My new Aspire Xplorer system

[AthlonXP1800]

I got the new hard drive replacement back from Overclockers UK, the one I send back was confirmed had clicks, I guess that mean it failed to spinning.

Here my new system up and running since 7 days:

AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+ CPU OEM with free Akasa AK-856 heatsink fan
Aspire Xplorer ATX Midi tower case
Antec 550W Truepower II Power Supply
ASUS A8N-E motherboard Revision 2.0
2 x 1Gb Corsair Value Select CL3 PC3200 DDR-RAM
Gainward 256Mb Geforce 7800 GTX Golden Sample videocard
Western Digital 250Gb SATAII 16Mb cache hard drive

The temp reading are the CPU heatsink actual temp.

http://img369.imageshack.us/img369/1600/case10wi.th.jpg (http://img369.imageshack.us/my.php?image=case10wi.jpg) http://img369.imageshack.us/img369/5520/case25dm.th.jpg (http://img369.imageshack.us/my.php?image=case25dm.jpg) http://img384.imageshack.us/img384/3049/dsc001920fr.th.jpg (http://img384.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dsc001920fr.jpg)

Upper and Lower inside the case, hope I am doing fine with cables management:

http://img369.imageshack.us/img369/9618/dsc001945ih.th.jpg (http://img369.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dsc001945ih.jpg) http://img386.imageshack.us/img386/6249/dsc001969kr.th.jpg (http://img386.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dsc001969kr.jpg)

The videocard: :D

http://img386.imageshack.us/img386/2447/dsc001972tz.th.jpg (http://img386.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dsc001972tz.jpg)

And now here are some benchmarks...

3DMark 2005 scores:

I discovered the EXPERTool can allowed the core clock max to 500MHz, I overclocked it and very surprised to see the card was very stable, can handle with 500MHz very easy like 470MHz. Maybe next time I could try increase the clock speed to 510MHz using with Forceware's Coolbits. :D

http://img371.imageshack.us/img371/8961/81143zk.th.jpg (http://img371.imageshack.us/my.php?image=81143zk.jpg) http://img371.imageshack.us/img371/4320/84592dx.th.jpg (http://img371.imageshack.us/my.php?image=84592dx.jpg)

Sandra and CPU-Z:

CPU and memory benchmarks on Sandra and CPU-Z details about the CPU and memory.

http://img387.imageshack.us/img387/585/sandracpuz1ki.th.jpg (http://img387.imageshack.us/my.php?image=sandracpuz1ki.jpg)

FearSPDemo:

I ran the game at 1024x768 with all options maxed included Soft Shadowing, 4X FSAA, Quality, Gamma Correct & TSSAA and 16xAF. The applications running in background are: Norton Internet Security 2005, BBC News Alerts, MSN Messenger, Messenger Plus, Fraps and EXPERTool.

The first benchmark below started from the car throughout the first checkpoint and killed the first 2 bad guys after the checkpoint:

2005-08-20 01:04:13 - FEARSPDemo
Frames: 11182 - Time: 226153ms - Avg: 56.444 - Min: 34 - Max: 239

The second benchmark below, I turned off 4xFSAA and loaded the first checkpoint, killed the first 2 bad guys:

2005-08-20 01:10:35 - FEARSPDemo
Frames: 2116 - Time: 37532ms - Avg: 139 - Min: 115 - Max: 158

I am very impressed with FearSPDemo, it ran much smooth with 4xFSAA and blaze fast when 4xFSAA is turned off, the new system are over 5 times faster than my old Athlon XP 1800+ with FSAA, AF and Soft Shadowing turned off. Also 64 bit Far Cry version ran blaze fast with HDR under Windows XP x64 on dual booting, it was unplayable with HDR on Athlon XP 1800+.at 1024x768 resolution.

Very pleased with the new case, it looked wonderful, it is silient case but there is a remain one tiny problem, the free Akasa AK-856 CPU heatsink fan (http://www.akasa.com.tw/akasa_english/spec_page/coolers/spec_ak_856.htm) have built-in thermal sensor that control itself to cooling the CPU down and 2 case fans are not connected and running. It was not a silient fan, it spinning at high and low speed every 5 seconds, not affected the case silient sound, in fact it as quiet as a fridge but the problem is, it created a rhythm that I can felt it when my hands are on the keyboard, mouse and ever touched the case. It was small rhythm feel all the time and sometime a day for 30 minutes, it created annoyed big rhythm feel big enough to send through my arm to my shoulder when I am used the mouse. I will leave as it is for 1 to 2 weeks to see how it goes, if I want a new silient heatsink fan, I probably will get Thermaltake Silient 939 heatsink fan (http://www.thermaltake.com/coolers/cl-p0200silent939/cl-p0200.htm) that will cure it. :)

Oh and one last thing I forgotten about, I noticed one strange thing when I installed the new 250Gb SATAII hard drive, Windows XP detected it as a [URL=http://img400.imageshack.us/img400/8972/satarem8yj.jpg[/URL]. I dont understand why it detected as removable hard drive, it not external, it is internal hard drive same as floppy drive, IDE hard drives and DVD-RW drive. I installed the latest nForce 4 driver and it still recognised as removable storage device. :confused:

[AthlonXP1800]

Wow what a strange day today. Earlier today, I started the PC and the BIOS alerted CPU fan failed or RPM too low, I knew it definetely the CPU fan with rhythm problem, I went into BIOS and discard changes then restart, same problem. I went back into BIOS and disabled Q-Fan controlled and save changes and boot sucessful, the rhythm noticed improved quiet down nothing like the day before, I checked ASUS Probe for CPU Fan RPM, it returned to 3500 RPM level.

