[Data]

After fitting new RAM and then tweaking the bios settings, (RAM timings, FSB etc) I have now found the sweet spot of the system.

CPU, Graphics card and FSB all overclocked, RAM underclocked but running at a 1:1 ratio (probably better for overclocking)

100% stable, no insane voltages or temperatures.

To go faster a better motherboard is required, this mobo will not go past 420 FSB but I have no plans on upgrading. Well maybe an SSD drive if the prices get real.

Mobo = Gigabyte EP43-DS3
CPU = Q9400 @ 3.4GHz
4 GIG RAM Kingston HyperX 1066 MHz @  840 MHz
HD4890 @ GPU 900MHz,  RAM  1100MHz

Win 7 WEI score

[Freddy]

Nice    Totally beats my system.  My lowest is the hard drive which staggers in at 3.9, but I have my eye on the Samsung drive we were talking about.  I don't know what I was thinking when I got this current drive - didn't research it enough or get one big enough...doh!



In short; you pwned me 

[Data]

That HDD score is sick Freddy, a score that low can mean something isn’t right, if I was you I would go to the Asus site and see if there is a driver up date that is windows 7 ready for the chip-set. It could be that the HDD is in the wrong mode.

If that doesn’t help then that new Samsung drive is gona make a big improvement. Make sure to put windows on it and remove that old one from your PC, that’s what I would do.

Waiting for someone to whop me now 

[Freddy]

Wow you are Da Man  

I went to Asus, installed latest driver.  HDD shot up to 5.7 !

Overall 5.5 now - set by RAM - which I am going to upgrade as soon as the prices come down.

Many thanks  

[Data]

5.7, that’s more like it.

Glad the driver idea worked out 

The rest of your scores look about right to me from what I know of your PC.

[Freddy]

Is everyone getting lots of updates lately ?  I seem to be getting one every day.

[DaveMorton]

My mother has been getting updates on her laptop on the order of 2 to 3 per day for the last week or more. I keep telling her "this is a good thing", but privately, I wonder just how shoddy the original product is, if this many "updates" and "patches" are needed.

[Freddy]

Well I tend to agree, it means they are working on bugs and things.  To me out of the box Windows 7 has been perfect really, but there will always be some issues in any kind of software.

[DaveMorton]

I guess I'm what one might call a "late adopter". I switched from Win95 to Win98 when XP showed up in Beta, and only went to XP after it was out a few years. And I don't foresee any changes to this theme in the future. But I can do more with "flint knives and bear skins" than most can do with Deep Blue.

[Freddy]

  I am sure you can - only a bad workman blames his tools !

[Maviarab]

Damn tools!......

[Bragi]

 , ye, damn tools.

Hard disk speeds don't seem to change much though over the years, my system is about 3 years old,maybe a bit more, and the only number that's the same is the HD speed. All other things have improved somewhat.

[Data]

10000 RPM drives are faster, raid 2 of them and faster still.

Or if you have the cash get an Intel SSD drive.

Loving Windows 7 for me its been pretty perfect since it came out.

[GT40]

Hi GeekCaveCreations! Nice to read you and to see I'm not alone.

I spent a lot of years (in the last century, lol) with Windows 3.1. And jumped to 98 after XP appeared, and then to XP when Vista was ending. The true reason was a real money problem but I was very happy with my computer. Now the only interesting VR thing to me is Second Life (the first program I installed when I finally got XP). All is running good, no reason to change.

I love your slot machine. Very well done, working fine. I remember my W3.1 computers: I had put the shortcut of a slot machine on the desktop and I played everyday. But I'm still poor.

[DaveMorton]

Thanks for the kind words, GT40. And hello.

While it's going to be a while yet before I finally break down and switch to 7, I've found myself a bit jealous of a couple of things that are included in  the new OS that XP just doesn't have, such as the nifty little clock that sits in the sidebar, and the constantly rotating background. I've decided, therefore, to take matters into my own hands, and wrote a couple of small apps to take care of the situation. Both are still in development, but they function well enough. I think I'll put them up on my downloads page of my site, for others to use.