I'm building a comp- how does this look?

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

Bens Extremely Awesome Latest Technology Computer

Motherboard: $108
Asus SK8V Motherboard
Athlon 64 FX
DDR SDRAM
8GB RAM Supported
5 PCI Slots

Processor: $995.00
Intel Pentium 4/ 3.4 GHz Extreme Edition 800MHz FSB, 2MB L3 Cache, Hyper Threading Technology

Graphic Card: $449.95
ATI RADEON X800XT - Model: RX800XT-VIO -- 12,001 benchmark
Core Mem Core
520MHz 1120 MHz

Sound Card: $79
Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS

Memory/RAM: $285
Corsair TWINX1024R-3200C2PT DDR SDRAM 1 GB RAM

Hard Drive: $155
Western Digital FireWire/USB 120GB Hard Drive

Optical Drive: $265
Fujitsu Dynamo 2300U2 2.3GB External Magneto Optical Drive

Optional - Floppy Drive: $40

Power Supply: $50 (sale)
Ultra 600Watt PS - 600 watt

Chassis Fans: $24 for 2

CPU Fan & Heatsink: $40

Grand Total: $2,490

Okay, if anyone can tell me what they like/dislike about it that would be great, also if anyone can tell me a better piece of equipment to buy, that'd be great too! :D I'm thinking that the motherboard I chose wasn't good enough, but I can't seem to find one that's better - Thanks in advance!

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

About the motherboard that I've chosen - I don't know much about chipsets, but I think these are the best ones out: (that arn't rediculously expensive) the Intel 875P, and the Intel E7505- I have a good feeling that thoes are alot better then the one I chose for my board, if anyone knows - reply! Thanks! :D

[EineBeBoP]

Graphic Card: $449.95
ATI RADEON X800XT - Model: RX800XT-VIO -- 12,001 benchmark
Core Mem Core
520MHz 1120 MHz



How much/whered you get it? I need links here plz.

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

GODLY - isnt it? :D it JUST came out, it's a monster. I only found 1 vendor selling it, here's the link

http://accessories.gateway.com/AccessoryStore/PC+Accessories_316441/Graphics+_A1_+Video_381951/Graphics+Cards_316685/AGP+Graphics+Cards_316688/2617586_ProdDetail

it totally destroys all the other recently released cards - and I mean it rips them to shreds. I found a 10 page report with loads of tests done on this card and other recently released cards, comparing them, shows just how awesome it is. take a look:

http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NjExLDE=

[EineBeBoP]

Indeed, I was planning on getting same card, but nearly everywhere is sold out.

[Rbstr]

your mobo and CPU do not match up

You need that ASUS p4c800 deluxe. (875 chipset) or the p4p800 Deluxe (865) $150 & $100 respectively

yeha i'm getting a X800 pro by the end of the summer

yeah and you hve an extarnal HD and CD drive, you need to get an internal one of both most likely.

Were is the guy that has the link to the Build your PC guide?

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

Thanks Rbstr! I went and checked out the best reasonable board i could buy and turns out the 'ASUS P4C800-E Deluxe' came out the winner :)

Oh and Rbstr, the X800XT gcard pummels the x800 pro :)

What did you mean about the external/internal somethings? I don't follow, elaborate if you can please :) thanks

One last thing - Do I have to buy an OS too? Lol sorry if that is a stupid question

[TekDragon]

The only thing I saw that I didn't agree with was the motherboard. Get an Asus P4C800-E Deluxe if your making a real gaming machine. You won't be dissapointed.

Also, i suggest looking into OCZ memory. Do some research on it. It's just as good (sometimes better) than the equivalent corsair. And, best of all, OZC is VERY compatable with Asus. You won't find Corsair anywhere on Asus's reccomended memory. Hell, i don't think you'll find it on ANY MB manufacturer's compatability list.

Don't take my word as gospel. Just go out and compare OCZ timings, price, and user ratings (on NewEgg) to the equivalent Corsair.

