red930 Posted July 14, 2007 Posted July 14, 2007 A dear friend of mine came over with his computer, if you can call it that, and asked: "Do you know how to built a video card into my machine, needs to be Gforce3 compatible , 32 mb"? I took one look at his machine and told him rather bluntly: "Nope, but i do know what you should be doing with it" and pointed to the rabish binn. Now you have to know this was a compaq desktop, (read not tower) from the ancient days. But oviously i was curious how the machine would look inside so i proceded to open the case. One is here to learn i always say:) Even opening the case was weird as there where no scews or such as one would expect on a normal case, or lets say i would, so i asked him how on earth he would open up this thing. He didnt know.... So let the fun begin, was my thought, i wanted that case opend up, even if it should take my whole free day and some more. After looking at it for 15 mins, didnt want to completly break the thing, he might still wanna use it, ya never know:) i found two push buttons at the side of the system and pressed them in de hopes something would move. Great was my surprise the whole front of the system came forward....that is incluiding the drives, hd, cd and whatever he had inthere. Never seen that one:) The inside of the machine had everything "mounted" on the mobo as far as parts there were, with brackets. Hence you attach a card onto a braket, fold that down, so to speak, and it slides into the mobo slot. Right... Space there was none as we know it, so in order to get hin a vidcard that would basecly fit into the case, we probebly wouldnt find it or had to cut off the top side of the card to make it fit, hence we went to a couple of my dealers to please them for a day with a tripp to memory lane. Dealer number one; "You need low whatever card so it will fit, yet they dont exist anymore.. Dealer number two; didnt know what i was babbeling about, (wich happens to me alot, so no worries there) But he had a nice upgrade set for not to much intell based msi bord intell cpu gig ram 160 gig sata hd legit windows home sp2 price a bit less then 400 euri, not to bad for someone who doesnt even play games, let alone do something extreme online. While we were there, the sales man was explaining some fact's from the MSI P6N SLI Platinum, wich looked as a awesome board, but for someone (my friend) who with an " normal, these days mobo can do without a vidcard, this mobo was a tad over the top, i thought. In the corner of my eye i saw my friend, who is a total caveman when it comes to " the language spoken in the computer world", becomming green, and looked utterly overtaken by all the numbers and letters not according to the alfabeth, as he put it, so i had to cut that convo short. To sum it up; I had a case standing here, wich i knew he loved We got a legit windows and an upgrade set so nothing could stop me now:) At half past 4 in the afternoon i started to clean out the case and prepare it for assembly. Put the cpu on the mobo, put the ram in, then put the powersupply in the case, after that i put the mobo in gently, attached the cable's and low and behold booted straight into the bios first time i tried. Omg i was on a roll! Checked everything i kwew of according the mobo manual and proceded with windows, or so i thought... /start of rant Put in the windows cd in order to format the drive and such and the second i jank it in the bios starts "screaming" : Bootsector-virus detected, keep on writing y/no? What the fraq!?!?! This is a clean-not ever used -tottaly new hd, watta mean virus? Looked at the time, great it half past 8 evening, there goes dinner..o well..ehh microsoft, lets call them since im fraqqing legit , let them handle it... Or not.. Got an dude on the line who had to talk to 3 other persons and then came back telling me; "The only option is re-format and re-install windows. Did that help? "Ehh, no?" "Why not?" "Well, you see i didnt format the drive yet, i just janked the cd from you boss inthere and then the bios started yelling at me and i dont linke it when a bios yells at me, makes me kinda kranky, what makes it worse is that i call so-called experts, like you for 15 mins and after explaining that i'm trying to format a totaly new bought drive wich btw had a seall on the packache, so i am assuming it is brand new, never touched, jada jada drive and you come with re-format the drive and re-install windows, that my dear nitwith, tells me you havent been listing or have no clue what im talking about, wich pisses me off. So that leaves us with one of two options; either you call me back or i'll sort it out myself either way, i'm hanging up the phone now, have a nice day." Obviously he didnt call back... Yes, i know , it wasnt all that friendly, but there is an reason i have this nickname, trust me... Coffee!! Here we go again: I am still looking at that error from the bios so i called another friend of mine, his answer was, well it could be that the format wasn't done properly, it happens sometimes and therefore the bootsector might be fraqqed.... ehhh, didnt format yet hun? nvm... He did however gave me a fix in the form of bootfloppy i could make so thats atleast something Then logic hit me, not one of my stronger points, and as you may have read i still have troubles with it. Next day when i was talking to another friend of mine he stated this: "Go into the bios and check fior the viruss-warning option." "Since your writing for the first time on the drive, in order to adjust the bootsetor for the use of the drive, it might see it as an virus cause your changing the bootsector" Doh... So after cheking that one and going forward with the install it was a piece of cake. Baselcly, all in all i had a blast building a machine again, and in the process made my friend's day since he now has an awesome looking machine. /end rant. note; my thanks go to Rinus who actually thought me alot And those who took the time to read some of my experiences building a machine Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
dr_bowtie Posted July 14, 2007 Posted July 14, 2007 nice one... That was a pretty good read... I have had some issues like that on build where you are just into the build too much and get side tracked by the simple things that slip your mind... look at the bright side....it could have always been worse... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
red930 Posted July 14, 2007 Posted July 14, 2007 True, if it wasnt for that one, it was an built/ install without a hickup, wich is so good for an confidence boost:) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnUnknownSource Posted July 14, 2007 Posted July 14, 2007 haha, pointed to the rabish binn[/qoute] good call! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
radodrill Posted July 14, 2007 Posted July 14, 2007 Good Show! Jolly Good Show!!! At least now there's one less Crappaq on the earth Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Blooz1 Posted July 14, 2007 Posted July 14, 2007 Good job! Nothing like working on rigs that use proprietary parts! I remember many years ago when Compaq was infamous for using their own 1/2 height floppy drives - list price for one of these beasts? $300!!!!! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sparkyftw Posted July 14, 2007 Posted July 14, 2007 ahh its always nice for a trip down memory lane. To my first computer build (stupid me not plugging in the power cord to the HDD) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jachyra007 Posted July 14, 2007 Posted July 14, 2007 Isn't Dell the same way? I remember trying to fix my dad's old machine, and the way the PS mounted, there was no way to replace it - either have Dell dig up some dinosaur PS they have lying around, or modify the case. Didn't matter though - he went to a local comp store (which was open on a sunday - can't trust them already) when I wasn't looking an got raped on a new setup...I coulda build 2x the computer for what he paid... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnUnknownSource Posted July 14, 2007 Posted July 14, 2007 Dell used to be that way years ago, but for a while now, they're just fine... you might pay a little more than you should, but oh well... not double! lol Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
red930 Posted July 14, 2007 Posted July 14, 2007 hehe i had one of them cases come in. took me about two fricking hours to figure out how to open it Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jachyra007 Posted July 15, 2007 Posted July 15, 2007 No, the small-town comp. store that was open on a sunday raped him - sold dad a whole new tower (which may or may not have been the problem, that thing was old as dirt) and I could have built one with 2x the power for what he as charged... Cant trust the big stores, can't trust some of the little ones...Guess he's gotta learn to DIY i guess...can't go wrong there!! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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