I am putting the descision up to you guys about a major investment of mine... im gonna build a PC (because there is no way in hell this old POS 1.7Ghz 512MB ram GeForce4200 is going to leave this house). it will be used mostly for gaming (maybe a bit for video editing, but i'll have mac G5's at college for that). im willing to spend somewhere around $600-$800. $1000 would be pushing it because i saw a prefab of the PC i kinda want for 1100.. and i know prefabs rip you off, and it was a gateway... eh...

sooo...

-one of those nice 64bit AMD processors (those are good right?) somewhere around 2.8 to 3Ghz

-1 or 2 gigs of RAM

-video card (im an nvidia man, i want you guys to argue out every component EXCEPT the brand name of my video card) something like.. i hear the latest thing is 256MB?

-hard drive, i know western digital is about the best, right? 250gig sounds nice.

-sound card, not insanely important that its top of the line, but the best bang for my (cheap) buck.

-power source (what brand?)

and any other components you guys reccomend from personal experience. and im guessing newegg is the best place to purchase these components? if not please do link the cheapest site.

thanks in advance.

Make sure you've got a PCI-e port.

Case
Hard Drive
Motherboard
DVD burner
Video Card
Memory
Processor

About 950 total.

The changes to knock it down:

Processor
Motherboard

Knocks about 100 off the price down to 850

This is all before shipping, and with only 1 gig of RAM. Up to you.

[QUOTE=Dj Yoshi]Case
Hard Drive
Motherboard
DVD burner
Video Card
Memory
Processor

About 950 total.

The changes to knock it down:

Processor
Motherboard

Knocks about 100 off the price down to 850

This is all before shipping, and with only 1 gig of RAM. Up to you.[/QUOTE]

Good choices, but definately stick with the $950 options. The $850 stuff is just too limiting (plus VIA chipsets are lame).

[QUOTE=Cool Matty]Good choices, but definately stick with the $950 options. The $850 stuff is just too limiting (plus VIA chipsets are lame).[/QUOTE]


Yeah, Yoshi rocks and stuff. Go with the $950, my previous system was a 3800+ x2/7800GT combo and it rocked.

sell your chinese gf so you can afford something better.

if(getThingFlags(source) & 0x8){
  do her}
elseif(getThingFlags(source) & 0x4){
  do other babe}
else{
  do a dude}

Yeah, yoshi has it about right. Except that case is ugly.

EDIT: Also, that case comes with a 20+4 pin psu... I believe that motherboard requires a 24+4 pin..

What, to you? :p

yeah, bill, i already decided on a different case.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811129155

[edit]and ruth, she's korean, you douche[/edit]

wouldn't you be better off with two 512 sticks of ram rather than in 1 gig stick?

Something about bandwidth and all that?

i dunno, i think ive heard something like that. can anyone verify?

I got the CORSAIR 512 MB RAMx2 for $80 some dollars a while back. It's cheaper but it requires two slots instead of one.

i was also thinking.. is a 450W power supply going to be enough?

While it's true that the 7800 is a power hog, a quality 450W with stable rails should be more than adequate.

ok cool.

and, what's gonna be the Ghz of this machine? i have 1.7 on this current one.. and i'd like to get something a lot better. i saw 2Ghz on the processor page.. but.. it's more than that right?

Yeah... Caz needs lots of Ghz so he can take high-quality videos of crap flying off of ceiling fans and whatnot.

hooray for generalizations!

But then he can't upgrade later.

You're fine with 450W, the 7800 is actually more efficient than the 6800, and you don't need more GHz since 1) the processor is clocked lower than it's rated. 3800+ means it performs about like a 3.8ghz Intel, actually better. And 2) The X2 has two cores...meaning for what you're wanting, it'll do it twice as fast.

ok great, i was wondering about that.

good news too. to my suprise i have enough money in the bank plus my tax return are going to be just over enough to buy this.

Jesus, WTF? Whatever you do, for the love of all that is holy, do not get an ECS motherboard. ECS is the most horrible motherboard brand to ever inhabit this Earth. Also, thank you for not getting the JUSTPC case. Not only are the cases absolute poor quality, but their PSUs are even worse. The Antec Sonata II is a lot better choice, with a great PSU.

As far as the RAM goes, yes, get two sticks for the dual channel performance. That Corsair 2x512 will do fine. Also if you like Western Digital, you can get a 250GB for around the same price as that Seagate. Here's my list:

Antec Sonata II
Asus A8N-E Mobo
EVGA 7800GT Graphics Card
AMD Athlon X2 3800+
Corsair 2x512MB PC3200 Memory
Western Digital 250GB SATA HD 16MB Buffer
(This hard drive is going to be a lot better than the Seagate. It has a 16MB buffer vs an 8 MB, and it's SATA instead of the older IDE standard.)
Lite-On Optical Drive

Total: $969 (probably right at a grand after shipping)

As far as the sound goes, you can use the onboard sound. Normally for a gaming machine, you wouldn't want to use onboard sound since it utilizes the processor, but since you'll have a dual core, it won't be a problem. I had to switch from an Audigy 2 ZS to onboard sound recently and the sound quality difference is barely noticable.