[EDIT] woops, looks like RBSTR beat me to the Asus P4C800-E Deluxe reccomendation.

[EineBeBoP]

External means it sits outside your case, and is linked by firewire or USB. Internal means it sits inside your case, and connects right to the Mobo.
You want internal.

[EineBeBoP]

Would you also post the links to:

Power Supply: $50 (sale)
Ultra 600Watt PS - 600 watt

CPU Fan & Heatsink: $40

Please? I'd really appreciate it. (And so would Corrosion, we've tracked his problem down to either the PSU or the Mobo.)

[Corrosion]

Would you also post the links to:

Power Supply: $50 (sale)
Ultra 600Watt PS - 600 watt

CPU Fan & Heatsink: $40

Please? I'd really appreciate it. (And so would Corrosion, we've tracked his problem down to either the PSU or the Mobo.)
or the cpu.... >_<

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

Lol, what are you - building my computer or something? :P
Power Supply:
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/Category/category_tlc.asp?CatId=106&SRCCODE=WEBGOO0106C&CMP=KNC-GOOGL

and for the fan&heatsink thang I just kinda rounded it up to $40, it's more like $37: ZALMAN CNPS7000A-Cu HSF for P4 and Socket A/478/754 1350~2400RPM - link:
http://www.pricegrabber.com/rating_getprodrev.php/masterid=2401325/id_type=masterid

[EineBeBoP]

VERY nice man.
I'm liking it a LOT.

Ok, last request.

Graphic Card: $449.95
ATI RADEON X800XT - Model: RX800XT-VIO -- 12,001 benchmark
Core Mem Core
520MHz 1120 MHz

Link plz. Does the store actually have it in stock NOW?

How did you find these prices, anyways?

[Kaltagesta]

GODLY - isnt it? :D it JUST came out, it's a monster. I only found 1 vendor selling it, here's the link

http://accessories.gateway.com/AccessoryStore/PC+Accessories_316441/Graphics+_A1_+Video_381951/Graphics+Cards_316685/AGP+Graphics+Cards_316688/2617586_ProdDetail


He already posted the link Eine, you silly billy.

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

lol, well I've spent a good 4 days building this comp, here's my new HD and CD drive, different from the origionals, these are internal:
CD Drive: $50
Sony CRX230A/U CD Burner / 52x32x52x CD-RW / B's Recorder Gold Software

Hard Drive: $86
Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 120GB Hard Drive

how do thoes look - good?

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

By the way, if Gateway doesn't have the x800XT, go to http://atacom.com/program/print_html_new.cgi?&Pagecode=SEARCH_ALL&Item_code=VIDA_ATIX_X8_XT&USER_ID=www they have it for like $10 more.

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

alright, I'm gonna crash, it's 3:30 here- I'll be back on the comp for a few hours tomorrow to make better the inevitable mess up in equipment - then I'm gonna work for 3 -4 months to buy all of it! so I'll cyas tomrrow. night

[HunterKiller]

Bens Extremely Awesome Latest Technology Computer

Motherboard: $108
Asus SK8V Motherboard
Athlon 64 FX
DDR SDRAM
8GB RAM Supported
5 PCI Slots

Processor: $995.00
Intel Pentium 4/ 3.4 GHz Extreme Edition 800MHz FSB, 2MB L3 Cache, Hyper Threading Technology

Graphic Card: $449.95
ATI RADEON X800XT - Model: RX800XT-VIO -- 12,001 benchmark
Core Mem Core
520MHz 1120 MHz

Sound Card: $79
Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS

Memory/RAM: $285
Corsair TWINX1024R-3200C2PT DDR SDRAM 1 GB RAM

Hard Drive: $155
Western Digital FireWire/USB 120GB Hard Drive

Optical Drive: $265
Fujitsu Dynamo 2300U2 2.3GB External Magneto Optical Drive

Optional - Floppy Drive: $40

Power Supply: $50 (sale)
Ultra 600Watt PS - 600 watt

Chassis Fans: $24 for 2

CPU Fan & Heatsink: $40

Grand Total: $2,490

Okay, if anyone can tell me what they like/dislike about it that would be great, also if anyone can tell me a better piece of equipment to buy, that'd be great too! :D I'm thinking that the motherboard I chose wasn't good enough, but I can't seem to find one that's better - Thanks in advance!

