PCI Simple Communications Controller.

[Mark Hennessy]

Yes, often by the time you're considering a motherboard change, it's time to retire the machine.

Not having SATA is a pain now - the last HDD I bought was about 20% more expensive than the SATA equivalent, and now, IDE drives are all but extinct. You can get adaptors to convert IDE to SATA - but no idea how they perform. I've just bought one from CPC to play around with (less than a fiver!). The 133MB/s transfer rate of the IDE interface is starting to become a problem, especially as modern drives have such big caches.

As I said, I'm very happy to give Colin an AGP graphics card - this might well delay the purchase of a new machine for a year or two. On the other hand, he might be quite excited at the prospect of a new toy - he deserves to treat himself from time to time - just look at the graft he does . I hope we haven't scared him away with all this debate!

[Joe]

throw away the old DIMM

Throw it south-east!

Thanks for the info Nick - I stand, or sit, corrected. I've been lucky that all the bits and bobs I've added to computers over the years have been second-hand and of the same vintage of the machines to which they'll be fitted.

- Joe

[Radio Fixer]

Home Ver of W7 is fine for most. I got Pro ver. to run XP mode for a legacy drwg package ... why did I bother. It works but cant get a print out... says printer is there but copy goes into a black hole. Reckon to take it off and save the disk space.

Someone said "Maybe Colin wants a bit of retail therapy" or words to that effect. Same with me, I like spending some of our savings and I too was brought up in "make do and mend" as well. On the last leg now and I have tried to let go of that way of thinking. Even got a guy to sort the 10 year old car and 15 year surf van now and had carpets cleaned this week. Would have done them myself one upon a time with a hire mch. But they were a Pro co. and did a fine job so happy and so is SWMBO.

Money is like manure: it does no good if it doesnt get spread around a bit. Reading some of the posts here business would dry up completely ...

Now wheres that new Honda car brochure?

Gary

[Nick]

...I too was brought up in "make do and mend" as well. ...Money is like manure: it does no good if it doesnt get spread around a bit. Reading some of the posts here business would dry up completely

This made me chuckle a bit

What is we do in this forum again? Rather than repair old radios, buy new ones?

I thought not !

[Joe]

Buying parts to upgrade/repair a computer is also making work for people and is a good form of re-cycling too.

- Joe

[Radio Fixer]

If someone found some NOS round Ekco's bet they would sell well ...

To me old radios are different and some are worth restoring. Better a lot went to the tip though and then the others would be more respected and have a better chance of being looked after in the future.

An old radio is a nice looking antique, that I get pleasure working on and I'm allowed to display. A computer, to me anyway, is just a tool that I enjoy that helps with the hobby. No way is an old one, even an early Apple going to be allowed on the sideboard.

You aint spending much on another 1G of Ram Joe and plugging in a free video card that may or may not work. Aint much employment there.

I waste my time here...

Gary

[Retired]

Hi,

What a great set of guys you all are; all this information is overwhelming to a relative computer novice like me to take in but I'm reading every post with a lot of interest.

Rather than jump in with a reply today I've been considering all the advice and information thus given so here goes.

When I had this computer upgraded a few years ago I spent something like £400 and later felt disappointed because I could have bought a brand new system for less so I'll never visit another local computer shop to upgrade for me.

There are both good and bad points regarding whether to buy a complete ready to go computer or to build my own.

On balance I think possibly the easiest and cheapest in the long term would be to buy a ready to go computer this way it is fully tested and under warranty. Modern computers are quite cheap at entrance level even Dell's and one of these would possibly have a much better spec than the computer I have.

Building my own did appeal to me because I like to learn and I could have turned it into a project but as Gary pointed out I also am up to my neck in projects including two full lathe restorations and there are after all only 48 hours in a day.

I greatly appreciate everyone spending time in advising me and this thread will hopefully prove of interest and use to other members in a similar dilemma to mine. I don't like throwing money away but neither do I like flogging a dead horse by paying for this or that add on which quickly runs up a big bill. I would be better simply buying a brand new computer knowing it to be up to date and then it would serve 12 years or so before reaching the stage I am now in. Given the cost of a new computer and the enjoyment I would derive from it for over a decade for outweighs the money involved.

Take for example the computer kindly suggested by Gary here;

http://www.ebuyer.com/395610-hp-pavilion...7j11ea-abu

Such a computer would be light years ahead of this I now use and over a ten year period it would only work out at around £1 per week at today's money. £600 in a lump sum is a fair amount but if I started playing around trying to upgrade this computer it won't work out cheap and it would still retain many old components just waiting to go bang when least expected and it would still be using an outdated HDD.

I've always enjoyed XP as I did Win98 but I'm not scared of change; I don't believe in change just for the sake of it but XP is on the way out as surely as Win7 will be in few years time but to buy a new computer now running Win7 would possibly give me ten years peace.

Bron and I live a very simple but rewarding lifestyle; we never go away on holiday in fact our only holiday away from home was for our first anniversary and it was a self catering cottage 35 years ago. We are non drinkers or smokers and we don't expect to have every modern electronic item possible; we don't even have a credit card although because of modern banking we are forced to have a debit card each which we treat as white hot.

Many years ago whilst being extremely poor we bought a VW Beetle on finance; I was forever working on this car and spent holidays under it rather than in it; one day I sat down with pen and paper and added up the years car ownership costs apart from fuel and insurance etc. The total at that time came to the same as buying a brand new Citroen 2CV on finance; since then we have run brand new cars making the car our slave and not us the car's slave.

Taking the above into account am I going to turn into a computer slave having to keep updating an old computer every time I want to move forward trying something new such as 3D drawing in this instance?

