|
Newegg has a policy of replace, not refund. I once ordered a computer kit from them, in which I had to install the CPU chip myself. The motherboard was bad, it was a design problem that could not be fixed simply by replacing it with another of the same. I forget what the problem was, but had something to do with incompatibility with the CPU. Since they would not refund, I spent several hours with their tech support, who even sent me a new CPU chip to try out. I eventually gave up, tossed the whole thing as a loss, and bought a new burned in computer elsewhere.
Therefore, I no longer buy from Newegg except for commodity parts that are a good deal.
|
|
|
|
|
8 year old? Replace anyway. Either you get something slightly faster but lighter / with better battery life or something significantly faster... with the benefit tha you have less to worry about your PC dying suddenly.
GCS d--(d-) s-/++ a C++++ U+++ P- L+@ E-- W++ N+ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t+ 5? X R+++ tv-- b+(+++) DI+++ D++ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
|
|
|
|
|
Most of us are not terrible concerned about the battery life or weight of a desktop system. Though to be fair, it does suck a bit if the CMOS battery is out of juice.
|
|
|
|
|
Whoopsie
GCS d--(d-) s-/++ a C++++ U+++ P- L+@ E-- W++ N+ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t+ 5? X R+++ tv-- b+(+++) DI+++ D++ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
|
|
|
|
|
I was planning on replacing the unit last summer, but prices and availability made me hang on. I fear it's the MB, not the RAM, so replacing the unit is probably my best choice.
|
|
|
|
|
BryanFazekas wrote: I was planning on replacing the unit last summer, but prices and availability made me hang on.
Same here
GCS d--(d-) s-/++ a C++++ U+++ P- L+@ E-- W++ N+ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t+ 5? X R+++ tv-- b+(+++) DI+++ D++ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
|
|
|
|
|
If you need it to run for a little longer, grab some ram. But at that age, it's a $46 gamble. It might be the motherboard failing for that RAM slot.
At 8 yo, you need to start planning anyway.
Charlie Gilley
“They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
Has never been more appropriate.
|
|
|
|
|
A quick test to see if its a motherboard issue or not would be to swap the RAM banks around. If the problem follows the RAM, likely its a RAM issue. If the problem stays with the slots, then its a MOBO issue. If it's MOBO, then a replacement is definitely in order. As others have noted, after 8 years, its probably time to consider a replacement anyway. I have a vague notion that consumer grade electronics - particularly capacitors - have about a 5 year life expectancy. Anything after that is gravy. Though no-one has told my 40 year old GE clock radio that!
Keep Calm and Carry On
|
|
|
|
|
k5054 wrote: A quick test to see if its a motherboard issue or not would be to swap the RAM banks around. If the problem follows the RAM, likely its a RAM issue. If the problem stays with the slots, then its a MOBO issue. That's a great tip! Thanks!
|
|
|
|
|
Yeah, I'm concerned that I'm throwing money away on RAM, even if the problem is not the MB.
As I said in other replies, I've been planning. This may force the issue, which is not necessarily a bad thing as long as I do it before it dies completely.
I considered installing W11 on a new one, but am going to stick with W10 for now. I don't need additional, unnecessary hassles!
|
|
|
|
|
I have old Laptop RAM floating around... You might look around for used.
Someone probably has some shelved (welcome to 2022)!
FWIW, Once a machine hits 2yrs, I try to buy an off-lease cold spare.
My previous cold spare is sitting on the shelf. I am close to getting one.
I've been taken down HARD before. I fresh install is about 80hrs of my time.
[Supporting Software from 25+ years ago]. Moved to VMs, so it might be down to 40hrs.
Eventually, I guess my Dev machine(s) will be in the Cloud, and I will just remote into them.
Why do I picture an X-Windows Like World?
|
|
|
|
|
You sound like my lost development brother
Charlie Gilley
“They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
Has never been more appropriate.
|
|
|
|
|
LOL. No, just old enough to have watched HDDs fail. Lost a RAID because a drive failed while the previously failed drive was still repairing (learned not to use drives from the same batch!).
Had SSDs fail. And whole laptops/workstations die.
I was called in to help a client who had Mirrored his server drives. Using an obsolete controller, and NEVER backed up because he had MIRRORED drives. Well his controller took a dump, and BOTH drives were IDENTICALLY USELESS because the controller formatting them to be unrecognizable in a regular system.
I still remember the first time my machine FAILED and I had a spare. It took me longer to take the drives out and put in the backup machine, then to boot up and get back to work.
Glad to consider you a development brother!
|
|
|
|
|
RAIDs - false sense of security.
Years ago (like 20) we had a very high end RAID in our production system. Many systems shipped to customers. One day, our engineering test unit went down with a bad controller board. Now, in addition to RAID drives and dual controllers, it had dual power supplies - I mean the thing was sold as no single point of failure.
Then one of the controllers died. And the tech replaced it, and we found out that the controllers weren't redundant. Apparently the RAID 5 they did depended on the specific controller.
Sales guy and the company were very upset when I cancelled their contract.
