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Flowery new desktop

A year and a half ago I put together a system built with some pieces I purchased from the Trenton Computer Festival. It was a server though, pretty loud, very heavy, and the hardware was a couple years old when I bought it so became out of date pretty quickly, and the Xeons were too old to have virtualization. When I decided to move I also decided to replace it and have the parts delivered here in SF.

Yesterday I put together the new machine.

Specs:

  • Intel Core i7-860 Lynnfield 2.8GHz 8MB L3 Cache LGA 1156 95W Quad-Core Processor
  • GIGABYTE GA-P55M-UD2 LGA 1156 Intel P55 Micro ATX Intel Motherboard
  • 2 x OCZ Platinum 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory Model OCZ3P1333LV4GK (so, 8G total)
  • 500G EIDE harddrive (from old desktop)
  • 1T SATA harddrive (from old desktop)
  • ATI Radeon X1550 (from old desktop)

Pretty sweet, right? I’m excited about the new specs, but I’m also excited about the case:

In Win Allure

It’s the In Win Allure case, with light purple flowers and Swarovski crystals! I felt a bit silly spending over $100 on a case that doesn’t come with a PSU, but I really couldn’t resist after seeing how gorgeous it was.

I put it together on Thursday and tossed in a couple harddrives from my old machine. Unfortunately I was running 32-bit Ubuntu on that old machine so it looks like I’ll be reinstalling with 64-bit probably next weekend so I can actually use that 8G of RAM and I’ll be swapping out my 500G EIDE with a 500G SATA I have.

15 Comments

  • Nathan Nutter

    That’s a very nice case! I’m going to link this to my sister, she will love it.

  • Nathan Nutter

    P.S. (She just painted hers red/pink.)

  • Nigel Babu

    Wow, that is one mean machine :P

  • Alan

    Thats what I thought: my sister will really dig this. I’m sending her the link now.

  • Jonathan Carter

    Spending some money to make something look really nice is quite often worth while, I’ve regretted once or twice only spending money on making something functional and then having to look at something ugly for a while. Looks really good!

  • RoboNuggie

    There is a company here in the UK that sells pink computer stuff, funnily enough called “Pink Computer”, not as nice as your case though…

    http://www.pinkcomputer.co.uk/index.php

  • vitorgatti

    Nice computer :)

    I’d like one of those processors to do lots of folding@home…! Currently I’m doing only 2 because of my Athlon X2 Dual Core :P

    But wait… CRT Monitor?! O_O

  • matthew

    Very nice! Congratulations.

  • nhasian

    I thought the Intel Core i7 processors used triple channel memory? Or is that just for optimal performance and it will also work with 2 channel memory?

  • pleia2

    I knew someone would mention the CRT! :) I just moved here and my flatscreen monitor hasn’t arrived yet, had to dig an old CRT out of storage for now.

    Not sure about the memory (dual vs triple), but it’s working great so far.

  • ikkefc3

    The Core i8xx has dual channel memory (no triple channel).

    You probably should replace the video card. It makes a lot of difference (e.g. buy a Nvidia Geforce GTX 260 or ATi Radeon HD 4890).

  • pleia2

    The video card is just a ~$20 one I snagged at newegg when my old one died, it works fine for what it is. Maybe someday I’ll get a better one :)

  • Jeff

    This would go nicely with the office design I have bouncing around in my head. Now all I need is a whole lot of cash to make it happen. :P

  • Scott Beamer

    Cute case. I’d been wondering why you were getting a new computer so soon (I’m obviously catching up on your blog posts. I just noticed recent status messages on Facebook).

    I’m glad you popped for 8GB of RAM. I’m a little sick of people telling me that I only need half that.

    They obviously have never run multiple apps and a Virtual Machine (or two) at the same time. :)

    I wish I had the patience to build my own. I opt for 2nd best and dealt with a place that does custom computers. They ‘re one of those that lets you pick everything (down to the brands models of all the parts). The also give you a choice of operating systems (Windows, Ubuntu, or Fedora – or none at all).

    I went for Ubuntu at the time only to show my support for a vendor what will install Linux (I’d have otherwise saved $20.00 and gone for no OS at all).

    I’ve been very happy with my baby which I’ve had for almost 19 months now.

    As for spending that kind of money on a case, there is a lot to be said for something that looks good. I think people that opt for something that’s only “functional” are a bit dull. :)

    I spent over $100.00 on my case also (although I don’t recall exactly what it cost me anymore. I know it was at least $150.00).

    OK, I’ll stop babbling now…..

  • azetidine

    I had a boring black case… but then I put Rainbow Brite stickers on it. Love what you did here. :)