Building A PC

[ROMAN]

I'm thiking of building a pc and here are the components I have chosen so far, tell me if theyre good, compatible, or if I'm missing something.
They are all from newegg.com

-XION Ultimate Engineering XON-002 Black/Silver Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 450W Power Supply $64.99
-Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 ST3250823AS 250GB 7200RPM
8MB Cache Serial ATA150 Hard Drive $108.25
-ASUS A8N-SLI Deluxe Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 SLI ATX AMD Motherboard $164.00
-CORSAIR XMS 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM Unbuffered DDR 400 (PC 3200) Dual Channel Kit System Memory
$123.00 times 3 so 3g and 369$.
-AMD Athlon 64 4000+ ClawHammer 1GHz FSB 1MB L2 Cache Socket 939 Processor $372.00
-eVGA 256-P2-N376-AX Geforce 6800GT 256MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 Video Card $284.99 for now later I shall upgrade.
-LITE-ON Black IDE DVD Burner Model SOHW-1693S Black $42.45

What do you guys think, I know theres no screen or peripherals becuase I already have them. Do you think there will be any bottlenecks between the cpu and gpu.

[nouse4aname68]

thats the same graphics card im getting

[Nikhil]

Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 ST3250823AS 250GB 7200RPM

I'd get a RAID setup instead. They're cheaper and you can get more storage without cutting down on RPMs.

[nouse4aname68]

what is raid?? and does it work for macs?

[Nikhil]

RAID is where you have two hard drives, but can choose to have them act as individual, or one hard drive. It's really nice cause you can put two low storage, but high RPM drives, and pay less, while still getting the same space and a higher RPM. There's also RAID extreme, but I'm not sure what that is. I don't see why it wouldn't work with macs, but then again, I'm not a computer expert, so I wouldn't know.

[nouse4aname68]

i know that my mac can have two hard drives, ill look into it, another question, it has a 160Gb hd in there now, can i get a bigger one too or do they have to be the same size?

[coltde420]

I'm thiking of building a pc and here are the components I have chosen so far, tell me if theyre good, compatible, or if I'm missing something.
They are all from newegg.com

-XION Ultimate Engineering XON-002 Black/Silver Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 450W Power Supply $64.99
-Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 ST3250823AS 250GB 7200RPM
8MB Cache Serial ATA150 Hard Drive $108.25
-ASUS A8N-SLI Deluxe Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 SLI ATX AMD Motherboard $164.00
-CORSAIR XMS 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM Unbuffered DDR 400 (PC 3200) Dual Channel Kit System Memory
$123.00 times 3 so 3g and 369$.
-AMD Athlon 64 4000+ ClawHammer 1GHz FSB 1MB L2 Cache Socket 939 Processor $372.00
-eVGA 256-P2-N376-AX Geforce 6800GT 256MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 Video Card $284.99 for now later I shall upgrade.
-LITE-ON Black IDE DVD Burner Model SOHW-1693S Black $42.45

What do you guys think, I know theres no screen or peripherals becuase I already have them. Do you think there will be any bottlenecks between the cpu and gpu.

You know dam well there is going to be no bottlenecks in that comp. Very nice rig. Good choice with the SLI mobo incase you want to add a second card later. Why didnt you go for a 7xxx series geforce or an FX series CPU? But with all that, you should be able run most games at high on 1600x1200 with all AA and AF turned on high.

[ROMAN]

Trust me, I would if I could right now but I'm already over my budget, maybe I will hold of for a month or so and get fx and 7series instead, thats like around 300-400$ more right?

[Nikhil]

i know that my mac can have two hard drives, ill look into it, another question, it has a 160Gb hd in there now, can i get a bigger one too or do they have to be the same size?

It's not just putting in two hard drives. I don't know too much about RAID, but it's a little different. The hard drives can be different sizes and RPMs.

[SE fanboy]

Yeah my friend has that setup. Try outpost.com they sell very cheap parts for making a pC

[coltde420]

I know the fx series amd's are exspensive. The athlon 64 fx55 is $811 and the fx57 is $1011. And that is on newegg. So your talking a 400-700 increase for the processor alone. But they are both socket 939 so if you want to upgrade later you have the option with the mobo your getting.

