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A new PC. Suggestions on tech?

Discussion in 'Hardware' started by vi-kata, 27 Oct 2003.

  1. vi-kata

    vi-kata What's a Dremel?

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    Right, I'm kinda thinking about buying a new PC sometime in the next 6-8 weeks, dependent on me getting a job. Because I've been backpacking for the last 3-4 months, I'm not really up with the play on the latest technologies.

    I'm not really interested in gaming with it, mostly it'll be used for VMware machines, Internet surfing and MP3/DVD playback, so the latest video card and most powerful processor aren't required, just something that'll do the job. It will however end up using 1 - 1.5Gb of RAM (lots of VMware machines!) so a chipset that can't support over 1Gb probably isn't up to the task.

    The question is: if I was going to build it myself rather than buying from Dell, what's the best bang-for-the-buck going today? Athlon or P4? And which mobo chipset? Intel 815 or something else? What chipsets are around for the Athlon today?

    Sensible thoughts rather than an Intel vs Athlon jihad would be appreciated :)

    Cheers
    Kata
     
    vi-kata, 27 Oct 2003
    #1
  2. Sid

    Sid Banned

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    Depends on your budget.

    I think going for an opteron with plenty of memory, a cheaper graphics card and a nice sound card, would be a good idea.
     
    Sid, 27 Oct 2003
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  3. kuba_lysa

    kuba_lysa What's a Dremel?

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    Epox EP-8KRA2+ with AMD Athlon XP 2500+ (Barton) and 2/3 x 512 Megs of fast DDR400+ memory can be good buy for you.
    BTW: Intel i815 is history for todays :) .
     
    kuba_lysa, 27 Oct 2003
    #3
  4. Tim S

    Tim S OG

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    Epox EP-8KRA2+ : why do you suggest this board? :confused:

    The Abit NF7-S is far superior to it ;)
     
    Tim S, 27 Oct 2003
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  5. kuba_lysa

    kuba_lysa What's a Dremel?

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    I think its fully comparable with your Abit. I had two pieces in my hands, on first I get stable 228Mhz FSB, os second 225Mhz.

    And Epox is chepar (in CZ) than Abit.

    But I know, its hard to decide which one.. :)
     
    kuba_lysa, 28 Oct 2003
    #5
  6. Sid

    Sid Banned

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    I reckon an opteron on nforce3 would proobably out perform a barton-nforce2 combo for the types of things that this guy is gonna be using it for.

    Asus SK8N - £150
    AMD Opteron 142 1.6GHz - £250
    2 x 512mb PC3200 Registed DDR RAM of your choice. - £???
    Matrox graphics card, possibly. - £???
    M-audio rev 7.1 - £70
     
    Sid, 28 Oct 2003
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  7. vi-kata

    vi-kata What's a Dremel?

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    Does the Opteron really outperform a similarly priced Athlon/P4 ?

    For £250 you can get a pretty fast Athlon and I'm not sure how the Opteron performs under a 32bit environment. Time to scurry off and have a look at some benchmarks by the look of things :)

    Cheers
     
    vi-kata, 28 Oct 2003
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  8. Yo-DUH_87

    Yo-DUH_87 Who you calling tiny?

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    Bahh, you hethans! :p

    i865 Springdale chipset, P4 800MHz FSB (in the clock range of 2.4-3.2 GHz), and a bunch of your favorite ram, then you're set :thumb:
     
    Yo-DUH_87, 28 Oct 2003
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