Need opinions on computer specifications

[Sea Skimmer]

:Lian Li PC-61 USB Black Aluminum ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
:EPoX EP-9NPA+Ultra Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra ATX AMD Motherboard
:Leadtek WinFast PX6800 GT TDH GeForce 6800 GT PCI Express 256MB DDR3 Video Card w/DVI
:Antec TRUEPOWERII 430W ATX Power Supply
:AMD Athlon 64 3200+ Venice 1GHz FSB Socket 939 Processor
:OCZ Gold Series 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) Unbuffered Dual Channel Kit
:NEC Black IDE DVD Burner Model
:Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD2500KS 250GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive

These are the specs a friend of mine has suggested for the tower; the price should be around 1100 USD without tax or shipping. He is in school for computer engineering, but I’d like other opinions, no way I’d trust just one person for this.

[Darth Wong]

What do you plan to use it for?

[Sea Skimmer]

General computer tasks, and gaming. No server use or anything like that.

[Miles Teg]

:Lian Li PC-61 USB Black Aluminum ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
:EPoX EP-9NPA+Ultra Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra ATX AMD Motherboard
:Leadtek WinFast PX6800 GT TDH GeForce 6800 GT PCI Express 256MB DDR3 Video Card w/DVI
:Antec TRUEPOWERII 430W ATX Power Supply
:AMD Athlon 64 3200+ Venice 1GHz FSB Socket 939 Processor
:OCZ Gold Series 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) Unbuffered Dual Channel Kit
:NEC Black IDE DVD Burner Model
:Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD2500KS 250GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive

These are the specs a friend of mine has suggested for the tower; the price should be around 1100 USD without tax or shipping. He is in school for computer engineering, but I’d like other opinions, no way I’d trust just one person for this.

I'd go with an EVGA video card personally. They have a *very* good warranty (lifetime against everything but physical damage to the card. IOW: break it overclocking or flashing the bios or something, and EVGA covers it.). Also, you might look at getting a 7800GT instead of the 6800GT. The 7800GT is about $50 more for a far superior card (faster, uses less power, etc.). One warning, if you do those two thing (a 7800GT by EVGA), know that EVGA has a know issue (artifacts in 3d games) with their 7800GT's that is now fixed with a new BIOS (and in some cases simply enabling VSync). One more thing: If you want to play Battlefield 2, you can get a nice bundle deal with a 7800GT EVGA card that offsets the $50 extra for the 7800GT =)

You will have problems with the OCZ memory most likely. They make good stuff, but most motherboards don't have default settings that work with it (I've built two machines with OCZ now that I had to modify the setting to get it to work right). If you don't want to mess with that, buy Corsair.

The rest looks good specs wise (unless you want to overclock). A lot of your brand choices I have issues with, but that's just personal oppinion (except for the EVGA, the lifetime warranty and great support make them pretty much the best choice in video cards hands down).

Miles Teg

[Jaepheth]

I'd a recommend a Seagate over a Western Digital. They're quieter.

Western Digital is a good brand though.


Also, you may want to get a 92mm Zalman fan for your processor. (~$25 for the aluminum/copper, ~$35 for all copper)

Oh, don't get the 120mm fan if you're using a mid tower, I doubt it would fit.

[Sea Skimmer]

I'd go with an EVGA video card personally. They have a *very* good warranty (lifetime against everything but physical damage to the card. IOW: break it overclocking or flashing the bios or something, and EVGA covers it.). Also, you might look at getting a 7800GT instead of the 6800GT. The 7800GT is about $50 more for a far superior card (faster, uses less power, etc.). One warning, if you do those two thing (a 7800GT by EVGA), know that EVGA has a know issue (artifacts in 3d games) with their 7800GT's that is now fixed with a new BIOS (and in some cases simply enabling VSync). One more thing: If you want to play Battlefield 2, you can get a nice bundle deal with a 7800GT EVGA card that offsets the $50 extra for the 7800GT =)

Sure about that price? The lowest I've seen the 7800GT at is 400 USD, while the 6800GT is 300.

You will have problems with the OCZ memory most likely. They make good stuff, but most motherboards don't have default settings that work with it (I've built two machines with OCZ now that I had to modify the setting to get it to work right). If you don't want to mess with that, buy Corsair.

My friend already has made this exact ram and motherboard combination work quite well for a third mutual friend. So I’m not too worried about that.

The rest looks good specs wise (unless you want to overclock).

I don't, my living conditions are frankly too hot in a litteral sence for me to want to do that.

A lot of your brand choices I have issues with, but that's just personal oppinion (except for the EVGA, the lifetime warranty and great support make them pretty much the best choice in video cards hands down).

Well the brands are what where recommended to me. If you've got better suggestions for brands, I'm open to them.

