Desktop.. Everyone has one of these!

[Ocram's Razr 964]

The blue lights make it look cool.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Actually very nice. I gather that this is a work in process limited by your cash flow. Good luck with it. I am not sure you need all that RAM. Doesn't your application page?

Admittedly, that much RAM will keep a large working set in memory if the O/S will allow it, but will it? Anyone know what the maximum working set is with Windows? (You are running Windows?). I've kind of lost track of what Windows does any more. I don't even remember if it uses hardware segmentation.

[hym 358]

I gather that this is a work in process limited by your cash flow.

Yes, it is.

I am not sure you need all that RAM. Doesn't your application page?

It does, but I've already bumped into resource limitations before and I don't want to have that issue again. Furthermore, there are some additional benefits to having plenty of RAM. Since the system graphics are powered from the CPU and not a dedicated graphics card, part of the RAM is used to supply memory for the graphics demands. Also, swapping data back and forth from the hard drive is okay when you are running a standard hard drive, but it is a guaranteed way to send an SSD to an early grave. Finally, RAM is rather inexpensive ($100 buys you 16GB of RAM) so it doesn't make sense to short sell yourself on RAM.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

A man after my own heart, as far as RAM goes. SDDs are considerably over-hyped at the moment because of the limited life. You are better off with big, fast HDDs. The read-ahead and buffering schemes of operating systems these days makes it very hard to justify a big expensive box of memory that pretends to be a disk.

How big have you got your paging file set? Mine is 22GB. A full partition left over after setting up my two operating systems. I only have 4GB of RAM, basically because I went for some big, external HDDs. The one that's always on-line is 1TB divided into five 200GB partitions (not compatible with NTFS).

[art128 4,622]

Congratulations and welcome to the real world. Mobility is fine when you need it. I haven't for over 10 years, and I don't miss it. You seem to have rather a lot of fans. Are you expecting a heat wave? And why the blue lights?

pssst, blue light cool your computer better cooler, not better, silly me... Greens are more environmentally friendly, and red gives you moar FPS but more heat. (no actually all that is a joke)

hym - You might actually get an aftermarket CPU cooler, the base intel one tend to "die" easily ( and you'll get far better temperature with an aftermarket heatsink.) something like cooler master hyper 212 evo is cheap and very efficient.

Anyway here is my desktop. My third screen adapter is in the mail.

  Edited September 17, 2012 by art128  

[GamerManGT5 35]

Great desktop everyone! Here is my desktop and psst, blue light makes your pc cooler .

Windows XP SP3

[hym 358]

A man after my own heart, as far as RAM goes. SDDs are considerably over-hyped at the moment because of the limited life. You are better off with big, fast HDDs. The read-ahead and buffering schemes of operating systems these days makes it very hard to justify a big expensive box of memory that pretends to be a disk.

Windows 7, which is what I'm running, is supposed to be aware of when it is running on a SSD, and optimize its performance accordingly. Still, I'd rather all my programs be able to live in the RAM entirely. Getting an SSD is an experiment for me, as I will be the only person I know who has one. I'm also not getting it till I have the money to afford a replacement drive if it dies prematurely.

How big have you got your paging file set? Mine is 22GB. A full partition left over after setting up my two operating systems. I only have 4GB of RAM, basically because I went for some big, external HDDs. The one that's always on-line is 1TB divided into five 200GB partitions (not compatible with NTFS).

Currently, the machine is running all the Windows defaults as I haven't taken the time to optimize it yet. I have bigger issues to deal with before that happens.

hym - You might actually get an aftermarket CPU cooler, the base intel one tend to "die" easily ( and you'll get far better temperature with an aftermarket heatsink.) something like cooler master hyper 212 evo is cheap and very efficient.

Right now, the system is running quite well, so I don't intend to spend any additional money for it for a while. With all the fans it currently has, it has more than enough cooling and there is room to had 3 more in the future.

As for the comments about the blue lights, a friend of mine has a couple cold cathode lights that are looking for a good home.

Latest desktop:

[jacksunny 741]

That's a really nice picture!

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

@hym: That is a very nice picture and I wonder if it is by one of the well-known American artists.

[hym 358]

I get all of my wallpaper from InterfaceLIFT.

[Alejandro24 575]

Linux Mint 13, GNOME Shell.

[grstudios 188]

Well, that's mine. I'm still using XP SP3, but I consider to upgrade to WIN 7 soon...