I ran emule program to download something and started Far Cry at the first level with HDR Level 7. 30 mins later when I am on the island closer to the sea carrier, I noticed the game started to shuttering every 5 seconds and realised something not right, I alt-tab to desktop to check the task manger for CPU and memory status and was surprised to see Far Cry are so memory demand, it still beg for more than 1.2Gb RAM memory, then 1 hour later Windows XP x64 was starved of memory resources and the CPU heatsink whirred at high 4500 RPM getting very annoying.

http://img390.imageshack.us/img390/7714/processes4ip.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

http://img384.imageshack.us/img384/8728/cpuprobe5ly.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

:lol: Oh well I thought 2Gb RAM was enough for dual core but it wasnt, it really need maximum memory so I will order another 2Gb Corsair Value Select same sticks next week and maybe Thermaltake Silient 939 heatsink somewhere on internet if I can find one. :p

[FraGTastiK]

good to see you moving forward to A64.I know you are going to have much fun with your new system.thanks for the benchmarks!

btw that thermaltake silent 939 K8 looks very much like the cooler that comes with every boxed A64 X2 CPU,some people even say both of'em are virtually the same cooler,maybe with different fans.I dont know if you got the boxed or tray version of X2 (if it exists?!).

my "safely remove hardaware" tray icon says that my sata drives are removable or hot swappable and thats a nice feature,but i dont get this in Device Manager if that is where you're seeing it mentioned as removable media.

[AthlonXP1800]

btw that thermaltake silent 939 K8 looks very much like the cooler that comes with every boxed A64 X2 CPU,some people even say both of'em are virtually the same cooler,maybe with different fans.I dont know if you got the boxed or tray version of X2 (if it exists?!).

Yes I read all the reviews, it have the exactly same cooler but different fan, Thermaltake used their own modified fan. Yes I got tray version of X2, Xtsit.com throw a free heatsink fan with it, not bad. :) I am disappointed that I cant find Thermaltake Silent 939 K8 at every UK stockists, it look like they dont stock it but they does stock Thermaltake Silent Boost that does not have heatpipe and only 21dB that I end up ordered one and shipped yesterday. Thank god what a huge relief that heatsink fan is silent, it totally quiet and the temp is exactly the same as terrible Akasa AK-856 heatsink fan when it roared at 3500RPM and 4500RPM when playing game.

my "safely remove hardaware" tray icon says that my sata drives are removable or hot swappable and thats a nice feature,but i dont get this in Device Manager if that is where you're seeing it mentioned as removable media.

Yes I noticed it too, it not in Device Manager but it listed under Disk drives.

I ordered another 2Gb sticks and it shipped from USA and should arrive next week. :)

[Buenamos]

nice system.

[BrianG]

So how do you like the dual core effect? The system is smooth, yeah?

It stunned my brother, opening window after window, task after task, and only hurting Quake3 framerates by 8%.

[AthlonXP1800]

Yeah Dual Core is really amazing me, the system is now running very very smooth and now no longer have shuttering in Far Cry when I am completed my memory upgrade to... 4GB RAM. :angel:

It seem Windows XP x64 working at best with 4GB, it will be no good with 2GB as you can see recent pics, 2GB made Windows XP x64 worked very harder with 172Mb left in available memory.

http://img251.imageshack.us/img251/3089/farcryprocess0yd.th.jpg (http://img251.imageshack.us/my.php?image=farcryprocess0yd.jpg) http://img251.imageshack.us/img251/1627/cpumemory2un.th.jpg (http://img251.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cpumemory2un.jpg)

When I installed another 2GB memory, the BIOS detected 4096MB fine and booted to Windows XP SP2, ran the memory benchmarks and noticed the scored is at 3900MB range and also said my memory is running at 333MHz. Went back into BIOS and I changed DRAM Configuration from Auto to Manual and set the RAM clock speed to DDR400 and saved the setting. Rerun the memory benchmark, very impressive with the number but I noticed when I read the memory benchmark report, it warned that the FSB clock is over 200MHz, hmmm I ran CPU benchmark and I was amazed it did actual overclocked by about 100MHz, it edged with Athlon 64 X2 4800+. :eek: :cool:

http://img331.imageshack.us/img331/9789/sandracpuz22xn.th.jpg (http://img331.imageshack.us/my.php?image=sandracpuz22xn.jpg) http://img331.imageshack.us/img331/677/temp22me.th.jpg (http://img331.imageshack.us/my.php?image=temp22me.jpg)

One thing really puzzled me about 4GB and XP SP2, it didnt detected the full 4GB but 3GB. That odd, the BIOS, Sandra and Windows XP x64 detected it fine:

http://img228.imageshack.us/img228/6778/wxpmem4cp.th.jpg (http://img228.imageshack.us/my.php?image=wxpmem4cp.jpg) http://img228.imageshack.us/img228/2580/wxp646ov.th.jpg (http://img228.imageshack.us/my.php?image=wxp646ov.jpg)

I guess it SP2 bug.

I will post the new results from 3D Mark 2005 scores later. :)

[BrianG]

Odd. I remember reading a thread somewhere else here about the 4GB/3GB XP effect. I coulf not find it though. IIRC it had to do with a virtual memory bug???

I just love the multitasking experiments.

http://www.nvnews.net/vbulletin/attachment.php?attachmentid=12212