Build me a computer

Let's not forget that how well your monster [or not] hardware
performs has much to do with what you *run* on it. Insert standard
OS-wars rant here.
.
_H*

 

I just wanted to point out that maybe you shouldn't get a "minimal" graphics card. Reason being, more and more applications are getting more and more graphic intensive. A "get-by" card today will be annoyingly prohibitive two years from now.... (very similar angst as "that took me an HOUR to download through my modem... )

Couple additional comments:

I agree with Bionic, AGP is quickly becoming extinct..., likewise with the 754 sockets...

I didn't put memory down simply because for your general purposes, almost anything will do. I got 1GB of PNY memory for my rig. (which some nerd-types consider "cheapo-memory"), and it has served me fine (and I use my pc for heavy gaming). Memory is getting pretty darn cheap these days, so it's not really an issue.

As for why HDD cables are migrating to SATA, well, because it's supposedly faster and more efficient. It is nice not having a bunch of ribbons clog up your box, but more importantly, and you should look into this as you have several hard drives, and in conjunction of how you mentioned you use them, is the RAID concept...

 

Okay... this is slightly over your price limit, but I think you'll like it.

http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping...=PX769AAR%23ABA

It's a refurbished HP PC, from their outlet store. Not only do you get a great deal for the price, but you also get a warranty and all that good stuff.

Here are the highlights:

Athlon 64 3500+
250GB 7200 Serial ATA HD
1GB Ram
Radeon XPRESS 128MB Video (okay, so this isn't so good. )
16x DVD+R/RW with litescribe

All for 599. Not bad really, considering that the HD and CPU and Ram if purchased separately would easily be 300 or 400.

Basically, for the price, you can't really go wrong. Even if you go out and spend another 50 bucks on GF 5200 and use that for your video card, you're still ending up with a great system that should last you quite some time.

 

you will be very UNHAPPY if you take your hard drives with you. if they have data on them, i recommend you get a board with serial ATA ports. that way you can mount up to two new fast drives and be able to keep your old hard drives for data only.

ALSO, i question you taking anything but the keyboard, mouse and monitor. the technology available back then was worse than ancient.

my suggestion is to spend a little more. build a system whole. if you need to save money, look at MB's that integrate sound, wireless, LAN, and video. (may want to bag the last option...no easy way to upgrade should you decide to do so later) then get a KVM switch. this allows you to use one monitor, keyboard and mouse on multiple systems. that way you will still have your old computer and its data that it sounds like you want to hold on too. using this suggestion, you will only need a $10 network card and a cheap router (you would most likely get one from the cable company that allows networking multiple computers if you go that route.) to get the old system working with the new system

now if what i have said has not changed your mind, keep in mind that taking your old stuff will most likely create some compatibility issues when trying to run them on a newer board. i read most of posts over several days but do not remember seeing an OS mentioned

 

Oh yeah, checking out johnnycat's link triggered another thought:

Make sure you have firewire AND USB ports... most mobo's/pc's do these days, but I have come across some cheap-o models that don't.

 

That's the nice thing about the HP... it has multiple Firewire and USB 2.0 ports. It's definitely wasn't a cheap-o model when it was new.

 

that HP deal is pretty awesome. i would go for that. then upgrade the video card if not built in. good AGP cards can be had for cheap now

 

It is pretty hard to argue with that HP, it does have just about everything you might want in terms of hardware, plus, you don't have to spend the time building it. The only thing that concerns me is the refurbished status, but it does come with a basic 90 day warranty (whatever that may actually mean! lol) Other than that, dang, it pretty much falls into the same category as my women, fast and cheap!


h34r:

 

The refurbished status kinda made me think twice when I bought mine back in July (altho mine was only a 3200+ with a 160GB HD)... but I haven't had a problem with it yet.

 

nothing wrong with refurbished. might have an issue with the hard drive as it will fail but usually if they dont fail within the first few months of life, they will last if not abused.

also got to look at it as not having to worry about the latest flash updates or the bleeding edge problems. should be squared away by now

 

Get a Mac Mini cheep monitor and keyboard and mouse and you are in business. Up and running in a few minuets. No fuss, no muss and it works.

 

Bionic gave you a good system spec. Antec Sonata II case is the best, DFI m/b is excellent (as is ASUS backup suggestion), and Athlon-64 is current state of the art.

If you're really concerned about disk drives dying (and you SHOULD be) consider getting two identical drives and using a RAID mirror to guard against total drive failure.

 

You can keep your case and most of your peripherials. ATX cases haven't changed so you won't need a new one unless it's inadequate for ventilation and space. However, you'll need a new beefier power-supply.

