Re: changing the fan cooler on my video card

Tech-Archive recommends: Repair Windows Errors & Optimize Windows Performance

Ok, so your saying to leave the sprout of IEEE 1394 plugs alone and tie them
off someplace in the case. Well, if that's it, because I already plugged in
the front panel 5 plugs: speaker, HD LED, Power Switch, etc.., those aren't
really my problem, even though that was helpful by telling me to just 180
degree them if they don't work. There was a CI plug on the case away from all
the others and that was somewhat of a wtf to do with this plug, until I saw
the mobo manual and tower manual and figured out why that one prong was empty
on the front panel connectors, well now it's not empty. That's if someone
opens the case.
No, I've fixed a number of PCs, and built a number more, but I'm still
learning about PCs. I know about the voltages on the certain molex and mobo
connectors that I just learned last week, and how to test them with the
multi-meter. I just learned about downloading the correct chipset drivers for
the non-Intel graphics cards. That bothered me, I went to the Intel website
that was printed in the video card manual of the ATI Radeon 9800 Pro that's
now in my Dell 8300 until I fix the cooler on the ATI FireGL X2 AGP Pro video
card.
This is a question I want answered that has just started bothering me when
I read the box, unopened with plastic still wrapped, on the VisionTek, Radeon
HD 3870. I went to newegg.com and tried to get some reviews on it, but they
aren't offering the card. Now I bought it from Best Buy and I had to go all
the way to Mission Viejo to get it, well 2 of them, I bought the last 2. It
was on sale from $249.99 to $129.99, $120 dollars off. Even if I went to
newegg, I don't think I could get it that cheap. What do you think about
installing this card in my new PC. Or do you think I should upgrade to a
better more expensive card? Another thing about the card is the compatibility
with Intel. I'm reading more AMD on the box then Intel Pentium 4. It is ATI
Radeon Graphics though. Yeah and looking through the plastic, I can see the
ATI label.
Maybe I'm worrying too much here. Another disappointment or hectic morning
because of my laptop. I've been hitting the tdameritrade icon that I brought
down to the quick launch task bar right next to the Start icon. It's called
the System Tray on the right side bottom task bar, but I'm not sure what they
call it on the left side. No matter. Hitting that icon, instead of going to
Internet Exploxer and clicking on the drop down menu, costs me $750 bucks. I
made $742.50 today. I could've made 30 cents on Citigroup, selling short at
$20.50 and it dropped to $20.20, but my brother is a bump on a log. He thinks
he going to get it all and won't take a profit. As soon as I got my laptop up
and entered in the data, 5000 shares of C, market, buy to cover, and clicked
it to dump it we were up only $4.30 dollars, I think I got $20.41. This
brother of mine let $1,100 dollars go, which is typical. Only thanks to a
couple of more trades and then settled at $742.
Ok, I know you don't want to hear my problems.
One thing I've learned, get the website up from the drop down menu of
recently viewed websites. It comes up everytime.
Alrighty, I need some sleep, went to bed at 3:30 am and woke up at 6:15
am, maybe 2 more hours of sleep.
Thanks, attilahthehun1

"Paul" wrote:

attilathehun1 wrote:
Man, it's 8:15 PM here and I live between El Segundo and Hawthorne 2 miles
from Manhattan Bch. I'm burning up. I have my shirt off and a towel around my
neck and I'm sweating like a pig. LOL

It is *perfect* here right now. My A.C. has been off for a week, T=72F inside
the house. Zero energy bill for that. Too bad it is raining like a bitch.

Anyways, I've abandoned my list for the day or two because newegg.com is
out of the RAM stick I want. I put down that I want 184 pin, DDR 333, 512 mb
stick, and 7 different sticks came up. The only one that quoted that it was
unbuffered. It was out of stock and I put in a notification in to tell me by
e-mail if it comes in. I said I would buy the items in my cart when the stick
was available. The stick was the last one on the list, I guess on purpose
newegg did that. Put it last on purpose.

You don't have to be that restrictive in your choices. You can purchase
PC3200 (DDR400) RAM if you want. What you want, is RAM that doesn't
say "registered". Likely there are lots of sticks that would work.

Ok, oh and by the looks of the VF900-Cu VGA cooler that I saw from your
picture that I don't think it will work on my card, unless I use the old
metal frame and plop the fan onto it. Maybe a water cooled system would work
better? Now that the card is bare of a cooler.

I think the VF900-Cu would work, but fitting the tiny heatsinks on the RAM
is the hard part. I bet the guy who helped you remove the screws on the
current one, could fit it.

Water is just asking for trouble - it takes some experience in selecting
fitting, hoses, etc, to get a water tight build. And accidents happen - one
guy, put his water pump on a separate switch from his computer. His girlfriend
was over for a visit, turned on the PC, but forgot the pump. His system was
fried because no water was flowing to make the cooling work. You need more
build experience, before going with water. Not recommended for first-timers.

