First Time Builder, Looking for Second Opinion.

[kalim]

This is the computer I plan to build. This is my first time building so I thought I'd would be best to get some second opinions.

Chenming -case (http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811125438)
I heard this case was very good for the price. All the form factors fit. Does anyone know anything better I should look into?

Asus -Motherboard (http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813131530)
I went with the socket 939 to keep a path of upgradeability. I heard that the Intel dual cores will a slight pin change. Do you think the AMD dual core will fit into this motherboard, or is it to early to tell?

AMD -CPU (http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819103501)
I picked the 3000+ because it is cheap. The socket 754s are selling cheap but those 3800s will sell cheap someday too :D .
Somebody told me to get a CPU with a 1mb cache. I remember reading somewhere that the althon 64s with the Integrated FSB the CPU would push data around so quickly that you would hardly ever fill a 1mb cache. What do you think?

Corsair -RAM (http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820145440)
For the Dual channel.

Gigabyte -Graphic Card (http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814125176)
I figure this will keep the well enough. I would have gone with a 6200 but this was only 20 bucks more.

Sony -CD-R\RW (http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16827106818)

WD -Hard Drive (http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822144160)
The logic behind this was that the hard drive is the slowest link in terms of system performance. I wanted to narrow the field as much as I could. Is it worth the extra money?

Antec -Power Supply (hhttp://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817103928)
I am not sure whether I need a bigger PSU for the components. Would a 380 watt be to small if I were to get a better graphics card and another hard drive?


I am trying to keep it under 1000$. I have the keyboard, mouse, speaker, and monitor already.

total component cost as is: 834$

Antistatic pad: 20$
Power strip: 20$
Going or down up on the PSU is about (+/-): 10$
getting a 120g instead the hard drive is about: -100$
Cooling and any cables that didn't come with OEM is: 70$
S&H: 30$

Price range: 864$-984$

[pop pop]

Well... I wish Saphalline was around, he's our resident build/RAM/graphics guru.

First, I'm not an AMD kind 'o guy. AMD is a great chip with a different approach. I just know more about Intel. So the questions about AMD dual core would best be answered by an AMD person but I'll say this: I think the 939 socket is probably OK but I think the chipset is where any issue may be. For example, my new build has an ASUS P5AD2-E Premium mobo which is socket 775 based (same as dual core, I believe). The chipset is 925XE, however. My mobo will not be able to support dual core because 945/955 chipset is required. I don;t know that there are any mobos on Newegg right now that support dual core. Coul be wrong, though.

Back to the real issue, your choices...

Case: looks fine. I would like one more fan.

Mobo: you can't really go wrong with ASUS. In fact, I love ASUS mobos. Some might argue that Gigabytes are better. Depends.

CPU: my guess is it's a very nice processor in its range. Looks like you might be gaming here and even if not heavy gaming, if you're tempted to OC, get a third party HSF. Zalman or Thermaltake are very good.

RAM: Corsair is one of the three brands to buy. Your choice has good latency, good amount, good price, good speed.

Burner: OK

PSU: Depending on your final graphics decision and maybe one or two other factors, you should be OK here. I would want more though. It's much better to spend a couple of bucks, have it and not need it than the other way around.

HDD: Relative to the rest of your system choices, you went over the top here. That's a blazing HDD with a steep dollar/GB cost--something on the order of $2.40/GB (I know--I have one). Unless you just want to boot really fast, why pay that kind of premium relative to your other component choices? You might consider something like a Seagate Barracuda, which is darned fast and you can get 160GB for about $112. Here's the logic--you save at least $60 there--put it into the graphics card--say by bumping up to a 6600 with 256MB. I think you would get more benefit out of that with the rest of your system.

Then again...there's just something about having the fastest non-SCSI HDD in the world :D

[i an not a nerd]

The Mobo is useing the Nforce 4 ultra chipset, so yes it will work with the AMD 64 X2's (dual cores).

And about the hard drives. It isn't worth the price just yet. I'm currently using 4 80 gb HDs in a RAID 5 config, but just 2 80 gbs on a RAID config should work as well as a 10000rpm.

[kalim]

wow! Pardon me for the delay. I wasn't expecting a reply so quickly.

A few questions about the hard drive.

If the hard drive is the slowest link in the computer (besides the optical drives), wouldn't it be best to spend the extra money for a fast hard drive, sense it also equates to higher performance in other hardware? Or Would the performance increase be so small that you wouldn't notice it? How is RAID any better?

[i an not a nerd]

Well, the performance wouldn't be very noticable, (except in loading times). Heres a link to an explination of RAID. http://www.adaptec.com/worldwide/product/markeditorial.html?sess=no&prodkey=quick_explanation_of_raid

[mario]

I have recently bought a pair of WD raptors for PCs I was assembling for games and we (so far) are very satisfied. We have noted visible improvements at boot up and when loading a new heavvy programme (particularly games); no particularly evident advantages dusing normal PC use on applications.
Noise level seemed to us also to be very low. May be we inconsciusly try to find good reason for having spent such a lot of money. In addition to high performances I would also consider that these devices seem to be very likely to maintain their value over time (importasnt if you one day will upgrade your system) and show 1.200.000 hours of MTBF (medium time between failures) which is normally an enterprise standard. RAID is something that need at least 2 hard disks and it's a technology that permit to write automatically on the second disk as a mirror of the first (thus improving backup) or to let the OS see the two phisical disks as just one bigger disk (with two sets of actuators). There are also other RAID arrangements but at least 2 disks are needed.

