Building Suggestions

[Elwood]

I would like to first start off by saying that there is an overwhelming abundance of great information on this site. I have learned so much in such little time. Because of all of this information, I think that I am ready to tackle a PC build.

I currently have a Dell Dimension 8100 with the following specs:
1.5 P4
128 MB RAM (PC800)
32 MB GeForce GTS

So that probably tells everyone (as well as myself) that I would be much better off giving the PC away and starting over from scratch. Way too expensive to upgrade, upgrades are limited, and Dell is not pleasant to deal with any longer (for obvious reasons).

Now having said that, this is what I normally do on my PC. Basic PC stuff (e-mail, web surfing, etc.) as well as manage a vast number of high res. pictures and games. I am not the extreme gamer, but I like to be able to play the latest games. Currently I cannot function on Doom III and I would like to get that changed for sure. I would like a PC that is not limiting and I can build upon. I will probably gather bits and pieces over the next several months.

So, I am looking at going with an AMD after everyone here speaks so highly of them. I am an IT person so I think I can follow directions and assemble one with help from this place I am sure.

Without further delay, this is what I am looking at and I would like to hear some feedback on what would be a good starting point.

AMD Athlon 64 3000+ or AMD Athlon 64 3500+
ASUS A8N-SLI Deluxe Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 SLI
BFG Tech BFGR6600GTX Video Card
CORSAIR ValueSelect 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM Unbuffered DDR 400 (PC 3200) Dual Channel Kit System Memory
A-Top AT859A-SV-LCD XBlade Silver Steel ATX Mid Tower 500W PS

I will used my existing HD, Sound Card, CDRW, mouse, monitor, speakers & OS

Since this is a very basic starting point, where can I improve and make some adjustments?

Thanks again; all input is welcomed.

[hockey man]

First of, welcome! Now to your pc.

Mobos are the first thing to look at and you chose a winner. The nForce4 Sli chip is the best on the market. The next thing is your psu. This feads everything so you need a good one. Most people here would recomend a 400w+ psu. Thermaltake, and Antec are both good. Now you seem to be saying that you will use the one that comes with the case. While that psu would be o.k., it would be a better idea to get a better one. Why would you want to limit yourself here when your getting an awsome mobo? Everything else you listed would be fine. For your cpu I would get the 3000+ and put the extra money towords a psu.

[Elwood]

Okay, so I could change my case and get a separate complimenting PSU. Now, how much wattage is enough? 420, 450, 500? Should I also consider a case that has adjustable fans?

Regarding, the processor; perhaps I should go somewhere in between and get proceed to get the 6800 (256MB) video card? With the SLI, I can always get another one of these video cards and add it later (when they come down in price) right?

Again, the input is great; keep it coming.
Elwood

[saphalline]

I will second hockey man's recommendation of a separate PSU. In fact, I think you will actually need a separate PSU for an SLI mobo, because of the new 24-pin power connector. Antec's TruePower II series is very very good and not too bad in price. 430W is only about $77. I know that might sound like a lot, but trust me, for a high quality PSU it's nothing!

I will also second hockey man's recommendation of the cheaper A64 3000+ (as long as it's the new Venice core revision). This is good enough for now. And I always say it's better to have a working computer than to have the best CPU just sitting there on your desk. :rolleyes:

Next, I don't know if I would recommend moving up from a 6600 GT. The next more expensive SLI-capable vid card would be a 6800 GT, and those things are in the $350 range! :eek: Not exactly cost-effective for a non-intense gamer! One 6600 GT now and one later should be quite good enough for you. Doom 3 runs pretty good on a single 6600 GT at 1280 x 1024 will everything set to medium or high. If you have grandoise visions of running every A-list title at 1600 x 1200 with 16x AF & 8x AA, then you'd probably need two 6800 Ultra's in SLI. Otherwise, stick to a budget! :D

The last thing I'm curious about is your current hard drive. You want to keep that one? Why? If it's not in your budget yet to get a new one, I understand, but if you can at all afford it I would recommend upgrading. The new SATA 1.0/2.0 hard drives are absolutely to die for if you're clunking along on an old 5400rpm hard drive. Today's hard drives are probably twice as fast as the cheapo that Dell put in that thing. Just a thought...

[Elwood]

Okay, for an SLI MoBo, is 430 Watts enough power? I am reading about people using 500+ for those, of course they are probably very intense gamers too. I am not an intense gamer at the moment b/c I don't have a capable pc. If I had one, I would say I may be about 7 or 8 out of 10. I have always been a Quake person and would like to

And the processor everyone is recommending is the A64 3000+. I am guessing that people recommend this one b/c I can toss it when I want to move to the 4000 series and only be out $150, right? If that's all it takes to move up to a faster computer, then I would only need to find a socket 939 processor b/c it snaps right in, right?

Also, back to the video card. My only thoughts on the 256 is that for only $100 or so more and I can have a 256 the possibly 512 one day. But honestly, I am only going on with what I read here in that I haven't seen these cards performing in person. I have only seen Doom3 run on my office laptop (Dell XPS). Its it running the 256MB NVIDIA® GeForce™ Go 6800 Ultra and a 2 Ghz and it runs pretty well while a radeon 9200 128MB greatly struggles with it on an older 8100 dell 1.5 Ghz. That's what I am basing my experiences on. Realistically, I have only dealt with Intel so I do not know what AMDs are capable of; I only trust the people here that do know them.

