It's time for a new computer

[Renn 208]

The time has finally come for me to build a new rig. gonna lay my PIII 600? 800? (I can't even remember what I have it's been that long) to rest. So, if you hardware freaks out there have some good suggestions, I'm open.

I've pretty much settled on

Case: Cooler Master ATC-201
Power: Fortron FSP400PFN
Keyboard: Cooler Master EAK-US1
edit: just bought a pioneer 16x slot load DVD drive


Other than that...I'm pretty much open, and will be looking for the following:

Vid Card: I'm no hardcore gamer and don't want to spend mad $$$, but something decent

DVD burner or a plextor CD-R: haven't decided if I really need the DVD burner yet...?

HD: SATA? or should I go with something tried and true

Audio Card: are there better choices out there aside from the Audigy? I'm thinking about something with 1/4" ins and outs, but that's a big maybe.

Mobo, cooling, proc, and RAM: will be decided last. how's the race between AMD and Intel going? Is intel a better value finally?

Don't need a monitor or mouse

TIA

[redline]

hum... I don't know what all that crap you listed is, dude, just get a dell ;)

[rana]

vid card - geforce 4 ti4200....gamers card but very good....or else geforce 4 mx if u really dont do much gaming....(dont knoe about ati...but i hear they have driver problems)

DVD Burner - HELL YESs!!....they can also record cd's.....although i am still confused about the formats....there is DVD-R+ and DVD-R- or somthing.....im not sure which is the better one...

HD - go with ata 133 and 7200RPM.....
wester digital HD - Reliable, quite, but kinda slow

IBM HD - Quite, fast as hell, but reliablility im not sure about due to problems with their 70gxp series...

Maxtor - Too loud for my taste, but reliable.

Audio - Nothing much better than an Audigy...

[Statsdreven]

hehe i should get a new pc too, i need to start the cpu fan manually!!!:mad: :D

[Rocky]

ATI driver problems? haha that was so last 3 years hehe. ATI rocks now. Cheap and best bang for the buck.

Don't get a DVD burner. There are so many different standards that the one you buy might end up like the way of Beta was to the VHS. (Read up on the new blue laser DVD recorder)

HD. get a WD caviar, anything as long as it has a 8mb buffer. Plus, regardless if it's retail or OEM, 3 year warranty.

Don't go serial just yet. Drives are not even coming close to using the full potential of serial ATA.

Audigy is great but if you buy some of the newer nForce boards, especially Asus/Epox, they come with different versions of soundstream and are just as good as the audigy's.

Don't skimp out on a case and good cooling with a good powersupply. I spent at least $150 on my case/powersupply. Can't go wrong with ANTEC or if you want bling bling case, go with a lian li.

Ram? ram is so cheap, buy the fastest you can afford but don't bother buying more then 512. It's usueless unless you do graphic intensive (not games) such as autocad.

If you want, tell me what exactly your looking for in a comp and a price range you wanna spend and i'll try to help you with a setup.

[mrjones]

Originally posted by rana
vid card - geforce 4 ti4200....Had a GeForce4 4400ti for 1/2 a year, amazing card! :eek:
That was, before it blew just over a month ago. As it was still under warranty, I got a GeForce FX 5200 as a replacement, haven't really tested it yet.
Originally posted by rana
Audio - Nothing much better than an Audigy... Doesn't the Audigy also come with the LiveDrive (as an option) like the 'old' SBLive cards? Lotsa jacks on that... :)

[firstkill]

i think everything is good..except for the ram part.. i would want a gig of ram...

then you can turn off swapping also.
512 isnt enough to turn off swapping.. i got errors playing warcraft 3 heheh


~fk

[BigDan]

Have you decided on a mobo/processor yet? Intel has some very interesting stuff out these days. A nice setup would be a 2.5ghz p4 with a i875P-based motherboard featuring the 800mhz bus. Put some highspeed DDR Memory in there (I would go with corsair) and then I would reccomend either a mid range geforce FX or an ATI Radeon 9600. I currently have the gf4 4200 and its a great card, can be had for cheap... but it doesnt feature the next gen technology with DX9. :)

Or you could go the athalon route, they have the new Barton chips... again I would look at something like an XP2500 or so. 2.5ghz seems to be the "sweet spot" for processors these days. I personally would prolly go SATA just because the cables are alot cleaner... but I dunno what the difference in price is. All I know is that the 486 in my closet uses IDE cables so its high time we moved on. :P

For sound cards, you have Creative with their Audigy 2, Santa Cruz with their Turtle Beach card, and M Audio with their Revolution card. I think the Santa Cruz is alot cheaper, and the Audigy 2 and Revo can both be had for under $100. Ive got an Audigy 2 in my rig.

