Little Tips When Buying a PC/Hardware

                     From Alex van Kaam

Please note that I can not be held responsible for what you do
after reading this file, these are just some tips from me than can
maybe help you set up or buy a good PC.


The Motherboard:
- Make sure it has a ZIF socket so you can always replace the CPU
  instead of buying a new motherboard
- Make sure you can set the Mhz of the CPU with jumpers on the
  motherboard, this way when you upgrade your CPU from say a
  Pentium 60 to a Pentium 90 you can set the CPU Mhz from 60 to
  90
- Make sure you have a cache of 256Kb, this is enough to cache
  64Mb of memory, remember that say a Pentium 60 can be faster
  than a Pentium 90 if the 60 has a cache and the 90 has no cache

- Make sure you have the second bank of simms empty, so if you
  want to increase your memory you can do so without selling your
  old simms.  Say you buy a PC with 2 simm banks that can each
  hold 2 simms, so that's 4 in total, and you want 16Mb, let them
  fill the first bank with 2 8Mb simms, so you can always add two
  more since you have the room
- Make sure you have a CPU cooling fan on your CPU, high spec CPU
  can get very very hot
- Make sure your motherboard is PCI, this is faster than VESA, if
  for some reason you need VESA slots there are motherboards that
  combine both

Graphics Card:
- Make sure it is built around a S3 chip set, this is one of the
  fastest chip sets when you are running Windows and if you like
  it or not Windows will be the Operating System for the next 5
  years or more.
- Make sure you have plenty of memory, with today's applications
  in SVGA, 2MB of Memory is not much, it's enough but it isn't
  much.
- If you can afford it be sure the memory is VRAM, this is about
  20%-30% faster than the normal DRAM.
- If you can afford it try to buy a 64 bit version of the graphics
  card, today's machines all run 32 bit, this way the graphics
  card is always faster than the motherboard.  (Yes a Pentium runs
  64 bits but only on the CPU not on the motherboard, these are
  all 32 bit.)
- If you also want good DOS speed for your non Windows games go
  for a card like the Diamond Stealth, it's has all I said above
  and it is fast under DOS unlike other card based around the S3
  chipset.

CD-ROM Drives:
- Right, this is a bit tricky, say you have 486 and you bought a
  quad speed CD-ROM drive, with every benchmark program you will
  get around 600 Kb/s as is expected from a quad-speed, BUT when
  you are running a game and your CPU is calculating, running your
  graphics card, your soundcard, checking your mouse and maybe a
  lot more your 486 DOES NOT have the power to cope with 600Kb/s.
  A Pentium maybe but a 486 not.
  Now don't get me wrong, a quad speed or even a faster one is a
  good investment, it has a faster seek rate and is a bit more
  future proof than a dual speed so if it is your first CD-ROM
  drive then buy it, but if you already have a dual speed and
  you're running it on a 486 don't expect a quad speed to DOUBLE
  the performance whilst playing a game.
- Also note that the bigger the CD-ROM cache the better the
  performance.

Sound Cards:
- Make sure it is a Creative Labs Soundblaster, I know on every
  sound card it says it is Soundblaster compatible, the salesman
  will tell you this and they are often cheaper too, but remember
  there is no Soundblaster so Soundblaster compatible as a
  Creative Labs, since they invented it.
- If you made your brand choice then go for a Wavetable version,
  music sounds so much better that once you have heard it you
  don't want anything else.


IO Card:
- Go for either a VESA or a PCI depending on your mother board
- Get an enhanced version it can hold 4 devices
- If you can find one with some cache memory on it, this again
  speeds things up, take it.
- Make sure you get the manual which will show you all the jumper
  settings, you may need them some day.

Hard Drives:
- Only one rule here, the bigger the better, these days all are
  32 bit and you should be able to get a transfer rate of above
  3000Kb/s with the right I/O card, also note that IDE drives that
  are bigger than 540Mb often require a enhanced IDE card.
- Try to buy the same brand as the one you already have, different
  brands of drives CAN have problems when putting one as a master
  and the other as a slave.

Speakers:
- Get some decent ones, you buy them once and they will outlive a
  few PCs

TIPS:

Read every manual of everything you have.
Try out the switches your IO device driver has when it loads in
your Config.sys file.
Using the right switch I raised the transfer with another 500KB/s.
Setting up a good system may take a few weeks, but it is worth it.

Banks switching takes time so if you buy a PC try to buy it with
all the memory you want in one bank.

When installing a second hard drive be sure to set the one you want
as C: to master with a slave present and the one you want as D: to
slave.  Also some I/O cards or Motherboards will have trouble
finding the C:  drive, or only finding it sometimes or only
finding it after a reset if you do not have the C: drive (master)
as the first drive on the connection ribbon.


My experience when buying hardware is that the smaller shops,
although a bit more expensive than say Escom, let YOU choose what
you want and will build the PC to your spec a lot better than the
large shops, and often they have lot more time for you when you
choose a piece of hardware.

DANGEROUS TIPS:  Try only if you know what you are doing !!!!!!!

Normally your motherboard speed will be the cpu speed /2, so on a
Pentium 60 your motherboard will run a 30Mhz, my motherboard has a
jumper to set the motherboard speed to a maximal 50mhz, again
increasing the speed of the system.  Note I'm talking of the
motherboard speed, not the CPU speed After you have done this
check your hard drive by copying some files and running some
simple games before booting windows.

Good luck
Alex

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