Charlie Gilley
“They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
Has never been more appropriate.
|
|
|
|
|
Reminds me of the old 10 inch backup tapes on the PDP/11s
Control Data Came out, and did their maintenance. When they were done, we could read OTHER tapes fine, but the ones we wrote for backups could not be read, because the tape head was out of alignment when the tapes were created. (They aligned it because it was having trouble reading OTHER tapes).
Being Young, we crossed our fingers. But the Operations Managers, barely 20... Changed procedures so that at least the first tape of each backup had to be mounted/confirmed on a DIFFERENT PDP/11, which meant that there were at least 2 tape drives that could read the tape. [FWIW, that process then discovered we hard Morons on the night shift backing up incorrectly. Thankfully he had the morning shift do this when we were all around, so we could find the issues. But backups were being made to the wrong days tapes. Crazy stuff]
|
|
|
|
|
I'd go for it but maybe get more memory.
I have a 10 years old desktop that ended up with 20GB of RAM, a 500MB SSD for system plus 4TB for data drives. It runs like a champ and for dev work is fast enough.
Mircea
|
|
|
|
|
Mircea Neacsu wrote: 'd go for it but maybe get more memory. At the time I built it, my current desktop was good with 8 GB RAM. 16 pushed the price up more than I wanted.
Assuming I build now (which is likely) I'm going with 32 GB. While 16 is probably enough right now, 32 gives me room for future changes in Windows and other sw.
|
|
|
|
|
TBH, given it's a desktop not a laptop, and you're clearly happy inside the case, I'd have thought it a no-brainer - check the RAM before even posting here. Open it up, swap the RAM cards and if it works, fine; probably one of the cards worked it's way out. If it's still at 4Gb you know its the RAM. If there's no readable memory it's the RAM and the motherboard! Nothing lost other than under 2 minutes.
|
|
|
|
|
The subject does ask a question, and in my OP I asked, "Any suggestions on where to look for components? I build my own and haven't been pleased with what I've seen at the common vendors."
As mentioned previously, I planned to replace the unit last year. This thread garnered replies that covered a lot of points, which is helpful, and pushes me towards what I need to do anyway -- replace the unit.
I have a habit of keeping things running, sometimes long after I should replace. This PC is obviously one of those.
|
|
|
|
|
I had (notice past tense) a pc that was quite few years old.
Upgraded to ssd, more memory but it was rather slow and would get these hangs where ssd would go 100% for a minute.
I was reluctant to spend the money for a possible faster pc.
My son has a rather new gaming pc. It is very fast.
So I took my boot drive put it in his and booted.
The difference was more than night and day!
So I spent 800 or so for new parts (used pcpartpicker; he had an older graphics card (radeon r290?) so saved on that).
It has been the best thing I did.
|
|
|
|
|
replace with new pc/laptop. expect to pay higher prices no builds. no repairs. no rebuilds. unless you are a masochist.
the alternative is to go back to stone tablets and caves.
|
|
|
|
|
My $0.02: Like many, I went through the same exercise a few months back. My workstation is 8 years old. Went to eBay and bought a system identical to mine (5 cents on the dollar compared to purchase). Can use it for backup, parts, debugging, whatever. I put TrueNAS on it and am using it for backup storage for the time being.
To get around the video card shortage, I even went to eBay and then to Dell's outlet store but didn't like the prices. I will wait another year and look again.
If your system is doing what you need and you don't really have to have shiny new things, $46 for memory seems pretty small compared to a system purchase.
Be careful with the online suppliers these days, the dummy bought a 1TB SSD and, without looking, put it in the system. Turns out that it was only 500GB. Someone must have pulled a scam return and the supplier (one of the most popular) didn't look at it, just put it on the shelf. Dumb me, but they won't screw me again.
>64
Some days the dragon wins. Suck it up.
|
|
|
|
|
I swapped the sticks. The good news is I have 4 GB RAM so the MB is ok. The bad news is I have 4 GB RAM so the second stick is dead.
Thanks for all the input -- throwing money into this unit is a waste. I've gotten 8 good years from it, so I have no complaints in that regard.
The feedback on video cards is spot-on -- supplies are limited and the quality I want is a bit stiff priced. However, my current video is 3 yo and apparently working fine, so I have no immediate need to replace it.
I don't like the cases I've reviewed -- most have very limited USB connectors on the front. I did learn one new thing -- it appears USB 3.2 and 4 use USB-C connectors only, which explain why some cases have one USB-A and one USB-C on the front, while others have only a single USB-C. If what I read is correct, all other USB connectors that currently exist will be phased out as USB 1, 2, and 3.0/1 die off.
Since I don't have any USB 3.2 devices, my current case (4x USB 2 and 1x USB 3 connectors on the front) is sufficient. I need to purchase a new CPU, MB, RAM, and SSD.
At some point in the future I'll replace the video card, and eventually the case.
|
|
|
|
|
If you are going to replace I can recommend importing an AMD Ryzen 4750G from South Korea. This CPU includes a good built in GPU, as GPUs are hard to come by right now. I found some at this eBay store https://www.ebay.com/str/beyondtheworld
|
|
|
|
|
I'm researching to determine if buying a CPU with a built-in GPU will work. I play Skyrim and it requires a good GPU.
|
|
|
|