Blogs Long term reliability?

http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=179541 Whoops!

 

Gave away recently a PIII 245mhz mmx with just 32mb of RAM that was bought brand new in '97 for around £1,000 and it was still running absolutely flawlessly with it's original 4mb 3DFX Voodoo chip inside. Only thing that ever went wrong was the fan that needed replacing about 2 years ago.

 

I had one of those boards and never had a problem with it running my overclocked XP2500+.
Weird how Asus seems to be quite split with different experiences for different people. I might consider switching to Gigabyte next time I buy a motherboard. Are motherboards the only component that spark such debate?

 

I think it mostly came down to being an early adopter. Pretty sure they were all revision 1. But even so, it's hard to go back to a brand after that.

I think HDD's would be second highest in the debate over reliability according to brand. For instance I won't go seagate anymore after losing two. But others might swear by them.

 

**** long term reliability, technology moves too fast for it to be much of an issue. however.... i do have my pc on 24/7 (not just because i cant be bothered to turn it off, it proabably does more while im asleep). Ive not had much just go due to old age, just hard drives and a monitor.

Most problematic electronics are external power bricks. Those things are always built on the cheap and the transistors go bang all the time. Literally had 4 of them go on me within a year. In different houses, on different surge protectors.

 

Optical drives consistently fail on me.
Been through:
Ausus drives
Sony Drives
Longest lasting has been LG
its been 3 years and that on an external (old fassion big brick model)
It is starting to get load now.

But I will stick with LG because they:
Last Longer
Burn Any thing
Cost nothing

 

Totally agree on Seagate. I've had two go and won't go back. Monitors, I've lost a couple. But they weren't massively expensive and you feel like you get something for your money when you replace them.

Ross, you're right about power bricks. However, I disagree about long-term not being an issue. I think long-term might be a relative term in the tech industry, but it's still important. Nobody wants to have to deal with hardware failure on their pride and joy.

 

well, it all depends on how we define long term. I think what i kinda got as was although I may only use a motherboard for say 2 years before it gets replaced, I might be using it almost 24/7 for those 2 years. Does that count as long term? How many hours of use can you reasonably expect to get from a mobo?

oh, and about optical drives.... the lasers may wear out.... but are you sure it wasnt simply getting dirty? i mean its bound to pick up dust over the course of a year or two.... if the pc is in a dusty environment then its going to get clogged quicker.

hmmm, actually this probably affects a lot more components than just optical drive lasers.

 

That's what I mean. "Long-term" means a different thing with PCs, but it's still relevant. Hard drive MTBFs are quoted in hours. So yes a 24/7 PC can be expected to last less time than one that isn't on all the time. My main desktop machine has core hardware dating back to 2005. Is it the fastest? No. Does it play every single game I want to play? No. But it does most of what I need and I therefore don't want to HAVE to replace it because of failed hardware. If I do end up building a replacement in the new year, I will find something else for my current machine to do, because it cost me a lot of money and I'd like to get my money's worth out of it.

I think it's different for people who change components all the time chasing benches and overclocking, but I think most of us just want to be able to play the games we want, do the work we need to and play some media without hassle. For that, reliability is key.

 

I've not had many bad experiences with components, aside from blowing a cheap PSU before I knew to spend good money on them and burning a MSI Skt A board when overclocking.
That said I don't like Creative anymore, their old Audigy cards worked well and were reliable, but I've had to use the warrenty on 2 X-fi cards and 2 Zen players as well. As such I don't plan on buying from them again, I've got my eye on a Xonar card and an Ipod touch(much as I dislike apple, at least they are reliable.).