For CD/DVD drives... I would reccomend Lite On - cheap and reliable, thats what I would get at least. And no sense blowing a couple hundred on DVD burners just yet, unless you really want one. Sounds like youve got a pretty slick case, but how many watts is that PSU? I wouldnt do less then 375 for all the stuff I described.

But what I am describing is all pretty high end stuff, you could easily put together a decent system for half the price... what sort of specs are you running now? And whats your budget? That would help things out. :)

[PerzBenz]

i sell cathodes and dual round cathode rings for the fans, and LED fans, ill have more products soon but those r what i have now

LED fans come in green red blue and tri
cathodes in green and blue
and round cathodes in blue red and green

prices are

LED fans 7$
dual cathodes 10$
cathodes 12$

[Renn 208]

Thanks for all the replies guys...I guess, just to clarify, I don't want to spend more than $2,500 on a new setup...but I'm also expecting not to approach that limit in the end.

Rocky, thanks for the drive tips, I guess I will go with a couple of ATA drives, quick CD-R, and slot load DVD then

So how's the reliability on the WD Caviar Drives? Last time I bought an HD was just before IBM ran into their issues.

And the case I've settled on is a little different from one I'm pretty familiar with, as I used an older version to build a comp for my sister. Good airflow, few sharp edges, thumb screws glalore, removable mobo tray, and all Al...so I think I've got all the important stuff covered. As for the PSU it's 400W unit.

BigDan,

That's exactly the kind of feedback I'm looking for, and exactly why I'm leaving the proc/mobo/ram decision absolutely last. When, I was building my sister's comp, it was almost a no brainer that AMD was providing the best value (just prior to the Ath XP chips). However, I know that the P4's have taken a nice path...so I just want to know if it's time for me to go back to Intel.

edit: I just took a look at a review of the Abit IC7-G mobo, and it looks pretty promising...I've had good luck with a previous Abit board, so that's why I checked it out. Are there other top notch mobos out there that I should consider?

Also, I'm getting the hint that the onboard sound on some of the higher end mobos might be enough? Are the M-Audio Cards worth further investigation?

Thanks Again.

[PerzBenz]

for the mobo get a

abit is7, it already has 6 channal audio, and optical sound. everything is onboard, but you would want a vid card.
it has 800 fsb, hypertreading support, can use ddr 3200, it has ata-150, i have this board in my computer. the price is only 97$! this is a steal, go check out the reviews!!! nothing but CRAZY GOOD SHIT, go tap this ass NOW.

AND BUY MY LIGHTS!!!

[Renn 208]

Originally posted by PerzBenz
for the mobo get a

abit is7, it already has 6 channal audio, and optical sound. everything is onboard, but you would want a vid card.
it has 800 fsb, hypertreading support, can use ddr 3200, it has ata-150, i have this board in my computer. the price is only 97$! this is a steal, go check out the reviews!!! nothing but CRAZY GOOD SHIT, go tap this ass NOW.

AND BUY MY LIGHTS!!!

hahaha,

Thanks for the rec...and I may as well buy some cathodes from you...although, I don't know what they're going to do stuffed inside my case without any window. :P(I ain't exactly the case modding type)

So, how do I go about getting some blue cathodes from you?, and do you have any pics?

[PerzBenz]

my shipment comes in tommorow. ill take some pics for you tommorow, i aceept paypal.

[dumpsta]

Instead of buying say a 120GB HD, get two 60 GB with a ATA RAID controller and set up a RAID 0...the performance you gain would be very noticeable. HD is a very big bottleneck, so 2x the performance is day and night. The HDs out there today are very reliable so its pretty safe to do.

[Renn 208]

Originally posted by dumpsta
Instead of buying say a 120GB HD, get two 60 GB with a ATA RAID controller and set up a RAID 0...the performance you gain would be very noticeable. HD is a very big bottleneck, so 2x the performance is day and night. The HDs out there today are very reliable so its pretty safe to do.

My only reservation is that if one drive goes down, then I lose the data on both drives, correct? I'd keep a RAID 0 in mind if I do make a daw and need a scratch pad, but for the time being, I'm thinking of just getting two separate drives non-RAID. (One drive for the O/S and essential apps, and another drive for porn:p )

[PerzBenz]

get 2 serial 150 HD's

[dumpsta]

If you have one 120 GB drive, if the one drive goes down, u lose the 120GB; It you have two 60GB drives, if one drives goes down, u lose 120 GB :)

[MrSpace]

a friend has 4 HDD in RAID.

two for the data, two for a copy of the data. So if one crashes, he's always ok. He never makes backup or anything.... but damn 4 HDDs!

Etienne

[Rocky]

Renn, get a quality CPU, Antec or Enermax and stay away from generic type PSU's.

