obobskivich wrote:

In the Pentium 4 days it (HT) tended to show the biggest gains in multimedia/productivity benchmarks, and in some cases would cause issues with games (instability or lower performance). Usually gaming-centric machines had it disabled as a result, but "everyone else" tended to leave it on. Some new-ish benchmarks I found with a quick search seem to indicate that with very-new games it's becoming an advantage though:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2274887
http://techbuyersguru.com/CPUgaming.php

What I see in the graphs there suggests that these particular games prefer 4 cores. Either 2 real + 2 HT, or 4 real regardless of additional HT...

gerwin wrote:

What I see in the graphs there suggests that these particular games prefer 4 cores. Either 2 real + 2 HT, or 4 real regardless of additional HT...

A lot of newer games that's likely going to be true for, as multi-threading (esp in DX11) becomes more prevalent. But older games tend not to preference/need more than 2 threads/cores and HT works against you - in the Anand link they show this with Fallout NV and Dragon Age, which are both older (ish). I've heard some folks claim that HT will break very old titles (just like SMP can), but I've never seen it myself (because I don't have an HT P4 in regular use).

Here's a benchmark with a P4 and HT:
http://hothardware.com/Reviews/Pentium-4-306G … reading/?page=4 (looks to be AOK with older titles 😀)

This is my 'daily driver':

No OC since I'm still on the stock cooler (which I just broke today when removing the fan to unclog the heatsink). I want a CM Hyper 212 EVO but I've managed to miss the boat twice on getting one. 🙁
They seem to be in high demand around here, one store had them at the usual price, me being lazy (why rush it? they've got plenty in stock! - silly me) didn't get one and when they ran out another store filled the void but at a much higher price, even then they still flew off the shelves and now there are none. eBay doesn't seem to be an option for me since the shipping costs are way more than the item is worth. Besides, it might not fit my case by a couple of millimeters.

The only things I miss from my previous machines are a Shugart floppy controller and dual PS/2 ports. One project I keep putting off is building a MOSFET-based controller to drive the 3 and 2-pin case fans from the single 4-pin chassis fan header on the motherboard.

My main gaming machine:

-Dell Precision 490
-Intel 5000x chipset
-two quad-core 2.33ghz Xeon e5345s (originally had two dual-core 2.0ghz Xeon 5130s.
-16gb DDR2-667 fully buffered (originally 4gb)
-500gb hard drive (needs an upgrade)
-AMD Radeon HD 7850 2gb
-Sound Blaster Audigy2 ZS
-Logitech G500 Laser Mouse
-Logitech G15 Keyboard
-Samsung 226BW LCD monitor
-Windows 7 Pro 64-bit

My secondary game machine:

-Dell Precision 390
-Intel 975x chipset
-2.4ghz quad-core Q6600 (originally had a 3ghz P4)
-4gb DDR2-667 ECC
-120gb Intel SSD
-1tb Seagate harddrive
-AMD Radeon HD 6850 1gb
-Sound Blaster Audigy
-Exciting Dell optical mouse
-Exciting Dell USB keyboard
-three Dell 1707fp monitors (1280x1024,) in an AMD Eyefinity array @ 4096x1024
-Windows 7 Pro 64-bit

My main rig is from 2009 and here are the specs:

I built that one in mid 2009 and only upgrades it has since are, the display adapter (in 2012 - was a a GTX 250 with 512MB), the Bluray drive (2013) and last two of the WD 1TB HDDs (2014).

Here are some more pictures:

tayyare wrote:

http://imageshack.com/a/img674/5600/IUHMiA.jpg […]
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First time I've ever seen an ASUS-branded PSU. Pretty sweet.

AlphaDangerDen wrote:

tayyare wrote:

First time I've ever seen an ASUS-branded PSU. Pretty sweet.

Actually it's the second one I had. The first one came with a cheapo Asus Vento case and was a standard 350W unit. This one is a 650W thing and purchased as a stand alone unit. I'm quite happy with it.