[Uraniun235]

I'd a recommend a Seagate over a Western Digital. They're quieter.

Samsung's Spinpoint hard drives are even quieter, if that's a priority.

I would personally go with just about any hard drive that offered a five year warranty... which I'm not sure that WD drive does.

[Glocksman]

There are some people who report problems with USB devices on nForce chipsets.
I had a problem with my nF3 board where my external HD would just quit working in the middle of the transfer if I tried to write large files to the drive.
The same problem also occured on a friend's Hewlett-Packard (Asus A7N8X-LX based machine, btw) nF2 Athlon XP setup.

Whereas on Intel and Via chipset boards, the drive works perfectly.

This might never be a concern with you, but it is something to be aware of.

Oh, and unless you plan on overclocking heavily, you can get good Kingston or Crucial memory a lot cheaper than OCZ.
As far as mobos go, brandwise I like Asus, MSI, and DFI.

DFI has a damn good support forum, while Asus's support blows huge chunks and I never tried to use MSI's support.

[Miles Teg]

Sure about that price? The lowest I've seen the 7800GT at is 400 USD, while the 6800GT is 300.

For EVGA yeah, you can get a 7800GT for $330 on newegg after some rebates ($350 before),

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130240

or a 7800GT + BF2 for $370 or something. EVGA 6800GT's are going for $300 now.

The rest looks good specs wise (unless you want to overclock).

I don't, my living conditions are frankly too hot in a litteral sence for me to want to do that.

That why I have a "winter" mode and a "summer" mode for my machines, lol. It works out since I usually play more games in the winter Though with newer AMD processors it's a non-issue. AMD has a nice feature called Cool'n'Quiet that throttles your CPU speed based on the load on your machine. The nice thing is, if you don't mess with your multiplier while overclocking, you can overclock your processor and still use CnC.

My X2 4200+ (stock 2.2Ghz, OC'ed to 2.6Ghz) idles at about 22C with CnC enabled (the processors get's clocked down to 1Ghz + I have a Zalman 7700 CU). The throttling is very transparent. Of course, when both cores are going full throttle, my temps get out of control (60+), but right now nothing but Prime95 will do that, so I don't worry too much.

A lot of your brand choices I have issues with, but that's just personal oppinion (except for the EVGA, the lifetime warranty and great support make them pretty much the best choice in video cards hands down).

Well the brands are what where recommended to me. If you've got better suggestions for brands, I'm open to them.[/quote]

Please note for each positive brand recomendation you get with a company, you'll get a negative as well. That said, Here're my brand preferences:

Motherboards: MSI. I've had about a half dozen boards, and I've never had a problem with any of them (at least not a problem that was directly MSI's fault: ever heard of the great Fake Japanese Capacitor fiasco?). That said, my current board is an Abit AN8-Ultra (I got it for the passive NF4 cooling). I'm relatively happy with it, but it took a while to get it working correctly (It wasn't giving enough voltage to my ram, and I had to update the BIOS to work with the X2, even though Abit claims out of box compatability).

Drives: Mitsumi or Pioneer (fast + quiet dvd+-rw drives)

Cases: Antec all the way. Lian-Li's are nice, but I've never liked their styling. If you can shell out the dough, get a P-180... such a bloody nice case (great cooling, very quiet, and personally I really like the styling).

Drive: Maxtor, though I hear their quality has wained in the last few years. I used to work at a computer shop and we used only maxtors. In the time I worked there (3 years), I only had to replace 2.

The rest of your stuff is in alignment with my brand choices (Antec PS, OCZ memory, AMD)

[EDIT]
Some additions (some that I am just chiming in with a second).

* Get a nice CPU cooler. Zalman 7000 or 7700 (the 7700 is huge, research it's fit to your MB/case choice), or Thermaltake XP-90 and XP-120 (again, the 120 is huge). Your ears will thank you, and so will your processor.

* Along that line, get a nice VGA cooler too. The dust buster's on most cards these days really suck (no pun intended). Again, Zalman is your friend in that department.

* Get a stand alone sound card if you are a gamer. On board is a lot better these days, but still not as good as a quality stand alone card. If you don't have a desire for surround sound or fancy I/O (optical, etc.) you can pick up a Sound Blaster Live! for less than $30 that will smoke any onboard card for performance and sound quality (plus stuff like EAX).

Hope this helps,
Miles Teg

[Ace Pace]

With that RAM and graphics card, your going to get held back by your CPU. I'd look into maybe using slightly cheaper RAM and upgrading the CPU to a 3500+.

[Uraniun235]

First, how is that RAM significantly different from any other PC3200 RAM? With the exception of overclocking, RAM latency tends to have a trivial effect at best on overall performance.

