Category: hardware

What started as a PC-upgrade project about a year and a half ago is now well underway. I’m upgrading just the motherboard/processor and the case, but it should perform like a new box after that. Ordinarily, I’d buy a higher-end motherboard in order to have it last through a few incremental upgrades, but I decided instead on a cheap Soyo motherboard as part of my new buy-cheap-and-buy-often strategy. So, the remaining decisions were the heatsink/fan and the case.

The case was actually an easy decision. A few months back, I read a review on Ars Technica for Antec’s Sonata case and it seemed to be just what I was looking for. In particular, the Sonata was designed to be quiet and that was one of my primary goals for this new machine:

OK, now we get to what makes this case special. Antec’s marketing term for its cooling management system is “Antec Low Noise Technology.” It consists of a handful of things, but the most important of these is the TruePower PSU that comes with the case. The TruePower 380W unit adjusts fan speeds based on the temperature in the case. Two Molex-connector power lines coming off of the PSU are marked as “fan only” lines. Those lines will adjust fan spinning speed (via voltage) to minimize noise, and frankly, it works really well. […]

In addition to the quieting features, I was also stoked about their innovative “sideways” hard drive mounting:

First, you can see on the bottom right that hard drives are installed “sideways,” that is, with the connector end facing you in this picture. This is a great design; it makes accessing drives very easy, plus it means that all of your drive cables can be made to easily run up the side of the case. […]

So, the case was an easy enough decision but the heatsink/fan was a bit tougher. At first, I had planned on going with a Zalman heatsink as it’s both an effective and very quiet cooler. However, I then saw Zalman’s motherboard compatibility chart where my motherboard was listed as not compatible (the only Soyo with that designation, natch).

So, I checked on Zalman’s other primary competitors to look for a suitable substitute. I first checked on Thermalright and since their heatsinks seemed a bit on the large side, I headed off to their support section to see whether any of their heatsinks would fit my motherboard. However, even though they have a motherboard compatibility list for each of their heatsinks, they’re not entirely comprehensive — my motherboard wasn’t listed on any of the lists (either way), so I was left unsure. I didn’t want to take a chance on buying a heatsink that wouldn't fit, so I crossed Thermalright off my list.

I next checked on Thermaltake and what first caught my eye there was their SilentTower. It uses heat pipes, which not only cools well but lifts the large heatsink well out of the way of any low-flying motherboard capacitors. In all, the SilentTower pushes about 52 CFM (about twice that of a normal fan setup) while remaining at 21 dB. This looked like just about the perfect heatsink/fan until I tried to buy one — it turns out that Thermaltake only released the SilentTower earlier this month and it wasn't available in stores anywhere yet.

So, I looked over Thermaltake’s other offerings. I had heard of some of their fans from their Volcano line, but I chose to avoid those they’re known for being a bit loud. But, their Silent Boost seemed more like what I had in mind. Granted, it only pushed 27 CFM, but it was only 21 dB and I wasn’t planning on overlclocking my box anyway. I didn’t see any motherboard compatibility charts on Thermaltake’s site, but the Silent Boost visually appeared that it would fit my motherboard easily (especially since it’s tapered towards the bottom).

So, I’ve ordered a Thermaltake Silent Boost ($25.75 w/ free FedEx Saver shipping from AccuPC) and an Antec Sonata case ($84.57 + $20 shipping from Provantage). Somehow seems as if my current PC has become even slower since ordering all these parts for my new PC — I can’t wait to assemble it and put it to good use :).

It all started on Thursday when I saw an offer for a free-after-rebate Soyo motherboard on DealNews (via the daily DealNews newsletter). Not that I was particularly in the market for new PC parts — I was trying to hold out for an Athlon 64 — but I was intrigued by this unusually good deal. As a first step, I looked up the retailer (Mwave) on ResellerRatings and found that they have a 8.73 rating along with a Gold consumer-excellence award.

From there, I mentioned it to Mike to get his thoughts on it (since he’s a professional IT Guy, I trust his opinion on this kind of thing). He confirmed that Soyo is a decent brand and he went on to say that his previous motherboard was even a Soyo (though he has an Asus now). Mike was even considering buying one for himself, until he read the offer details and discovered that the deal required a CPU purchase from Mwave as well.

Being the skeptic that I am, I figured that Mwave was overcharging on the processors to cover the costs of the motherboard. So, I cross-checked their prices against NewEgg’s. As it turns out, Mwave’s processor prices are actually lower than NewEgg’s (!). Mwave’s Athlon 2800 is $108 (compared to $116 at NewEgg) and their Athlon 3000 is $144 (compared to $166) at NewEgg.

At this point, both of us had all but discounted the idea of going for this deal. In Mike’s case, he already had a spare AMD 1700 and so he could have just about built a computer from spare parts and this “free” motherboard. But, with the required processor purchase, it would be far from a free PC for Mike.

And, in any case, I was only really considering this as a stop-gap measure to hold me over until Athlon 64s (Socket 939, specifically) became widely available. And, under that scenario, I would have bought a cheap Athlon 2200 or something to go with it (which would still work out to a decent speed upgrade from my current Athlon 700 for not much dough).

For those wondering why I’m even bothering with another PC upgrade when I already have a new PowerBook ;), I have my reasons. In the short-run, I still haven’t found an editor that I like on Mac OS and, in the long-run, I still need a PC for games (Doom III, Half-Life 2, and so on).