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

As long as you don't have a need for Win 7, why not just stay where you are? Is there anything in Windows 7 that you need to do that isn't in XP?

[hym 358]

Relevance. XP is a dying OS. Win 7 still has a lot of life left in it.

[Alejandro24 575]

As it doesn't change too much. Linux Mint 13, GNOME Shell 3.4.

Relevance. XP is a dying OS. Win 7 still has a lot of life left in it.

Not at all. WinXP is still an option. If XP is dying is because Microsoft wants, but a community of users doesn't agree with that. Proof, look at the net all the interesting complements, improvements and forks of WinXP (I still remember Windows XP UE Edition, wow that was totally amazing fork).

[Cockatoo 2,257]

As long as you don't have a need for Win 7, why not just stay where you are? Is there anything in Windows 7 that you need to do that isn't in XP?

Win 7 has a decent 64-bit version (XP's was apparently not that great and was by no means mainstream) so if you want to take advantage of a 64-bit processor or more than 4GB or ram i.e. modern hardware, XP isn't really an option. Win 7 has at least 8 years of updates left (I think) whereas XP has less than 2. IMO 7 also has a nicer UI than XP.

On the flip side, XP will run better on significantly older PC's and if you still have your install disc, you don't need to put any time or money into getting a new one.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Relevance. XP is a dying OS. Win 7 still has a lot of life left in it.

Agreed, but if this software is doing what you want/need, why bother changing. It is pretty stable by now. Only a new machine should drive you forward.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Ubuntu 12.10 Beta2 - Has a new version of GIMP, so watch out.

They say that a clean desktop is the sign of a sick mind ... In this case, I just put this up and haven't moved much over yet.

[Alejandro24 575]

Ubuntu 12.10 Beta2 - Has a new version of GIMP, so watch out.

...

They say that a clean desktop is the sign of a sick mind ... In this case, I just put this up and haven't moved much over yet.

Not bad Nonny, I have the presentiment that Ubuntu 12.10 will come enhanced, also hope so the same for Linux Mint 14 (with all this of Cinnamon 1.6 and Shell 3.6, I'm too excited with this). The new versión of GIMP is 2.8, right? I love the new version, the single window option is really great.

Nothing change too much, Linux Mint 13, GNOME Shell 3.4:

Clean desktop is a sign of a sick mind...

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Ubuntu 12.04 LTS. Picture is the view of the marina from Signal Hill, St. John's, Newfoundland. This marina is in the very outer reaches of St. John's harbour.

[melbgy39 6]

  Edited October 16, 2012 by melbgy39  

[Terring 6,476]

[GamerManGT5 35]

New notebook = new OS = new desktop

melbgy39: bluescreen?

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Interesting image.

[Ol' Michiganian 6]

My newest desktop (note: I didn't take the photo, a friend of mine did.)

I-75 northbound at exit 144A south of Saginaw, MI.

[Alejandro24 575]

Well, is a desktop, but not at all. Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini Pro, Android 2.1:

And why not, my computer desktop too. Linux Mint 13 Maya, GNOME Shell 3.4:

  Edited October 25, 2012 by Alejandro24  

[Ionic-Elm 13]

It's my hometown, Indianapolis.

And yes I have Windows 8, I know, it's terrible, imo it's fine.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

If you can get a desktop like that with Windows 8, then other than the complaints about DVDs, what's the problem?

[Evandad 109]

Suzaku, I have to agree with you on windows 8, the biggest reasons why I sometimes can't stand it are the lack of a start button and its inability to let SC4 run!

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Suzaku, I have to agree with you on windows 8, the biggest reasons why I sometimes can't stand it are the lack of a start button and its inability to let SC4 run!

Well, I have to disagree on your point about SC4. W8 is just Windows NT 6.2, and not enough has changed to disallow running the game using the methods discussed in the crash discussions for W7. Some things have been ripped out, like DVD movie support, but other than the new desktop and support for touch screens, I think you shouldn't have a problem.

As for a missing start button, the question is: If there is no start button how do you start a program for which there is no desktop icon? I personally hate cluttered desktops. I guess if you can't start the job any other way you could find it in the file system and/or create a .bat file for it and run that. If it is something you use a lot, why not create a desktop icon for it. You can always stash infrequently used icons in a folder. After all, they are just links with command lines.

If you are really P.O.'d, stay on W7 unless you really need something in W8. Distinguish need from want.