Furthermore, because there is no architectural or FSB speed difference between the 3200 and the 3500, their maximum theoretical utilization of memory bandwidth will be identical; upgrading the CPU incrementally will not take better advantage of the RAM.

Second, the 6800GT can't be held back that much; the difference between a 3200 and a 3500 in Doom 3 is only 3.5 fps.


The prices are no longer exact, but a 3500 is still almost $30 more than a 3200.

* Get a nice CPU cooler. Zalman 7000 or 7700 (the 7700 is huge, research it's fit to your MB/case choice), or Thermaltake XP-90 and XP-120 (again, the 120 is huge). Your ears will thank you, and so will your processor.

AMD's stock cooler is more than adequate for the Athlon64. The chances of the processor dying a premature death because the user went with the stock heatsink/fan are negligible.

However, an alternative HSF can be quieter.

[Miles Teg]

* Get a nice CPU cooler. Zalman 7000 or 7700 (the 7700 is huge, research it's fit to your MB/case choice), or Thermaltake XP-90 and XP-120 (again, the 120 is huge). Your ears will thank you, and so will your processor.

AMD's stock cooler is more than adequate for the Athlon64. The chances of the processor dying a premature death because the user went with the stock heatsink/fan are negligible.

However, an alternative HSF can be quieter.

I didn't mean to imply that the stock HSF was inadequate to the task, merely that it's excessively loud (to me at least). However, the Zalman will keep the chip cooler (== longer life and better stability) at a much lower noise level. To me, it's well worth the $30

Miles Teg

[Ace Pace]

First, how is that RAM significantly different from any other PC3200 RAM? With the exception of overclocking, RAM latency tends to have a trivial effect at best on overall performance.

Furthermore, because there is no architectural or FSB speed difference between the 3200 and the 3500, their maximum theoretical utilization of memory bandwidth will be identical; upgrading the CPU incrementally will not take better advantage of the RAM.

Second, the 6800GT can't be held back that much; the difference between a 3200 and a 3500 in Doom 3 is only 3.5 fps.

1) Its not, its a trival differance but a rather large price increase and a far better use of that cash is on a better CPU.

2) Upgrading the CPU incrementally will not take advantage of RAM, it WILL improve preformance, don't assume my entire argument is based around the RAM, its just a note.

3) Reading the Half Life 2 CPU guide on Anandtech.com leads me to agree, but in this case, I feel that when dropping RAM and adding the CPU, its worth it, again, its NOT worth it if your shelling out far more money, but if the price difference is what you gain from downgrading the RAM, it is.

[phongn]

If you are not overclocking then you do not need OCZ ram. Get cheap Kingston, Crucial, Corsair or Mushkin RAM (lifetime warranties are your friend). The performance boost you get from higher-grade RAM due to their lower latency is negligible. In addition, dual-channel RAM is not that useful unless you use onboard video.

Aluminum cases tend to be louder than their steel counterparts. I like Antec's case line, especially the SLK3800B (not too expensive, not too loud) and P180 (expensive and very quiet).

Consider a Zalman heatsink for your CPU and maybe GPU to cut down on noise.

EPoX isn't bad but I generally prefer Asus motherboards.

[Ace Pace]

EDIT: I R idiot.

Though earlier point stands, at socket 939 its all dual channel, and hes not going to find cheaper prices by searching for 'normal' RAM, as far as I know, they all work in dual channel nowdays,

[Sea Skimmer]

There are some people who report problems with USB devices on nForce chipsets.
I had a problem with my nF3 board where my external HD would just quit working in the middle of the transfer if I tried to write large files to the drive.
The same problem also occured on a friend's Hewlett-Packard (Asus A7N8X-LX based machine, btw) nF2 Athlon XP setup.

Whereas on Intel and Via chipset boards, the drive works perfectly.

This might never be a concern with you, but it is something to be aware of.

Was it ever a problem with anything else? An external hard drive one thing I do not expect to ever be using but I wouldn’t rule out all USB.

[Glocksman]

I had a card reader that gave me problems, but it was secondhand, so I'm not sure if it was the mobo or just a bad reader.

I never thought I'd say this after the MVP3 fiasco back in the P2 days, but I'm partial to VIA's K8T800 (AGP) and K8T890 (PCIe) chipsets over the nForce due to my bad USB experience.

But of course your mileage may vary.

[Arrow]

:Lian Li PC-61 USB Black Aluminum ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

I have to second the opinion of going with another case. I built my new system a few weeks ago, using a Lian Li case (v1200, specifically), and between heating problems (which was due to it being a BTX style case) and the rattling from the fans, it had to go. Fan rattling might a be a problem for you. I went with a Cool Master Stacker 810, and its a much better case. For your needs, something like a CM Armor or Centerior (sp) might be a better, possibly cheaper, option.

