News - Valve reveals SteamOS, a Linux for your living room

[crossy]

That might more to do with your SSD,or some other component,ie, a hardware level problem. Are you still running a Vertex2? The Vertex2 and Vertex3 had BSOD issues. IIRC,some Samsung HDDs had problems with the the SB850 and SB950 on AMD motherboards. I know the F3 definitely had an issue with the SB850 and SB950.

That's fascinating information - Vertex2E's been in since the rig's been built and it's only when the system is being hit in gaming that I get a failure. And I've also got a Samsung F3 as a main drive, so although I'm on an 890GX mobo maybe it's that drive that's helping the issue. I'd assumed it was a power or memory related issue - but your info is a good argument for replacing the Vertex2E with something more modern. Was planning to do that anyway because an 80GB drive is a bit tight these days, even with a separate dedicated apps partition elsewhere, because of those dumb programs that insist on dumping rubbish on C:

Strangely enough, it used to be pretty stable, then there was a slew of updates from MS and reliability and performance seemed to slide after that.

To put it in context I have had not ONE Windows 7 BSOD(or even Windows 8 on another box) in years of usage with my main computer,let alone daily BSOD problems. Neither has any of my mates,unless they were overclocking(which lead to freezes more often than not) and testing stability.

Work's laptop BSOD's a lot - but that's down to a known incompatibility in the way that our VPN software and the Juniper Networks client that no-one seems to be in a hurry to fix ... it's just one of those things apparently.

Thankfully it wasn't me who got Vista'd - but I'd got folks who I was helping who did. And all of them were delighted to be able to move to Windows7. I was pretty pleased too because it cut out all the moaning about wanting to go back to Windows XP.

[DanceswithUnix]

I agree with CAT on Windows Vista, I got it 6 or so months after it was released on a system above recommended spec and it worked very well. Having waited until the driver issues subsided, that had little to do with Microsoft, I found my experience with Vista to be very good. Once the service packs were delivered the OS was one of the best I have experienced at the time, Windows 7 was great as well but it was basically Vista with some of the kinks worked out and none of the teething issues from 3rd party drivers.

That is certainly true. I found that of all the Windows 98 variants the best was, wait for it, Windows ME. People look at you funny when you say that, perhaps take a step back in case it is contagious. Possibly because on most machines it was hard to keep an uptime of more than an hour straight after an install, but let it update itself and it worked fine.

ISTR most people I knew avoided XP at the start because it was slower than 98se, and some games wouldn't run. In theory stability should have been better than 98, but in practice it was worse. Again, Microsoft seem to change how drivers are written every other release so no hardware worked.

Once hardware and software started coming out that expected you to be running XP, then it was time to change. It had matured by then and didn't crash anywhere near as often.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

That's fascinating information - Vertex2E's been in since the rig's been built and it's only when the system is being hit in gaming that I get a failure. And I've also got a Samsung F3 as a main drive, so although I'm on an 890GX mobo maybe it's that drive that's helping the issue. I'd assumed it was a power or memory related issue - but your info is a good argument for replacing the Vertex2E with something more modern. Was planning to do that anyway because an 80GB drive is a bit tight these days, even with a separate dedicated apps partition elsewhere, because of those dumb programs that insist on dumping rubbish on C:

Have you tried a flash to a newer firmware revision on your SSD?? It could even be your SSD going kaput. It might be a software issue,but the Vertex series have been known to have problems. If you are looking at a new drive,the Plextor M5S looks good.

[Steve]

ISTR most people I knew avoided XP at the start because it was slower than 98se, and some games wouldn't run. In theory stability should have been better than 98, but in practice it was worse. Again, Microsoft seem to change how drivers are written every other release so no hardware worked.

Some of us jumped the 9x ship early and went for Windows 2000. Now, if you want to talk about drivers...

[Dooms]

Give me a Roku style box that runs SteamOS has Netflix and can streams games from my gaming PC in the other room for less than £200 and I'm sold. I don't care about the full PC in the living room, that would just mean 2 computers I need to upgrade to play games.

[crossy]

Have you tried a flash to a newer firmware revision on your SSD?? It could even be your SSD going kaput. It might be a software issue,but the Vertex series have been known to have problems. If you are looking at a new drive,the Plextor M5S looks good.

Again, many thanks for the info (your status as a guru is definitely safe!), the 2E should be up to date. Replacement's going to be a Samsung 840 series (prob Evo) because we've got a couple of 830's here and they've been trouble free and fast.

Getting back to SteamOS for a second, that's one of the things that annoys me about Windows. Sure, post-crash it does all this information collection, but there's never been an occasion where I've had some useful feedback about a root cause. Not that Ubuntu's any better, but at least with the logs that Linux leaves lying around (remember SteamOS is Linux-based) I've got a slight chance of figuring out why a system dumped.

Again, thanks for the pointers.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Again, many thanks for the info (your status as a guru is definitely safe!), the 2E should be up to date. Replacement's going to be a Samsung 840 series (prob Evo) because we've got a couple of 830's here and they've been trouble free and fast.

Getting back to SteamOS for a second, that's one of the things that annoys me about Windows. Sure, post-crash it does all this information collection, but there's never been an occasion where I've had some useful feedback about a root cause. Not that Ubuntu's any better, but at least with the logs that Linux leaves lying around (remember SteamOS is Linux-based) I've got a slight chance of figuring out why a system dumped.

Again, thanks for the pointers.

The 830 bifurcated into the 840 Pro and 840 lines. AFAIK,the 840 EVO replaces the 840. The Plextor M5S does appear to use longer life NAND,and seems to be more on par with the 840 Pro.

[DanceswithUnix]

AMD support announcement. Should have come sooner, but at least they got there in the end.

http://www.fudzilla.com/home/item/32...coming-in-2014