The Bliss of Computer Upgrades

[Loki Ahmrah]

Or rather, the self-implied bliss. One automatically assumes that the damn thing will sort itself out. Not at all.

To cut a long story - riddled with tales of frustration, anger, hope and despair - short, I have had the most awful computer upgrade experience imaginable and don't let this post fool you. I am still in the thick of it unfortunately. Picture this; display properties of 16 colours running at a resolution of 640 x 480.

On the other hand, I now have an Epox 8RDA+ motherboard - Thank God for the nForce 2 chipset - and a wopping, great 512MB DDR RAM with the beautifukCorsair XMS 3500. Unfortunately, I can't install Windows XP yet as I don't have the XP compatible drivers for graphics cards*, etc.

* These I have switched between uncountable times since Saturday. Three I had access to, none worked.

I found out the hard way that I'd need XP drivers. Let's just say with all the errors I encountered, the only way of restoring my computer was via formatting my hard disk thus losing, much to my despair, a certain avi file worth 2.1GB which I had only finished downloading a few days before.

Now, the processor fiasco. I ordered and paid for a AMD Athlon 2200+ processor. What I recieved, despite what it claims on the invoice is an AMD Athlon 1500+. I contacted Overclockers UK today and they instructed me to change the CPU clock ratio and FSB frequency in the BIOS in order to achive the correct settings. To me this translates into: You buy a 2200+ processor. They give you a 1500+ processor then instruct you to overclock it - which my computer is unable to do for some reason - in order to achieve the desired CPU speed.

I paid 118 pounds for my processor. That site doesn't even sell 1500+ processor anymore. There cheapest AMD Athlon is 1700+ at 47 pounds. You do the math and work out how much I am being ripped off there. I will be making a few irate phone calls tomorrow because I refuse to stand for it.

So now I have finally been able to install the drivers for my NIC card and get online. Now I am going to browse far and wide for every single driver I need for every single device in both 98 and XP forms. Tomorrow I am ordering my Sapphire 9700 Pro godammit! :(

[AmazonBabe]

:x

Best of luck to ya, Loki. And if you need any, I'll be happy to send a truck-load of aspirin your way. :)

[Sanis Prent]

Wow, that's a hell of a horror story.

[Loki Ahmrah]

The internet really is a man's best friend. I have just finished installing all the drivers I needed which were obtained online and now my computer is running as it should be. I feel rather proud that I sorted all these little buggers out by myself. Yay me! :D

[Morgan Evanar]

Actually, you need to set the bus speed for 133. You won't be ocing the processor at all, as the slowest XP is a 1600.

Doing a mobo swap almost always requires a fresh install of windows. Graphics drivers are easy to get. Just download them from NVidia or ATi's site.

[Loki Ahmrah]

I did set the FSB speed to 133MHz and the clock ratio to 13.5 as instructor by the operator but when I saved my changes and exited to the CMOS it wouldn't let me go any further due to some sort of problem so I had to reset my settings in the BIOS once again. :\

[Loki Ahmrah]

Morg, you're a hero. I've just set the FSB frequency to 133 again but this time I set the clock ratio to default and it accomodated for the alterations and is now registering the processor as 2200+.

I can see clearly now the rain has gone...

[Morgan Evanar]

Anytime ^_^

Why didn't you ask me in the first place? =p

[Loki Ahmrah]

Because I've had access to the internet for a whole one hour and twenty minutes. :)

[Sanis Prent]

While I, on the other hand, hath gone bloody crosseyed!

I'll have to eventually figure this mess out whenever I plunk down for a new AMD motherboard that can break the gigahertz barrier, and chunks o' DDR.

[Morgan Evanar]

nForce2, FOR SERIOUS!

Its really uber, and has all kinds of cool stuff you want to have.

[Sanis Prent]

I've no idea what that is ^_^;

[Morgan Evanar]

Heh, its a mainboard chipset. Its kinda like the Force, it binds the computer together.

So you want one that works well.

[Sanis Prent]

cool :)

So...like a 2 gHz Athlon tagged on? DDR too? I'd consolidate if at all possible.