Anyhow, I got to talking with Mike about how we missed this great deal “by that much” (since it required a processor purchase). And, at that point, Mike shared with me his newly formed buying strategy which I like to call the “cheap but often” approach.

Summarizing my thoughts on the matter up until that point, it seemed reasonable to me that it would be cheaper to buy higher-end PC parts since they last longer between upgrades (as opposed to buying cheap parts which have to be upgraded much sooner). However, Mike expressed that, with the price difference between high-end and low-end parts, it's actually cheaper in the long run to buy cheap or mid-range parts, even if it means buying them more often.

Logically, his point of view made sense to me, though it was a little jarring at the time since it wasn't the way I was used to thinking. So, to prove it to myself (one way or the other), I decided to whip up a spreadsheet to calculate PC upgrade costs over time (using both strategies). As I made the spreadsheet, I held these assumptions:

• A “cheap PC” will last three years and, after that time, neither the motherboard nor CPU could be migrated to the new box. That is, it’s assumed that the CPU is maxing out the cheap motherboard’s capabilities already and that an upgraded CPU wouldn’t be possible.

• An “expensive PC” will also last three years; however, a refresher CPU could be bought at that time which would extend the life of the box an additional two years.

• And, lastly, each “new” box would built by scrounging parts from the “old” box whenever possible — I wouldn’t be building a completely new machine each time.

And, for the spreadsheet to make sense, here’s what I have in my current PC with notations of which parts can’t be reused in the new box:

• Asus Slot A motherboard [nope]
• Athlon 700 [nope]
• Western Digital 120 GB hard drive
• Maxtor 10 GB hard drive [probably not]
• Plextor CD-R drive
• Pioneer SCSI DVD drive
• GeForce4 Ti4600
• Floppy drive
• D-Link NIC
• 1 GB PC3000 RAM (bought earlier)

With that out of the way, the spreadsheet is available in OpenOffice.org Calc format (7k) and PDF (62k). You may notice that the “now” section for the “Expensive Route” includes both an SATA drive and a DVD+R/DVD-R recorder (as both of those parts would allow the expensive PC to laster longer between upgrades). Not to worry, the “Cheap Route” gets those parts also, though only as needed (as part of the 3-year “Cheap Route” upgrade where it’s assumed that the motherboard of that time will predominately feature SATA controllers).

So, as you can see from looking over the spreadsheet, the cheap route is cheap not only in the short-run (as expected) but also in the long-run (which I didn’t initially expect). With the exception of Year 3, the cheap route remains cheaper than the expensive route right through the 8-year projections (even though it requires replacement parts sooner).

So, with the numbers in-hand, I ordered the Soyo motherboard and an Athlon 3000 to go with it. With FedEx Saver shipping, they should be arriving within the next few days :).

Update 03/31: The original spreadsheet had an error in one of the formulas, but that’s been corrected. The end result (the “cheaper route” being cheaper in the long run) is the same.

As I was going to check my e-mail this morning, I found that the screensaver wouldn’t wake up after shaking the mouse. I then noticed that the PC was off and the power switch wasn’t having an effect either. I had a hunch that it was another dead power supply.

I dug out my power supply tester and, sure enough, it was dead. Dead power supplies are fairly rare, but I was especially annoyed that this was the second time this brand had died on me. Around this time last year, my original power supply died and I replaced that with a 300 watt power supply from JGE. Then, that replacement died only a week later and I replaced it with the same model.

That replacement last until today, apparently. But, I wasn’t going to be fooled again. I wondered about JGE’s quality control at the time and I’m now convinced that it’s not very good. So, I drove down to Fry’s and selected a 350 watt Kingwin power supply (I would have gone with 300 watts again, but the 350 was about the lowest wattage I could find.)

So, $50 later, I had a new power supply. I took it home and installed it: voila, a happy PC once more. Interestingly enough, a sticker on the box said “Silence”, but I figured that was just marketing hype. However, it was actually markedly quieter than my old power supply.

So far, I’m pleased with Kingwin. And, it’s bound to last more than a week ;). In any case, I won’t be buying JGE again.

I’m on the mailing list for The Gadgeteer — they review gadgets of all kinds, though they specialize in mobile gadgets and accessories to go with them. Anyhow, their latest review was for the Oyster Portable Computer Docking System.

It’s a bit hard to explain, though I’ll try. It’s not so much a traditional “docking station” as a USB hub within a stand :). You open up the laptop all the way so that the screen is parallel to the keyboard. Then it goes in the stand such that the screen is upright and facing you. After that, it’s just a matter of plugging in the mouse and keyboard into the Oyster — it has an internal USB hub which connects to the laptop.

If that doesn't quite make sense, check out the pictures in the review and that should clear things up. Initially, it didn’t seem to me that there was much use for this. But, it started to make sense to me after a while. It was like having a universal docking station with the screen at a convenient height (and no monitor needed).

The Gadgeteer really liked it as well saying that “I can not recommend the Oyster highly enough!” (though I’m not sure I’d go quite that far). Of course, it is $200, but that’s still about half the price of a real docking station (I checked Dell’s site and they’re listed for $399).

Looking at the overhead tvs at the gym, I’ve seen some of the commercials for Intel’s Centrino. For those that haven’t seen them, it features a desk & laptop working in unpopulated areas such as a meadow or the middle of a stadium with the tagline that it’s “mobile technology”.

And, from all the fanfare, I was guessing that it was based on a nationwide cell network or something (like the Sidekick from T-Mobile). But, nooo — it’s just integrated 802.11b on the chipset. That’s it. Built-in Wifi — where have I heard that before?