[hyelife]

If I were you I would go with Dual Core. I would recommand this one "http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819103547". Its only a 100 dollars difference but its well worth it. Dual core is the way to the future.

[Neil105]

i recommend amd 3700+ san diego core ($350ish). dual core is for multi tasking, when you want to run many program simultaneously but for gaming, the fx series is better from what i read/know. i wouldn't go sli/crossfire just yet since no game support it yet, personally, i'd prefer to get a single x1800 once it becomes cheaper.

I'm also building a system, but my budget is lower, so i'd be getting a 3000+ venice core, and clocking it to 2.7-9ghz. Its all good, but currently our system is overkill for todays game, if you include a good video card that is.

anyone disappointed with age of empire 3? graphic wise, the character/hero looks no more than a hundred poly.

[coltde420]

i wouldn't go sli/crossfire just yet since no game support it yet

Where did you hear that little information? A sick amount of game support, especially anything new coming out.
http://www.slizone.com/object/slizone_game.html

Act of War: Direct Action Myst IV Revelation

Age of Mythology, NASCAR SimRacing

AquaNox 2: Revelation, NBA Live 2005

Armed & Dangerous, Need for Speed Underground

Armies of Exigo, Need for Speed: Underground 2

Battlefield 1942, NHL 2005

Battlefield 2, Pacific Fighters

Battlefield Vietnam, Painkiller

Bet on Soldier, Painkiller: Battle Out of Hell

Breed, Pariah

Brothers In Arms, Perimeter

Call of Duty, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time

Call of Duty: MultiPlayer, Prince of Persia: Warrior Within

Call of Duty: United Offensive, Project Snowblind

Colin McRae Rally 2005, Quake III

Colin McRae Rally 04, Return to Castle Wolfenstein

Comanche 4, Return to Castle Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory

Conan, RollerCoaster Tycoon 3

Counter-Strike: Source, Rome: Total War

Dark Age of Camelot: Atlantis, Serious Sam: The Second Encounter

Desert Rats vs. Afrika Korps, Settlers: Heritage of Kings

Dirt Track Racing 2, Sid Meier's Pirates!

Doom 3, Sims 2

Doom 3: Resurrection of Evil, Sims 2: University

DRIV3R, SpellForce

Earth 2160, Splinter Cell

Everquest, Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory

Far Cry, S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadow of Chernobyl

Everquest II, Star Wars: Battlefront

FIFA Soccer 2005, Star Wars: Republic Commando

FlatOut, Stolen

Freedom Force vs. the 3rd Reich, SWAT 4

Full Spectrum Warrior, The Chronicles of Riddick

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, The Incredibles

Ground Control II: Operation Exodus, Thief: Deadly Shadows

Guild Wars,ToCA Race Driver 2

Half-Life 2, Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness

Halo: Combat Evolved, Tony Hawk's Underground

IL-2 Sturmovik: Forgotten Battles, Trackmania: Sunrise

Imperial Glory, Tribes Vengeance

Joint Operations: Typhoon Rising, Tron 2.0

Kohan II: Kings of War, Unreal

LEGO Star Wars: The Video Game, Unreal 2

Lineage II: The Chaotic Chronicles, Unreal Tournament 2003

Lord of the Ring: Battle for Middle Earth, Unreal Tournament 2004

Madden NFL 2005, Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines

Max Payne 2: Fall of Max Payne, Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War

Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, World of Warcraft

Medal of Honor: Breakthrough, X2: the Threat

Medal of Honor: Spearhead, Xpand Rally

Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault

Those are the game optimized for sli.

[Neil105]

i wasn't sure on sli support (beside isnt optimize different than being built specifically for it?)

of course you can play game with sli, otherwise why bother with it. what i meant is that they havn't taken its full potential since it just recently went mainstream.

just from my knowledge, i don't like to google/research just to make a simple point. come prove me wrong with your search.

[coltde420]

I wasnt trying to prove you wrong, you said no game supports sli, when obviously a hell of alot of games do. And everytime Nvidia releases new drivers new games are added.

[markyp23]

Categoric error above, you want 3GB, 3 x 1GB, 6x 512MB, the A8N-SLi Deluxe only has 4 RAM slots. So I hope you hadn't ordered yet.

