Building a couple more PC's - Looking for advice.

WarAdvocat · Post by **WarAdvocat** » Sun Aug 21, 2005 7:17 pm

I'm upgrading my main box, and I want to build an HTPC around my existing AMD 64 3000+ processor. I was thinking about dropping it into one of those small form facor 'barebones' systems I've seen from shuttle or the like. Anyone have any input on that?

Secondly, I've been asked to build a computer for my friend's college-bound son. He wants a machine that will run everything at "high detail". My friend has asked for a nice system but within reasonable budget. Thus, I'm shooting for something in the $2000-$2500 Range.

The spec I'm leaning toward is along the lines of:

Nforce-based Mobo with PCIE (SLI capable?)
AMD Athlon 64 4000+
2 x 1GB dual Channel RAM
300 GB ATA HDD
Geforce 7800GTX (PCIe)

Can anyone make some specific suggestions on motherboards? RAM? Hard Drives? I have just begun to research PCIe mobos. I'd also like to do some value engineering on this system.

Mr. Perfect · Post by **Mr. Perfect** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 12:12 am

You mean 2gigs of ram, made out of two 1gig sticks? In that case, I've only found one decent set. OCZ has a set that can do 2-3-2-5 on A64 systems. You can find it at newegg. Corsair has sets too, but they've all got considerably higher latencies.

Edward · Post by **Edward** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 5:40 am

Keep in mind the cost of display case and Peripherals. As well as the OS.

WarAdvocat · Post by **WarAdvocat** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 6:21 am

Edward wrote:Keep in mind the cost of display case and Peripherals. As well as the OS.

The listed components will run about $1500.00 Case+19" LCD will run about 500.00, leaving me 500.00 for optical drives & misc other stuff. I think I'm comfortably within budget, especially considering they have an existing 19" display they'll probably use.

Edward · Post by **Edward** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 6:26 am

Is the mobo and board sli capeable? How many dimms does the board have? Just think that youll want to consider allowing for upgrades.

As well you may want to but two 250 GB WD HDs and set them up in RAID. Since they are going for soo cheap these days.

WarAdvocat · Post by **WarAdvocat** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 7:37 am

Edward wrote:Is the mobo and board sli capeable? How many dimms does the board have? Just think that youll want to consider allowing for upgrades.

Yeah.. The motherboard. That was one of the things I wanted advice on. I budgeted about $200 for a decent mobo. I didn't actually pick one.

As for RAID, That's in the upgrade path, along with SLI video I think

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 10:02 am

Matrix and I can probably spec out the "high detail on everything" system. We already put together a virtually identical system for shadowfox.

The DFI Lanparty NF4 SLI-DR is the board that we used in shadowfox's system.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813136151

WarAdvocat · Post by **WarAdvocat** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 2:33 pm

Hmm.
Krom, any objection to the ASUS A8N-SLI Premium?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813131540

This system will never be overclocked by me, so I'm not so concerned with clockability. With no further ado, here's the rest of what I'm thinking:

AMD Athlon 64 4000+ (or better.. the dollars to performance ratio gets kinda steep after 4000+ IMO)
2 x 1GB PC 3200 RAM in Dual Channel Configuration
300 GB ATA HDD
Geforce FX 7800GTX (PCIe)

I'm thinking upgrade to New Processor, SATA RAID & New Video and/or SLI in a year or as necessary.

I'm actually meeting with my friend tomorrow at lunchtime so it'd be cool to have an idea of what he's getting into

Do I seem to be on the right track?

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 4:20 pm

No real objection to the Asus, both boards have nearly identical features. I prefer the DFI for ease of installation and that it comes with the right amount of extra goodies, that is all.

Sergeant Thorne · Post by **Sergeant Thorne** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 4:37 pm

WarAdvocate wrote:Geforce FX 7800GTX (PCIe)

I believe the "FX" is a typo/mistake on your part. Just so no one gets confused...

WarAdvocat · Post by **WarAdvocat** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 4:47 pm

The thing that scares me about the LANPARTY Board is the review that said it requires a floppy to flash the bios. Then I saw a pic of a floppy in the packaging.

I mean really? How 1989 is THAT??

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 5:56 pm

Requiring a floppy to flash the bios is nothing new or uncommon in motherboards today.