As for CPU, i'm not going to comment cause i'm a AMD die hard fan with mad O/Cing skillz :P

If you want a stable system where your not going to tweak and mod it, stick with a intel pentium. processor. Grabe a Vantec Aeroflow as a heatsink and fan. TMD fans are the shiznats! Very quiet.

You can check out www.bigfootcomputers.com (http://www.bigfootcomputers.com) for some stuff.

Oh that reminds me, make sure you know what you want in this computer, quietness or performance?

As for ram, if your going to o/c or using dual channel MB, get matching ram. I believe corsait, crucial and OCX makes mathcing rams sets. Don't bother with generic ram unles your not planning to O/C or anything.

Cables, this is a tuffie. If you want the semi compactness of serial ATA cables but want to use IDE, grab some rounded IDE cables. I have 3 UV reactive IDE cables.

[mrjones]

Originally posted by Renn 208
My only reservation is that if one drive goes down, then I lose the data on both drives, correct? Correct. I had a stripe 0 set running on two 40Gb Maxtor drives, but the PC shop messed up my partitioning and I was stuck with a 2Gb system drive. Nothing would repartition the drives, and moving all system docs and swap files didn't help. WinXP is not happy with 2Gb.
Got rid of the stripe set, now running the two drives seperately, and like you suggested, one is for system & appz, the other for... ergh... fun stuff. ;) :P

[Rocky]

What I did is that I using 2 HD separate. Leaves 2 devices I can plug in. One is a CDR/RW/DVD combo drive. Leaves me 1 device left. I'm saving that spot for a DVD burner when the time comes. For now, I have a basic CD rom sitting in it's place.

[Renn 208]

Originally posted by Rocky
Renn, get a quality CPU, Antec or Enermax and stay away from generic type PSU's.

Hopefully, that shouldn't be a problem with the Fortron, as I've read some favorable reviews on it's build quality and power efficiency.

Here's a link (http://www.fsp-group.com.tw/english/02_products/01_pc_power_supply.asp?modelid=10&modelname=FSP400-60PFN&factorname=High%20Watt)

As for CPU, i'm not going to comment cause i'm a AMD die hard fan with mad O/Cing skillz :P

If you want a stable system where your not going to tweak and mod it, stick with a intel pentium. processor. Grabe a Vantec Aeroflow as a heatsink and fan. TMD fans are the shiznats! Very quiet.

Thanks, I'll look into that!

You can check out www.bigfootcomputers.com (http://www.bigfootcomputers.com) for some stuff.

Oh that reminds me, make sure you know what you want in this computer, quietness or performance?

Both! haha... I know, a delicate balance and all that.

As for ram, if your going to o/c or using dual channel MB, get matching ram. I believe corsait, crucial and OCX makes mathcing rams sets. Don't bother with generic ram unles your not planning to O/C or anything.

I've always been a fan of Hi-Q RAM, and I've used crucial sticks in the past...but it seems like corsair is getting more share these days?

Cables, this is a tuffie. If you want the semi compactness of serial ATA cables but want to use IDE, grab some rounded IDE cables. I have 3 UV reactive IDE cables.

That's what I figured as well...don't think I need UV reactive cables though.

[MB300E87]

where's koolvin in all this?

[Rocky]

Don't forget to buy a FLEX CAPACITOR! Very important!

[Renn 208]

Originally posted by MB300E87
where's koolvin in all this?

That's what I'm sayin...

Originally posted by Rocky
Don't forget to buy a FLEX CAPACITOR! Very important!

Shoot, I knew I was forgetting something...and I just bought a Mr. Fusion off of newegg.com.

[Renn 208]

Alrighty...here's the update: I'm down to the last decision what proc and cooling solution should I get?

Here're the boxes/bubble wraps of stuff that I've acquired since last posting:

Case: Cooler Master ATC-201
http://www.coolermaster.com/case/p201a.htm
Power: Fortron FSP400PFN
http://www6.tomshardware.com/howto/2003060...upplies-18.html (http://www6.tomshardware.com/howto/20030609/power_supplies-18.html)
Keyboard: Cooler Master EAK-US1
pioneer 16x slot load DVD drive
120GB|WD 72R WD1200JB 8MB-CACHE (I would've gone Hitachi, but the warranty made it for me)
ATI Radeon 9500Pro (might have gone np softmod-->9700, but don't feel like dealing with the hassle, and like I said before, I ain't that hardcore)
Abit IC-7G
Kingston DDR 500MHz 512MB KIT|PC4000 HYPERX
http://www.kingston.com/hyperx/default.asp

Total damage so far...just a shade over $900

Things to follow:
2 more HDs (got RAID on the board so it'd be a shame not to use it)
CD-R lite-on/plextor premium? hmm, haven't decided if i may want the plextors features in the near future...or if they're worth double the price of the lite on.

and i've managed to not have any PCI cards to pop in so far
:cool: