best cheap/free scores 1.1

[Dan81]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Not exactly. 3842 is current-mode PWM controller, which implies single-transistor forward topology. However, it could be that the 3842 is used for the APFC circuit and there is another controller for the main PS. You need to find all of the controllers in that PSU to determine what it uses. I seriously doubt the 3842 and LM339 are the only ICs there.

I checked it again, and other than these two chips there's only another PCB with a SMD version of a LM339, and a L6561 on the PFC board which of course, is a power factor controller.

That 3842 IC is near the location of the fuse (which is blown by the way).

Not bad.

Thanks! Apart from a few rust spots near the PSU (it had been hit a lot in that part, very likely due to an crappy PSU that had a fan that was failing) and a fan that needs to be lubricated again (and a blue LED one at that) it looks pretty good. Two standoffs on the bottom are missing but I think I can harvest a whole set of 'em from any Deer case.

Nice. I got one here too.
Put a nice big cooler on it and you should be able to overclock it close to the core clocks of the PCI-E 7600 GT (which IIRC is 560 MHz core). I haven't seen a 7300 GT with a good stock cooler anyways (and that's actually an understatement, as many simple come with more of a joke than an actual cooler.)

It's dead. I do have the PCI-E variant of it tho.

Good luck! I had the same happen on a PNY 8800 GT XLR8 and couldn't revive it. After 2nd reflow, actually, GPU went short-circuit between all 3 power rails. RIP!

I do have a guy who can do it for me and I've had all cards come from him working like new.

The only thing it needs (beside a reflow) is a bigger HSF.

Usually that is bad news for an ATI card if it's any of the high-end models. But for a mid-range, you might be lucky and it might just be a shorted FET without the GPU chip being bad.

Wikipedia says it's a mid range card. As for the FETs, none are visually bad on a first glance.

[Topcat]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

My system in my house got a cheap GPU upgrade from a 1gb GTX460 to a 4gb GTX970....thanks Ratdude.

There was also an Antec 550w PSU in the bottom of the box as well...

[ratdude747]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

My system in my house got a cheap GPU upgrade from a 1gb GTX460 to a 4gb GTX970....thanks Ratdude.

There was also an Antec 550w PSU in the bottom of the box as well...

The latter was a $5 Goodwill score... so old it has no SATA... it's a 20 Pin with 5V/3V 5 pin and 14 pin aux connectors. And 12V only molex plugs for fans... Back then 550W was massive. I figured TC has more use for it than I do...

[momaka]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

The latter was a $5 Goodwill score... so old it has no SATA...

Nice!
No SATA? No Problem! I find that those more modern OEM PSUs from Dell and HP have only SATA and no molex. The cure: steal a strand of molex from an older PSU and exchange it for the SATA on the newer OEM unit. Result: old PSU has SATA, new PSU OEM PSU has molex.

Apart from a few rust spots near the PSU (it had been hit a lot in that part, very likely due to an crappy PSU that had a fan that was failing) and a fan that needs to be lubricated again (and a blue LED one at that) it looks pretty good.

Ah yea, I forgot to ask which version of the case you had in my last post: is it the black case with gray accents white/silver case with red accents? I think the black one is fine with the blue LEDs... though I think the white/grey version would look better if it came with red LEDs (or even none at all).

The time spent worrying about whether or not another problem -- from which I may not be able to recover! -- lurks around the corner is a needless distraction.

I don't use software ("tools") that I can't rely on for the same reason. If I lose an hour of work because a program crashes, there's no guarantee that I can remember what I did in that hour and successfully recreate that effort! What's the cost of forgetting some detail that I had successfully addressed, initially?

Well, see that's why you have your criteria that you do. But again, as I mentioned above, not everyone has the same abundance of HDDs like you do. Moreover, not everyone has the same "mission critical" need for their HDDs as you do. For example, I can't even tell you how many PCs I have running with questionable HDDs (some are close to junk even by my "standards" ). Just two of them off top of my head: one is a TV streaming PC (not mission critical and no important data on it whatsoever) and the other is a GP PC I sometimes use to test questionable software (like shady "driver finder" tools when I want to quickly find a driver for something that's not exactly easy to find anywhere.) In either of those cases, I have ZERO care if the HDDs in these PCs failed.

