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[feliscatusx2]

No 2 Daughter's young man (Ben) asked whether I wanted his old, but still fairly new PC.  No charge, gratis zilch etc.  Some bits are missing having been used in his new media centre.

It arrived on Sunday.

It is an Antec Sonata case with an Asus Mb, AMD 64 3000+ CPU with 1Gb RAM 

I need to find Hard, Optical and Floppy drives.  No problem.

The Mb has 2 SATA ports plus 2 UDMA 133 ports.  I already have a UDMA133 Samsung HDD but my CDRW and floppy are Beige and the case is black.

So I ordered from those nice people at CCL 1 Samsung 250Gb SATA HDD, one LG SATA DVD writer one IDE CD/DVD ROM and a black Sony Floppy Drive.

CCL deliver by CityLink  (who guaranteed delivery by today)

Did anything arrive?

No 

Looking through the box of bits that came with the PC I find that Antec use a special HDD mounting screw to pass through the rubber bungs in the HDD mounting tray.  For 2 HDDs I need 8, I've got 3 

Phoned Ben, they are out.

Sent an E-mail to Antec Europe Support (we will answer your question within 24 Hours).

Have they replied?

No 

Waited in all day for CityLink, and also for the man who said he would come today to quote for fixing a misted up sealed double glazing panel.

Did he arrive?

No

Bin day tomorrow, just been out to get things ready and the heavens opened    my flash white polo shirt (£2.50 in Primark) is soaked.

Not a happy bunny.

Be warned.

[kitz]

All in all not the most productive of days 

[mr_chris]

Hiya... I have a few Antec server cases at work that came with those screws... I can see if I have any spare ones... if you want, give me a prod - I'll be in work towards the end of the week and can have a look if you want

[roseway]

There are few things more frustrating than waiting in for a delivery which never arrives. I find myself sitting on the edge of my seat (so to speak) all day, and I can't concentrate on anything else. So you have my sympathy.

[tuftedduck]

Confucius he say:- "Some days you are the pigeon, some days you are the statue" 

[feliscatusx2]

Progress!

The delivery arrived today while we were in Whistable (got that paperback I have been after for ages - 95p ), and was taken in by a kind neighbour.

Ben phoned to say he has found the screws and these will be delivered tomorrow.

Antec replied to say they can send even more screws if I give them an address.

Just waiting now for a new graphics card to replace the nVidia 5900 series gaming card fitted to which is attached a passive heatsink that look very much like a shrunken Anderson air raid shelter   .  As I don't do games I've ordered an ATI 9550 AGP card with a passive cooler.

Only decision now is what OS.  I have 98SE ME and 2000 Pro.  Mrs FC wants 2000 as that is what she uses at work.  Looking through the ASUS CD there are motherboard drivers for 98/ME and I may install the 98 patched with ME files that I was using before.  Just to be b****y difficult you understand.

And please don't tell me that XP is more secure 'cos it ain't necessarily so  .  98 may be old but it is very easy to secure and will do everything I need it to for now.  And it will run on 1Gb of RAM if you talk to it nicely.

Will probably go for 2000 though.  Indecisive, moi?

Still no word from the window man though  .  I will try someone else.

Thank you all for your attention, it's nice to blow up now and again.

[roseway]

Perhaps I'd better not comment on what OS to install.
Mind you, dual-booting works very well - install Windows first, leaving (say) 10GB of the HD unpartitioned, then Linux.

[kitz]

Progress indeed

hmmm  I dont much care for 98 - but thats just me and I did have some problems with it.
I think out of those choices then Win 2k would be my preference.

[feliscatusx2]

I've fitted the Optical drives,  Floppy and SATA HDD.  All on rails that slide in (and out again).  Realised that I was short of a SATA data cable and that the SATA power connectors are on one cable and are too close together.

Now ordered 2 data cables with right angled connectors and a Molex > SATA converter from CCL (1st class post, not CityLink  ).

Graphics card is on the way, Ben will be round tomorrow evening to check all the cables are plugged in the right holes and to tidy up and see if everything works OK.  If anybody is going to blow it up then I would rather it be him  .

I will probably go for W2K as I have already downloaded all the relevant drivers etc.

But it will be a very slimmed down, cut back hacked about version.  This is a good site for W2K/XP/Vista: > http://www.blackviper.com/ ,  he lists all the services and suggests which can be safely disabled or set to manual.

The fox cubs are doing well and have grown up into handsome stroppy teenagers.

[kitz]

Lets hope the new cables arrive soon.  I'm awaiting a couple of parcels from city link (one of them containing an Antec case) over the next few days too, so I hope the driver doesnt do the same thing on me what he did to you :/

Will write up what I'm doing when I get chance - but things seem to have been a bit hectic this week and I dont seem to have had much spare time.

>> I will probably go for W2K as I have already downloaded all the relevant drivers etc.
Good choice me thinks

Let us know how it all goes.

[feliscatusx2]

Being an impatient sort I wandered into the little PC shoppe at the top of the road and enquired whether they had a SATA data cable they could sell me.

Very, very nice man rummaged in a drawer and produced a packet with a data cable and a molex to SATA power converter.  How much?  "Oh just take them away we've got a drawer full of the b****y things".

So it's now sort of up and running, CPU shows as AMD 64 3000+ running at 2.0Ghz, HDD not yet formated but recognised correctly, will boot from the SATA CD/DVD RW and the floppy.  The wiring is an absolute rats nest at the moment, but this will be sorted when everything is in place.

And it's QUIET 

I may disconnect the blue LEDS on the front though.

Still waiting for the graphics card which is coming from Amazon.EU, which is probably stowed on a dirty british coaster with a salt caked smoke stack, butting through the Channel in a mad March gale (the only bit of poetry I remember from childhood).

Just need to sort out what data I need from the drive in this PC then transfer that drive to the new one.

And yes, I had fitted the rear case fan the wrong way round 

[kitz]

So youre getting there slowly but surely

>> I had fitted the rear case fan the wrong way round 

hmmm  Ive never "nearly" done that with a fan 

[mr_chris]

hmmm  Ive never "nearly" done that with a fan 

lol... why does the smiley make me think someone's not being totally truthful here..?

[Pwiggler]

i bought a new drive yesterday for this media centre coz the drive 'dissapeared' from the system a few times.

250gb sata for $34 !  not bad .... tried acronis true image for the 1st time to make a mirror of the old drive - worked a treat  

[feliscatusx2]

It's up and running 

Just got loads of software to install over the next few days.  The important stuff, K-Meleon and Kerio firewall are on, E-Mail works.

Gosh it's quick.  Win 2K with 1Gb RAM and an 2 Gig CPU.

No problems as yet.