1. are all these parts from one store? if not buy from one store.

2. buy and AMD FX-53 and this link (www.nventiv.com) and heres the review link (http://www.aceshardware.com/read.jsp?id=60000268)

[Chavez66]

Unless you want to burn money you really don't need an athlon 64 MObo the latest games etc are still only just running 32 bit applications and it will be a huge while before any applications start doing that (excluding graphic apps like photoshop etc), also consider getting an Athlon processor if you want an athlon board they are cheaper and (i think) much better than pentiums and yes Ati do beat Nvidia hands down (go my 9800 pro) also think about getting a dvd drive (if not a dvd rw)? they are not that much more expensive and i would imagine games will start coming in DVD discs very soon PC gamer etc already do their demo discs this way, plus with a nice graphics card you get a decent mutli region player which i handy for watching movies in your r00m.

My two cents :D

Chavez66

[HunterKiller]

Unless you want to burn money you really don't need an athlon 64 MObo the latest games etc are still only just running 32 bit applications and it will be a huge while before any applications start doing that (excluding graphic apps like photoshop etc), also consider getting an Athlon processor if you want an athlon board they are cheaper and (i think) much better than pentiums and yes Ati do beat Nvidia hands down (go my 9800 pro) also think about getting a dvd drive (if not a dvd rw)? they are not that much more expensive and i would imagine games will start coming in DVD discs very soon PC gamer etc already do their demo discs this way, plus with a nice graphics card you get a decent mutli region player which i handy for watching movies in your r00m.

My two cents :D

Chavez66


depends whehn it comes to games that use directx then yes, but on opengl games =no.

[Rbstr]

Yeah you can just mix and match mobo's anyway you want, they have to have the right slot and chipset for the CPU in this case he's getting a P4 in 478 form factor, so he needs a mobo that is liek that using an 864 or 875 chipset(or a via/ati/SiS that have that slot)

And the X800XT is only better than the X800 pro if if i don't do this realy easy mod the the board that turns it into a X800 XT in all except clock withc is easy to do By OCing it

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

Firstly: HELLS YES! I got the job - booyah. lol.
Secondly: about ATI and Nvidia cards - currently the best of the 2 out are the X800XT's from ATI and the GeForce FX 5950's from Nvidia. If you look at the numbers and all the reviews that compare them - the X800XT is two or three times better then the GeForce. Now bow down before the 512MHz/1.12GHz X800XT core speeds! Bwa ha ha!
Thirdly: It would be difficult for me to trade my processor for that one at only $180 cheaper. Mine rips that one to shreds, I don't think that one even has hyper-threading - But I'm going to have to look into it because a bunch of other people also proposed the same exact processor!

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

and is 1GB of RAM alright? How much better would 2GB be? Considering this is the most godly computer out of any other PS player... I'm gonna have to get 2GB lol.. it's pretty funny if you think about it.. all this stuff and only 1GB of RAM :)

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

1 last question lol, is this cd-rom thing alright? I'm not sure if it's good enough, looks it to me! http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=668955&Sku=S167-3238&CatId=477

[Rbstr]

no 2 gb wi'll most likley not see any improvement, infact performance will go down if you buy 2 gig Sticks as they have bad timings

[Daleon]

For what your spending, I think a fx53 939 setup would be better than the P4/EE.

2 gigs of ram is not out of the question either, 2 1 gig sticks of the new corsair BH6 chips will have better timings than just about any other memory available at pc4000 speeds, but thats about 800-900 in ram.

