27 May 2008

Quick Update

I know I've been a bit slow in updating (even though I said I wouldn't), but we've had several different things going on, both at the office and at home. We just returned from a banner weekend driving to southern Georgia Friday and back home Sunday for a wedding. I'm hoping to go home tonight and do some write-ups on the intial setup and some considerations to take into account (such as operating system choice, RAID and hard drive setup, etc). The first post will probably be a planning section for determining specifically what you want your home server/home-theatre PC to do, and how to plan for eventual upgrades. There should be pictures as well. I'm trying to do all of this ahead of time so you all don't have to wait for pictures showing what to do.

In consideration for our server/HTPC, I have decided against using an old Socket 478 processor from an upgrade for my father-in-law, and go with my old Prescott Socket 775 processor. The only thing that concerned me with this is the heat factor. The Prescotts are known to be an extremely hot-running chip. As such, I've gone ahead and lapped (I'll explain in a moment) the processor and am trying to figure out a way to lap the stock (meaning from the manufacturer) heatsink/fan (HSF). I'm trying to provide the acronyms for everything, as I have a tendency to use the acronyms rather than the full-length name. The process of lapping basically entails using progressively finer grits of sandpaper and sanding down the object (in this case the processor and HSF) until it is perfectly true (as flat as the state of Kansas, in other words). I have completed the lapping of the processor, though I used both methods of lapping (one which gives an extremely flat surface and the other which provides an extremely reflective surface but not necessarily as flat a surface). I took pictures throughout the entire process, however, I forgot at the very beginning to take a picture of the initial processor and how it would look before you began. I do have to provide a warning: If you lap anything, whether it be the processor or the HSF, it WILL VOID YOUR WARRANTY! If you want to maintain the warranty from the manufacturer, then DO NOT lap your products. I decided to lap mine as I have several stock Intel HSF's; additionally, the processor from Intel is approximately 3.5 years old (so the warranty may have already been void due to its lifetime).

So for next time (as much a teaser for all of you, as a reminder for me as to what to post), I'll discuss the considerations for the operating system and the entire planning of the layout of the server/HTPC. As it stands now for us, we are looking at making a file server (for both our media and our executable and work files) with the eventual upgrade to a full-fledged HTPC with the addition of two or three components. So, we will discuss how to determine your needs and how to achieve them. If you have any specific questions or things you want me to address, please feel free to comment or email me. Until next time, don't fry anything too important.

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posted by Herr Breiten @ 09:00 Comments: 0