:EPoX EP-9NPA+Ultra Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra ATX AMD Motherboard

I've seen a lot of good feedback on Anandtech and HardOCP for this board.

:Leadtek WinFast PX6800 GT TDH GeForce 6800 GT PCI Express 256MB DDR3 Video Card w/DVI

Go with the EVGA - much better warrenty. 7800GT model if you can.

:Antec TRUEPOWERII 430W ATX Power Supply

I've heard mixed things about Antec powersupplies. But I've heard a lot of mixed about most other powersupplies.

:OCZ Gold Series 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) Unbuffered Dual Channel Kit

Crucial or Corsair would be better/cheaper.

:Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD2500KS 250GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive

The WDs don't support NCQ. While its not an issue now, Vista supposedly requires NCQ. Maxtor, Samsung and Hitachi drives support NCQ; I have a Hitachi 250GB SATA2 Deskstar, which supports NCQ (enabled via a DOS tool) and it runs extremely well.

There are some people who report problems with USB devices on nForce chipsets.
I had a problem with my nF3 board where my external HD would just quit working in the middle of the transfer if I tried to write large files to the drive.

<snip>

As far as mobos go, brandwise I like Asus, MSI, and DFI.

DFI has a damn good support forum, while Asus's support blows huge chunks and I never tried to use MSI's support.

I haven't had any problems with USB on the nF4.

As for DFI, hehe, while their support forum has a lot info, its not exactly responsive. For my new system, I ordered their SLI-DR, and it killed itself in a week (turned out a PCIe x16 slot capacitor sodder point blew, leaving smoke residue over the back of the board). The forum ignored my posted on the issue (except for one guy having a similar problem), and they ignored questions I asked on other topics, or the replied with a serious attitude problem. I doubt I'll ever buy DFI again.

I replaced that DFI POS with an Asus A8N Premium - fastest, most trouble free install ever. I didn't even have to run the repair option on the Windows install disk.

[Sea Skimmer]

For EVGA yeah, you can get a 7800GT for $330 on newegg after some rebates ($350 before),

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130240

or a 7800GT + BF2 for $370 or something. EVGA 6800GT's are going for $300 now.

Say, I just noticed, your link is to a 512meg Geforce 6800GT card, not a 7800GT

[Glocksman]

I haven't had any problems with USB on the nF4.

Based on the digging around I did at the time, I'd say that the problem isn't that widespread and has to do more with a particular device chipset (like the Oxford chip in my external drive case)/nForce USB driver conflict than a universal problem.

Otherwise you'd see everyone screaming about it and the big OEM's like HP dropping nForce like a stone.

[Uraniun235]

Vista supposedly requires NCQ.

Where did you hear this?

[Sea Skimmer]

Thanks everyone so far

Here's a partly revised list of specs I'm looking at now

:Lian Li PC-61 USB Black Aluminum ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
:EPoX EP-9NPA+Ultra Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra ATX AMD Motherboard
:eVGA 256-P2-N376-AX Geforce 6800GT 256MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 Video Card
:Antec TRUEPOWERII 430W ATX Power Supply
:AMD Athlon 64 3500+ Venice 1GHz FSB 512KB L2 Cache Socket 939 Processor
:CORSAIR ValueSelect 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM Unbuffered DDR 400 (PC 3200)
:NEC Black IDE DVD Burner Model
:Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD2500KS 250GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive

The processor added about 20 bucks, the ram has saved 40, the different graphics card made no difference in price. I am looking to change more hardware, but I'm out ot time for resaerch at this very moment of posting.

[Miles Teg]

For EVGA yeah, you can get a 7800GT for $330 on newegg after some rebates ($350 before),

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130240

or a 7800GT + BF2 for $370 or something. EVGA 6800GT's are going for $300 now.

Say, I just noticed, your link is to a 512meg Geforce 6800GT card, not a 7800GT

Whoops I'd still suggest going to a 7800 (just re-checked, you can get an evga one for $350 *after* rebates.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130238

The price difference isn't much considering the cost of your system, and you get a card that is just one peg down from top of the line instead of 2-3 (and is a lot faster). Of course, if it's out of the budget, it's out of the budget .

</soapbox>
Miles Teg

[Arrow]

Vista supposedly requires NCQ.

Where did you hear this?

I think it was xbit, but I'm not sure. Its been a little while. Hence the "supposedly".

[Sea Skimmer]

The price difference isn't much considering the cost of your system, and you get a card that is just one peg down from top of the line instead of 2-3 (and is a lot faster). Of course, if it's out of the budget, it's out of the budget .

Its probably going to be out of the budget. The tower isn’t going to be all that expensive, but I’ve got shipping and tax to add to that and I need to buy the whole rest of the computer and some software for it, this is a scratch project you see.