Getting onto what I did today. I started building the new PC that I am
upgrading my Dell 8300. Well upgrading isn't exactly what you'd call it.
Everything will be new except the hard drive, optical drive and floppy drive.
Maybe even the floppy drive will be new. I was having second thoughts about
how I installed the front panel connectors. You know the small connectors
that you have to push down onto to those small row of pins on the mobo, that
you can barely see. The ones on the outside I pointed outware towards the
ends of the mobo, and the ones on the inside of the mobo I pointed inward
towards the middle of the mobo. In other words, the labels that you can read
what the connector says are pointed inwards on the inside pins and the
connectors on the outside closest to the edge of the mobo, those labels are
pointing towards outer most edge. Well, there are only two options, inside
pins and outside pins, I think you get my drift. Do you think that is the
correct arrangment?

The diagram in the manual is pretty clear. The PANEL header has two rows of
pins. Each 1x2 connector with twisted pair of wires, goes to pins in the same
row (horizontal). The LEDs are polarized. If the LED doesn't light up when
you run the system, simply rotate the connector 180 degrees and try again.
The SPKR cable has two wires, fitted into pins 1 and 4 of the 1x4 plastic
shroud. The speaker, reset and power switches are not polarized, and it
doesn't matter which way they're turned (+ and -). The LEDs matter, and the
+ and - are significant, but no damage done it they're plugged in backwards.
Just rotate them and plug them in the other way, and they'll light up. There
should be a total of five twisted pair cables to connect. The only one that
is essential, is the PWR switch, to turn the computer on and off. The computer
would work without the rest of that stuff connected.

1x2 1x2 1x4
PWR PWR CASE
<-- LED --> <-- SW --> <-------- SPKR ------->
X X X X X X X X


X X X X X
<-- 1x2 --> <-- 1x2 --> No
HDD Reset Connection
LED Switch



There was also another thing that bothered me, I was
using a screw driver to screw in the motherboard screws that has been
magnetized. I know not to get a magnet close to the hard drive, but what
about the motherboard screws? I hope I didn't blow it by using that
screwdriver.

The motherboard is not sensitive to magnets. The hard drive isn't either.
It takes a very strong magnet to damage the hard drive. The most sensitive
thing for magnets, is one of those old CRT monitors with the vacuum tube,
as you can throw off the color purity with magnets nearby. That is why
computer speakers are "shielded", so they won't upset a CRT.

The hard drive has magnets inside it. Powerful magnets. So if magnets
were going to affect the hard drive, they'd have to be stronger than
the ones used on the actuator. Pictures here.

http://www.computer-hardware-explained.com/hard-drive-magnets.html

<<snip>>

There is another 2 front panel connectors that are much thicker cables
and it says it goes for EAR mike. There are 2 plugs one says AZALIA and
the other says AC.97. Now the thick black cable goes directly to the
> AZALIA plug and then it has an offshoot plug that says AC.97. There are
> 2 plugs coming off 1 black cable. On the mobo though, there is only one
connector, a F_Audio connector. So, I've plugged the AZALIA plug into
> the F_Audio mobo connector. These are coming off of the front panel,
> that's why I guess you see F_Audio, front audio.

The Azalia (HDAudio) connector is fine. Each connector is a 2x5 with room
for 10 pins, but only 9 pins are on the motherboard. The missing pin is
for keying, to guide insertion the correct way.

The Azalia has plug sensing signals, which is the difference from AC'97.
Note the instructions in the manual, regarding "Disable front panel jack detection".
You want to leave your check box unticked, as you've used the Azalia plug and
not the AC'97 one. So your jack sense will work, and there is no need to
Disable it.

There are some other plugs, now I'm not talking about the front panel
regular connectors, I already spoke about those already. These plugs are some
I've not encountered before. There are a bunch of connectors, well not a
bunch, it's 1 thick black cable, like all the others I've been asking about,
that has a nine different 1 prong connector plugs that I don't know wtf to do
with. There is an LPT labels double row of prongs, that I think is used for a
printer?

LPT header would be for a parallel (printer) port. You'd need a PCI slot cover
and cable assembly to use it.

There is another set of unused prongs that say COMA that are used
for I don't know wtf ?

Serial port RS232. Again, you'd need a PCI slot cover and cable assembly to use it.
Serial port was used with modems at one time.

Now this sprout of plugs say IEEE 1394 and I have no
place so far to plug them in that is familiar to me.

You don't have a 1394 chip onboard, so the front panel 1394 jack will be unused.
Leave the cable unconnected.

The motherboard is a GIGABYTE S-series Ultra Durable 2/ Dynamic Energy
Saver that supports Intel Core 2 Multi-Core Processors. It's a model
GA-EP35C-DS3R motherboard. The tower is a Thermaltake P/N: VA8003BWS case.
Oh no, it says ATX motherboard, BTX upgraded kit (option). ATX is that Intel
supported or AMD supported? If it's AMD then I'm off to a bad start. I think
I have an Intel chip and an Intel motherboard? Well, here goes with the chip,
it's a Intel Core 2 Duo, that answers half the question, Dual Core DESKTOP.
I'm pretty sure the mobo is an Intel chipset because I got it from newegg.com
and the motherboard came up as wanted accessories or the chip came up as
wanted accessories. Either or I forget which I ordered first and then added
on.
Ok, I think this message is getting a bit longwinded.
Any more help will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks, attilathehun1

ATX is the dominant form factor for desktops. Both AMD and Intel motherboards
are made to fit that form factor. BTX was used in some prebuilt computers,
and at this point, I'm not sure of its official status (dead or alive).

Paul

.

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