Author Topic: Chat topic (Read 4236 times)

Iggy · « **Reply #105 on:** June 26, 2011, 09:56:39 AM »

There's another thing I was thinking about last night. Power consumption of hardware seems to increase quite a lot as well. My new GeForce GTX560 needs 2 additional powerplugs from the PSU because the power from the motherboard isn't sufficient, the new PSU I bought is 850 Watt, the old one 500. If this trend continues I'll need a nuclear powerplant to power my PC.

MrBlackCat · « **Reply #106 on:** June 26, 2011, 04:01:41 PM »

Quote from: Iggy on June 26, 2011, 09:56:39 AM

There's another thing I was thinking about last night. Power consumption of hardware seems to increase quite a lot as well. My new GeForce GTX560 needs 2 additional powerplugs from the PSU because the power from the motherboard isn't sufficient, the new PSU I bought is 850 Watt, the old one 500. If this trend continues I'll need a nuclear powerplant to power my PC.

I was upgrading an OLD PC a couple of years ago and the power supply had blown... it was a 185watt unit. They added a DVD Burner to it or something. They didn't understand why I had to get a 250. Because of the old and small unit, the PSU was costly.

So yeah... in modern computers with power draws from every direction, you need it.

Here is something interesting. I bought cases a few years ago for my Optical Drive farm units and all they are designed for 9 optical Drives each. That is what they are made for. They have 10 sets of power plugs for this and are 550 watts. By that calculator it says 450W for DVD and 350W for CD ROM units. This includes the interfaces and everything. For me, it is so hard to imagine how much these systems are pulling today. In my old computers, the highest powered unit I have is a 300 (maybe 350) and that is a full height unit with a P120 Board, 5 Hard Drives, a Tape drive, Two 3.5's floppies, and Two 5.25's floppies. Very unusual to have anything much bigger than that back then.
Times have changed.

MrBlackCat

Remmke · « **Reply #107 on:** June 27, 2011, 10:49:23 AM »

With high-end cards you'll need extra power these days but these cards a lot more efficient than old hardware. When in idle power consumption is brought back dramatically, same goes for your CPU.

Just check [http://www.guru3d.com/article/msi-geforce-gtx-580-lightning-xtreme-edition-review/7]this[/url] out. 207W difference when going from idle into max consumption :p

MrBlackCat · « **Reply #108 on:** June 27, 2011, 02:55:13 PM »

Quote from: Remmke on June 27, 2011, 10:49:23 AM

With high-end cards you'll need extra power these days but these cards a lot more efficient than old hardware. When in idle power consumption is brought back dramatically, same goes for your CPU.

Just check [http://www.guru3d.com/article/msi-geforce-gtx-580-lightning-xtreme-edition-review/7]this[/url] out. 207W difference when going from idle into max consumption :p

That is very true... being able to draw what they need, rather than just being in an "on" state.

Same tech used in notebook hardware. I don't know if that was and inherent adoption of function or logically applied, but I notice a lot of Portable computer technology being built into Desktop systems about ten years ago. Things like Hibernation for instance.
Relative to power consumption and speed, my first notebook had a key combination you could change the processor Mhz to one of four different settings... like in the old days almost all computers after 286class machines had "turbo" buttons which switched the processors between two different Mhz speeds. They all displayed the speeds on small LED digital displays on the cases. Most of my computers have those.

MrBlackCat

Iggy · « **Reply #109 on:** August 03, 2011, 06:45:39 PM »

Gosh I really do wonder if that member is a spambot. :p

MrBlackCat · « **Reply #110 on:** August 03, 2011, 07:17:55 PM »

Quote from: Iggy on August 03, 2011, 06:45:39 PM

Gosh I really do wonder if that member is a spambot. :p

How can you tell? (hehehe)

MrBlackCat

Iggy · « **Reply #111 on:** September 11, 2011, 05:32:38 PM »

http://www.radgametools.com/iggy.htm

Look guys, I'm not some find of friggin dog, ok? :p

MrBlackCat · « **Reply #112 on:** September 11, 2011, 07:20:26 PM »

Quote from: Iggy on September 11, 2011, 05:32:38 PM

http://www.radgametools.com/iggy.htm

Look guys, I'm not some find of friggin dog, ok? :p

Hehehe... so do you like to fetch sticks or stick your head out the car window? Maybe you ARE a dog and don't realize it. You have never tried to chase me, so I don't guess so though.

It sounds like a pretty good system actually.