[irg7620]

RAID stands for Redundant Array of Indepedent Discs. essentially what this does is allow both drives to have the same data on them and the system accesses both at the same to speed up load times. there are different levels of raid: 0-5. 0 being what us consumers would normally use. 1-5 gets into server type of stuff. it has been a while since i have researched this, so my information may be a little off now.

[CompGeek]

Get a 3500+ and a 7800 GT, or better yet, GTX

[Mich]

my advice:

- try to take 2*1gb sticks and not 2*512, it will be more future prove (cfr fear, bf2). Don't take 4*512, the onboard memory controller of the a64 still has troubles with it, even the venice/san diego e3 revision CPU's. When you use 4 512 dimm's, you'll have the use the 2t command rate, which slows your memory down a lot.

- When you take the asus a8n sli deluxe, also take another cooling for the chipset. The standard cooling is very noise and will eventually break down. I have the same motherboard, and i used a zalman nb47-j (costed around 5€).

- Don't take a clawhammer cpu. As i said before, the venice/san diego revisions have a lot of advantages and will perform better than a clawhammer. I didn't even know you could still buy one. Try to take a decent single core cpu (3700+ san diego) of a dual core if you have enough cash (x2 3800+).

- I would take another dvd writer, like the nec 4550 or the benq dw1640. Both cost around 50€ and perform very well.

- if you still have some cash left, try to take a 7800GT, its much stronger than a 6800gt with its 20 pp and 7 vs (6800gt has 16/6 configuration). Personnally, i don't think the 7800gtx is worth the higher price in comparison with the 7800gt.

- last remark: raid doesn't give you a lot of performance gain. You should run synthetic benchmarks to notice the difference . Raid stands for redundant array of inexpensive disks and it's a way to use more than 1 hd. You have different raid's:
- raid0: striping (data is cut in two and send to two hd's). You'll need at least 2 hd's for raid0. When one of the two crashes, you will lose all your data!
- raid1: mirroring (data is copied and then send to two hd's, you'll need two).
-raid 5: raid 0 with an extra hd's, so in total you'll have 3 hd's: two for striping, and one for backup. When one of your raid0 hd's crashes, you can use the backup.
- raid0+1: for this configuration you'll need at least 4hd's. Data will first be striped and send to two hd's, but at the same time copied and send to two other hd's.
- raid10: the same than a raid0+1 but here the data is first mirrored and then striped. You need at least 4hd's for a raid10.

=> when you use different hd's (for example: 160gb and 200), you will lose 40gb from the second hd! A raid can only be done with to hd's of the same size, when you use hd's that have a different size, you won't be able to use those extra gb's.

I hope i didn't make to much spelling errors

[hoverbike]

try to take 2*1gb sticks and not 2*512, it will be more future prove (cfr fear, bf2). Don't take 4*512, the onboard memory controller of the a64 still has troubles with it, even the venice/san diego e3 revision CPU's. When you use 4 512 dimm's, you'll have the use the 2t command rate, which slows your memory down a lot.

I heard that if you use 4*512 it's faster then having 2*1GB.

I hope i didn't make to much spelling errors ops

There is a spellcheck button under the post writing table. Use it.

[CompGeek]

try to take 2*1gb sticks and not 2*512, it will be more future prove (cfr fear, bf2). Don't take 4*512, the onboard memory controller of the a64 still has troubles with it, even the venice/san diego e3 revision CPU's. When you use 4 512 dimm's, you'll have the use the 2t command rate, which slows your memory down a lot.

I heard that if you use 4*512 it's faster then having 2*1GB.

I hope i didn't make to much spelling errors ops

There is a spellcheck button under the post writing table. Use it.

Entirely depends

Certainly not true with an Athlon64

Can be true with P4 because 512mb stick can be made with lower latencies.

[ROMAN]

OKay update time I scrapped that computer and instead am going with this from tigerdirect.ca. Tell me if there are any better components out there for a similar price or if I'm missing anything in terms of hardware.

