Taking the plunge into the custom built world

[BC_Programmer]

Room for future expansion.  It's only 2 - 2.5 Gig...

 

depends on the system. the 32-bit address width limits a 32-bit OS, no matter how much you tweak, to a definite limit of 4GB of RAM- however as with all PCs since the original a good portion of memory is stolen by the system. On the XT, for example, this was a teensy bit above the 640K of DOS memory (XT's could take 1MB of RAM). not all of this was used so that is how we got the HMA (high memory area)... but enough of that.
obviously nowadays peripherals and the system store a lot more data in the upper echelons of RAM; I have often heard that Video RAM is addressed here, but that is a load of bollocks- the VRAM is accessed via the display driver routines and or I/O addresses. what is actually reserved is for shared system memory, which Both AGP and PCI-E support. If more VRAM really did consume actual memory address space it would be kind of pointless to have VRAM in the first place anyway.


What is really consuming this space is the I/O address lanes of each peripheral; flipping bits here and there, writing memory, reading memory here and there at device I/O addresses in memory can tell you things about those devices. this RAM is reserved, and cannot be used for running applications.

[Aardobard]

What speed #'s can you come up with here....IE Raid vs. normal drive status ? ?

Take a look at this thread on a sister forum: http://www.overclock.net/hard-drives-storage/551501-post-your-setup-hd-tune-results.html
The second post is a single drive 640GB with a 94 Mb/sec avg transfer rate.
The third post uses two of the same drives and achieves a 203 Mb/sec avg transfer rate. (Note: the raid setup in this example also uses a technique specifically to boost transfer rates at the expense of storage capacity (short-stroking) but the point is that the raid array is capable of achieving much faster transfers than a single drive.)

It was the best example I could find of two setups using identical drives.

[Aardobard]

I don't think I'd use a 64 bit version either, to be honest.

I added Vista home basic 64 mostly as a place holder.  By the time kpac buys, WIN7 will be out.  In systems today, I see no reason to use 32 bit systems unless you have specific applications that do not function under a 64 bit OS.  Visually, there is no difference.  Functionally, you get to utilize more than 3.5 Gb of RAM, among other things.  Pragmatically, if I had an application that needed a 32 bit OS to function, I'd be inclined to run it under a virtual machine within the 64 bit environment.

I made the switch to a 64 bit OS a year ago. For me, it's a no-brainer. 

[Aardobard]

Woah, thanks so much Aardobard. That is a great list - a lot more than I expected. And it's over £100 pounds cheaper. I'd being using at least Vista Home Premium, though, but the other monitor will balance the price. And 6 Gigs of RAM? Great!

Forgot to ask.......Do they ship to Ireland? I can't find anything on shipping.
Thanks, but I'd like something a bit more stylish! See-through panels with LEDs...
Is it full-tower I need? How about this one?

The Antec 900 is a legendary case, you will be very happy.

[kpac]

Prices are changing like the weather. The CPU Aardobard priced went up ~£20, the motherboard came down ~£2, and the GPU must be out of stock, as I couldn't find it anywhere.

that makes 6GB of RAM pointless then.... 32-bit OS's can only access up to around 3.5-4GB.

I didn't know that, thanks.

Knowing that, I'll probably set up a partition with Windows Vista/7 32 bit, just in case I have any compatibility issues...

The Antec 900 is a legendary case, you will be very happy.

Thanks again.

[BC_Programmer]

Actually I was also expecting at least a few compatability issues myself, but neither my laptop or my current build has had problems with 32-bit applications- they run just fine. And of course I can run fancy pants 64-bit programs too 

[Aegis]

So, Mr. La-De-Da, what's out there for 64 bit, anyway?   
(We now return you to your regularly scheduled thread.)

[BC_Programmer]

not much, actually. A few games seem to have a 64-bit mode, and a few programs do, but for the most part all I run are 32-bit programs.

but I mean- c'mon- notepad is 64-bit... that's reason enough to switch. In fact that was the driving force behind the switch. Or maybe it was minesweeper. Not sure.

[kpac]

Thanks for the enlightenment, BC. Vista Ultimate x64 is actually only about £5 more expensive than 32 bit...

[Aegis]

Just teasin', BC.  It'll all be 64 bit, someday, and then the 128 bit hardware will hit the market...   

[BC_Programmer]

and you why we'll have 128-bit processors and 128-bit memory access architectures- it's all for notepad. and maybe minesweeper.

New features in the 128-bit version of minesweeper: now you can play field sizes up to 2^128 in width and height! (note: 1TB or more of RAM recommended)

new features in notepad: Insert key toggles insert mode. (note requires at least 2TB of RAM and internet explorer 9 to be installed)

[patio]

I have been running Vista Ultimatex64 for over a year now and the only 2 apps that i had issues with are out of my old toolbox and were written for Win ME or earlier...

Go for the x64.

[kpac]

Thanks patio.

Anything special about Vista Ultimate?