Uncle_Mojo

I've become a big fan of the Samsung SH-S203 series burners. Sata connectivity and excellent performance. Both models are available on the Egg.

I built an HTPC using this board: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16813138041 Has 2 PATA, 4 SATA and 4 PCI and has been running great for a few months now. I don't really like the placement of the 24-pin connector, but otherwise it's a good board for not a lot of money. I put an AM2 4600+ (65W) processor and 2X1GB ram and used the onboard sound. Though I have no direct experience with it, this board may fit the bill for less money (AR) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16813186104 I've used several Foxconn boards in the past with good results, but I'll warn you, the rebate process with them is a PITA. And, you'll likely only be able to get one rebate per household. Hope this helps, and good luck!

Isn't that rebate deal expired? Or am I missing something?

Thank you for the reply! Actually, though I was hoping for a recommendation based on experience with a particular board. At any rate, I think I've decided to go with this one for $60 AR. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16813186110

The wife's mobo has expired. Need a recommendation for a good mATX board to replace it with. I've got some good 939 AMD chips as well as some Pentium Ds. Memory isn't an issue either, as I have plenty of DDR and DDR2 stuff around here. She had a P4B 2.4 gigger with 512 MB dual channel ram and ATI Radeon 9000 AGP graphics and XP Pro, which suited her fine. I don't fool around much with mATX, but I thought someone here might have a recommendation. TIA!

If you can, back it up and use the WD tools (available on the website) to write zeros to the drive. If you can't, then just send it in. I doubt there's much to worry about, but you just never know.

McMaster Carr. Cheap, fast reasonable shipping.

As a matter of fact, I have lapped an XP-90. I did it after the base became slightly "bowed" creating a low spot near the center of the base. A long lapping session, starting with 600 grit, brought the surface back flat and useable again. In the process, all the nickel plating was removed. I don't have any meaningful temp information, as the uneven base yielded poor cooling. Given the retention design of this cooler, and the ammount of material I had to remove, I think that lapping your XP-90 couldn,t help but improve cooling.

Thanks for the reply! I've periodically had a USB flash drive installed as well as a USB wireless network adapter. After playing around with it some, it appears that this is indeed the case. Now, why would this interfere with the boot order, and how do I prevent this behavior from interfering with startup?

Thanks! I already swapped out all the cables and the CMOS Battery. The Raptor is set as first boot device already. I'll give the other ideas a shot. I'd really like to get this sorted out before I deliver this box.

Here's what I'm working with: LanParty UT nF4-D (modded to SLI & SATAII) (BIOS Date Code 2005/11/14) AMD 3700+ San Diego 1GB (2X512) OCZ DDR500 WD Raptor 150 BFG 7600 GT OC X-Fi Xtreme Gamer Floppy OC @ 2.7, 1:1 RAM Prime stable for 18+ hrs. The system runs great, but there is an annoying message during post stating that "the boot devices have been changed" and to press F1 to continue or Delete to enter BIOS. The Raptor is the 1st boot device, and I've changed nothing since OS install (XP Pro.) and every time I look at the BIOS settings, they are unchanged, yet I still get this message. While this wouldn't bother me much, I'm building this for my nephew and would really like to get rid of this issue. FWIW the Raptor also shows up as a removeable device in the taskbar. I've never seen this behavior before, and the only new parts are a "SATA II Compatible" data cable for the Raptor. Any pointers? Is the OS recognizing the RAptor as a removeable device the issue? Update BIOS? Whaddaya think, fellas? Thanks!

Are you talking about the VFD wires from the PSU adapter to the front panel?

Motorola SurfBoard! 3+ years and no issues whatsoever. As an aside, I went with Motorola because that is the modem that my small cable company rents/leases customers.

Call 'em up, I did.

As you can see from the pic... ...a 10.5" 8800 GTX card should fit in here. May be a little snug with the power connector plugged in, but it should fit. Keep in mind, this is the 3D Aurora 570 case.