THD-1600MM :: Maxtor / DiamondMax 10 / 160GB / 7200 / 16MB / ATA-133 / EIDE / OEM / RoHS Compliant Hard Drive (2 lbs)
In Stock $121.99 $121.99




L12-1052 :: Lite-on SOHD-16P9S / 16x DVD-ROM / 48x CD-ROM / Black / Internal / Drive (3 lbs)
In Stock $32.99 $32.99




L12-1068 :: Lite-on SHW-1635S / 16x8x16x DVD+RW / 16x6x16x DVD-RW / 8x DVD+R DL / 4x DVD-R DL / 48x24x48x CD-RW / Black/Biege Faceplates / Internal / DVD Writer (3 lbs)
In Stock $74.99 $74.99




TC1-6000 BL :: 1.44MB Floppy Disk Drive (Black) (1 lbs)
In Stock $26.99 $26.99




H54-1908 :: Hyundai B90A / 19" / 8ms / SXGA / 1280x1024 / Silver / LCD Monitor (18 lbs)
Available While Supplies Last $377.99 $377.99




ULT31846 :: Ultra / X-Finity / 500-Watt / ATX / 120mm Fan / SATA-Ready / SLI-Ready / Titanium Blue / Power Supply (2 lbs)
In Stock $94.99 $94.99




ULT30215 2 :: Ultra 1024MB PC3200 DDR 400MHz CL3 Memory (2 x 512MB) (1 lbs)
In Stock $134.99 $269.98




R301-1014 BK :: RealWorld Technology Sicuro RW-360XL Black Techno Lighting 360° “Surround Sound” Gaming Speakers (14 lbs)
In Stock $94.99 $94.99




P450-7814 :: XFX GeForce 7800 GT Overclocked / 256MB DDR3 / PCI Express / SLI / Dual DVI / VIVO / Video Card (1 lbs)
In Stock $411.99 $411.99




C283-1034 :: Cooler Master Vortex TX / Socket A/754/939/775/370 / Full Copper / CPU Cooling Fan (1 lbs)
In Stock $53.99 $53.99




T925-1055 :: ThermalTake Extreme Spirit Chipset Fan (0.5 lbs)
In Stock $20.99 $20.99




A107-1042 :: Aspire Multi-Fan Speed Controller (1 lbs)
In Stock $12.00 $12.00




ULT30120 :: Ultra Memory Aluminum Cooler (DDR or SDRAM) Purple (0.5 lbs)
In Stock $2.99 $11.96




ULT31530 :: Ultra Computer or Device Power Cable (0.5 lbs)
Available While Supplies Last $4.99 $4.99




ULT31118 :: Ultra 5.25" Bay Freezer with 2 - 60mm Fans - Silver (1 lbs)
In Stock $9.99 $9.99




F180-4200 :: Microban Anti-Microbial Mousepad (Silver) (1 lbs)
In Stock $6.99 $6.99




M17-1812 :: Microsoft Internet Keyboard (3 lbs)
In Stock $16.99 $16.99




L23-6244 :: Logitech MX310 Optical Mouse (3 lbs)
In Stock $33.99 $33.99




C375-ACM51 :: Cyber Acoustics ACM-51 Boom Microphone with 7' Shielded Cord (0.25 lbs)
Usually Ships in 7 - 21 Days $5.99 $5.99




T925-2070 :: Thermaltake Silver Armor Aluminum Full-Tower ATX Case with 11 External Drive Bays, Clear Side, Front USB, Firewire and Audio Ports (30 lbs)
In Stock $242.99 $242.99




A458-2116 :: Abit Fatal1ty AN8 SLI NVIDIA Socket 939 ATX Motherboard / Audio / PCI Express / Gigabit LAN / USB 2.0 & Firewire / Serial ATA / RAID (3 lbs)
Usually Ships in 7 - 21 Days $296.99 $296.99




CP1-A64-4000 E :: AMD Athlon 64 4000+ / 1MB Cache / 2000MHz FSB / Socket 939 / San Diego Core / Processor with Fan (1 lbs)
In Stock $472.99 $472.99

[CompGeek]

Dont get Ultra ram

Dont need the ram cooler

Dont get a maxtor HDD, they fail often.

[hoverbike]

Dont get a maxtor HDD, they fail often.

Mine has not so far (1.5 years and counting).

I was wondering when the 1 TB hard drive is coming out?