My possible new computer

[edyzmedieval]

I went for the best on every component. No compromises, a truckload of money.

-ASUS M2N-SLI Deluxe Socket AM2 Motherboard
-AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4800+
-Corsair 2 x 1024MB DDRAM - Lifetime Warranty - on the lookout for powerful RAM
-Seagate Barracuda 400GB HDD 7200rpms SATA
-SONY Floppy Disk
-LG 4167B DVD-RW 52x/16x
-2 X nVidia GeForce 7900GTX 512 MB
-Creative X-PI Xtreme Music(sound card)
-Antec TX1050B cover
-Logitech Media Elite Keyboard
-Logitech G7 mouse

Looking for a monitor. The cover has 2 coolers integrated, so has the motherboard.

The price: You don't wanna know.
Please tell me your thoughts about this.
I'm interested in:
-quality of the chosen products
-power

Thanks.

[Reenk Roink]

Absolutely delightful rig edyzmedieval...

Everything is great, nice job on the twin nVidia GeForce 7900 GTX, running in SLI, that would be a beast.

Your definitely getting the top of the line cheese with that.

Two things:

What's the price? (please tell)

I think a 300 GB hard drive is too much, but hey, you know best what you're going to be doing (all that pr0n has to fit somewhere ).

As soon as some of the fall games come out (Neverwinter Nights 2, Battlefield 2142, and of course M2:TW) i'm going to upgrade the graphics card.

I'm holding off on a new computer until 2007, when Vista comes out and Dual Core becomes a bit cheaper. Looking at Alienware for that, though I only have about $1500 right now.

[edyzmedieval]

I'm a normal guy, not really with pr0n, but my computer is stuffed with basketball videos and different programs(C++, Blender...) and tons of games.

The price is about 3000 euros.
I need 300GB because I will have tons of games on it.

And this comes at a price though: I need to pass my exams with very good marks.

[Reenk Roink]

On the bright side, you won't have to upgrade for a very long time.

Have fun mate, hope you get it.

[edyzmedieval]

The 300GB is cheap for it's size(and it's a good brand too). It's a Seagate, and costs 150 euros. It's IDE though, I need to search for a SATA2 with about 10000rpms which will go for maximum power.

The 2 nVidias go over 30000 points with 3D Mark 2005!!!

[_Martyr_]

I would either buy an AMD or wait for the new generation of Intel chips (coming pretty soon). The Pentium chips are pretty outgunned as far as gaming is concerned.

Nice rig though. You better do well in your exams now!

[edyzmedieval]

New generation of Intel chips? Perfect!!!
When?

Yeah, of course. I want this.
First post edited. I found a killer HDD.

[orangat]

The Conroe is suppose to appear in the 2nd half of this year so anywhere from June-Dec.

For the psu, get a beefy pcpower&cooling unit.

[Lemur]

Those PC Power and Cooling power supplies are killer, but they're LOUD. I'm listening to one right now. It's one of their "silencer" models. It's making slightly less noise than a dust buster.

Look for one of the new power supplies with a 120mm fan. Something like this. Better chance of it not being such a blower.

[Papewaio]

Why not dual HD's in a RAID array for speed?

That way your paging files will be twice as fast.

And/Or get i-RAM (from Gigabyte) you slot in RAM and you can use it as a HD ... either for loading the OS or favourite game into or having as your paging file.

[edyzmedieval]

The Seagate Barracuda is a SATA HDD, which proves to be at a good price(almost 300 euros). Features:

-400GB space
-7200 rpms
-150MB/s

Basically, I think it's a good buy.
The cover has a huge cooling fan, a bit bigger than the one shown by Lemur, and a smaller one up top(normal cooling fan).

As for RAM's, I opted for a dual 1024MB DDRAM Corsair. The performances are good, but if there's room for improvement, I'm open to ideas.

[C-F]

Why not dual HD's in a RAID array for speed?

That way your paging files will be twice as fast.

And/Or get i-RAM (from Gigabyte) you slot in RAM and you can use it as a HD ... either for loading the OS or favourite game into or having as your paging file.

I agree on the multiple HD's, as a matter of fact, I would get (have) 3 @ 150GB ea.
1 for OS (c ~ 30GB; D for dl's, caches, etc.)
2 as raid for progs and data (multiple partitions)

[Papewaio]

The Seagate Barracuda is a SATA HDD, which proves to be at a good price(almost 300 euros). Features:

-400GB space
-7200 rpms
-150MB/s

Basically, I think it's a good buy.
The cover has a huge cooling fan, a bit bigger than the one shown by Lemur, and a smaller one up top(normal cooling fan).

