Need a bit of help

[Kidan]

I'm considering building my next computer system and it's been quite a while since I've done so.

Now the help I need is information about everything
motherboard/processor, vid card, audio card, good cases with good airflow, fans, etc
and links to where to buy them (hopefully cheap)

 

[amorphus88]

you in UK or US?

if you're in US, go for newegg.com or mwave.com.  I prefer mwave.com, but newegg has cheap shipping.

ok, now, I'm going to suggest AMD (someones gonna come along and say P4 is better, but AthlonXP is the obvious winner  

)...

also, along with the AthlonXP, I'd suggest either Abit NF-7, Asus A7N8X (Deluxe), or Epox 8rda+.

RAM?  all depends on if you want to overclock or not, and what your price range is (ultimately, what your CPU choice is)... 512mb is the most you'll need for now.

Video card - Radeon 9500 Pro, if you want a high middle range card, 9700 Pro if you want lotsa power.  All-In-Wonder version of them if you want to watch TV on your comp

Sound card - if you go with AMD, and get one of the motherboards I suggested (or one with the MCP-T Southbridge), you wont need a sound card... nVidia's Soundstorm's sound quality is only clearly beat by the Audigy 2 (A $100 Soud card).

Mouse, keyboard, etc, dunno.

Monitor - get a flat CRT (not flatscreen, as in LCD - flat CRT) - less glare, less eyestrain, and looks cool.  the Viewsonic G90F is good.  G90FB is black.

Case - just look around.  ventilation isn't a problem, and cases these days come with a back blowhole standard, and at least one front intake.

PSU (Power Supply) - Enermax 350 watter is my suggestion.  maybe a Vantec Stealth...

CPU Heatsink and fan - your choice, really.  but only if you get your processor OEM.  if you get the CPU retail, then it comes with a heatsink/fan combo.

other drives, all up to you.

however, for hard drive : get one with an 8mb buffer, and 7200 RPM. improves performance lots.


most importantly, though, WHAT IS YOUR PRICE RANGE??? and are you going to overclock?

 

[Kidan]

I'm not going to overclock. Also I plan on scavening from my current system. The DVD player and CD-RW work just fine also contains a nic i'd keep

What i plan on getting is :
motherboard
cpu
audio (could possibly choose on-board)
video
ram
case (and other odds n ends such as fan/psu)
hdd

I don't want to have to get a new comp for at least 2-3 years after this, so my price range is negotiable

 

[amorphus88]

still, specify an upper range. I can get you the sweetest comp on the face of the planet for upwards of $5k (4 gigs of ram, quad-processors, SATA RAID5/RAID0+1, etc.)

or a decent one you can keep on using.

and it also depends on if you want the bragging rights that come with Intel's higher mhz ratings (yes, thats right, Intel is "faster" than AMD......

, but notice I mentioned "bragging rights") or not.

Last you for the next 3 years, eh?

Heres a sample setup:

Quote[/b] ]
AMD AthlonXP 2700+ (Thoroughbred Core, Revision B, 2.17ghz)

Epox 8RDA+

(1x512mb) Kingston PC2700 (DDR333) RAM (512mb)

ATi Radeon 9500Pro (128mb)

Western Digital 120GB Special Edition EIDE Hard Drive

yeah, just the basics, all from Newegg.com... comes out to $663, sans shipping.

 

[Kidan]

uhm...2 grand would be the most period, i'd probably be able to talk the wife out of 1.5 grand, she'd prefer 1 grand max

and thanks amorphous

 

[amorphus88]

PSU and case you can probably get from a local store. I saw an Antec Sonata case at OfficeMax just the other day - its a nice case, and comes with two fans, I think, and a PSU. all for about $100-$150.

you'll need a keyboard, monitor, mouse, and floppy drive, and you're all set. the whole system will be that $663+$30 shipping = $700, lets assume, plus $150 for the case, plus $150 for a monitor, and $50 for mouse keyboard and floppy.

there ya go, a pretty good system for $1050. oh yeah, and you need an operating system, too, I guess. heheh. thats another like $300.

$1350's pretty good...

 

[SLAM]

A CRT? Less glare than an LCD?

*laughs*

No, if you get a good quality LCD from THESE days, as opposed to ones from a year or so ago, you will have no problems, get just as good performance as from a CRT, and be saving a good 14" depth of desk space, and around 20 pounds. My KDS Rad-5 LC was $300, and I'm incredibly pleased with it. This is after coming off a 19" flatscreen CRT, mind you, so I have had a comparison .

As for Athlon XP vs. P4, let me illustrate:

Pentium 4 = Really fast water pump, really big tube to pump water through.
Athlon XP = Slightly faster water pump, much smaller tube to pump it through.

I am referring to the difference in bus speed. Yeah, at base level, Athlon XPs manage greater speeds than P4s, but the sad fact is that AMD's bus speed won't do it justice. Get a good P4 and mobo, and the right kind of RAM, and you'll kick an AMD's butt any day of the week. Not to mention Intel's history, and all-around chip reliability. I dunno, it's up to you. I got an Athlon XP 1.67 GHz last year, and I was happy with it, didn't have any problems. I'm running a 2.53 GHz P4 with 533 MHz bus speed, and I'm even happier now. Not a great comparison, but I'm likely to stick with Intel until the day they make a completely fatal screwup on one of their chips.

 

[CCGR]

Kidan,

Intel is winning the speed race, I'd recommend getting a baord that will support 800Mhz front side bus and a processor to go along with it. That should be available in a month or 2. That will hold you for the future a bit.