MrBlackCat

Iggy · « **Reply #113 on:** February 03, 2012, 11:17:01 AM »

Problem time - I could use some help here. I have several HD's in my PC of which one has the OS installed, the other one is for programs the other two for back-up and my documents. I bought 2 2.5TB HD's to replace the HD's for my documents and the back-up. They're properly recognized by the BIOS and Win7 and run as they should. Then I shut down my system and replace 2 S-ATA cables for newer ones, including one of the OS HD. After switching the cables and insuring everything is properly connected I boot up the system only to encounter this error;

This error occurs each time I boot up the system normally. Booting into Windows Startup Repair makes the system hang also. I checked the BIOS and I do not see anything wrong. All HD's are recognized and boot settings are correct. I hear the OS HD spinning up and working as normal. I also placed back the old S-ATA cables in case the new ones aren't good but to no effect.

MrBlackCat · « **Reply #114 on:** February 04, 2012, 02:39:17 AM »

I have seen this before... multiple possible causes.

It the recognition of your drives by the OS worked "once" and then not again, then I have seen this several times. Unhook each of the new drives one at a time to verify it isn't an actual hardware problem... meaning the board of one of the new drives.

Another condition that occurs AFTER recognition has to do with File Table memory... some are dynamically adjusted and this sometimes fails after a HDD format.
Example: I would mount and format a drive in Novell Netware and even put files on it, but try to reboot and it would fail to load the volume (partition section) on a given drive because of memory allocation issues.
This was caused by the loading order of Memory Management (relative to partitions/volumes) and disk drivers etc.

What happens if you just unhook both new drives completely?

Don't do anything extreme yet though, it is most likely just a driver/memory issue that can be sorted.

So... are the drives formatted yet? And if so, what are the partition sizes? I do not know all the size barrier issues with drives that large, but there has always been them in the past.

Let us know what you find out. Good luck.

MrBlackCat

Iggy · « **Reply #115 on:** February 04, 2012, 09:49:26 AM »

After some testing I think the problem lies with one of the 2 new HD's. These 2.5TB HD's use a new file table system called GPT in order to recognize the enormous storage capacity => http://www.wdc.com/global/products/features/?id=6&language=1

The HD in question worked fine yesterday (first time use) and I successfully transferred 201Gb of data to it. Second or third time booting up with the HD connected results in the error above. I also tried connecting the HD with 3 different S-ATA cables in case it might be that but no.

Both 2.5TB HD's are formatted in this GPT filesystem and have 1 single partition of 2.27TB each. One worked only once it seems while the other one keeps working properly. I hope that's a good sign.

MrBlackCat · « **Reply #116 on:** February 05, 2012, 01:58:31 AM »

Size issues again... that sucks. I have seen this since the inclusion of hard disk drives in PC's. They never seem to plan far enough ahead. My first hard drive was a 10 Megabyte drive in a stand alone case as large as a normal desktop pc, and weighed about 25 pounds... external of course.

I miss the good ole days when you set your bios up to read a drive (manually) and that was it... all the geometry was hardware calculated... the way it should be. I hate to think my data is driver dependent like now-days.

A common work around when partitians were the issue was to split the drive. This was often done on Novell systems for security reasons, but was necessary on some sizes of drives because of capacity.
Anyway... end of ramble. I guess you do that more when you get old. But I was once banned from a forum for having posts too long. Oh well.

WinXP is the newest OS I have, and 1TB is the largest drives I have.

I think it is odd that one drive works and other is having issues though...
Let us know how it goes. I am curious as I don't know much about such drives.

MrBlackCat

Iggy · « **Reply #117 on:** February 05, 2012, 01:24:35 PM »

I think I'll just send it back for a replacement drive. Maybe I'll have more luck with that one, I won't fiddle around with this broken one for long.

MrBlackCat · « **Reply #118 on:** February 05, 2012, 07:28:50 PM »

Quote from: Iggy on February 05, 2012, 01:24:35 PM

I think I'll just send it back for a replacement drive. Maybe I'll have more luck with that one, I won't fiddle around with this broken one for long.

New drives do fail right off sometimes, but it is rare in my experience. Out of a couple hundred drives, I can remember but once or twice maybe this happen.
I am really surprised at Windows "reaction" to it though... seeing as the OS partition isn't on the drive. But with the HDD having its own translation software, I can imagine all sorts of issues that could come up.
Good luck.

John Martin
Mr.BlackCat

Iggy · « **Reply #119 on:** March 03, 2012, 10:06:31 AM »

I send back the broken HD and got a replacement two days ago. And today, after transferring about 400Gb of documents to it, it got defect again with the same symptoms as the previous one. What the heck is wrong with these modern HD's?

Edit;
Well by the balls of Jesus. I thought the second HD was broken so I had it ready to send back. Until I received today the Sharkoon HDD Dockingstation, which allows you to insert a 2,5" or a 3,5" HD into it and connect it to a PC through USB2.0 or eSATA. And voila, it works perfectly. 0_o