As for RAM's, I opted for a dual 1024MB DDRAM Corsair. The performances are good, but if there's room for improvement, I'm open to ideas.

Its a good buy because it is not SATA II. SATA II has a throughput of 300MB/S

In Aus a 400Gb Seagate 7200.9 7200rpm SATA-II hard disk, 16mb cache, NCQ goes for $396.00 Australian. $1 per MB.
While a 300Gb Seagate 7200.9 7200rpm SATA-II hard disk, 16mb cache, NCQ goes for $203.50. $0.67 per MB.
And 250Gb Seagate 7200.9 7200rpm SATA-II hard disk, 16mb cache, NCQ goes for $176. $0.7 per MB.

At the moment the sweet point for SATAII is around the 250 to 300 GB HDs.

Buy 2 300GB SATAII. Same price as a single 400GB drive.

For speed put them in a RAID 0 array and you will end up with a machine that has 600GB and twice as fast at accessing HD memory. These being SATA II you would have a theoritical transference rate of 600MB/s.

For memory integrity put them in a RAID 1 array (mirroring) and if 1 hard drive dies the other will keep going and you won't lose important information. You will have 300GB but a very safe system for data recovery. You would have a transference rate of 300MB/s and redundancy on your information.

[ZombieFriedNuts]

Where you going to buy all this from

[edyzmedieval]

Thanks for the tips Pape. I'll ask the guys over for some SATAII HDD.
By the way, what's a RAID?

I guess you know computers better than changing nappies....

[Lemur]

A raid is where you tie the function of two or more hard drives together. Here's the texbook definition.

Some of us are both hardware ninjas and nappy-changing ninjas.

[edyzmedieval]

Thanks Lemur.

[LeftEyeNine]

Some of us are both hardware ninjas and nappy-changing ninjas.

Briefly this is called family ninja, Lemur.

[Papewaio]

Here is a great site for understanding things about PCs: http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/

Tutorials about the subjects of SATA and RAID.
Everything you need to know about RAID

Serial ATA

[LeftEyeNine]

..and here talks another family ninja.

[edyzmedieval]

Thanks Papewaio-san. Much appreciated.

[edyzmedieval]

I found a new processor, much powerful than the one listed.
Tell me what you think.

Intel Pentium IV 660
Core: Prescott
Frequency: 3600 MHz
FSB/HTT: 800 MHz / -
L2 CACHE: 2048 KB
L1 CACHE: 16 KB
Fabrication Process: 0.09 microns
Technologies: SSE3, HyperThreading, XD bit, EM64T, Enhanced Intel Speedstep
Connection: Socket LGA775

[orangat]

I found a new processor, much powerful than the one listed.
Tell me what you think.

Intel Pentium IV 660
Core: Prescott
Frequency: 3600 MHz
FSB/HTT: 800 MHz / -
L2 CACHE: 2048 KB
L1 CACHE: 16 KB
Fabrication Process: 0.09 microns
Technologies: SSE3, HyperThreading, XD bit, EM64T, Enhanced Intel Speedstep
Connection: Socket LGA775

No good. Go with AMD FX60 if money is no object or the AMD X2 4400+.

[edyzmedieval]

Can you tell me why is it no good? Give me some reasons.

[orangat]

Can you tell me why is it no good? Give me some reasons.

Because the Prescott 6xx is old and already superceded by the Cedarmill 6xx and Presler 9xx. Both the Cedarmill and Presler are fabricated using a smaller process. The Cedarmill runs much cooler and the Presler significantly faster in most apps.

And all of those cpu's are somewhat slower and overall run much hotter than an equivalently priced AMD X2.

[tibilicus]

AMD FX60 if im right is a bit over priced but has rediculous spped and performance.

I would recomend AMD x2 4400 + as wqell duel core is very useful and the spped is good to.

Also I would recomend an ATI is much better than Nvidia In my opinion.

Other than that not bad.

[edyzmedieval]

Hmmm... Any AMDFX60 over 3.4 GHZ? I'm looking for a 3.6GHZ with HT.

[_Martyr_]

Raw clock frequency means very little in the world of processors. An AMD64 has better performance at 2GHz than a P4 @ 3.6GHz.

[edyzmedieval]

That's interesting. I thought raw power is the most important...

Is the ATI X1900 better than nVidia 7900GTX?

[cunobelinus]

Im sorry but amd 64s are so better than intels but otherwise very nice.Wish i was any adult and had cash to buy and amazing computer .My computer was amazing but it aint anymore its getting out dated