I am already finding it highly frustrating just seeing the yellow perils and knowing they ever existed in the first place on top of this because this system is outdated I can run emachineshop 2D graphics but it dies on emachineshop 3D graphics which after all firstly prompted me to begin this thread

A trusted friend very kindly sent me details a a wonderful motherboard bundle for around £200 which would certainly run the graphics I need without trouble and I was very tempted to simply order one of these bundles and say what the heck just get on with it.

I've had plenty of time today to think about what I want; all your information has been truly helpful rather than confusing; to go the upgrade route would put me back to the years we ran banger cars only because we could not afford a new car until I did the sums; since then all our cars have been under warranty so we could drive in peace knowing no sudden heavy repair bills would land with a loud thump as they did only too frequently. I no longer even check the oil level as it never changes between each yearly service; I don't have oil and filter changes with an old car at 3,000 mile intervals and a huge bonus is I no longer worry each year about the dreaded MOT. In fact I clean the car about three times a week due to our lousy climate but I know the car is always ready to go.

To upgrade this computer would only bring certain aspects up to date but the performance and reliability would be hindered by the remaining old components rather like the weakest link in a chain.

All my working life I have worked very hard as my wife Bron also has so like Gary says there comes a time when the purse strings need to be slackened a bit for certain items or jobs that need to be carried out. When we were desperately short of money we saved like mad to enable me to buy the first computer at £1,000; PC's were just coming in at work alongside the AS400 mainframe. I had great difficulty trying to learn how to use a PC because my job was very stressful and I simply could not sit looking at a monitor for hours on end so the decision was made to buy our own enabling me to keep up with my job requirements. That £1,000 was a great deal of money so these days £600 isn't going to hurt at all given our lifestyle and how little we actually spend on what others would consider necessities (booze/cigarettes etc.).

On top of all this my computer earns its keep because we now shop around on the web for best prices and the computer pays for itself. We don't have children so don't have anyone special to let spent our hard earned money when we finally drop dead so I think the time has arrived to spoil ourselves a bit as we can afford it and get the economy moving once again.

I appreciate straight talking Mark so would never be offended by someone offering help or advice even if it wasn't what I wished to hear and I doubt anyone on this forum would go out of their way to offend intentionally; I ask because I want to know and this is how I learn; I also gain other peoples views which are always most useful.

Regarding the resolution; I set the resolution of the monitor to give full screen picture; I've tried changing resolution but it changes the picture size considerably; set at 1024x768 everything on the monitor looks brilliant to me but then as you rightly say I don't know any better as I admit I'm totally ignorant in such matters. Adjusting my resolution to the graphics card? Do I have a graphics card installed to adjust to; an honest question because I thought I needed a graphics card to drive the 3D? I stand to be corrected and welcome suggestions without taking any offence whatsoever; I'm more than happy to consider anything put forward in posts as each person posting is at least taking the trouble to reply.

After that lot back to the plot; I now know the yellow perils had absolutely nothing to do with my initial problem of moving 3D graphics around and it was unfortunate that I was nosy enough to find the yellow question marks in the first place. The computer stated “Device Unknown” so if this computer hadn't a clue what it was installed with how would a novice know and what could a novice do to resolve the problem. In my case the 3D graphics could not be printed or moved to a folder etc. so when I saw the simple communications controller fault I could only think this to be the cause after all the 3D was not communicating? It took many hours to find out that this was only an unused modem. It wasn't time wasted because due to all the posts I gained a lot of most useful information and knowledge. However now the yellow question marks are solved the initial problem remains and I'm still unable to play around with 3D graphics the way I want to do. What a downright joke this really is though. Over the last 14 years I've spent hundreds of hours playing with all kinds of drawing packages without success and finally a couple of days ago I cracked not on 2D but quickly produced a 3D drawing I would have been proud to share only for this old computer to put up a fight.

I did say right at the beginning I was happy to pay for a new computer and hopefully I have given my explanation as to why I will go ahead and buy new.

This once again has now thrown up a number of options; I stated I preferred DELL but I know nothing regarding what are good or poor computer brands; the Pavilion recommended by Gary looks a brilliant choice and is all singing and dancing; as this thread was started for information I think it would be good to carry on by discussing what computers are on offer and hopefully by doing so the information may also help others.

I still intend to wait until the New Year sales though because usually there are good deals to be had and in the meantime I can consider any information supplied.

I've not been scared off Mark in fact far from it as this thread has taken off nicely and generated a lot of interest and has answered my questions in full; I know know what the “Unknown Device” is and all the posts have convinced me it's time I bought a new computer.

Its good to know this forum is fully loaded with knowledgeable members willing to help others during their hour of need. Thank you one and all.

David says he can waffle on but by heck David I'm well up there with you.

Kind regards, Col.

[Skywave]

I like spending some of our savings and I too was brought up in "make do and mend" as well. On the last leg now and I have tried to let go of that way of thinking. (etc., etc.)
Gary

Gary - why have you "tried to let go of that way of thinking": i.e. the 'make do and mend' philosophy?
Just curious; perhaps I can learn something from you.

Al.

[Joe]

Just a word of caution about warranties. Some companies will carry out repairs free of charge but you have to pay the carriage cost to and from them. I don't know specifically about Dell but make sure you read the small print.

- Joe

[pwdrive]

Gary - why have you "tried to let go of that way of thinking": i.e. the 'make do and mend' philosophy?
Just curious; perhaps I can learn something from you.

I think I know where Gary's coming from, I'm the same, spent all my life slogging, doin' with this, doin' without that, enough's enough, small make do and mend yes, big make do and mend nah.

Lawrence.