Minimal upgrades you'll need of motherboard, ram, cpu, and graphics card. You can roll over the HDs, cd drives, case, cabling, etc... SATA is wholly unnecessary too, unless you got money to burn:

You'll want to go AMD so you don't get shafted by Intel's "change to a new socket next quarter", besides the fact Intel CPUs are way behind the technology curve until probably 2007. AMD64 and socket 939 (the new "slot-1" for the AMD world) will be golden for at least that long. Also, Socket 939 won't go obsolete for a while, and you can go dual-core with it when you want to step up.

ASUS A8N5x $92
I swear by ASUS (they make PowerBook inards too), and this is the simplest, least amount of useless (gay), extra-frills board in their current lineup (the SLI stuff) with the minimal forward looking requirements, 939, and X2. You don't get cool-n-quiet: AMD's version "centrino" of clocking down the cpu, fan, and power requirements when you don't need it. Oh well.

512MB ram ~ $60 - page-5 of that link takes you into the cas-2 DDR400 512MB range of decent ram. I recommend the CMX512-3200C2 or the BL6464Z402. Seriously, to me they all look practically the same at that range. I use the CMX512 for 333 and it's great. These days though, I strongly recommend getting minimally 1GB instead, either as one 1GB stick, or buy two of these 512s and get dual-channel action going such as this for $114 or the other dual-sticks on page-9.

AMD cpus are not the cheapest these days, but you get a lot of bang for the buck. GHz doesn't mean too much because the AMD64 architecture is even faster per clock than the Intels. So pick from this page. Either a 3000+ or 3200+ is good enough for the non-hardware FPS gamer basics. Let's just say a 3200+ for $152.

That's $92+114+152=$358 so far. CPU and GPU are the major price hogs these days. GPU next: either an Nvidia, or an ATI, the only two remaining GPU makers left after the great wars. If nvidia, the last generation 6600GT is good enough unless you're some hardcore FPS'er. Maybe the ASUS 6600GT $173 then. I have no experience with ATI stuff but, something in the x800 series should be equivalent.

So, then add a bigger wattage PSU ($30?) for the GPU (yes these days) and the motherboard/cpu, and you're done for about $600. Drop the video card for a non-bigname ASUS brand, and you'll shave a bit more, or go for the 3000+ (1.8GHz) cpu.

So now, this is a honking, bad-nice person, hand-built, entirely off-the-shelf machine on a budget that'll last you for another 2 years, besides any GPU/CPU/ram/HD upgrades meantime. You also get overclocking options too.

Hell, I should upgrade my - A7N8X-Deluxe, 2.0GHz AMD 2800+, 1GB, 4-drive scsi-320, nv4600ti - system to this too sometime.

 

You know, I actually looked into the mini-mac when it came out in an effort to expand my computing horizons, and was highly disappointed. You basically pay for a prior generation chip, plus it doesn't include any wireless stuff.

For once, I thought crapple was reaching out, only to be disappointed (again), as their marketing strategy held true once again: make the main unit appear somewhat cheap, then nickel and dime you to death with accessories you'll no doubt 'need'... :angry:

 

At the risk of stretching out this thread interminably (especially since Tony hasn't posted in a bit), I'll add the following:
Anandtech is a great site for reviews and pricing. They typically put out buying guides for budget, mid-range, and enthusiast buyers, and their Real-Time Price engine is great for finding a deal.
Main page: http://www.anandtech.com/
RTPE: http://labs.anandtech.com/

I'll try to avoid posting any more in this thread until Tony shows up again to bump it

 

Tony:

It sucks you still don't have some sort of higher-speed Internet where you live.

I have dial-up at my hobby farm and have used it perhaps TWICE in the past year. It's just too painfully slow, I'm lucky if I can connect at 19.2 kbps. Talk about a time warp.

Both times a critical issue came up at work and I had to check into something. I thought "Sure beats driving 1.5-2 hours back into Winnipeg." Yeah right, I STILL ended up driving back into Winnipeg.

If the company will pay for it hint hint- I'd consider a DirecPC or similar satellite Internet system offered in Canada. Horrible latency/jitter but just for downloading/uploading huge files, it's better than dial-up.

jay

 

Alot of good suggestions here, so I won't try to suggest what to get -- just another option on where to get it (never heard of newegg, but I'll check 'em out). I trust Tiger Direct -- never had a problem with anything I've ordered from them. In fact, the computer I'm using now came from them.

They offer software, individual components, combinations of components (mobo & chip), barebones kits, and full systems.

You could go with a barebones and add in your current drives, etc. Check out this page from Tiger Direct. The first one on the page, the Asus K8V, looks cool, and it's $400.

Good luck, Zap!

 

I don't think he said that he doesn't have where he lives, just that he personally doesn't have it...