Processor: Intel Core i7-980X Gulftown 3.33GHz LGA 1366 130W Hexa-Core 32nm Processor

Motherboard: MSI Big Bang-XPower LGA 1366 Intel X58 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard

Memory: Corsair Vengeance 12GB (3 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model CMZ12GX3M3A1600C9

Video Card: ASUS GTX680-DC2T-2GD5 GeForce GTX 680 2GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card

Storage
Corsair Performance Pro Series CSSD-P256GBP-BK 2.5" 256GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
OCZ Vertex 2 OCZSSD2-2VTXE120G 2.5" 115GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
2 x SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3EG HD203WI 2TB 5400 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

Case
Corsair Obsidian 800D Full Tower Case - Steel, ATX, 4x 120mm Fan Ports, 3x 140mm Fans
Corsair Obsidian 800D SATA 6Gb/s Upgrade Kit
Corsair Obsidion 800D/700D Front Panel USB 3.0 Upgrade Kit

Audio
ASUS Xonar Essence STX Virtual 7.1 Channels PCI Express x1 Interface 124 dB SNR / Headphone AMP Card
Corsair Gaming Audio Series SP2500 High-power 2.1 PC Speaker System

Cooling
4 x Cougar CF-V12HPB Fans for H100/H100i
Corsair H100i Extreme Performance Liquid CPU Cooler
Scythe S-FLEX SFF21F 120mm Case Fan

Power Supply: Corsair Professional Series HX850 (CMPSU-850HX) 850W ATX12V 2.3 / EPS12V 2.91 80 PLUS SILVER Certified Modular Active PFC Power Supply

Multimedia
3.5 Inch Internal PCI-E PCI Express USB 3.0 HUB Card Reader SD SDHC MMS 🤣 M2 CF
SAMSUNG 20X DVD±R DVD Burner Black SATA Model SH-S203B - OEM

Networking: Netgear WNDR3700-100NAS 802.11a/b/g/n Rangemax 2.4/5GHz Simultaneous N600 Dual Band Wireless Gigabit Router/ USB port

Monitor: ASUS VW266H 16:10/1920x1200 Black 25.5" 2ms(GTG) HDMI Widescreen LCD Monitor

I7 950
6GB Patriot Viper RAM
Sapphire 7870 GHZ
Crucial M4 128GB SSD
WD Velociraptor 10k RPM 150GB
XSPC 360 Rad water cooling loop ( had old 4870X2 on loop til i fried it ) 🤣
No OC atm but was at 3.8 at one time.

First PC - this one is my main rig.

ASUS M2V-TVM
1.50GB DDR2-667 RAM
ASUS Geforce 210 1GB GDDR3 64-bit
Samsung HD103SI 1TB SATAII
450W Delux PSU
DeluX MT375 Midtower case
LG GSA-H55N DVD drive - still works exceptionally

Second PC - this one is the "retro"(for me) rig.

ASRock P4VM800
2.50GB DDR400 RAM
MSI Geforce FX5200 128MB
Western Digital Caviar SE SATA 80GB
400W Seventeam PSU
Best BST-11951 (don't try googling it,the case has actually no name on it)
TSSTCorp SH-S182D DVD drive - has trouble reading scratched discs but otherwise works fine.

Now,here's the pic from my P4 thread,showing both systems.

The specs of my every day work horse:

Core 2 Quad Q6600
4GB DDR2 800
Radeon HD 4800 series
1TB Western Digital Blue
Windows 8.1 (I got it when it first came out for $15, it was that or a pirated version of XP / 7)

It's an oldie but a goodie!