And, my hard drive; I have replaced the Dell clunker with a WD 80 Gig ATA100. Now, I know that it is not nearly as capable as a SATA and I will want to get a new hard drive at some point. I am not sure what I will go with; I assume the SATA II is the way to go?

Thanks for the help.
Elwood

[saphalline]

The size of your PSU is not dependent on the mobo. Mobo's use very little power themselves. What determines your power needs are the rest of your parts. Number and chipset of your vid card(s), number and type of your hard drive(s), number and type of your optical drive(s), number and type of your expansion card(s), total amount and speed of your RAM, speed and type of your CPU, etc. In order to recommend a specific wattage of PSU, we need to know the total picture of your new system. As a general rule, a system with SLI (and all that it implies) suggests you should start at 400W and move up as necessary. How far you move up depends on your other parts.

I am guessing that people recommend this one b/c I can toss it when I want to move to the 4000 series and only be out $150, right?Not really. We recommend the 3000+ (or P4 3.0GHz) as a starting point. You can increase your CPU speed as long as you have filled out the rest of your system and you still have money to spend. But when you've used a CPU until you have to upgrade it, I never see as being "out" the money. You get your use out of it! I don't see that as a loss.

A vid card is not comprised entirely of the amount of onboard RAM it has. The chipset also makes a tremendous difference. I can name several vid cards that have 256MB on them that can't cut it for Doom 3. In your example, there would have been very little performance difference if the 6800 Ultra had only 128MB and the 9200 had 256MB. The onboard RAM does help in some way, but only up to a certain point. It's just like system RAM. 1GB is waaaay better than 256MB (on WinXP), but there's very little difference between 1GB and 4GB (for most activities). In terms of overall performance, a 6600 GT is about half as powerful as a 6800 Ultra, but it's about 4 times as powerful as a Radeon 9200 (especially when it comes to the latest games). I hope that puts things into a bit more perspective. ;)

If you have a hard drive made in the last 1-2 years and are happy with its capacity, then I see no reason why you need to upgrade. Yes, SATA 1.0 and 2.0 hard drives are faster, but not to the extent that your current hard drive will hold you way back. The next time you upgrade, however, will probably be for a SATA 2.0 hard drive. They're very nice. :cool:

[Elwood]

Thanks everyone for all of your input. I have a rough draft on what I will be installing. No more than 2 Hard drives and not more that 2 CD/DVD drives. 1 floppy drive and that will probably be all of my drives. I will use 1 sound card down the road in one of my PCI slots. I will look at the 6600GT video cards unless I have extra to spend on the 6800 Ultra. I will keep the AMD Athlon 64 3000+ (Venice) unless I have the extra money to spend.

As stated, I will probably stay with the same MoBo and use the Tsunami case from Thermaltake. I would like to get a power supply that can effectively connect all of these components and cool this case efficiently as well. Considering I may get an SLI Configuration, I would like to take that in consideration as well. I may just pony up the money and get one of these:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...N82E16817103931

I will look at a SATA hard drive as well b/c I am currently using a 100 ATA 80G that I paid $30 for and it is doing fine with the current PC.

I did have a question regarding the SATA devices. I have read that when installing a new MoBo, you must install a new copy of the OS on a hard disk. Is it a challenge in getting the SATA HD to be recognized? How does this affect a SATA DVD Burner? Should I possibly stick to an IDE Burner?

Thanks again.
Elwood

[saphalline]

Try that link again, it didn't work for me.

The Tsunami case is very nice. My friend has that one and I was quite impressed by the overall quality and the little things that make it highly flexible. Not to mention it's about 1/4 the weight of my case. :rolleyes: Thermaltake is definitely getting better at making cases.

$30 for an 80GB hard drive? Not bad! Good price on that, but if you're looking to get another hard drive for that new system, then I would definitely suggest a SATA drive. Get one with NCQ, like this Seagate 160GB (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822148034) for $94.

Yes, you'll need a fresh install of Windows when you build a computer. You won't be able to just put your current hard drive into the new system and have it work. The problem with that is that Windows currently has all sorts of drivers installed for the platform it's running on now, and if you change that suddenly then Windows probably won't boot. And if you want to play games, you must reinstall Windows! There's no getting around that. You can certainly use the CD of Windows you have now, you just have to stop using your current installation (can't have the same license running twice).

Current chipsets have native SATA built into the southbridge, so there's absolutely no problem recognizing SATA hard drives. Windows will install to a SATA hard drive without a problem. SATA optical drives, on the other hand, still have a few hiccups, so I recommend installing Windows on an IDE optical drive, and then adding a SATA optical drive (if you so desire) after the installation of Windows is complete. Honestly right now, I wouldn't consider a SATA optical drive to be worth the extra cost. IDE is perfectly fine even for higher speed dual-layer DVD burners. Maybe in another 6-12 months they'll have the hiccups worked out...

[Elwood]

Sorry about the link, here it is again.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16817103931

Yeah, I do like that Seagate 160 SATA. I didn't think that there was too much difference in the IDE & SATA DVD Burners at the moment or there would be more SATA Burners available. I think that will be my first purchase b/c I can actually use the burner now and get the rest of my system when I save up some cash.

I didn't think that I could go wrong with a brand new hard drive at 80G for $30. I paid $90 at Worst Buy and they gave me a $30 mail in rebate and Western Digital gave me another $30. I had to buy it b/c 2 pin connectors on my other driver were broken and I couldn't get the parts to fix the drive. I still have it and tried to do some backwoods engineering on it, but I haven't had much luck.

As always, thanks for your time and helpful advice Saphalline.