Two processors does not mean twice as fast. A dual core means you'll be able to multitask better. Gaming performance will improve almost zero over a single core, unless the game is multithreaded (which is unlikely), meaning it can take advantage of both processors at the same time. Unless you have a program that can see both processors, all you will get out of a dual core is better multitasking. That won't be true forever though. With all the dual cores coming out, a lot of new programs will be multithreaded, but almost nothing of current ones are, especially games.

As far as the actual GHz, a 2.0 GHz in AMD means about a 3.2 GHz in Intel. The 3800+ figure is just a performance generalization because of the dual cores. Against a single core 3.8 GHz Intel, the Intel would actually win in single program tasks if they aren't multithreaded, where as the 3800+ would win in multithreaded programs or in multitasking.

For video editing. Dual core is going to be aweome for you.

ok well im gonna need a consensus here.. do i go with yoshi's or judgedredd's?

ECS makes a lot of good quality motherboards. They've gotten high ratings from ExtremeTech, and the Newegg board has a 4 star rating, which means it's usually pretty good with some idiots who go "OMG IT WAS DEAD WHEN I GOT IT ECS SUXBAD".

Also, he's going into video editing...if you would've taken the time to read his post, you would have known this. Derka.

Finally, you suggested SATA with nForce4 chipset. You lose sir.

I don't know a damned thing about the case. It could be quality, it could be crap, but it seemed about the same price/feature ratio as mine. But I wouldn't doubt, considering your other inane bias, it's perfectly fine.

I wouldn't listen to him Caz, but you're the one making the decisions.

Listen to Yoshi, except the case. And try to get 2 gigs of ram if since you're editing video.

yeah i know im getting the other case.

I'd also not suggest getting 2x512mb. It'll be much easier to upgrade to 2x1gb, and past that 3 or 4x1gb for Vista on this board (I'm fairly sure it's going to handle >1gb memory better than XP. Right now you can actually see performance DECREASES when going above 1gb of RAM on XP.).

SATA works fine on NForce4. Really. It does.

[QUOTE=Cool Matty]SATA works fine on NForce4. Really. It does.[/QUOTE]
Yet another reason not to listen to CoolMatty

[QUOTE=Dj Yoshi]Yet another reason not to listen to CoolMatty[/QUOTE]

See tech thread.

Oh, and please mature a bit, will you?

This would be the reason this is the only time Caz is doing this. Sorry to get this into your thread Caz.

I'm plenty mature. It has nothing to do with that, or hating you. What it does have to do with is people wasting REAL money on products that may/may not work. If I was telling people not to buy SATA if they have nForce just to piss someone off, that wouldn't make me a very good person to rely on as far as all that goes, now would it?

[QUOTE=Dj Yoshi]This would be the reason this is the only time Caz is doing this. Sorry to get this into your thread Caz.

I'm plenty mature. It has nothing to do with that, or hating you. What it does have to do with is people wasting REAL money on products that may/may not work. If I was telling people not to buy SATA if they have nForce just to piss someone off, that wouldn't make me a very good person to rely on as far as all that goes, now would it?[/QUOTE]

Take this to PM if you want to argue it.

Ok I honestly believe Yoshi is right here. Listen to Yoshi, Cazor, and stop posting naked pictures of yourself.

[QUOTE=Cool Matty]SATA works fine on NForce4. Really. It does.[/QUOTE]

Yeah, I'm using SATA on nForce4 just fine.

Personal accounts mean nothing though. I'm using a Biostar motherboard just fine--does that mean I should start reccommending them?

Asus A8N Motherboard (SLI or SLI-deluxe version if you ever think you will get a second Gforce card)
AMD 64-bit 3700+ (Make sure you get the San Diego core, as it has more L2 Cache, but that is generally what AMD ships out to distributors now)
Nvidia Gforce 7800GT (If you can afford it, you should try and get your hands on the 512MB RAM 7800)
2GB RAM (Corsair Value or Kingston have good deals, and IMO, its a must if you are gonna do any video editing at all)
160 GB Seagate HDD (If you can afford, get a second on and RAID them, thats what i have, and I LOVE it.)
Soundblaster Audigy 2 (This is probably your best for the most quality at that price. If you love sounds, then look into the Xfi Fatal1ty series)

You can get a X1800XT for ~350$ now. You should definitly go for that if you can.

Obi does has a point. Though I would probably get myself a X1900XT being the graphic whore I am.

7800GT beats it and it's 50-70 bucks less.

Its priced less? Most places around here sell the 7800GT for more than the X1800XT.

BLAME CANADA!!!

Fa shizzle.