New computer time!

[Malcolm]

I'd like some input on the products that I plan to buy for my new upcoming PC:

-----------
Asus A7V8X-X SOCKET A VIA KT400 5PCI 3DDR 1AGP8X ATA133 (http://www.asus.com/prog/spec.asp?m=A7V8X-X&langs=01) = $100 CND
AMD Athlon XP 2400+ 2.0 GHz 266 MHz FSB = $130 CND
DDR 512MB PC3200 PC3200 DDR 512MB 400MHZ = $105 CND
Western Digital WD1200BB 120GB 7200RPM 8mb (http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?DriveID=12) = $162 CND
Envision 910E ENVISION 910E 19IN.26MM 1600X1200@75HZ (http://www.envisionmonitor.com/products/specsheets/en-910e-specs.html) = $215 CND
Sony DDU162110 16X DVD-ROM = $51 CND
Asus CRW-5224A 52X24X52 CDRW RETAIL (http://www.asus.com/prog/spec.asp?m=CRW-5224A) = $67 CND
Creative Sound Blaster Live 5.1 Value OEM = $49 CND
Altec Lansing AVS300 ALTEC 2X3.5W+10W SUB (http://www.alteclansing.com/product_details.asp?pID=AVS300&sID=2) = $38 CND
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I haven't decided on a video card yet.

So far this is going to run me $932 CND ($670USD/$410£).

The computer is going to be used mainly for programmin' but I do intend on running Halo PC, Halflife2 and Doom3 when they come out :D.

Any suggestions?

[Tagrineth]

ATi Radeon 9800 Pro, or if you're too worried about price, 9700 Pro or non-Pro.

[Stezo2k]

GeForce 4's seem to be getting at a good price recently too, pretty good BTW very nice motherboard, very similar to mine :D

[Malcolm]

I'm going to be buying this computer on Monday so if there are any bad comments about any of the hardware in my list **please** let me know.

Thanks.

And about the videocard, I'm going to pick up an old PCI card to run with till the 9800 comes out; at that time I think I'm gonna get a 9700 pro

[Malcolm]

Was just shown DDR @400MHz is slower then 333MHz, so I'm 'downgrading' to 333MHz and saving $40 :D

[URAMetroid]

I think DDR333 is OK, but if the FSB is 266 MHz isn't a waste to get DDR333, unless you plan to overclock then you need more speed. And video, the 9700 is fine (or the 9600 if you what to save some money).

[The Khan Artist]

The 9700 is much better than the 9600, which is actually slower than the 9500. Don't you just love naming schemes?

[Lex]

I recommend you getting a Athlon XP 2500+ (barton) with 333fsb, the price is almost the same here, and with the higher fsb you will get a nice boost.

[Malcolm]

good call, its $10 more and there is a noticable speed increase

[URAMetroid]

I forgot to ask what's wrong with the nforce 2 chipset's?
I heard somewaer they have better audio and gaming performance.

[Malcolm]

Originally posted by URAMetroid
I forgot to ask what's wrong with the nforce 2 chipset's?
I heard somewaer they have better audio and gaming performance.

Only when you're using a NVidia based graphics card

[vampireuk]

The nForce2 works well with ATI cards too ;)

[Doomulation]

Oh you probably went and bought your computer now, but i thought i should say...
the intregrated sound that i have is excellent for sound and you'll save money for a soundcard.
It doesn't have EAX or whatever it's called, but it does have surround support and it works great!

