A few additions to BBA's newest monster.

[BBA]

I didn't like the drive space of my two 18GB SCSI drives, so I replaced them for good drives and got rid of SCSI altogether.

Now I have the following:

P4 Northwood at 2.8GHz ( aircooled w/Tt Volcano 7+ )
512MB of PC400 DDR ( on a single dimm ).
Quadro DCC ( converted from GF3 ) at 225/500.
1x 120 GB WD drive with 8 MB cache
1x 120 GB IBM drive
40X Liteon CDRW
16X Toshiba DVD
Turtle Beach Santa Cruz.
Kenwood 5x100W reciever with 5x 2 way speakers ( using Polk drivers )
Home made 12" powered sub.
19" VX900 Gateway monitor
Razor Boomslang 1000dpi.
MS Sidewinder 3D Pro
Logitech Wingman Formula Force GP
Thrustmaster Tacticalboard
USB MM keyboard
Windows XP Pro
Office XP Pro
Etc...etc..etc...

And it's all bought and paid for with the wifes blessing :)

I'm a happy camper...to say the least.
( Now I have to work that angle for the Radeon 9700 or NV30 )
:D

[Mntsnow]

Congrats on the new drive space ! 240 gigs is so much nicer than 36 :D

[BBA]

I'll say...it's like I have a new lease on downloads and game installations. :) No more juggling what I wanted installed at a time.

[Stan]

Hey BBA,

I see that you have the IBM and WD (8MB) 120GB.
Do you see any difference in terms of performance between these 2 drives?
I need to upgrade my server disks pretty soon and I can not make up my mind between these 2 HD.
I have been a big IBM fan since I've been buying HD (I've got IBM disks everywhere - SCSI and IDE). But the WD comes with 8MB (but it is a bit more expensive).
Does the 8MB justify the higher price tag?

Thanks

Stan

[BBA]

The 8MB drive is available from CompUSA for $229, but there is a mail in rebate for $100 if you buy it before 9/7, so the total is $129.

It's the only reason I bought it. I don't think that is a price you will want to pass up. The rebate coupon is available on the website.

As far as performance difference...from my direct testing of both drives, the WD does about 20M/sec faster than the IBM at every point on the drive and has a slightly faster access time as well.
If your looking for a drive...you don't want to pass up this deal.

[Stan]

$129 is very cheap indeed.
Unfortunately I live in London UK. I could buy the 120GB WD 8MB for £137 (+ VAT 17.5%) and the 120GB IBM for £103 (+ VAT 17.5%).
Here in UK, there is a big difference in price... so I might stick with IBM for now.

Stan

[Stan]

Well, I've just checked CompUSA.... and it is sold out...

[BBA]

The local store here in Jax has about twenty of them...and the sales people do not even know about the rebate coupon.

[BBA]

BTW: I removed the Tt Volcano 7+ because it was too noisey...and the Intel heatsink runs darn near as cool with a lot less noise. ( less than 2ºC difference, if that, as far as I can tell ).

[GohanSSJ]

My computer:

Garbage can LOL
j/k

Anyway nice system and that space is really good

[Stan]

Intel or AMD Garbage can? ;)

[BBA]

Thanks GohanSSJ

[NDC]

As I know, you had U160 10K SCSI drives. How do the 8MB IDE drives compare in performance? I was kinda leaning towards IDE drives on my systems as well...

[Stan]

Hey NDC, there is a good article on Tom's Hardware. You might want to read it.

Western Digital WD1200JB With 8 MB Cache: Outperforms SCSI Drives (http://www6.tomshardware.com/storage/02q1/020305/index.html)

Stan

[BBA]

I can't tell any difference between the SCSI and the 8MB drive. They both bench about the same, except the SCSI access benched at 5.5ms and the 8MB ATA benches at 9ms.

It does not make enough difference to warrant the extra heat and startup time to initialize the controller.

[NDC]

Thanks, guys. :)

[GohanSSJ]

Originally posted by Stan
Intel or AMD Garbage can? ;)
Hmm kinda late response lolz

It was at that time a Intel garbage can
I had

P3 667
256mb memory (133mhz)
Ati Rage Fury 32mb
(other parts havent changed and i will state that below)

Now i got (and the changes only costed me totally 20 euro because of a few good deals lol)
AMD Athlon 1000 mhz
384mb memory (133mhz)
Geforce 2 MX400 64mb Tv-out
Maxtor 40 gig 7200 rpm
Plextor CD-RW 8x4x32
Lite-On 40x CD-rom player
17inch monitor
As for mainboard i have no idea really but its a good one since in the month time i got this comp it never have frozen that and it runs the whole day except for when im asleep, still 1 time i left it on because of downloading and that time also no problems at all.