[kalim]

Well I guess I will have to do a little more research on the HDD. Thanks for all the responses. Ill tell you how it goes.

[kalim]

I wasn't sure whether to put this in a new post, but saw pop pop update his, and he seems to have all limbs intact so.. :D

-Case- (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811112022) I have decide to ditch the chemning for the more expensive Lian-Li case. (which is in fact the second cheapest Lian-Li. :rolleyes: ) It has four, 8cm fan mounts.

The question here is should I expect four 8cm fans to come with the case, when the pictures show fans installed? The specs dont help :D.

Cooling System: 80mm Fans: 4

-Mobo- (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813131530) I went down on the Mobo to the A8N-E which doesn't have SIL (which I'd never use) and less multi-drive configurations (all I want is Raid 0).

-CPU- (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819103537) The 3000+ Venice core appeared on newegg a fews ago for only 4 bucks more with SSE3, Although I am not sure what the hell SSE3 adds to SSE2 just yet.

-GPU- (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814125184) Not much to say here. Up'ed to 256mb.

The cd-rom/cdr/rw/dvd-rom is now cd-rom/cd-r/cd-rw/dvd-rom/dvdr/dvd-rw/dvd-dl

Added a floppy to the list. I going to take it out of an old 300mhz but I not sure about compatibility. Safer to buy a new one.

PSU is the same, but bumped up to 550 watts for the headroom.

HDD: Im keeping the raptor! It might be grossly overpriced for what it is, but I do't care! (this is not logic talking ;) ). 1) I plan to be doing lots of incoding and decoding. 2) I haven't filled my 15gig yet (I don't know what I'd do with a 120gig.. ). 3) 5 year warranty. 4) boot real fast!

Ok a question here. I was reading the online manual for the raptor and I came across a few references to a "Western Digital Serial ATA Cablie with SecureConnect." This poses a problem because I am buying the raptor OEM and was just going to use the SATA connector that came with the mobo. Is this a problem?

Thats all I've got. Thanks in advance.

[pop pop]

Case--Looks good and I would expect the fans to come mounted/installed.

Mobo--I love Asus. I went for the whole nine yards and on retrospect, the P5AD2E Premium was overkill. It has more stuff than I'll probably ever use ... but it's there if I do want it. Throttling down is probably sensible.

CPU--I'm an Intel guy, don't know a lot about AMD. Someone here once said 90 percent is the sweet spot for performace to price ratio. I think that's true. Get the most you can with that in mind. At the time I bought mine, the Intel Prescotts went as high as 3.6Ghz for $619, I bought 3.2 for $280. 3.2 is about 90 percent and I can OC to 3.6 anyway.

GPU--The move to 256 is a good one.

Floppy--In my mind, essential. As for compatibility, a floppy is a floppy.

PSU--You've got more than enough room to spare there.

HDD--You'll absolutely love the Raptor almost no matter what it costs (I do). You may even be tempted to buy another--I am. :D Buy it OEM and just use the SATA cables that come with the mobo. No problems there. Download the WD tools to prep the drive if needed, I did but I found the Raptor came already partitioned and formatted (one partition, NTFS).

[kalim]

Well that is good to know that I won't need to buy fans, and even better about the cable. That would be counterproductive on WDs part.

Have to go read the Mobos BIOS setting. I am sure that will dig up some more questions to bug you with!

[deathbydegrees]

I would personally (actually i did for my rig lol) move up to the 939 socket amd64 3200 instead of 3000. I hear the 3000s are very loud (if that matters) And plus i think its always good to stay at a constant performance level throughout yer system. the 3200 stock is great, and whether u go with a 3200, 3500 or 3800, i remember reading that they all relatively OC to a max of 2.6 GHz but dont quote me...and being that the 3200 is almost 100 bux cheaper than the 3500, its a good bang for buck in my view...just a suggestion.

[kalim]

Yea, I was thinking about going with the 3200, but the budget is very tight (just about 10$ under the limit right now). I am also a little supcious about these incremental CPU speeds. How do you know if AMD is just OCing a 3000 and calling it 3200?

I am just cynical that way.

[pentachris]

I hear the 3000s are very loud
A cpu isn't loud. There are no moving parts in it to generate any noise.

How do you know if AMD is just OCing a 3000 and calling it 3200
It is possible that the core of a 3000 was actually manufactured to be, for example, a 3200 or 3500. But perhaps it didn't quite pass the quality control checks to run at that speed, and so they cross-wired some circuits or something to make it run slower - at a speed where it would pass the quality control checks.

I'm not saying that happens with AMD 64 chips, but I do know that similar things have happened in the world of PC component manufacturing.

It doesn't happen the other way around, though (or shouldn't, anyway! :eek: ).

[kalim]

Well, I ordered the parts and they came a day early, so I started to build.

I have mounted the power supply and switched the I/O shield out. I installed the HDD, and scared myself while doing it (I accidently touched the PCB on the bottom). I actually put the HDD in wrong direction the first try :D . I installed the CD-Rom and Floppy, which were a pain to position flush with the outside. I broke a screw off on the CD-ROM, which I am not sure what to do about.

I have a question(s) about Antistatic pads. Do these pads plug into the wall, or are they just static resistant like some mouse pads?