Have fun with your new computer ;)

[Flash]

No. Most of integrated sound is crap, same shit as software modems or network
cards. When cpu gets loaded you'll get this "hick, hrrr, hr" If not anyway overall sound quality is like rusty oil drum.
And SB Live have one thing called "compatibility" it's compatible with everything - from antique DOS games from late 80s to newest games. And there's no reason to buy Audigy OEM - SB Live w/ hacked drivers is same thing because same DSP chip (Audigy 2 have different revision and it's 24bit/96kHz capable, you're not a musician, right ? So it's useles s for games, and many games still use 16bit 22kHz sound, none - 24bit )

And good soundcard is 15-20 (US) $ Just like 50pcs pack of good CD-Rs, so don't be so greedy :)

Only mobos w/ good onboard sound it's nForce based w/ MCP-T DSP (it's very powerful, and you may call it Vortex-3 as it designed by former Aureal employees :) )

[Lex]

Originally posted by Doomulation
Oh you probably went and bought your computer now, but i thought i should say...
the intregrated sound that i have is excellent for sound and you'll save money for a soundcard.
It doesn't have EAX or whatever it's called, but it does have surround support and it works great!

Have fun with your new computer ;)

I've got an intergrated AC97 Realtek ALC650, 5.1 sound + EAX, works excellent, the ALC650 is intergrated on a lot of mobo's so buy one with a ALC650 if you go for intergrated sound.

[Flash]

Originally posted by Lex
I've got an intergrated AC97 Realtek ALC650, 5.1 sound + EAX, works excellent, the ALC650 is intergrated on a lot of mobo's so buy one with a ALC650 if you go for intergrated sound.

ALC650 is only a codec, it doesn't support EAX (it's emulated, with EAX Unified it can be done even by SB16 or Yamaha OPL3SAX)
Instead of being 3D and DirectSound accelerator it's 3D Sound decelerator :D
All DSP functions are done by CPU, so if you compare your system with same w/ full sound card you can see that your system is up to 30% slower when processing complex geometry or sound.

Better to buy nForce2 based mb, they have that ALC650, but with MCP-T, very powerful sound processor, it does hardware EAX2 instead of crappy emulation.

IMO best of them is Epox 8RDA+, Asus A7N8X in therms of stability and speed.

And mobos with only AC'97 is the lowest end of audio, because all DSP functions is emulated you can forget about real quality and you'll get additional slowdowns and all cracks in N64 games on powerful machines (1700Mhz and up) is all because this integrated shit.

I have only Celeron 900 and old Vortex 2 for games but, i never get any cracks even in PD and CBFD.

But all talks about sound is senseless if you don't have good acoustics.

Many people have cheap plastic "Komputer Squeakerz" and i hear from them "I have awesomå 5.1 system" .... until they hear my 250W (real watts, not PMPO) 3 way speakers with cellular woofers and isodynamic tweeters (15Hz-55Khz frequency range, it can say enough for hifi guru). I've also made good 4-channel tube amplifier.

So, if i get angry enough, best for my neighbours is to find a bomb shelter :D :D :D (But i've never actually listened it louder than 40W, it's more than enough for my room ) ;)

[Malcolm]

I've actually just placed the order adn the computer should be here by then end of the week; this is what I ended up getting:


AMD Athlon XP 2500+ 1.83 GHz 333 MHz FSB Barton Socket A with fan (Retail) $139
Asus A7V8X-X SOCKET A VIA KT400 5PCI 3DDR 1AGP8X ATA133 $101
MemoryDDR 512MB PC2700 PC2700 333MHz DDR 64x64 512MB 184 pin DIMM $80
Western Digital WD1200BB 120GB 7200RPM ATA100 2MB 8.9MS EIDE HARD DRIVE $162
Envision 910E ENVISION 910E 19IN.26MM 1600X1200@75HZ $215
Sony DDU162110 SONY 16X DVD-ROM E-IDE OEM DRIVE BULK PACK $51
Asus CRW-5224A 52X24X52 CDRW RETAIL $66
Creative Sound Blaster Live 5.1 Value OEM Sound Blaster Live 5.1 digital OEM $49
Altec Lansing AVS300 ALTEC 2X3.5W+10W SUB (BEIGE) (RETAIL) $38
Sapphire Xpert 98 Rage XL 8M SDRAM AGP2X Sapphire Xpert 98 Rage XL 8M SDRAM AGP2X $33
Linkworld 313B P4 full ATX; 4+2 Bays; MIDI Tower built-in 2 front USB w/cable; 300W lifetime wty. $36
Panasonic FDP14W Panasonic 1.44M (White Grey) $13
BenQ 6511VA BenQ 6511-VA PS2 KB English $10
Logitech B69 LOGITECH B69 Optical Wheel USB+PS2 3 Button (OEM) $23


The total is $1168.4 CND ($850 USD, $520£) including tax. The store manager says that I'll get an additional discount but I'm not counting on it.

