Reader's Rigs - Phuncz - Page 1

Username?
Phuncz, I created the account just recently. After visiting the forums in the past, it’s time I registered and engaged in some discussions ;)

Age/Occupation/Location?
I’m 23 years old currently residing in Belgium. My job as a salesman involves computers, apparels like printers, routers and such. Pretty nice work, not too boring ! And I get to fiddle with all kinds of expensive toys I better not buy.

How long have you been a member of Guru3D forums?
Not that long really, about a few months. A shame though. I do visit the site daily since 2000 I believe. One of my favourite sites with cool news hardware news and very nice articles.

What did you first come here for?
Well, it was too long ago to tell actually. I just recently had bought ADSL I believe. And in finding good hardware sites I came across Guru3D which went basically immediately to my favourites list.

What do you mainly use the system for?
Browsing, Photoshop, watching movies, chatting, e-mail, games, music, etc etc. There isn’t much I don’t do on it :)

How much did you spend on the rig?
All together ? Pretty much hard to say. I’d say about 2000€ what’s inside now. I always upgrade only parts, never the whole system. Last things I bought where the new case, Promise FastTrak S150 TX2plus card, Sunbeam frontpanel, a HIS X850XT AGP and some other stuff I’m probably forgetting.

How often do you update/buy a new rig?
Hard to say also, I update when I think it’s time or when I come across something worthwhile. The X850XT for example, I could get it pretty cheap and my overclocked/softmodded 9500 became pretty obsolete. I’m planning on buying a new motherboard, CPU, RAM and videocard in about a year or so, my system is fast enough for me now.

What components are used?
Only the best ;)

• AMD Athlon XP 2400+ @ 2,3GHz
• Asus A7N8X Deluxe Rev 2.0 fitted with 2 Zalman NB-32J coolers for Southbridge and Mosfets
• 1024MB PC2700 DDR Infineon (2x 512MB)
• HIS Radeon X850 XT 256MB AGP fitted with Asetek Waterchill VGA-block
• Promise FastTrak S150 TX2plus for my DVD+/-RW drive
• 2x Western Digital Raptor WD360GD 36GB (10000rpm, SATA, 8MB)  in RAID 0 for OS & games
• 2x Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 160GB (7200rpm, ATA133, 8MB) for data and swapfile
• 1x Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 250GB (7200rpm, ATA100, 8MB) for backup only
• BenQ DW1620A (DVD+/-RW)
• Lite-On LTR-52246S (CD-RW)
• Labtec APX 4620 (pretty huge 2.1 speakers)  
• Intel Pro 100+ PCI Networking Card (hardware-based NIC 0wnage)
• Dell UltraSharp 2005FPW (20.1" widescreen TFT screen)
• Cooler Master ATC-310-GX1 Full Aluminium Server Case
• Tagan TG480-U01, 480W PSU, sleeved and connectors replaced with black ones
• Asetek WaterChill KT12-L30 (for CPU, VGA & NB), pump has been replaced with a Liang DDC 12V

Why ATI or NVIDIA, why Intel/AMD?
ATI because I could get the card cheap. Also, I like ATI just a little bit more than nVidia. I chose an AMD because the 2400+ was known for easy overclocking. That and the fact that the Intel setup of same speed was about 100€ more expensive. It’s running at 2.3GHz in stead of the standard 2GHz. With faster memory, I should get it running faster.

Does the system work as expected?
Yes, it has been as reliable as a mountain until now ! Not a single malfunction in 2 or 3 years !! Probably because almost everything is kept cool, even in the summer. Water cooling for the hottest components (CPU, VGA, NB) and air cooling for the motherboard components (passive sinks on almost anything that gets hot), hard drives and add-on cards.

What's the best part of your rig?
Hard to say. I’m really fond of my case, but also of the BenQ DVD writer, the Raptors… But I think I love the Dell 20” screen the most. A big investment, but it is just that: an investment. Gaming is sweet on widescreen, Photoshop is even more fun, browsing and reading mail is sweeettttt. Watching movies even sweeter !

What sucks and should not have been bought?
Argh, the Infineon RAM. If I knew it wouldn’t even clock 2MHz faster (yes my system doesn’t boot with the RAM set to 168MHz). I should have gone for DDR400 from Corsair. But RAM was expensive back then (DDR400 from a good brands was twice as expensive). I’ll probably won’t update it until I replace the entire motherboard with CPU along with it.

Modified cases/video cards/other? Did you do it yourself? Walk us through it.
Well, I had a nice modded Stacker in the recent past. Radiator in the top, nice UV lighting and orange UV fans which gave the fans a really hot look to it. It was full to the brim, hard to believe ain’t it ? Watercooling, lots of CCFL’s and other various apparatus really fill a case ! It was a nice case but I had no more use for it after I bought the ATC-310 which I have now. The huge aluminium block as it is has 2 cut-outs in the sidepanels, with the Coolermaster logo in orange UV-reactive Plexiglas, on a slab of black Plexiglas. It needs some CCFL’s though, not much light coming from the logo yet. The rest of the case hasn’t really been modified yet, the top panel will probably be cut to show a nice trio of radiators connected in a special way, but that’s probably something for 2006. The optical drives have Coolermaster aluminium faceplates attached, which really blends in with the case. Also a nice Cooldrive 6 which keeps the fans quiet and the Seagate 250GB HDD cool.

3DMark scores?
I don’t know actually, I don’t really believe in those scores or better said, I don’t care about them. I know Doom 3 and Quake 4 run like a charm on High Detail @ 1680x1050 ;)

Future upgrades?
I’ve got some more modding in the pipeline as the aforementioned radiators and extra window on top. Also a Coolermaster Cooldrive 6. In the distant future, I’ll be updating the mayor hardware components too. In the meanwhile I’ll probably replace my speakers, because they are starting to show degraded sound quality (what ?! can’t hear you, my speakers are too loud !). Too bad though, they really make enough noise, even for the neighbours !