Hardware Help...

[KeithKman]

I posted this on Tech Support Guy Forums (http://forums.techguy.org) and people said to post here, so here I am!

 PC Specs:

¤ P4 @ 2.4 GHz 533-MHz system bus
¤ 80 Gig Hardrive @ 7200 RPM
¤ Hard Drive Fans
¤ 1 Gig of DDR 2700 RAM (two sticks of 512)
¤ GeForce 4 Ti 4200P
¤ Gigabyte GA-81EXP motherboard
¤ 50x CD-Rom
¤ AHANIX Platnium XP Case w/ Digital Thermometer
¤ 400 Watt Power Supply

 Input Devices:

¤ Monitor: ViewSonic A90f+ (19 inch CRT)
¤ Logitech Mx500 mouse
¤ Logitech Elite Keyboard
¤ Logitech 2.1 Speakers
¤ Plantronics Audio .90 Headset
¤ Connection: 3100kbps / 220 kbps
- (cox.net cable)

I want to get a new motherboard (system board) that supports 3200 RAM or higher, 8x AGP, RAID, ect. I was looking at the Asus P4C800-E Deluxe (http://usa.asus.com/products/mb/soc..._d/overview.HTM). Is this a good motherboard for a P4, or should I get a different motherboard? Any suggestions?

Once I swap out the motherboards, I need to load the new motherboard drivers to my hard drive so my USB and NIC works. But if I have the old GIGABYTE software and drivers loaded for my old motherboard on my current hard drive, would that cause any problems?

I would like to set up some sort or RAID system (is this a good idea?). What is the best raid to run or preformance? I currently have once 80 gig hard drive, and would need to get another 80 gig hard drive. Whats Sata, Serial ATA, and ATA133?

And last I would like to get a new 8x AGP card. I was looking at the 256mb ATI 9800 PROs, FX 5600 and 5900 PROs. Whats the best for the system I want to run?

Thanks!

Where to begin . . .

- Asus P4C800-E Deluxe reviews

- You will probably find that you will have problems just swapping out the mobo's w/o actually doing a clean install of the OS. I know it's a pain, but it will save you in the long run. Backup your data and reinstall everything.

- RAID0 is striping, good for speed, both drives are basically just added together. RAID1 is mirroring, good for safety, at least two drives required, average is about 1/2 of smallest drive will be what you get to use. RAID0+1, striping w/ mirroring, best of both worlds, I think you can still get away w/ just two drives.

- SATA = Serial ATA = very fast, 150MBps burst speed. ATA133 is 133MBps burst speed.

From PCWorld.com Note, however, that SATA drives used with add-in cards or with motherboards having a separate SATA controller chip are limited to the 133-MBps speed of the PCI bus. Full-speed SATA requires a motherboard with SATA support in its core logic. Currently, motherboards based on Intel 865 and 875P (Canterwood) chip sets support full-speed Serial ATA.

- I doubt if you would even notice a difference between 8X and 4X AGP, so is it really worth it?

- Oh, and Welcome to TechIMO!

[KeithKman]

I dont have a burner. I was thinking of buying a burner and backing up everything on my PC besides the gigabyte software and drivers. Someone said even if I back up the files and then load them on my PC after I reload my OS that it might not work because it wont put the programs in the registry or something. Is this true?

Also thanks for saying welcome. I am the new forum whore on teh forums

You'll have to reinstall your programs for them to run properly.

Now they do have software like alohabob's PC Relocator but I've never used it. There's also a professional unlimited use version.

[KeithKman]

wow thanks for the help. Any suggestions before I do this stuff?

A disc w/ all the updated drivers would be nice to have before you start your install.

Also, partition your drive so you don't use all of it for the OS. You could easily get away w/ just having 6-8GB's for XP. That's w/ a lot of programs installed. Now if you're a gamer, you might wanna alot more, depending on how many games you install. Most will agree it's not a good idea to put everything onto one big drive. It's harder to stay organized, and if something goes wrong w/ the drive, you're pretty much SOL.

If you wanna get really picky, do 4-6GB's for the OS. Make another partition of at least 4GB's for your APPS. (Again, the more games you play, the more space you're going to want to dole out.) The rest of the drive can be for DATA, stuff you download, wanna keep, etc . . .

Order some pizza and your favorite beverage(s).

[KeithKman]

Rofl, awesome. Thanks for the help!

now I got to fine the money

Here's an example of mine.

Disk0:

1st Primary Partiion is Linux Swap
2nd Primary Partition is Linux "/tmp" (soon to be 1.5GB instead of 1GB)
3rd Primary Partition is Windows XP Pro

Disk1:

1st Primary Partition has Windows pagefile and the "TEMP" directory
2nd Primary Partition is Linux "/boot"
3rd Primary Partition is Linux "/"

Disk2:

This is my RAID0 array of 2X20GB HDD's.

Forgot the pic.

[KeithKman]

hehe nice. Why FAT32 and not HTFS?