Roxanne and the Red Lights. in Whey and Sonic Screwdrivers.

  • July 11, 2016, 8:09 p.m.
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  • Public

Actually, it was Kelly Quark that had the right lights, but I couldn’t resist the title. I spied a DRAM led flashing red once, but more importantly there were two red LEDs on her video card that were solid red. Which, of course, I didn’t notice until I tried to boot her last night and there was no feed to my monitor. I heard the typical Welcome to Windows boot sound through my speakers, so I knew the system was otherwise running okay.

Now, Kelly is almost six years old, but she really doesn’t need an overhaul. Her AMD quad-core is humming along nicely, and I was neurotic and maxed out the board with 16 gigs of RAM. Overkill? Oh yeah, overkill. If I were to replace the motherboard/CPU, I’d probably end up keeping the same RAM. RAM speeds just don’t matter that much. If anything, I’d start replacing the hard drives. I’ve had hard drive crashes in the past, and believe me, it’s the one component you just don’t want to die. I actually have two solid state drives, and one “traditional” hard drive. One of the SSD’s is obviously the boot drive; I was neurotic and set the paging file to the second one. You want that fast read/write time for your paging file. The third drive still has half a terrabyte free. I remember a time when memory was at a premium…

Point is, I’m not rebuilding Kelly over a busted video card. Since I’m a packrat, I was hoping my previous rig, Roxanne Covalent, still had her video card in her. She’s had her power supply scavenged, but she’s otherwise still operational. Athlon 64 processor and 3.5 gigs of RAM are fast enough for a Windows XP rig. I’d just need to toss in a PSU and a video card, and she’d be good to go, even if she’s eleven years old.

I was going to dramatically be all AND YES, ROXANNE STILL HAD HER VIDEO CARD, but well, she did. Still, I did the classic take-it-out-and-put-it-back-in with the Kelly’s video card. Aaaaand did some way overdue dusting. Kids, if you don’t have a clear side to your rig like I do, you can’t see all the massive dust build-up. Upon reinstallation, Kelly’s video card was still a dud.

For the nerds, Kelly had now-dated Radeon 4870. Ran any game I play on high settings, but I don’t play bleeding edge games. Roxanne’s end-of-life card was a GeForce 9400 GT (an upgrade from a GeForce 6600). Roxanne’s card is a significant downgrade from Kelly’s, but I don’t really game much anymore. So, whatever, I’ll ride it for a while. Since naming and number schemes seem to mean jack shit, this is what I used as a reference: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gpu-hierarchy,4388.html It’s like “Whose Line Is It Anyway?”, all the numbers are made-up, and the points don’t matter. Seriously. I miss when we could rate CPU’s by raw megahertz and stuff.

Obviously the old card works. Huh. I wanted to be all romantic like “Roxanne’s last gift to me” or something, but I didn’t set it up right. ROXANNE WAS MY FIRST BUILD AND SHE’LL ALWAYS BE SPECIAL TO ME. So there. : P

As an aside, yes, there’s a pattern to my naming scheme. My first computer was Lisa Electron. Then Roxanne Covalent. Then Kelly Quark. Whatever my next build is, I’ll have to be something more scientifically specific than a quark. If this makes no sense, you fell asleep in science class. Frankly, Kelly has an amazing case and I see no reason to completely start over. Solid, lots of fans, lots of thumbscrews, lots of room for expansion. When I replace the motherboard, I may just call her Kelly Quark 2.0. Or Kelly Quark-A, a la Enterprise A. I’d swear I replaced her power supply in her first year (never skimp on a PSU, buy something like a thermaltake), so she’s already Kelly Quark 1.1. Does this make her Kelly Quark 1.15? Or does that downgrade her to 1.05?

Okay, now I’m babbling. I’m just glad I can crack open my desktop and fix my own problems. Shit man, I once fixed Candi’s laptop. It “died”, and I was all “Hey, lemme try replacing the hard drive.” Did it work? OH YEAH. People get too impatient with technology. It’s generally only one part that’s broken, not the whole thing. That’s how Apple is ripping everyone off by convincing them their products can’t be fixed. Okay, now I’m REALLY babbling.


Last updated July 11, 2016


Pinkerton July 12, 2016

I LOVE building computers. Like you, I don't play a lot of demanding games but I still like having a super fast rig. Kind of like how car aficionados might have a muscle car that they take to the grocery store.

Timmy™ Pinkerton ⋅ July 12, 2016

If nothing else, I used to triple-box Everquest2. Actually, that was a lot of fun, pity the game lost its zest for me. It's just a comfort to buy silly games like Sims4 and not even think about "will it play?"

Gilraent July 12, 2016

Pam built my computer. She is the geek in the family when it comes to that kind of stuff. Used to build computers for extra money, took programming class in college etc.
hmm on the name. I'm trying to pull one out of my hat and can only think of gluons, but I don't know how that fits. It's been a while since I've watched anything science-y online. Been spending way too much time doing other things. like twitter, and housework.

Timmy™ Gilraent ⋅ July 12, 2016

I was a comp sci major for three years and the punch line is I learned nothing about computers. My first build made me nervous, but it was otherwise pretty easy. Just read the specifications to buy the right parts. The actual parts can only fit in one way, into one spot.

Probably the only annoying thing now is navigating all the video card naming jargon.

Gilraent Timmy™ ⋅ July 12, 2016

Because of my photography, Pam built mine all around that aspect. Plus it looks pretty fucking cool :) You're right about having the window on it. I can see when it needs to be dusted out, and it's not as often than I thought it would be with the dogs around.

Timmy™ Gilraent ⋅ July 12, 2016

Cases are an underrated aspect. Roxanne's case looked cool, but was flimsy and not big enough. If I ever get another case, definitely sticking with an Antec.

Tux July 13, 2016

I enjoy your naming scheme. Mine's a lot simpler - for awhile it was Sonic the Hedgehog characters (Sonic for the Laptop, Knuckles for the Big Rig, Amy for the headless linux box) but these days it's a little more abstract. The server is Dharma, the laptop is Zephyr, and the gaming rig is BEAST.

Timmy™ Tux ⋅ July 13, 2016

Cool beans. : )

Fawkes Gal July 15, 2016

I didn't even need to play that video. I could hear that horn of disappointment in my head. :-D

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