Anyways for the price I think I'm getting a great system.


Thanks to everyone who helped, or tried to :)

--Edit--
Just incase you're wondering I'm putting my GeForce2 in my new computer and putting the XPert 98 in my old computer which has been given to my mother :)

[Lex]

Originally posted by Malcolm
I've actually just placed the order adn the computer should be here by then end of the week; this is what I ended up getting:

[size=1]
AMD Athlon XP 2500+ 1.83 GHz 333 MHz FSB Barton Socket A with fan (Retail) $139


is this a boxed version? didn't the boxed amd fans made a lot of noise?

[Malcolm]

possibly; I'm not too worried about case sound anyways. This system is just a work station, I have a laptop that does all my downloading and such.

This system will never be run for more then 5 hours every day

[sytaylor]

Western Digital WD1200BB

GAH! its gotta be the JB.. thats the one with 8mb cache its fast as hell (although the one i have seems to be buggy and ive missed the warranty by about 3 weeks :getlost: )

[Flash]

Originally posted by Malcolm
I've actually just placed the order adn the computer should be here by then end of the week; this is what I ended up getting:



Linkworld 313B P4 full ATX; 4+2 Bays; MIDI Tower built-in 2 front USB w/cable; 300W lifetime wty. $36



The total is $1168.4 CND ($850 USD,

Everything is ok, except one thing - Linkworld case.


Linkworld PSUs is pure trash - missing filters, crappy protection. It can burn and kill whole computer when overloaded or by network surge, i.e. lightning, welding transformers etc. !!!

I saw 9 PCs dead with their crappy PSUs - two of them with dead mobos, three - with hdds, and four - completely burned out - mb dead, cpu, hdds, memory, everything. When i've measured voltage on +5v line ... it was 28 v :o
And it's with only one resistor burned.
And there was no AC problems, all PCs was killed after adding new HDDs, videocards (so it was just overload)

When i've replaced it with same, but 0.5W instead of 0.125 - i've got 4.98v.
Nice .... :-(

Good PSU will simply shut down if overloaded (if it's overloaded by AC you may to have to resolder fuse (if it's not removable), but some of new PSUs have semiconductor fuse, so you will probably never mess with soldering iron
and even open PSU'S case (except cleaning, but it can be done with vacuum cleaner through fan hole)

So when you get your PC, go to nearest computer store and buy a good PSU
(you don't have to replace case, it's just a piece of stainless steel )

Good PSUs:

Addtronics
Delta
HPC (High Power)
Powerman
Seventeam (very good but extremely rare)

Delta and PowerMan is the best but all of them are very good (although Addtronics made loud name by HP servers it's not the best of them and it's
a bit overpriced, anyway)

There's also some good PSUs but they're too expensive for home PC.


And about cases.
Very good and not too expensive cases
is :

ChiefTec
InWin
PowerMan

And of course used case from good server is excellent solution if you don't have too much money.

There's also many good cases such as ASUS and Thermaltake but they not better and a bit expensive, so if you like alien design and have money to waste
go and get them...


BTW you can't get good case with good PSU for $38 CND (if USD - maybe, bought PM6004 250W case - simplistic but have good design (have enough place for hdds, i have six of them and was only need to make additional power connectors.) - it's the price of middle-class PSU (such as CodeGen)

And here's my PC w/ real 250W PSU and 6HDDs plus Voodoo5 6000
(look at +5v and +12v )

[Malcolm]

Well, with this inmind, I contacted the store manager to change my order. After a nice long 35min talk we decided that I would grab a Elitech 6070, it has a nive 5 year warrenty and has a $5000 insurance policy; I'm happy.


Thanks for the info Flash.