Of course, that's not to say that I exercise this same level of "I don't care" attitude about all of my HDDs. Obviously, the ones I use in my personal "main PC" builds have to be a known reliable model and good standing SMART status.

So that's why I chose to "tier" all my HDDs rather than just have the binary choice of "good" or "bad". If I didn't, I'd have to have tossed more than half of my HDDs out by now, if not more. And some of these "less-than-perfect" HDDs have served me well for so many years now. As for losing them at any moment - I don't care, because I usually keep enough backups of the things I care about.

Because hardware is cheap; time is expensive!

Ugh, I'd rather not delve into the flaws of that statement.

[Curious.George]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Well, see that's why you have your criteria that you do.

My point was to have SOME criteria -- instead of just "winging it".

Moreover, not everyone has the same "mission critical" need for their HDDs as you do.

It's not that the "mission"/use is "more important". Rather, that I don't want to have to screw around wondering if a drive's (or PC's!) "quality" is the reason I'm encountering "problems".

When I bought my first PC, I bought two of them -- so that I could use one to verify the proper operation of the other (identical hardware and identical software). Back then, the whole "97.328% IBM compatible" nonsense was a constant thorn in folks' sides (is this a hardware problem? compatibility problem? or just a software bug??)

E.g., I purchased an early release of AutoCAD's "Advanced Modeling Extensions" (ran under a DOS extender) and it misbehaved in very significant ways! To convince myself that it was the software's problem, I ran it on the "spare" machine to see if there were different results. As the behavior was identically bad, I knew to contact Autodesk and could provide a concrete example of the flaw(s).

So that's why I chose to "tier" all my HDDs rather than just have the binary choice of "good" or "bad". If I didn't, I'd have to have tossed more than half of my HDDs out by now, if not more. And some of these "less-than-perfect" HDDs have served me well for so many years now. As for losing them at any moment - I don't care, because I usually keep enough backups of the things I care about.

I've only had two drives fail WHILE in my use. The drives I've discarded have been rescued drives that threw SMART errors in their initial assessment (Obviously, when I remove a drive from a piece of rescued kit, I can't tell just by looking at it whether it is worth my while to bring the drive home or if it is already toast.) I affix a green sticker to the drive telling me the POH figure when I first acquired the drive so I can "match" drives of comparable age in particular applications.

[hardware cheap, time expensive]

Ugh, I'd rather not delve into the flaws of that statement.

I've always found that to be the case. Each of my first two PC's were $8K (by the time you added all the memory, IO cards, monitor, etc.). Yet, they paid for themselves on my first project. By contrast, I can't count the number of hours I spent hand-holding colleagues who'd opted for $2K beige boxes!

I now dread "upgrades" because each (hardware upgrade) usually comes with a considerable amount of time spent (LOST!) reinstalling software, checking for software updates to incorporate at the time, verifying licenses, sorting out the new "features"/bugs, etc. As a result, I may cling to a particular software release for 10 years before feeling the NEED to upgrade.

[Not true on my BSD boxen as it's relatively painless to move a system to another box -- just pull the drive! ]

[Agent24]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

You can always buy more hard drives. You can't ever buy more time.

When you look back, will you wish you'd spent more of it on troubleshooting your own computer? In truth, I used to love that. Not so much anymore.

[momaka]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

My point was to have SOME criteria -- instead of just "winging it".

But "winging it" IS the criteria that works well *for me*.

It's not that the "mission"/use is "more important". Rather, that I don't want to have to screw around wondering if a drive's (or PC's!) "quality" is the reason I'm encountering "problems".

Fair enough.
Still, if you do your "winging" the "right way", you'll know when the HDD is part of the problem.
(At least for simple systems anyways. Like my TV stream box for example: if it ain't streaming, it's probably the website that's down. Or my WiFi maybe.)

