4-21-06 - I got a new computer, Woo Hoo! My last computer lasted me almost two years, which is a record for me so far. She was a good machine, but as always, the need for more power is a constant battle in keeping up with the latest games. The old ATI 9700 Pro was quite a champ though, hanging on for quite a while modestly keeping up with the new games. FEAR really took it down though, and with the new Far Cry coming out soon, it was time.

Specs are as follows:

• Aspire Super x-alien aluminum case (from the old computer, heck of a case)
• Athalon 64-bit 3500+ Claw Hammer processor
• dual channel 1024 GEIL PC3700 RAM x 2 (2 gig total)
• eVGA 256-P2-N553-AX Geforce 7600GT 256MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 video card
• ZALMAN VF700-CU 2 Ball VGA COOLER (I heard noisy things about the stock GPU cooling fan)
• Gigabyte Galaxy liquid cooling system (this thing is a BEAST)
• Western Digital 10,000 RPM Raptor Serial ATA hard drive
• ASUS A8N32-SLI Deluxe Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce SPP 100 ATX AMD Motherboard
• Liteon 8x DVD writer
• and last but certainly not least, ViewSonic VX922 Black/Silver 19" 2ms LCD Monitor (2ms refresh!)

This thing rocks so far, and I love the LCD monitor, it cleared up a lot of real estate on my desk going from the old-skool monitor. Weighs a heck of a lot less too!

Random pics I took are below and on the next two pages. I forgot to take pics along the assembly path because I kept getting distracted by beer and confusing engrish instructions. Man have computers gotten a lot more complicated to build! The heat pipes on the motherboard are crazy, and of course the liquid cooling system took a bit of molesting to fit in a manner in which the case side door actually closed, and that whole air flow thing to get sorted out too.

The freaking' radiator on the galaxy system is HUGE, the pics do NOT do that thing justice, if my Jeep ever starts to overheat I know where to scavange a radiator from! And the cooling hoses are the biggest I've seen in a liquid cooling system to date...3/4" diameter (for reference, the old Aquarius hoses were 1/4" diameter), and when it fires up you can see it moving water like crazy...It drained the tank in less than 2 seconds on initial boot to prime the system, dang.

Click on any pic for a larger view.

1) The new parts waiting to be assembled.

2) The Galaxy Cooling System.

3) The radiator (measures almost 8"x10"!)

4) Cooling tank, processor liquid cooled heat sink, MB chipset fan and some coolant.

5) The Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe in all her glory.

6) The gratuitous "top-down" shot.

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