[Flash]

Originally posted by Malcolm
Well, with this inmind, I contacted the store manager to change my order. After a nice long 35min talk we decided that I would grab a Elitech 6070, it has a nive 5 year warrenty and has a $5000 insurance policy; I'm happy.

Five years warranty and $5000 insurance policy for entry-level case ? Good.


Thanks for the info Flash.

No probs.

[Malcolm]

actually the case isn't really entry level anymore, its costing me $105 CND. On the bright side it does have 3 internal fans and a whole wacky load of internal lights; I'll never bump into stuff in my room at night ever again!

[Flash]

Originally posted by Malcolm
actually the case isn't really entry level anymore, its costing me $105 CND. On the bright side it does have 3 internal fans and a whole wacky load of internal lights; I'll never bump into stuff in my room at night ever again!

3 internal fans ? Enough for a small server.

And about servers. I've got Supermicro CSE-742S-600 server case for $10 USD yesterday :happy: :happy: :happy:

One friend called me and said "I have some a bit ugly, big but new computer case, grab it or i'll throw it away, and if you'll give me some money it will be nice"
I had P166MMX machine for old DOS games in mind, so i've said "How about $10" ? "Deal"

So i've got big box. But when i came home it was real shock, i thought it's full tower atx case (good for $10 anyway)
but it was $730 server case :o .... :D

I've changed my mind. I have AthlonMP 2800+ CPU and very good dual cpu MB,
so i have only to buy CPU ($280 USD buy memory (2Gb, this can be a bit expesive), soundcard. I've already have
extremely powerful videocard but it will wait this new PC as it Requires AGP Pro slot

And i'll replace my current PCs MB with even better one but with three ISA slots (one for AWE64 and another for PSX dev... oops, yes i have this thing )
:D This machine will be for legacy games
and hadware, i have also 3DO Blaster. (but i have FZ-10 too, but to go in another room everytime when i want to play old good Captain Quazar, Gex or Star Fighter is not too good idea as my parents can watch TV, and since plans for massive upgrade i probably won't buy new CRT for TV in my room... again :) )

[AlphaWolf]

Originally posted by Malcolm

Envision 910E ENVISION 910E 19IN.26MM 1600X1200@75HZ (http://www.envisionmonitor.com/products/specsheets/en-910e-specs.html) = $215 CND


Thats a good monitor, if its CRT is as good as mine, it can actualy do 2048x1024 res at 59hz :happy:

My monitor is almost the same as that one, only mine is the 980E. I spent $150 on it last year. It even has a nice anti-glare coating on it.
http://www.envisionmonitor.com/products/specsheets/en-980e-specs.html


Originally posted by Flash
No. Most of integrated sound is crap, same shit as software modems or network
cards. When cpu gets loaded you'll get this "hick, hrrr, hr" If not anyway overall sound quality is like rusty oil drum.
And SB Live have one thing called "compatibility" it's compatible with everything - from antique DOS games from late 80s to newest games. And there's no reason to buy Audigy OEM - SB Live w/ hacked drivers is same thing because same DSP chip (Audigy 2 have different revision and it's 24bit/96kHz capable, you're not a musician, right ? So it's useles s for games, and many games still use 16bit 22kHz sound, none - 24bit )


I wouldn't only stick with creative, theres no reason to anymore. Back with the real mode drivers in the dos days you did want compatibility, but now with protected mode drivers there is VDMSound (http://ntvdm.cjb.net/). If you truely want good sound, get any sound card that has an SPDIF out port, and get a surround system that has a built in DAC with a digital input, not those $150 PC surround speakers that plug in to the analog 1/8" stereo ports, they sound like crap and are overpriced.

With analog outputs, the quality of the sound cards DAC is what you are relieing on, which is also the most expensive component on the card. Not only that, but your sound is susceptable to interference from the hard disk or cdrom drive or other components. With digital outputs, you don't even use the sound cards DAC, and there is no interference. In this scenario, a $30 aureal vortex would sound every bit as good as a $150 SB Audigy.