Ugh, I'd rather not delve into the flaws of that statement.

I've always found that to be the case.

My comment had a deeper/darker meanings that that.
So for all practical purposes, let's just say I agree with what you said that resources/hardware is cheap, time isn't.

[Curious.George]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

You can always buy more hard drives. You can't ever buy more time.

Nor can you buy back the data that you may have lost!

When you look back, will you wish you'd spent more of it on troubleshooting your own computer? In truth, I used to love that. Not so much anymore.

Some people actually enjoy "tinkering" with their machines. More power to them!

I, OTOH, see the machines as tools that I use to do MORE interesting things. How many carpenters tinker with their hammers? Painters with their brushes? They each tend to be more concerned about whether or not their tools will perform correctly when called upon -- and replaced when in doubt!

[Curious.George]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

A pair of Dell 2407's with the ridiculous "power button" problem. Sheesh! You'd think the guy who came up with that design could have spared another microcent of plastic on each unit...

[Dan81]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Ah yea, I forgot to ask which version of the case you had in my last post: is it the black case with gray accents white/silver case with red accents? I think the black one is fine with the blue LEDs... though I think the white/grey version would look better if it came with red LEDs (or even none at all).

White/Silver with black accents. It came with blue LEDs, although I'd personally reinvent the old style with Green/Red leds

Stuff installed inside it:

ASRock A55M-HVS
AMD APU A4-3300 FM1
Samsung HD502IJ (7200RPM, 16MB, SATA II 500GB)
2GB DDR3-1333
400W K-Mex unit*
Lite-On iHAS222 SATA DVD writer
Gainward Geforce GT630 1GB GDDR5
Windows 8.1 Pro


Anyways, scored a Seagate ST31000340NS to replace the old Samsung HD103SI (which did see A LOT of usage) that only had 5400RPM.

[Dan81]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Couldn't edit my previous post, but the reason I put the asterisk is that the PSU is a frankenstein build - Sun Pro casing, K-Mex internals (and beefy ones at that - real ERL-39 transformer, nice thick heatsinks - only problem it had was the ever known crapcaps (I think it was SC but I don't remember) otherwise it was really good build wise.) and a gold grille from a dead Enermax 365W.

Also scored two Winfast DV2000 with respective 1394 brackets from a friend that wanted to get rid of some stuff.

[Topcat]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

I was going through my most recent pile of freebies from the county & local shops....in that pile is a HP 200 G1....some baytrail board with 2x 4gb soDIMM's in it. VGA port is bad, but the displayport works....so fixable, yes.....but boooorrriiinnng!!! The case was filthy, nicotine sludge and dead roaches in it (this came from a local shop)..... I was going to fix it until I realized in all it's mATX glamour, it has plenty of room around the bottom edge of the motherboard...so it dawned on me, one of those legendary X7DCA-L motherboards will fit in this with zero modifications!! ...so the hell with the baytrail board with the dead VGA port....I refurbed & cleaned the case, and set it aside for when I find another of the X7DCA-L's.

This post was created from the baytrail board from this system...from Mint 19.1 Live. Yes, that's Ratdude's $5 PSU find. The CPU on this board doesn't even get warm.....

[Agent24]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Some people actually enjoy "tinkering" with their machines. More power to them!

I know - I used to do that a lot too - but nowadays I just want my computer to work reliably. I tinker a bit at the electronic component level now, but if a wonky computer peripheral is getting in my way, I'm likely to just replace it, than spend hours testing 50+ different versions of the same driver or such as I have done before.

[Topcat]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

I know - I used to do that a lot too - but nowadays I just want my computer to work reliably. I tinker a bit at the electronic component level now, but if a wonky computer peripheral is getting in my way, I'm likely to just replace it, than spend hours testing 50+ different versions of the same driver or such as I have done before.

I tinker with my 'toy' machines (I have lots of them)....the machine I count on the most is 7 years strong.....with no 'tinkering'....just an occasional upgrade or blast with the air hose.

[Per Hansson]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Please show us the "godlike" cap choices Antec made in that PSU

[Topcat]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

Please show us the "godlike" cap choices Antec made in that PSU

I haven't cracked it open yet...but I envision a few 'fukkyou' caps staring back at me when I do..... This worthless baytrail board was a great one to test it with.....if it went up in smoke, that would make it all the more exciting.....but it didn't, it ran flawlessly all day....darnit!!

BTW I got something in the mail today.

[Curious.George]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

I know - I used to do that a lot too - but nowadays I just want my computer to work reliably. I tinker a bit at the electronic component level now, but if a wonky computer peripheral is getting in my way, I'm likely to just replace it, than spend hours testing 50+ different versions of the same driver or such as I have done before.

If I want a "distraction" (something "therapeutic", mindless), I'll recap a monitor (can never have enough "spare" monitors!).

If I want something a bit more engaging -- but still, non-critical-path -- I'll repair the odd bit of medical kit or a TV (things that I don't "need" to have working or that I can do to benefit someone else).

[I'm repairing an electric wheelchair, presently. When done, some poor soul will reap the benefits -- but, it doesn't have to be NOW!!]

But for the tools that I use (whether software, hardware or "mechanical"), if I have any problems, I just want to replace them and keep working -- not divert my thinking process to fixing something that I shouldn't HAVE to fix, NOW!

[Topcat]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

I was going through my most recent pile of freebies from the county & local shops....in that pile is a HP 200 G1....some baytrail board with 2x 4gb soDIMM's in it. VGA port is bad, but the displayport works....so fixable, yes.....but boooorrriiinnng!!! The case was filthy, nicotine sludge and dead roaches in it (this came from a local shop)..... I was going to fix it until I realized in all it's mATX glamour, it has plenty of room around the bottom edge of the motherboard...so it dawned on me, one of those legendary X7DCA-L motherboards will fit in this with zero modifications!! ...so the hell with the baytrail board with the dead VGA port....I refurbed & cleaned the case, and set it aside for when I find another of the X7DCA-L's.

This post was created from the baytrail board from this system...from Mint 19.1 Live. Yes, that's Ratdude's $5 PSU find. The CPU on this board doesn't even get warm.....

Ok, the more I diddled with this, the more I liked it, with a specific task in mind. The CPU is a Pentium Quad core @ 2.4Ghz with 8gb DDR3 RAM in dual channel mode. When I first looked at it, I wasnt sure if it was dual core with HT or quad....but researching the specs, it is indeed a quad core!! Since the Displayport works, that's all I need....I can care less about the VGA port....and as efficient as this thing is, it would be stellar to make a DVR out of for my home & shop security system. The current one is a power sucking C2Q that isn't really up for the task at times...multiple simultaneous recordings seem to really bring it down. Spec-wise, this should blow it away as far as speed and efficiency. The original PSU was a mere 180w if that tells you anything. Of course it won't go back into that HP case, I have a really awesome wall-mountable industrial case for the DVR. I installed Win7, the BIOS is SLIC'd for it (although the COA on the case was Win8.1)....and tomorrow I'll do the graphics test to see if its really up for the task....as new as it is, I think it should be fine.

[Curious.George]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

I tinker with my 'toy' machines (I have lots of them)....the machine I count on the most is 7 years strong.....with no 'tinkering'....just an occasional upgrade or blast with the air hose.

My "newest" (as in, manufactured most recently) box was build ~7 years ago. The other boxes that I use, daily, are 2007-2009 vintage. The SB2000 is closer to 2002. (The other SFF and USFF boxes aren't worth counting)

The thing that they all have in common is that they spend gazillions of CPU cycles waiting for my wetware to figure out what to do next! As the wetware is unlikely to get any faster (), I don't see a pressing need to upgrade the boxes (just so they can "wait -- faster")

OTOH, I will routinely upgrade the disks or memory in them. And, often swap out I/O cards (e.g., I used to be more heavily invested in SCSI peripherals that I am, now). But, I really dislike having to update software (and, as most software updates are to fix "security holes", running them air-gapped is a far more effective "fix"!)

My "tinkering" is limited to building appliances -- e.g., an asterisk server scattered around my living room floor, tonight, and a ZM box sitting off to the side to take its place once its done.

[momaka]

Re: best cheap/free scores 1.1

I found some cool stuff the other day... rather an old PC with some intersting hardware... but will withhold the post until I get the pictures on my PC so I can upload them.

Ok, the more I diddled with this, the more I liked it, with a specific task in mind. The CPU is a Pentium Quad core @ 2.4Ghz with 8gb DDR3 RAM in dual channel mode. When I first looked at it, I wasnt sure if it was dual core with HT or quad....but researching the specs, it is indeed a quad core!! Since the Displayport works, that's all I need....I can care less about the VGA port....and as efficient as this thing is, it would be stellar to make a DVR out of for my home & shop security system.

Interesting how far technology has gone in the last 10 years, isn't it?
And here I have next to me a system that I just put last month with similar specs: Intel quad core 2.4 GHz CPU with 8 GB DDR2. Except the very tiny minor difference is that my CPU is the Q6600 ... which makes the PC draw a whooping 190W from the wall at full load. Heatsink not feeling warm? Ha! I have a 4 heatpipe cooler on my Q6600 and even with that I don't see temperatures any lower than 50C under load (touching 60C when OCed to 3 GHz). Also just put a GTX560 in it a few days ago, and the total power consumption under full CPU+GPU load is around 330 Watts from the wall. Doubles as a nice space heater.

So yeah, quite a bit of improvements they made in the power consumption on that tiny board of yours there. BTW, what's the CPU model in that, I'm curious?

White/Silver with black accents. It came with blue LEDs, although I'd personally reinvent the old style with Green/Red leds

Yeah, I prefer the classic red/green or green-only LEDs style as well. Blue LEDs and their variants (white, purple, pink, and cyan, IIRC) tend to be a bit too stand-out and harsh IMO.

Nor can you buy back the data that you may have lost!

But I told you before - the "less-than-ideal" HDDs, I ONLY use in PCs that aren't critical to me (i.e. ones that have no data to loose).

Some people actually enjoy "tinkering" with their machines. More power to them!

I, OTOH, see the machines as tools that I use to do MORE interesting things.

I see them as both tools and tinkering boxes.

But that does NOT mean that all of my computers are little toys that I "like to play with" - not at all. I don't know why you keep ASSuming!

I have different machines for different uses. Some are merely tools (i.e machines I do work on), as in your case. Others are purely for enterteinment, testing, and just general "thinkering".

The PCs on which I do work (taxes, doc prep, datasheets storage + lookup, and etc.) are NOT my toys and I don't mess with those at all. Like you, I don't really touch them after they are setup (i.e. no OS or software updates, unless I know the update is to fix some issues that the software has without creating new ones - and this I test on my "toy" boxes quite often.) I also almost never upgrade them, save for the occasional bump in RAM (if needed only). Typically, my work PCs get a new or used but good HDD from a reliable source and minimalistic but reliable hardware - no fancy GPUs, crazy RAID array, or anything I don't need in them. In fact, most of my work PCs are typically just bone-stock OEM office PCs (minus the OS, of course - I can't stand OEM bogged-down pre-installed OSes).

The "thinker boxes" on the other hand, vary wildly in nature. And depending on what I want to do with them, they may get a nice new HDD, or a completely junk questionable HDD. And this is why I tier my used HDDs, as I explained above. So please stop assuming that I put junk HDDs in everything!

I tinker with my 'toy' machines (I have lots of them)....the machine I count on the most is 7 years strong.....with no 'tinkering'....just an occasional upgrade or blast with the air hose.

Thank you!
Finally someone who understands what I am trying to say above.