Building questions on parts

[glcrhill]

Hi everyone. I am new to posting but have been reading this board for quite sometime and trying to learn as much as possible. I built my first pc about one month ago.

I am in the process of picking the components of a new pc to build. This is to be a gift for my sister and brother in law. They currently have a 5 year old Dell computer with an 800 megahertz processor and a 32 mb video card. They would like to be able to play more games on the computer but are not hard core gamers. They also like to get on the internet but are currently not able to connect at speeds faster then 22000 bps. I think they have a winmodem on their computer.They also like to burn cds with music

After much research this is what I have picked out so far with questions. Will be buying at newegg.

Antec solution series mid tower case with 350W power supply
Alternative Antec life style Sonata with 380W power supply.
Like the alternative because it has audio and fire wire in front but not sure haw hard it is to build in due to way hard drives go in and smaller size to fit everything. Comments? Are power supplys ok? Going to add another fan to pull air in front of case.

ABIT nForce 2 motherboard NF7-S.
Looking for reliability and ease of set up and moderate price. Remember I am new at this. Don't want a board that is going to be a hassel to set up. System will not be overclocked. Want decent onboard sound and firewire. Other alternatives?

Gigabyte ATI Radeon 9600xt video card, 128MB DDR retail package.
I selected this because it looked like it might fit the bill for games without costing a small fortune. Also it came with some games. I am not a gamer so does this card look ok?

AMD Athlon XP 2600 Barton retail. $90
Seemed like the best bang for the buck and I am partial to AMD processors.

Kingston PC2700 512 MB Cas 2.5
I know this board suports dual channel memory, but does that really make a big difference. I looked at buying 2 sticks of 256 memory but it adds a fair amount to the price. The other thought I had was that another 512 could be added latter if they wanted. Does 512 versus 1024 make that much difference for games?

Western digital Special Edition 80GB 7200 RPM Model WD800JB with 8 MB buffer.
Is this drive ussally fairly reliable? Thought about a SATA drive but it seemed like they were harder to get set up. Comments?

Sony Floppy

Encore 56K PCI Fax Modem Model ENF-656-EHW-INPR
Seemed like a nice cheap hardware modem.

Optorite 8x DVD+/-RW Drive retail. Price $98
Seemed like a nice unit for the price

Windows XP home.

I think that about covers it. Would like to keep the price around or under $950. Looking forward to your comments

[malcore]

Case- check (always a matter of taste)

Motherboard- check

Video card- check

CPU- check

RAM- check (not a big difference between single and dual channel on AMD systems. 1024 is nicer for games , however 512 should do for now)

Hard drive- check (WD make nice reliable drives)

Floppy- check

Modem- ?????

DVD- Look at this drive (http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=27-154-010&depa=0) , nice price, great features and has been getting some great reviews (http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.html?i=2039&p=16)

Looks like a nice setup.

[saphalline]

Case - The Antec Sonata has gotten some horrible reviews with respect to cooling. Stick with a more standard case with better fan options. Also, I find it better to get the case and PSU separately. Antec's PlusView1000AMG ($70) mated with Thermaltake's Silent PurePower 420W ($39) would be a nice combo. Not something you'd want to lug around very often ;) but a nice combo.

Mobo - Newegg currently only has that mobo as OEM (no driver disk and extras) which is not something I would recommend. Not only does OEM carry a limited 90-day warranty, but without the CD and extras that will make assembly more difficult. If you really want Firewire onboard, go with the Abit AN7 which is more expensive at $103 but is a better mobo (NForce2 Ultra 400 chipset).

On the one hand, that's a mightly powerful video card for casual gamers. On the other hand, it's pretty cheap these days. :p If you want to save some cash, go with a GF FX 5200 or Radeon 9200 (both under $100) but I really can't say anything bad about a 9600XT!

Optical drive - again, to save some cash, go with a standard CD-RW drive. Less than $40 these days for a good one. But $100 for a dual-format 8X DVD burner is a darn good price, too. Your call.

One more thing... what about a monitor? Do they have one? Is this part of the price? Just wondering since it wasn't mentioned.

Everything else looks good! :cool:

[malcore]

I agree about the Sonata case.

However....the NF7-S certainly is available at newegg as retail (http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=13-127-166&depa=0) . Also, ever since rev. 2.0 of this board (which is all you can buy now) it also uses the nForce2 Ultra 400 chipset. The two boards (NF7-S and AN7) are essentially the same board. The AN7 is simply an upgrade of the NF7 series.

The only differences between the boards are the AN7 has Abit's uGuru chip (for overclocking within Windows). It has one firewire port on the back which on the NF7-S you need to use the included bracket. The AN7 also has 4 USB ports on the back and the NF7-S had just two. Again, there is an included bracket for more ports. The AN7, being newer, is still working out some BIOS issues (mainly with uGuru), whereas most of the BIOS bugs for the NF7-S have pretty much been worked out.

Both use the nForce2 Ultra 400, both have Dolby Soundstorm audio, both are good boards for the Athlon.

[glcrhill]

Thanks everyone for the good info.

The information about the DVD buner is great. I looked at the reviews on the NU DVD burner and think I will go with your suggestion. Plus the price is lower.:)

The information on the case is well taken. I used the larger Antec case for my first build and the temps have been staying very cool. The only drawback is the noise from the fans. I see Chieftec has a very similar case to the Antec for about $55. Is the build quality simmilary to the Antec cases? This with the Thermaltake power supply you mentioned seems like a nice combination.

The ABIT motherboard I was looking at is the retail version. I made sure to double check after your comment.

Again thanks for all the help.

[saphalline]

Chieftec makes cases that are almost identical to Antec's (I think they have the same manufacturer or something) so the Chieftec is probably fine. Chieftec is more or less the "generic" version of Antec. While I would not likely buy a Chieftec for my main system, I would most certainly do so for other computers.

Yes, sorry about that mobo confusion. Newegg's search tool isn't always accurate.