I think, that my adventures with Athlonium 64 deserves a thread, so here it is.
For someone, who doesn't know, what Athlonium 64 is, go here: http://personalitycafe.com/video-games/92503-what-video-game-you-playing-currently-424.html
I have been running various benchmarks and tests for over 1 week now. I completely tired of all those below cinematic experiences. When I'm gonna finish benching I will post results here.
This is a short update, but currently rig looks like this:
(smaller card is 56k modem, because why not)
Visual representation of how much money I "wasted" on better parts:
I finally got graphics card and pics are after cleaning it (that dragon is so cool :kitteh:
So my graphics card as I got it was pretty much in bad condition. Radeon looked like it had old thermal paste (brown) stuck and mixed with dust around the fan and plastic, it looked like clay. Also I thought, that it had some missing heatsink screws, but thank god it doesn't. Clearly someone before me has really has taken of the cooler and tried to apply thermal paste, but ho it got into fan I have no idea. On the other side, there were traces of another thermal paste, this time it's grey. So yeah, cleaning was really needed. Big chunks of dust were also stuck in copper heatsink. Besides bad first impression it worked. It's fast, real DAMN FAST! Everything graphics related ran smoothly, even web browsing became actually a good experience. It was like getting new eyes. Everything runs so fast. Sorry benching and testing will be done, when I'm gonna get all parts. Card looks stable, it passed 1 hour Furmark testing, but there is a problem with fan. It's noisy, but that's not the main thing what is wrong with it. I can hear, that it touches something when spinning, there is a grinding noise and I can't figure out from where it comes. I really want to take off heatsink and look better at that thing, but I currently don't have any thermal paste. I will get it maybe next week. Overall, I kinda expected problems with fan, it was used a lot, so it's no surprise, that it's worn out, maybe placing mobo vertically will solve that problem (graphics cards may have sleeve bearing fan). Drivers worked fine and overall my first time experience with ATI is good. I really expected so dodgy drivers or something bad software related, but I didn't found that. Also after some looking at system information, I can say, that card is reference design ATI Radeon X800 Pro 256MB. So I got what I ordered. And if someone wonders if it can run Crysis, I can answer that. Yes, it runs and is playable at low settings and low resolution. So cool!
I know, that soon I will get WD Raptors. Maybe tomorrow.
I want to invite those people to this thread, who were interested in Athlonium 64: @Crimson Ash @Skeletalz @Pifanjr @Judson Joist
For someone, who doesn't know, what Athlonium 64 is, go here: http://personalitycafe.com/video-games/92503-what-video-game-you-playing-currently-424.html
I have been running various benchmarks and tests for over 1 week now. I completely tired of all those below cinematic experiences. When I'm gonna finish benching I will post results here.
This is a short update, but currently rig looks like this:
(smaller card is 56k modem, because why not)
Visual representation of how much money I "wasted" on better parts:
I finally got graphics card and pics are after cleaning it (that dragon is so cool :kitteh:
So my graphics card as I got it was pretty much in bad condition. Radeon looked like it had old thermal paste (brown) stuck and mixed with dust around the fan and plastic, it looked like clay. Also I thought, that it had some missing heatsink screws, but thank god it doesn't. Clearly someone before me has really has taken of the cooler and tried to apply thermal paste, but ho it got into fan I have no idea. On the other side, there were traces of another thermal paste, this time it's grey. So yeah, cleaning was really needed. Big chunks of dust were also stuck in copper heatsink. Besides bad first impression it worked. It's fast, real DAMN FAST! Everything graphics related ran smoothly, even web browsing became actually a good experience. It was like getting new eyes. Everything runs so fast. Sorry benching and testing will be done, when I'm gonna get all parts. Card looks stable, it passed 1 hour Furmark testing, but there is a problem with fan. It's noisy, but that's not the main thing what is wrong with it. I can hear, that it touches something when spinning, there is a grinding noise and I can't figure out from where it comes. I really want to take off heatsink and look better at that thing, but I currently don't have any thermal paste. I will get it maybe next week. Overall, I kinda expected problems with fan, it was used a lot, so it's no surprise, that it's worn out, maybe placing mobo vertically will solve that problem (graphics cards may have sleeve bearing fan). Drivers worked fine and overall my first time experience with ATI is good. I really expected so dodgy drivers or something bad software related, but I didn't found that. Also after some looking at system information, I can say, that card is reference design ATI Radeon X800 Pro 256MB. So I got what I ordered. And if someone wonders if it can run Crysis, I can answer that. Yes, it runs and is playable at low settings and low resolution. So cool!
I know, that soon I will get WD Raptors. Maybe tomorrow.
I want to invite those people to this thread, who were interested in Athlonium 64: @Crimson Ash @Skeletalz @Pifanjr @Judson Joist