The sony cdrw is fine. I don't care to much for that psu, if its pushing out 600 watts for that price its won't have the most stable rails. A sparkle or enermax in the 460-550 range would be ideal.

The gateway deal is long dead, none of those orders shipped, prolly won't for a cpl more weeks. XT's are still hard to get, especially under $500. CDW just got in a big shipment, I think they were going for $480 range. Also the XT doesn't compare to the 5950, have to rate it against 6800 Ultra's.

All this and a 120 gig maxtor drive? A 250 gig sata WD is like $170 or so.

[Corrosion]

For what your spending, I think a fx53 939 setup would be better than the P4/EE.

Yah, no shit, but the damn FX-53 is fucking ~800$.

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

>_< mine's $995

Everyone's telling me to get the FX53 instead... but WHY!? it's a GHz slower, it's got 1MB less cache. What makes it better???

[TekDragon]

You don't need 2 gigs. That's for newbs who immediately think "more is better".

Go for quality. Either get PC3200 with the fastest timings you can find (2-2-2-5), or go with some PC4000 like i did. I recomend OCZ.

[Daleon]

Hmm, I bet you were saying 1 gig was for newbs a cpl years ago to huh. Sorry, but I could defintely use another gig of memory and make serious use of it right now, let alone in a few months when XP-64 is ready.

Just to break it to you, when your playing PS and running windowsxp with nothing at ALL in the background, your using around 800+ megs of ram. Thats if you got a pretty clean system and not a ton of junk running which most ppl do. So seeing as how your almost maxing out your available free memory and could start to use more pagefile do you really think were that far off from 2 gigs becoming the standard?

As for the fx-53, its simply the best desktop chip right now, especially for gaming. HT'ing, the extra meg of cache, and mhz speed of the EE still don't put it over it. Also fx-55 should be even nicer.

[Rbstr]

yes but measure it with games like HL2 and other games like that, they ues less becasue PS, need to store alot more not texture data in its ram.

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

Can somone explain to me why the fx-53/55 board is better even though it's an entire GHz slower and has less cache? When people tell me 'it's just better, so get that instead' it doesn't talk me into it

[Rbstr]

Its 64 bit instaed of 32 bit first off.

It's just the Way the CPU is desined, it need few clock cycles to puch the same amount of calculations ect.

[HunterKiller]

Firstly: HELLS YES! I got the job - booyah. lol.
Secondly: about ATI and Nvidia cards - currently the best of the 2 out are the X800XT's from ATI and the GeForce FX 5950's from Nvidia. If you look at the numbers and all the reviews that compare them - the X800XT is two or three times better then the GeForce. Now bow down before the 512MHz/1.12GHz X800XT core speeds! Bwa ha ha!
Thirdly: It would be difficult for me to trade my processor for that one at only $180 cheaper. Mine rips that one to shreds, I don't think that one even has hyper-threading - But I'm going to have to look into it because a bunch of other people also proposed the same exact processor!

dude dont take ATIs word use reviews and BTW you can purchase bothe the 6800 GT and ultra, but not unltra extreme. What you said about the X800 xt being the best is not true, the x800 pro is just as good if you mod it and the 6800s are better in opengl type games.

[Unfinal_Fantasy]

Who said I was taking ATI's word for anything? I've spent days putting this computer togather, looking at benchmarks and reviews and such

[TekDragon]

Hmm, I bet you were saying 1 gig was for newbs a cpl years ago to huh.

When the biggest game out was Wizardry 8? Your damn right I said 512mb RAM was enough. Anyone who bought 1gig was an idiot. By the time you actually started using that 1 gig, your memory was out of date.

Just to break it to you,.. blah blah blah

Just to break it to YOU, i have QUALITY memory. One gig of OCZ DDR 500 Gold EL series.

This weekend I was playing PlanetSide and CnC Generals at the same time, with no noticable lag.

So go ahead and get 2 gigs of memory. Like i said before, by the time games come out that will actually use that much your memory will be considered slow and out of date.

[DeepStrikeck]

he's gotta point