My first DS rig is 8 years old - still in use

Walking past the cool blue cathode tubes last night, I realized that my Twister Pro rig from Digital Storm will be 8 years old this year.

Way back in 2007, when I was researching what gaming rig I wanted to get, after months of research I had it narrowed down to Alienware and Digital Storm. They spec'd out nearly identically, including cost, but what sold me was how on the various Consumer Review pages, I was seeing personal responses by DS employees if someone had a complaint. That plus the use of name brand hardware clinched it for me.

Fast-forward 2.5 years later, and my motherboard dies. Still in warranty, I ship it back to DS and they replace it, along with my memory, hard drive, and the graphics card (what can I say, the MoBo didn't go without a fight). I finish out the 3-year warranty without any other issues.

Fast forward 3 more years of regular use and my windows install gets corrupted. Having recently re-imaged an even older Dell and going through 8 billion XP updates because of a years-old install disc, I decide I'd really just rather have a new computer and I order a Vanquish II in 2013.

At this point, I wipe the HD of the Twister Pro and install Windows 7 on it and pass it on to my daughter. I also take out the massive 9800 GTX (when DS replaced my graphics card, they didn't have an 8800 GTX, so they sent that instead) and replace it with a GeForce 210 (less powerful, but much, much, much quieter and cooler).

Fast forward 2 more years to 2015 and the DS Twister Pro is still going strong. I replaced the heat sink fan just before Christmas as it was on its last legs. My 8-year old daughter uses it for all of her school websites, plus she's got Portal and Portal 2.

It is a solidly built machine, and I won't be surprised if it's still around when my youngest (2 years old) is old enough to use it.