Here's mine:

MSI H55M-E33 Intel H55 1156 Motherboard
Intel i7-870 Quad Core 2.93 Ghz CPU
Kingston 16GB DDR3 HyperX Ram
CoolerMaster Vortex Plus CPU Cooler
Gigabyte HD7750 1GB Graphics Card
Asus Xonar DS Sound Card
Startech USB3 Card
Thermaltake 700 Watt PSU
Samsung 850 Pro SSD 250GB Hard Drive
Samsung 1.5GB Hard Drive
LiteOn Bluray Writer/Player
Windows 7 Ultimate

My main PC is nothing special, just a core 2 duo I got for free from a friend. It was real dusty and missing the HDD. I disassembled it, blasted the case w/ compressed air and threw in a sata laptop hdd from an old vista laptop, and it runs like a dream, not too loud, not too quiet. A lot quieter than my old xbox 360 actually. sorry for crap picture quality, all I got with a camera is my phone 😵

My primary PC (first photo) is:

Antec P183 Case
Corsair HX620 Power supply
ASUS P9X79 Pro Systemboard
i7-3930K @ 4.2 GHz
Noctua NH-U12P cooler
Noiseblocker fans throughout
64 GB G-Skill RAM
2GB GTX 770 (a GTX 660 is what's in the photo)
480 GB Corsair Neutron GTX SSD
2 GB Western Digital HDD
ASUS DVD-RW
Sony Blu-Ray burner
Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeMusic
2x Dell U2412M Monitors
AudioEngine A2 speakers + S8 subwoofer

My other PC (second photo) is specifically for racing games (primarily iRacing):

Lian Li PC-A05NB case
ASUS P8Z77-V systemboard
i5-3570K @ 4.5 GHz
4GB EVGA 980 SC
Sound Blaster Z
Sennheiser PC350 headset
Corsair H80i AIO cooler
8 GB Corsair RAM
Corsair CX600M power supply
128 GB Samsung 830 SSD
Lite-On DVD drive

My new beige computer case came today!

I've been wanting to do this for a while and today I just created my very own "sleeper" computer. Ok whats a sleeper computer? Well you've probably seen those people shoving itx boards into 80's 8-bit computers and game consoles, but personally I grew up in the 90's so while those were all cool and everything they just didn't fit into my nostalgic idea of what a personal computer should be. So I've had the idea of taking an old beige box from the 90's and shoving my "modern" Core 2 Duo computer into it. The only problem with that was my computer is an Micro-ATX motherboard and most computers of the 90's had weird OEM cases or AT style cases.
So one day I stumbled across this InWin case on Ebay and ordered it. Now, I'm not quite finished yet, I wish to replace my LCD monitor with a proper white CRT like a Trinitron or something and get a case badge of some kind.

When I first put it together I realized I onlt had black DVD drives! D:

So what did I do? I wasn't about to paint it, but I suppose I could have. Fortunately I had the forethought to save the face plate from the original drive that came in my Packard Bell before I tossed the drive. So after a bit of modification I managed to get the faceplate to fit and work perfectly on my DVD drive. 😁

So here is it fully assembled!

I had my old computer set up to be under the desk but I used to have my computer on the desktop in the past and I thought I would take this opportunity to put it back that way. 😁

The Specs are:
Mobo: IPIBL-LB (Benicia)
CPU: Core 2 Duo E8400 (3ghz socket LGA775)
RAM: 8GB
PCI cards: ATI All in Wonder Theater 550 Pro
PCI-E cards: AMD Sapphire 7790 HD (1GB)

Very nice. Will you get a matching white/beige LCD too? I think Eizo have some white ones still, but I don't know if their shade is a good match for old computers. 😀

I actually intend to find a white CRT to really complete the authentic look. 🤣

I have a white CTX LCD I could use but right now it's on another computer so there's no reason to do that. 😜

I'm also thinking about peeling an old "Intel MMX" badge off of one of my older computers I have laying around (that I don't use) just to really put icing on the cake. 😁

(Deleted. No longer relevant anyway)

Thanks! 🤣

I should totally be able to find a monitor, it's just a matter of patience. 😜

Also yeah these speakers kickarse, they are super loud and I love that I can adjust Bass and Treble right on the speaker. I bought this pair for 4$ at a local thrift store.

Once I get the monitor I'm totally bringing this thing to a LAN party. 🤣

I demand to see what it looks inside! 😀