So now I am faced with a decision. School has ended, and I am selling my PC in three days, and now I don't know what to do. Should I just build a garbage pc and save my money for a later date, or should I buy a pc that has SLI capabilities and room for more RAM? I was looking along the lines of just buying an SLI mobo with 1gb memory (just one stick of 1gb ram), a 3200+ venice, one 6800 gt, a scsi 74gb, and some dual-layer dvd. This way I could buy another gig of ram whenever (max being four gigs), upgrade my proccy to dual core maybe, and buy another graphics card for SLI. Or should I Just wait for crossfire? Imagine I have the budget of somewhere in the neighborhood of $1400 and I already have my audigy 2 zs. Could maybe be the cheapest system possible or get very close to the budget, you guys decide. I just need a little push one way or the other. -Rob
I wouldn't bother with either SLI or Xfire unless I was guaranteed a 50% minimum perf boost across the board. Otherwise regardless of wallet the added price isn't justifiable considering you need 2 cards, an expensive PSU, an expensive mobo and then you still have plenty of extra heat and noise. I'd suggest you go for the perf system but hold off on the gfx until you see what nVidia are releasing (this month?) and ideally what ATi's interesting hybrid shader design brings (which may be late to the party). One of nVidia's latest GeForce cards should be cheaper and faster than going for 2x6800GT in SLI (or equivilent Xfire). The biggest reason you wouldn't want to do any of this would be to wait for AMD's new Socket scheduled for some time next year, who knows what will be around by then though and who could wait that long?
So go with the middle system then? Hey, if I have an 80-pin scsi drive will It work with like that DFI-UT board? I was thinkin about just buying an Aria and having that one scsi 10k rpm drive in there, but am a bit worried about heat, and just buying like one x800pro (they're only like $280 shipped now) on the pci-e x16 slot and just buying one gig of OCZ performance RAM. There was this MSI board that I was lookin at ( http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16813130485 ). Would that work with scsi? And would an audigy 2 zs and a x800pro fit in that and an aria? Thanks for the help thus far. -Rob
You're talking about Antec's SFF Aria case (with PSU), right? If so any microATX (mATX) mobo should fit up to a size of 9.6"x9.6". That mobo you link to is based on the ATi Xpress200 chipset which always lacks any o/c'ing support so is not at all advisable. Look for something based on the nForce4 as there's no other viable chipset where PCI-E is concerned (K8T890 lacks dual-core and is also VIA based). There's no need for the X800Pro as the X800XL tend to be cheaper and is decently faster too (16 pipes vs 12). You'll ideally want 2 sticks of RAM with Skt939 mobos to utilise Dual Channel, whether you go 2x512MB or 2x1GB. 2x512MB is generally rec'd as it's easiest to run with fastest timings and 1GB total RAM is plenty for almost anything the average consumer will throw at it. As for your SCSI drive all it should need is a controller card (most likely PCI), that should get your drive working in any system but whether it's worth it depends on the speed and capacity of the drive, regular IDE (ATA & SATA) are closing the gap all the time. I don't think the Aria will have a problem accomodating a single slot gfx card, PCI soundcard (Audigy 2 ZS) and a SCSI control card. All you need is a mATX mobo with at least two PCI (preferably 3 for future expandability or to give the gfx card more room). The Aria is poorly ventilated though and runs hot with only medium range components, you could mod it yourself though. The PSU is particularly good so should be capable of whatever you can fit inside the case. I'd suggest looking for an nForce4 mATX mobo BUT they won't quite handle 4GB (4x1GB gives 3.6GB from what I hear). Even for a high perf system 1-2GB should be plenty.
Woo Well alright, This is the conclusion I've come to. I can buy this PC, and then it's fairly future-proof because; a) It will support dual-core (yes/no? i really have no idea, how would I find out?) b) I can buy another card later for SLI c) I can buy 2 more gb of memory Here are the parts; Motherboard: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16813136152 Processor: http://www.newegg.com/product/Product.asp?item=N82E16819103537 Memory: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16820144322 DVD Drive: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16827106819 Hard Drive: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16822135106 Video Card: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16814127158 Case: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16811156129 And Windows XP Pro Whaddya think? It comes to $1250 with shipping and tax. Is there any other way to get a better budget-ish and fairly futureproof system than that? -Rob
mobo - solid board with lots of room for upgrading. proc - solid as well and should oc nicely if needed. mem - check with dfi to see if it falls in the recommended memory. You can find it somewhere on dfi's site. although i cant remember where but i think you are fine anyways. dvd - got one myself and hasnt gone wrong yet. hdd - if you do lots of games you might run out of room fast. Look into seagates baracudda line plus they have a 5yr. warranty on almost all their drives. not a bad price range by my opinions either. video card - i likey plus with your board you can add a second one later case - personal preference really. If you like the look then kudos. Might want to get a diff. PSU possibly. definately if you are going to oc or do an additional video card. Not sure if that PSU will support all the features you have now. But over all it looks good to me as you can upgrage to todays top processors when you are ready to upgrade and you can always add memory although it doesnt look like ddr2 is supported but thats a whole diff. issue on its own by some peoples perspectives. SATA2 drives supported so yey for that
I wouldn't exackly know how to future proof your system, but i do know, that crossfire will allow you to have any x800 card as the secondary card (correct me if im wrong guys) so if i may direct you to this thread, maybe some new ideas may pop into your head http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=91163 I'd hafta say, the new king of cpus, no?
