Tweak3D - Your Freakin' Tweakin' Source!
Talon/Falcon Northwest Prelim (Page 4/4)


Posted: January 28, 2000
Written by: Keith "Farrel" McClellan


Even More Interview Stuff

Tweak3D: I looked through all of the paperwork I received with the system and I didn't see anything saying that opening the case voids the warranty (something that is very common with big system builders computers), just a warning about grounding yourself before touching the components. There was even a contact list sticker attached to the power supply (very cool). Does your company discourage or encourage users to open their computers, and will you still support a system that has been fiddled with a bit (assuming they didn't break anything while they were in it)?

Kelt: Customers are free to upgrade at will. To be honest we don't "encourage" it on Talons like we do with MACH Vs. On MACH V systems we use brass thumbscrews so you can even more easily poke around. Talons are aimed at the more casual, less tech savvy gamer than our custom systems. So most of them probably will never be opened during their life. As for support, we fully support every product we sell.

Tweak3D: All of your advertisements, including the web site and the one you are supplying to the gaming magazines, are saying that you are outfitting your computers with 7ns PC100 RAM, which I believe is rated as CAS-2 (your web site says it's CAS-2, but the printed add only mentions the ns rating). However, you have it set as CAS-3 within the BIOS, and whenever it is set to CAS-2, software errors pop up (as I found out when my BIOS somehow got reset...the computer itself detects it as CAS-2 RAM). Why is the system unstable when set to CAS-2?

Kelt: Actually you just got a 'slow' piece. We got a few pieces of a Fujitsu brand SDRAM module we found that didn't perform as fast advertised. Had you not been in Malaysia, we would've just overnighted you a new stick ;-) (We have an overnight service warranty for US buyers). We do set the memory timings on Talon systems defaulted to CAS-3. The 2/3 difference is just not measurable in mid-range systems. Talons do offer a lot of headroom for the experienced user to tweak these settings however. You have to keep in mind that the audience that Talon is aimed at is not the power users. They're the people that make 3dfx the #1 selling 3D card, not the people who swear they can see huge differences between 16 and 32 bit color.

Conclusion

Thanks for your help in answering my questions (and getting me the system). Be on the lookout for some other articles based around the Talon - including a peripheral hardware review and the review of the system. Until later - and as always, feel free to email me with your questions and comments. [Ed. Note - That doesn't mean he'll respond kindly...]

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