Auxiliary Computer, Aux for short (I guess.)

[VastLite]

This one is made up of all the top tier leftovers of my gaming computer-alpha.

It was made with pretty good components in its day, but seems dog-slow compared to what I'm used to now.

The Motherboard is an Asus nForce 570 SLi, (Again, 2x Pci-e 16x slots that I never seem to be able to use the second one of...)

I really wanted an Athlon 64 X2 6000+ when I was building this, so I waited until I found a really good combo deal on it and the mainboard. So yeah, CPU be a 6000+
Runs way too hot, especially in its confined space. There's next to no airflow where the computer sits. Even with high-end air cooling (MX-2 thermal compound and a nice Freezer 64 Pro) it idles in the high "smelting aluminum's" and in-game I believe it could heat all of Canada.

Memory was over-extravagant, G.Skill HZ's, a matched pair of 1GB sticks at the same timings of my other computer, 4-4-4-12 @ 800Mhz. I should have gone with the 4GB kit at CL6, but not knowing how much damned memory Windows Vista and 7 would take down the road, 2GB seemed overkill on XP.

The videocard in it now is a Radeon HD 3850 512MiB (I really wanted an 8800GT back then, so there was no way after being forced to settle for something cheaper that it was going to have anything less than 512...) It actually still holds up reasonably well for the resolution of the LCD it's attached to.

(Oh that reminds me, my other computer has a really nice Asus LCD monitor I got for Christmas. It's a 23.something inch 1920x1080, it's a TN panel, but really, what isn't today. My light photoshopping will have to settle being done in a 6-bit color-space, oh well.)

Anyway, the 3850 is driving a 17" 1280x1024, and it looks very good in-game for how old it is. The Saboteur looked amazing when my sister was playing it because her computer was too laggy to finish a race or something. She ended up finishing the whole game on it from that point on. Guess that's what the computer is for: other people than me playing it...

Hard drive in it is also very new. It's a 1TB Western Digital "Blue." I have absolutely everything I've ever downloaded on the internet on it and it still has 400GB free. That's with every disk image I have on it too. Some may say overkill, I prefer the term "future-proofing." That or if I ever want to run my own version of redtube. Now if I could just find willing actresses...

Power Supply is just crap. I'm really surprised it's still running (knock on wood and/or insert superstitious ritual here (no, not that one, you know you can't do that in public!) ) It is absolutely value brand. It says 600watt on the side, I've never had it hooked up to half that wattage, I'd be surprised if it could still continuously output 400watts. Anyway, bought the thing before I found out about Newegg, on TigerDirect. I recall it being $49 or something, and I never did get the rebate. It's shining feature is that it has 2x 12-volt "rails" and two pci-e power connectors (Can you see where I'm trying to go with these builds? But by the time I have enough money for a second card, I can by one for cheaper that is more than twice as fast. So no SLi club for me :|

Case is the epitome of ghetto. I took the original mesh lining of my primary case (it was preventing me from installing the extra fans) and taped it to the side where the acrylic window had fallen off with black duct tape. I have about three fans attached to that webbing, one with just bare screws on the mesh, no mounting brace or anything. The rear didn't even have a spot to but an exhaust fan, so I just kind of put one in a place with a bunch of holes. It kinda moves air.

Dvd Drive is very similar to my other one. It's a Samsung "SuperWriteMaster" and yes that is all one word. Imagine that from a Taiwanese company...

OS is the same too, Windows 7 Ultimate x32.

Oh, another thing I forgot to list on the other one: my primary computer is hooked up to some pretty old but very decent Altec Lansing, with virtual surround sound. (It's a knob, you can turn it down if it's too annoying) It also has a really cool subwoofer.

This one has some cheap Cyber Acoustics speakers I bought from RadioShack. They actually sound really good for what they are, and even come with a separate, sort of passively powered, subwoofer. It's the perfect volume for the tiny space it's in.

That's about it for this computer. I can't list any more because the other ones aren't mine. I just built them. I have 6 to my name in this house. 5 are currently used full-time (as in they are plugged in) and 4 are gaming computers. (2 of those being mine of course. And of course they are the fastest. (They being these two, if you're following along at home) )

Other honorable mentions go out to my old 7900GT that my sister now has, also to my old 19" lcd that I gave my other sister for Christmas. Oh, and certainly to the pair of 80GB SATA hard-drives I used to run as a striped raid. (Somehow no matter what I did, running those two drives in a raid configuration would corrupt my list of installed programs in XP, perhaps it was the drivers, but it would do it every time I reinstalled windows, without fail, the exact same way. It was some eerie stuff.) And certainly, last but not least, my first Athlon 64 I got way back when, the 3200+ that is currently running our office computer. Couldn't have done it without you. (That's usually what you say when you end one of these, right?)

[VastLite]

CPU was changed to a Phenom II X4, running at 3GHz

Ram is now 4GB, DDR2 800 running at a CAS latency of 4 cycles.

Motherboard is now my old 790GX, still running strong.

Graphics card is now my old Radeon 4850, also still running strong.

My dad kind of inherited my nice keyboard, mouse, speakers and monitor, so I'm pretty much using crap.

A Sony Trinitron (I don't even know the size, the thing weighs as much as my TV) that I run at 1600x1200-70Hz.

Like I said, the mouse and keyboard are just horrible, I don't even want to know what they are.

I'm using my old stereo as a set of speakers. They're quite large and the bass is nice but way too loud to be propped up against a wall like they are. They are usually turned off and I just use headphones.

I switched to 64-bit with this one as well, it's not as bad as I thought.

I really have only used this computer for video-conversion so far. It's actually pretty decent at it. It can rip a DVD in Handbrake at about 45fps using the High profile with pyramidal b-frames enabled. (Set to 6 reference b-frames.) Not too bad and only about 15fps slower than the 6-core.