There is no way I would bother with something that won't do 64-bit. So, do you think the PSU that comes with that case right now would work until later? (eg: until I decide to buy another gfx card and more memory, at which point I would probably buy a new PSU (maybe xconnect)) -Rob
looking at the site the raidmax PSU's seem to not give many of the buyers enough to run their 64bit machines. Keep in mind those are only buyer reviews and their demands may be more or less than yours. You might want to find a more reliable PSU if your budget can afford it. I preferr Antec myself but there are dozens of other enthusiast PSUs out there to swear by. Ultra, enermax, tagen and a few others i can think of at the moment are other great brands assuming you choose the right PSU. I generally keep the mind frame that when buying a case the main goal of the manufacturer is to sell the case and they add the PSU at little to no extra cost to them. Meaning you probably dont want to expect a neopower from them hehe. Although this is not true for all case/PSU combinations more along the lines of budget cases though. Foenix - although a very nice thread, the cost of something like that for Sva4g3&* would end way above his projected budget. I think the cost of that processor even above 2Ghz on newegg was over 700 USD. Neat information though i will admit. If i had the cash to throw around id do it only as a second rig to my AMD however
Yeah the last PC I built was with an antec case that came with a 430w truepower (see sig) and that was just fine, but I think I'll just try this PSU and see what happens, because I can always buy another one if this doesnt quite work out. -Rob
Thanks for everything, anyone else have any words of wisdom? Buying this by Wednesday next week (like 4 days or so left). -Rob
There's no real info on that PSU other than that it rates itself as 420W, which means practically nothing unless it's a good brand of PSU. Is it ATX12V 2.0 (24pin) or just ATX12V (20pin) ... does it have any SATA power cables built in ... does it have any PCI-E power cables built in ... what's the ampage on each rail? Chances are it would be okay but why risk it with expensive pretty high-end parts? If you want your PSU to last ensure it has as much as possible of the above and is of a good make such as Enermax, Antec, OCZ, ThermalTake, ToPower, S.Flower (TTGI), CWT etc. IMHO the case seems fine although I'm an advocate of 120mm fans, 80mm fans are noisy and push little air in comparison ... very 90's. Anyway to save some clicking here's the selection ... $135 "DFI LANPARTY UT nF4 Ultra-D Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra ATX AMD Motherboard - Retail" $146 "AMD Athlon 64 3000+ Venice Integrated into Chip FSB 512KB L2 Cache Socket 939 Processor - Retail" $180 "GeIL Value 2GB (2 x 1GB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM Unbuffered DDR 400 (PC 3200) Blue Aluminum Heat Spreader. Dual Channel Kit System Memory - Retail" $30 "SONY Black 16X DVD-ROM 52X CD-R 32X CD-RW 52X CD-ROM 2M Cache IDE Combo Drive - OEM" $60 "Western Digital Caviar SE WD800JD 80GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache Serial ATA150 Hard Drive - OEM" $365 "MSI NX6800GT-T2D256E Geforce 6800GT 256MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI-Express x16 Video Card - Retail" $80 "RAIDMAX Scorpio ATX-668WUP Blue Aluminum ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 420W Power Supply - Retail" Mobo; considered the best (is SLI certain on it though?). CPU; superb value and should o/c very well but the max multiplier is 9x, if money isn't too tight you may want to push up to the 64_3200+ Venice for the 10x multiplier. Just in case your CPU can hit 2.9ghz the 9x would require 322HTT (not impossible) while 10x would require a very doable 290HTT. RAM; I don't rate Geil too highly myself but they do have a following. The latency is woeful though (3-4-4-8) and it's not even like it's all that cheap, definitely look at something else (eg Crucial Ballistix). DVDRW; Sony aren't considered the best but should be fine, I'd suggest NEC or Pioneer myself. HD; too small (larger costs little extra) and go for 5 year Seagate over WD every time. Gfx; very nice and the perfect choice to make SLI a possibility whilst still enjoying a very capable single card solution.