AMD chips ar decent and coupled with an Nforce2 board sound you'd be set! AMD will be releasing 400mhz front side boards soon, so that would be worth waiting for.

For hard drive I'd recommend WesternDigital with 8mb cache. Speed and 3 year warranty

Antec/Cheiftec cases are nice for ventilation

oh yeah DDR RAM all the way. 333/2700 or better

ATI 9500 or better for video

check out my site http://www.progresssyetmsinc.com

 

[SSquared]

I've gotta agree with SLAM. I've got a 15" LCD and, unless I have to, I don't think I'll ever buy a CRT again. The colors are crisp and bright, the graphics are super sharp. The space it saves is outrageous. No glare. I've had it for over a year and I still am amazed at it.

 

[Tromos]

And I would tend to agree with our Review Mistress

My only comment of note: If you do decide to go AMD, buy the retail box, not an OEM processor. Not that the heatsink and fan that come in the retail box are exceptional (although they are normally adequate), but if you bought the retail box and have any problems with the processor, AMD support won't hesitate to send you a new one. If you buy OEM, you'll have to fight that out with your reseller.

 

[amorphus88]

no, no, my friend, look at the benchmarks. an AMD at 2 ghz can beat out a P4 at 2.4ghz...

people still think mhz matters in power nowadays. it doesnt. look at Macs. a dual G4 system (1ghz for each proc) will beat out a Dual P4 system (at 3ghz each)...

no, I said FlatCRT has less glare than traditional CRT.

also, CRT has better refresh rates, don't have any problem at all with ghosting (even the best of LCDs have this), and costs much less for better image quality. it all really comes down to desk space and money, really. I have a CRT myself.

gaming and movies, I'd rather not have an LCD. of course, I'm a performance monkey who got spent $70 on my CPU heatsink/fan, and another $15 on my northbridge and southbridge coolers...

Quote[/b] ]I am referring to the difference in bus speed. Yeah, at base level, Athlon XPs manage greater speeds than P4s, but the sad fact is that AMD's bus speed won't do it justice. Get a good P4 and mobo, and the right kind of RAM, and you'll kick an AMD's butt any day of the week

on the contrary, you get a good AMD board, and good proc, and you'll kick Intel's butt any minute of any day. it all comes down to whether or not you want to be 1337. 1337 people use AMD. n00b3hs use P4. do you want to be n00by?

 

[amorphus88]

also, AMD has a 256kb L2 cache, and P4 has a 512k L2 cache. performance doesn't take a hit by this, though.

Quote[/b] ]Antec/Cheiftec cases are nice for ventilation

oh yeah DDR RAM all the way. 333/2700 or better

actually, it really depends on what you're doing with your case. Antec/Chieftec/Chenming/whatever - that style case - it provides a lot of ventilation through the front grill (lots of breathing room), but quite honestly, you can do fine without it, especially if you aren't doing anything intensive.

DDR RAM all the way? it depends on what the FSB on the proc is. running your ram in synchronous mode is better, so if you're not overclocking, then you'll need maybe DDR266 (effectively running at 133mhz FSB) (in other words, PC2100) for your proc. DDR333 is 166FSB, and few procs run at that speed natively.

Quote[/b] ]ATI 9500 or better for video

it provides about the same performance as a Geforce4 Ti 4600, just remember that. a little better, actually. the 9500 is pretty close to the high end market.

Quote[/b] ]For hard drive I'd recommend WesternDigital with 8mb cache. Speed and 3 year warranty

the only important thing there is the 8mb cache. any 7200rpm HDD will do. getting an EIDE hard drive is preferable, especially since whatever mobo you get will probably come with at least 1 EIDE cable anyways.

Quote[/b] ]Pentium 4 = Really fast water pump, really big tube to pump water through.
Athlon XP = Slightly faster water pump, much smaller tube to pump it through.

nah. the difference is in their pipelines - Athlon has a 10-stage pipeline, and P4 has a 20-stage pipeline. now, look at it this way (I shamelessly ripped this example off another sire, btw)

if you have a sandwich machine, you can have an assembly line, where 1 sandwich gets made at a time. one arm puts the bread, the meat, the toppings, and the second slice of bread on. this is a one-stage pipeline.

now, if you have a longer pipeline, then you have one arm only doing bread, one arm only doing meat, one arm only doing toppings (lets assume 1), and one arm only doing the top piece of bread. this, in our example, is effectively a 4-stage pipeline.


now, we can have that original 4-stage pipeline, (this will be our "Athlon"). now, on this side, we have the "P4", with the 8-stage pipeline. it takes longer, and can go faster, but there is a delay from when the order for, say, 100 sandwiches goes through and when the first sandwich comes out. the "Athlon' has 4-stages, and thus the sandwiches start coming out sooner (this delay is in the nanosecond range, so it doesnt matter, really.)

also, an error in the process happens quite freuently. so when the machine screws up, it throws away the sandwich, and starts all over. when the P4 screws up, say, at the 7th stage, then it has to star t all over and make up 7 stages. when the Athlon screws up, it only has to make up a maximum of four.

however, the P4's singular "arms" at each stage are faster.

do you sorta get it now? this is a very rough explanation.

 

[SSquared]

I don't have ghosting on my LCD. I don't have a refresh problem. I'm currently set to either 70 or 72 Hz on my refresh. I'll admit, my DELL laptop's LCD is not nearly as good, and probably does have a wee bit of ghosting. But it's my work machine and is usually docked to a 21" CRT anyway.

I've watched DVDs on both LCDs.