Rob00GT

Thanks for the link, but it didn't do any good. I'm in the USA (Texas to be more specific) and I checked the dealers listed. Nothing in their online catalogs come close to what I'm looking for. Any other suggestions?

BTW, why is the title of this post "Fan Recommendation" when it's power supplies you're interested in?

OK, so you've got a fast processor with lots of memory, 2 hard drives, 2 burners, plus a video card that requires power all from 230W??!! Let me guess, you've got a couple of splitters that turn one molex (power) connector into two, right? I don't think your computer is going to live much longer. You need a minimum of 350W, probably closer to 400. You can get one for $30 or less on special at an electronics store like Fry's, but the quality may be no better than what you have already. Personally, I have a setup similar to yours and I went with a 450W Enermax that cost the better part of $100. I have power connectors left over for future expansion and have never had a power problem.

I have a Gigabyte GA-7VT600 1394 motherboard. It has an onboard 6 channel audio capability but only the standard "line in, line out, mic in" stereo plugs built in to the back panel. I want to plug it in to a standard home theater receiver but need a toslink connection to do so. The owners manual states on page 75 that I can buy an optional "SPDIF Output Device" that plugs into a designated set of pins on the motherboard and you just screw it down to an empty card slot in the back of the case. Here are the factory specs: http://www.giga-byte.com/MotherBoard/Produ...T600%201394.htm Download the manual from here to see exactly what it looks like: http://www.giga-byte.com/Motherboard/Suppo...T600%201394.htm The manual shows a nice picture of the "SPDIF Output Device" and shows exactly where to plug it in..... but nowhere on the Gigabyte web site does it tell where to buy one. It's not listed anywhere that I can find. I've also tried finding it at my favorite online computer stores as well and came up with nothing. Anyone know where I can find one? How much should something like this cost?

I always enable S.M.A.R.T. in bios. A little over a year ago I started getting the S.M.A.R.T. error message at bootup on one of my hard drives that was part of a RAID 0 array. The error message gave me about a month to back everything up before the drive actually failed. If you ask me, changing that one little BIOS setting is cheap insurance.

Fan noise was one consideration, it will also be a pretty big box that isn't very sightly in an entertainment center in my living room. The large case is necessary for the 4 hard drives in a RAID5 array. Of course I could go with a network attached storage (NAS) solution but that would just add more traffic to the network. I'm running with about 400GB of storage right now (with no DVD's saved to disk yet) in a RAID1 setup but I'm planning to expand it anyway. That box is currently running Windows Server 2003 and hosts my web site, acts as file and print server, and is the repository for my 65GB of MP3 files. Since I converted my entire CD collection to MP3 files all my CD's have done is collect dust in a closet. I'm looking forward to stacking my DVD's in the same closet. More suggestions are welcome!

OK, so before I take the plunge into XP Media Center Edition 2005 I need to know if it will do a few basic things that are important to me. My plan is to build it myself and use the media center pc as a "media server" for my house. It will be placed in my office where no one will notice all the fan noise and a media center extender (or some other silent thin client device) placed in the living room and bed rooms, connected by 100MB/s ethernet. Now here is where I'm foggy on the details. I want to copy my DVD collection onto the hard drives of my "media server" so that a movie can be called up by any of the extenders/thin clients any time. No I'm not looking to make a bunch of pirate copies of DVD's, I just want to have a single device (the extender) next to the tv that can serve up all my media. I'm tired of having VCR's and DVD players in every room with the associated media strewn across the house. With kids you never really know where your DVD's might end up and having them playable "on demand" eliminates the problem. OK, now if that is possible what about assigning rights to individual extenders? For example, an extender in a child's room can view any movie rated PG or G, but not rated PG-13 or R. Is an extender that smart, is Media Center that smart, or can I place the movies is different folders based on ratings and allow only certain extenders to see them? Since XP Media Center Edition is based on XP Home and not Pro I know that Active Directory is not an option. Finally, I want to do the same thing with MP3 files. Playable on demand from any room but able to set rules. I want the kids to be able to play their stuff, but they're too young for Eminem, Limp Bizkit, and some other harder-edged artists. Your advice is appreciated. Rob

Well, the story ends with a format of the hard drive and a reload with XP Professional. I've never had trouble with SP2 on Pro, this was my first experience with XP Home Edition. Never again! Luckily last October (thanks to the great how-to's on this site) I created an unattended install DVD of XP Pro SP2 and Office 2003 SP1 so the windows/office reload only took an hour while I watched TV.

Thanks for the help, unfortunately it didn't work. After doing everything I could think of, I went into Add/Remove Programs and removed SP2. Once it was gone full network connectivity returned. I tried installing it a second time from the Windows Update web site but that too caused a network failure. Guess this is one computer that will just have to live without SP2.

OK, so I agreed to help out my neighbor by updating his PC with all the latest MS patches, including SP2. He bought a system from Gateway that came with XP Home edition but has been without internet service for a while, and I've got DSL so.... Anyway, everything is going fine, using the Windows Update web site to download and install everything. When SP2 install completes, I no longer have any internet connectivity. Here are some of the symptoms: * When it boots, it aquires a valid IP address from my router. However, if I disable the LAN connection and then enable it again, it cannot get an address from the router. * When I try to ping a server on my network from the command prompt I get the following error message: PING: transmit failed, error code 65. The computer is a Gateway 500S model that came as a package with 15in. flat panel monitor, speakers, etc. It's an Intel 2GHz processor with 256MB of memory. I had a spare NIC laying around so I installed it just to make sure there wasn't a hardware failure in the onboard NIC, it didn't work either. Everything points to a problem caused by the SP2 upgrade, I just can't find any references to what it could be. Everything I've ever worked on was for XP Pro, I'm starting to really think this Home edition sucks. Your advice is greatly appreciated.

I've upgraded to the F7 bios. Still no luck.

I have a Gigabyte GA-7VT600 1394 motherboard and for the life of me I can't figure out how to turn on the SMART monitoring for the hard drives. At bootup I see the message that SMART is disabled, but looking through all the BIOS options I can't find any way to turn it on. I'm on the F5 BIOS revision. Can anyone help?

Sounds like you need some more education on the subject. Here's some reading material to help you get started. How to configure multiple web sites with a single IP address using IIS 6.0 How to configure web site logging with Windows 2003 How to troubleshoot a web server in Windows 2003 These are all specific to Windows Server 2003. If you're still using Windows 2000, each of these web sites has a link to the Win2000 version of the article. Have fun!