** PROBLEM ** I've just read a review saying that nVidia has recently made it almost impossible without some hardcore soldering to get this board to SLI, and I am currently looking into better RAM, and the SLI-D instead of Ultra-D -Rob
im going to hafta support you on that one do you plan to do any overclocking? cause that venice core looks real sweet in the combanation that you've got it in! New CPU cooler? for a system of this calabier box just doesn't cut it anymore
Now I'm stuck between gettin one of those aspire mini-itx shuttle-like cases and just gettin a sonata or something. Damn. But yeah I was gonna buy a thermaltake something or another, but it got real good reviews, any recommendations for an air cooler for socket 939? -Rob
You'll have to make certain each one can do 939, but I'm pretty sure all can. In loose reverse chronological order ... PRIMECOOLER HYPER 4+ (120mm!): http://www.hybrid-mods.net/index.php?module=ProdReviews&func=showcontent&id=39 http://www.a1-electronics.net/Heatsinks/2005/1st/PrCooler_HypCool-4+_Feb.shtml CPU HSF ROUNDUP (05-2005): http://www.behardware.com/articles/568/page1.html THERMALRIGHT XP-90C: http://www.nvnews.net/reviews/thermalright_xp90c/index.shtml http://www.virtual-hideout.net/reviews/thermalright_xp90c/index.shtml http://www.insanetek.com/index.php?page=thermalrightxp90c_1 http://www.techniz.co.uk/modules.php?name=Reviews&rop=showcontent&id=241 http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=139&type=expert http://www.nvnews.net/reviews/thermalright_xp-90/index.shtml (XP-90) GIGABYTE G-POWER BL: http://www.short-media.com/review.php?r=291 THERMALTAKE SILENT 939: http://www.techniz.co.uk/modules.php?name=Reviews&rop=showcontent&id=232 THERMALTAKE SONIC TOWER (passive CPU cooling): http://www.a1-electronics.net/Heatsinks/2005/3rd/Thermaltake_Sonic-T_Apr.shtml KESTRELKING VI: http://www.3daccelerated.com/hardware_reviews/accessories/kestrelking_vi.html TITAN VANESSA S-TYPE: http://www.viperlair.com/reviews/cooling/air/heatsinks/titan/vanessa/ THERMALRIGHT SI-97: http://www.3dxtreme.net/index.php?id=thermalrightsi-971 SCYTHE SHOGUN HEATLANE: http://www.rojakpot.com/showarticle.aspx?artno=208&pgno=0 SCYTHE FCS-50: http://www.ap0calypse.com/showthread.php?t=1704 THERMALTAKE FANLESS103: http://www.xyzcomputing.com/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=314&Itemid=2 THERMALTAKE SONIC TOWER: http://www.insanetek.com/index.php?page=thermaltakesonictower_1 THERMALTAKE BIG TYPHOON: http://www.insanetek.com/index.php?page=ttbigtyphoon http://www.overclockercafe.com/Reviews/cooling/Tt_Big_Typhoon/index.html http://www.futurelooks.com/?m=show&id=130 http://www.a1-electronics.net/Heatsinks/2005/3rd/Thermaltake_Big-Typ_Apr.shtml http://www.legionhardware.com/html/doc.php?id=396 THERMALTAKE BEETLE: http://www.insanetek.com/index.php?page=thermaltakebeetle_1 http://www.overclockercafe.com/Reviews/cooling/Tt_Beetle/index.html http://www.virtual-hideout.net/reviews/TT_Beetle/index.shtml (Beetle 4in1 HS, 05-2005) http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=3140 http://www.legionhardware.com/html/doc.php?id=395 http://www.techniz.co.uk/modules.php?name=Reviews&rop=showcontent&id=200 THERMALTAKE K450: http://www.techtastic.ca/reviews4/k450.html SPEEZE EE507B7: http://www.a1-electronics.net/Heatsinks/2005/2nd/Speeze_EE507B7_Feb.shtml ZALMAN 120mm CNPS7700-ALCU: http://techreport.com/reviews/2004q4/zalman-cnps7700alcu/index.x?pg=1 http://www.insanetek.com/index.php?page=zalmancnps7700 http://www.silentpcreview.com/article209-page1.html ZALMAN 92mm CNPS7000B-Cu: http://www.thetechlounge.com/review.php?directory=zalman_7000
Alright, change of plans, check this out; Changed Mobo to DFI LANPARTY UT nF4 SLI-DR Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 SLI ATX AMD Motherboard - Retail, see at http://www.newegg.com/product/Product.asp?item=N82E16813136157 Changed Case to Antec SONATA II Piano Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 450Watt SmartPower 2.0 ATX 12V V2.0 for AMD & Intel systems Power Supply - Retail, see at http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16811129155 Changed Memory to OCZ 2GB (2 x 1GB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) Unbuffered Dual Channel Platinum System Memory Model OCZ4002048ELDCPE-K - Retail, see at http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16820227210 Changed DVD Drive to Pioneer Black IDE DVD Burner Model DVR-109 BK - OEM, see at http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16827129161 Changed Hard Drive to Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 SATA NCQ ST3120827AS 120GB 7200 RPM Serial ATA150 Hard Drive - OEM, see at http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16822148039 And that's it. What do you think? Anything else I should change around? Anyone have any case/psu recommendations besides the Sonata? I'm thinkin' about buyin a dremel to mod the case for better airflow, unless someone has a better case idea for me. Thanks so far everyone. -Rob
Looks smashingly good to me! The 120GB won't be too limiting though, right? It's only $2-3 to increase it to 160GB with 200GB coming in around $110.
