64-bit amds were more than competetive with intel's current p4s..?

`They're completely competitive in everything but heat and MHz. By MHZ I mean the number only. Both the A64 and the Intel P-M's are competitive at lower MHz.

sthayashi wrote: the loudest computer fan I've heard was

an Intel fanboy. If not the loudest, at least the most persistent.

Here is a test of the motherboard and cpu, if you can read Chinese characters or run it through a translator. On the last page is a performance comparison to a Via C3 1.0G combo. 'Ol man is convinced, based on the Super Pi performance, that the Shelton does have L2 cache, even though it doesn't sho...

Intel Shelton processor is made using Intel’s 130nm process technology and is based on the Intel Pentium M “Banias” architecture, HKEPC.com web-site reported on Thursday. The chip does not have L2 cache, unlike the majority of today’s central processing units, and works at a core-clock in the range...

..........with an 845 chipset. Most of the page is in Chinese characters. Link thanks to ol' man at Hardware Central Forums.

Here.

Has anyone compared Samsung and Fujitsu? You ought to be able to get an idea from other drives such as Hitachi that appear in comparisons with the Samsung in one report and the Fujitsu in another. Seems Samsung is not that quiet anyway. "That quiet" will be different for everyone. You decide on you...

Suggest you read the tests linked in Mike C's sticky at the top of this forum, and the test linked in this thread

passive cooling?

No, but with a good heatsink such as a Zalman 7000 or one of the ThermalRights, you can use a low rpm fan that will be essentially silent. More so if that 1800+ is a Tbred and not a Palomino core.

bhtooefr wrote:Basically, treat anything with "H-PBGA" as unusable, as you don't have the equipment to do it (most likely).

Are you saying that "H-PBGA" is a solder only, intended for notebooks?

Test is here.

The 40G is compared to a Seagate Momentous and two Hitachis, both larger 80G, a 4200 and a 5400rpm. Comments on noise are near the end, by ear. The performance tests appear thorough.

But note: despite the author's hope for a 3 year warranty, the Samsung's is one year.

K7 parts can be used in two different modes when idle. The blue bars represent what the chips were designed to consume when idle in Windows. In this mode the CPU would enter a “stop grant” state when Windows Idle process issues a hlt command. The state has sometimes been called “bus disconnect”. Th...

The only thing that disapoints me about these xp/si is the fact that they still orientate their heatpipes for a desktop type PC. But most of us use towers to avoid having the noise too close to our ears while occupying reasonable footprint on the floor. Why don't they design their heatpipes with th...