New Computer Bits
Just to make sure I didn’t accidentally let any money be left over after Christmas, I ordered a bunch of new parts for my computer late last week. The first (and biggest) part arrived today: a new 19″ LCD monitor to replace my current CRT.
I had actually debated getting two monitors but the prices were only almost low enough for me to justify that. Having two monitors at work is definitely a productivity-booster (having code on one screen and documentation on another is invaluable), but I can’t really justify the purchase until I start doing a lot more coding and a lot less gaming with my home computer.
The rest of the parts are all intended to resolve the heat problems I’ve been having lately. Currently playing any games involves turning on a big desk fan that’s pointed inside my open case so that the processor doesn’t melt. I bought a new processor fan, case and case fans that will hopefully fix the problem.
I was a little depressed when I looked into what would be involved in upgrading my system itself. Unfortunately, when I bought my current system I wanted to keep using my existing AGP video card and so got a motherboard with AGP rather than PCI-E support (to my credit, PCI-E wasn’t the obvious wave of the future at the time). At this point, there’s not a heck of a lot you can get for AGP video cards, so my next video card upgrade will likely entail a new motherboard (and potentially a new processor, since they keep changing pin layouts).
I shouldn’t need a new system for a while yet, but I’m starting to think that “upgradeability” isn’t the driving force for rolling your own machine that it used to be.