The floppy in the packaging is probably the same floppy that would be in the Asus packaging, the SATA RAID driver disk. It is impossible to install windows on a silicon image (or any other PCI RAID for that matter) without a floppy drive.

WarAdvocat · Post by **WarAdvocat** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 7:34 pm

That stinks. I like floppyless computing...

So what about the rest of the PC?

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 7:43 pm

Not all 7800 GTX cards are created equally, XFX and eVGA have cards with a high factory overclock (490/1300 vs stock 430/1200). Both brands are reasonably solid, eVGA supposedly has a superior warranty tho.

The XFX card is just called "overclocked", the eVGA card would be the "KO edition".

WarAdvocat · Post by **WarAdvocat** » Tue Aug 23, 2005 6:27 am

Nice.

Any thoughts on the RAM? Brandwise? I was contemplating using the OCZ 2 x 1GB kit,, just for the sake of simplicity

suicide eddie · Post by **suicide eddie** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 7:28 am

mmm ram. anything with a lifetime warrenty should do nicely but i would leave the 7800s for a while to mature through as theres been talk of hardware probs with antialising.

WarAdvocat · Post by **WarAdvocat** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 8:24 am

Hmm nice info Eddie, I wasn't aware of that but I'm going to hope that they resolve it with drivers. Besides, the computer isn't for me.

Here's what I've got specced out now:

Case: Thermaltake Tsunami (Black)
Power Supply: Fortron Bluestorm 500W PSU
Motherboard: DFI LANPARTY nF4 SLI-DR ATX
Processor: AMD Athlon 64 4400+ Dual-Core
Alternate Processor: AMD Athlon 64 4000+
RAM: OCZ 2 GB Dual Channel PC 3200 RAM
Video Card: Leadtek 7800 GTX
Alternate Video Card: eVGA GeForce 7800 ACS Edition (out of stock at NewEgg)
Optical Drive 1: NEC 3540a DVD Burner
Optical Drive 2: Sony 16x/48x DVD/CD ROM
Floppy Drive: I/O Magic Black Internal Floppy
Mouse: Logitech MX-518
Keyboard: Saitek Gamer's Keyboard
Monitor: ViewSonic VP191B Black 19" LCD

suicide eddie · Post by **suicide eddie** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 3:54 pm

dont forget the built-in flash card reader

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 7:02 pm

For gaming, the Athlon 64 4000+ will outperform the Athlon X2 4400+. Reason: 4400+ is 2.2 GHz/1 MB, 4000+ is 2.4 GHz/1 MB.

WarAdvocat · Post by **WarAdvocat** » Fri Aug 26, 2005 8:17 am

Krom wrote:For gaming, the Athlon 64 4000+ will outperform the Athlon X2 4400+. Reason: 4400+ is 2.2 GHz/1 MB, 4000+ is 2.4 GHz/1 MB.

Not to mention the $200.00 difference in cost...

Neo · Post by **Neo** » Mon Sep 05, 2005 6:24 pm

Hiya! ^_^

I would say go with the Leadtek as far as the 7800 GTX is concerned. Also, I would consider getting a nice monitor that can run at 2048*1536 at 85 Hz. In other words, there's no point in getting a GTX if your monitor can't support the "highest settings." ^_~

And, I was going to suggest getting a Pentium M 780, since it outperforms the Athlon FX-55, but

1. You seem to be interested in symmetrical multiprocessing.

Even if you weren't, it wouldn't matter, because,

2. You plan to upgrade to SLI.

If you didn't care about upgrading, then I would have said get a Pentium M 780, and make sure that the motherboard supports dual-channel memory (either PC2700 OR PC2-4300; I'm not too sure about the PC2-4300 because of the high latencies. But that shouldn't matter on an Intel system).

And then your buddy should be able to sm0ke a f00b.

Two things to keep in mind:

If you must have SMP, there is a cheaper version of the Athlon X2 out, the Athlon X2 3800+. Also, the nForce4 boards will probably drop in price (if they haven't already) since the nForce4 SLI X16 chip set is now the premium joint. ^_~

hmm, looks like the Athlon 64 4000+ is cheaper than the Pentium M 780. But keep in mind that:

1. The Pentium M outperforms the Athlon FX-55, and

2. It dissipates considerably less power.

These are just some ideas. Nothing more. ^_^