These must exist already but I can't find any.

Looking for a flip-up VGA monitor (up to 8" size) - that's flip-up as in like a laptop monitor. I've tried in-car PC places and ITX shops online and mounting brackets, arms searches & I can't find what I want at all.

Even better if it's a pico-ITX PC case, with the flip-up on top of the case. I'm sure these'd be popular with other folks too :)

(the idea is just to put a portable PC together; I like laptops fine but I think they're too big to really be considered mobile)

Definitely start out doing a search on your CPU type and some keywords like 'overclocking' - then you can see what other folks have done already with it, so you can see what levels are safe / stable to go up to.

re: Dr. Sponge - you're right, there's plenty of Earth creatures discovered and filmed many a time that don't require oxygen to live - they exist around volcanic vents underwater and are considered sulphuric. They look like shrimps and lobsters and those kinds of guys.

Can someone please explain what the solar-panel looking things are in the photo linked in my previous post in this thread, if they aren't solar panels.

If you're into strange pictures from Mars, try this one:

http://xfacts.com/spirit2004/

& scroll to the end of the page. (not that the page in whole isn't worth a read, it shows more official images of ice on Mars, wonders about colour correction, and has some more pictures that - I reckon anyway - anyone with a bit of familiarity with geology would recognise right away shows rocks that have been weathered and scattered by fluids of some kind; in case anyone here isn't aware that water being on Mars at some point is not a contended view)

NEVERMIND! - whilst searching for the 'triangle dunes' Mars image during writing this post, I found another site that has a decent photo of what I asked about - http://www.goroadachi.com/etemenanki/mars-hiddencolors.htm - and it's really obviously parts of Spirit that are visible.

Someone explain, from the original image link photo ( http://photojournal.jpl.nasa/catalog/?IDNumber=PIA10214

http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/jpegMod/PIA10214_modest.jpg ):

what the hell is the thing in the middle-bottom of the image that looks like a mortar and pestle

what the hell are the two objects on either side of the above-described thing, which look like mirror images of one another

what the hell are those two mirror-image objects upon, because it looks like a further two things at each side of the image - which also look like mirror-images of one another, which I thought "must be Spirits solar panels" but they appear to be on the surface and blending in with the rest of the rocks on the surface. If those aren't solar panels, then it looks alarmingly like someone's built patios on Mars.

In general for graphics card installation (not sure exactly how much you mean you don't know about them):

1. make sure you have a free motherboard slot for the card, which you will likely have

2. find out what slot it is - PCI, AGP, most thesedays for games will be PCI-E. Make sure you get a card that is the right slot type!

3. to install it you do need to open the case up (obviously make sure the computer if OFF and unplugged when you do that). You should really ESD-ground yourself (do you have a wrist-strap? or something similar) and also only touch the card at it's sides, and not touch the contacts (the bit that plugs into the board). Also a good idea to ensure there's nothing (like fluff, or way worse - any metal or plastic fragments) in the slots or on the contacts, so install it in very well-lit conditions.

Push out or take out the expansion slot (where the bit on the card with the plugs will go) and to plug the card in just make sure you push it into the slot flush (not one end then the other end - plug it in all at the same time).

4. You'll probably need to install drivers, these should either come with the card (on a CD or a DVD), or they'll be at the manu's website for download. Windows should see that you've added the card when you power on the machine, and will ask you to install the drivers, it uses a wizard to do that and it's pretty straightforward.

One thing on some BIOS - you might need to change the BIOS settings to use the card for your video-input. It'll read something like 'Onboard Video' and you need to change that to 'disabled' instead of 'enabled'. If you weren't using a graphics card beforehand (ie - you have onboard graphics) then the BIOS would be looking for the monitor to be plugged into the motherboard directly, whereas with a graphics card you plug the monitor into the card instead.

Sometimes these update automatically, but it's worth knowing about in case you get a blank screen and think it's broken - it's more likely the BIOS is still trying to see the monitor from the motherboard port.

It sounds complicated but it's not really that hard, lots of people do it. As for if that card's any good - I don't know, I didn't look at it. Type in it's product name / number to google or another search engine and there should be reviews and benchmarks for it.

3 graphics cards - is this going to be a triple SLI rig?

Definitely a full tower case size - if you want even go for an Extended ATX as then you can space the graphics cards out from one another better (depends on how many slots the motherboard has of course), but they're usually server cases so check out Thermaltake's website for some BTX chassis, Armor and Kandalf. There's a lot of good case manufacturers for games rigs, I've just been at Thermaltakes site quite a bit so I know it's very detailed with lotsa good photos.

Internal / external HDDs are also listed as 3.5" bays, optical drive space is listed as 5.25".

If you are going to put in something like a fan controller, then you need to check how many drive bays it takes up. Same for watercoolers - there are cases made especially for waterblock fittings too and the pumps and so forth.

For fans, it all depends on your components and how hot they get. Generally a high-end game rig needs at least two intakes and two outtakes, plus you'd likely have high-end coolers on the CPU and the chipset and the cards and RAM also, plus for the HDDs especially if they are crammed together without much space inbetween them.

If you o/c then you definitely need more cooling.

Also it depends on if you want quiet fans or not - the bigger fans tend to be noisier.

Rule of thumb: heat rises. I'd have intakes at the front on the floor of the case to pull in cooler air, and if I didn't have HDD cooler cases - also put fans to intake cool air over the HDDs.

And have outtake fans at the top, and at the back.

However many intakes you have, at least match the number / size / power of them to the outtakes! (not including the PSU which has it's own outtake). There's some fancy fan controllers that monitor the case temperature and adjust fan speeds as required.

If you want to spend even more serious money, there's loads of options - say like a cube shaped case that takes two full ATX boards and PSUs for them.

Ideally, I'm still looking for a 4U server rack case, but I want one with a large fan or series of fans on top - and I can't find any. I think the heat dissipates better with air cooling from a desktop footprint case, also it dissipates off the componets more evenly. I found the kinda thing I want in a case called the Torture Rack - but it's only acrylic justnow and while I like seeing all the insides best, I'd prefer mostly aluminium for EM shielding, as my place is full of loads of other electrical things and there's too many outside glitch-causing signals..

I can't quote things here, so I won't re-type any of that....

the CPU speed should mean it's processing overall at whatever MHz is stated - so for that quad core you need a motherboard that can handle 1066MHz bus speed.

I don't have one myself but I'd hope it isn't running that slow (266MHz) per core, cause apparently not all the cores are even recognised by some OSs (eg - windows) - then say if it only recognises two, or an application runs only 2 cores then you're running at Pentium III speeds?!

There's a bit about what the chip is made up from here,

http://techgage.com/article/intel_core_2_quad_q6600/

When I typed '800' for the RAM I meant 800MHz, not that other number (transfer rate) that is stated along with the RAM ( for 800MHz it would be 6400 ).

800MHz means it runs at 800MHz, 667MHz runs at 667MHz, and so forth - it helps to match the speeds there up to the motherboards bus speed, it prevents any bottlenecking.

This here = just a guideline, not to be taken as gospel: generally if you have bottlenecks then either the CPU cache is having to hold the tasks processed for longer, or the chipset(s) on the motherboard are, or the RAM is - point is, whatever is fastest will be done processing while whatever is slowest will be on the overworked side of things and backlogged in terms of its tasks. So, say your CPU is doing multitasking easily but maybe the northbridge is getting too hot - hence why there's lots of chipset coolers available to buy.