my end of summer upgrade...make suggestions!

[Forbidden Donut]

Well, I'll be heading back to school in a few weeks, so it's time to upgrade! A couple of things first: This is not a machine for overclocking. I want this thing to be stable as a rock for a long time, hence the intel brand mobo and crucial ram. Also, I'd like a reccomendation on the hard drives...I've included the 3 options I'm considering, and would like people's opinions on whether or not the speed increase from raid is worth it, or if the maxtor sata drives are worth it. So...without further ado....


Processor: Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 Processor 3GHz, 800MHz FSB, Socket 478 Retail - $ 393 ( http://www.googlegear.com/jsp/Produ...oductCode=80661 )

Motherboard: Intel D875PBZLK i875P P4 (800FSB) Skt478 DDR ATX Motherboard w/Gigabit LAN, RAID/Serial ATA Retail - $154 ( http://www.googlegear.com/jsp/Produ...ductCode=240893 )

Vid Card: Visiontek Xtasy 9800 Pro Video Card, AGP 8X, 128MB DDR - $299 ( http://www.compusa.com/products/pro...ARCH&tabtype=rb )

Ram: 2x512 crucial pc3200 - $190 ( http://www.crucial.com/store/PartSp...464Z40B&cat=RAM )

Sound Card: Creative Labs SB Audigy 2 6.1 Sound Card Retail - $114.50 ( http://www.googlegear.com/jsp/Produ...ductCode=290211 )

Power Supply: Antec TruePower True430 430W Power Supply Retail - $82.49 ( http://www.googlegear.com/jsp/Produ...ductCode=270007 )

Hard Drive: Western Digital Caviar WD1200JB (WD1200BB Special Edition) 120GB EIDE ATA/100 7200RPM Hard Drive w/8MB Buffer - $106 ( http://www.googlegear.com/jsp/Produ...ductCode=101205 )
------------------------------------OR------------------------------------------
2xMaxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 6Y080M0 80GB Serial ATA 7200RPM Hard Drive w/8MB Buffer - $205( http://www.googlegear.com/jsp/Produ...ductCode=100710 ) for RAID0 configuration
------------------------------------OR------------------------------------------
1xMaxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 6Y120M0 120GB Serial ATA 7200RPM Hard Drive w/8MB Buffer - $124 ( http://www.googlegear.com/jsp/Produ...ductCode=100705 )

TOTAL: $1338.99 or $1437.99 or $1356.99

Things I'm keeping from my current comp are: LG915FT+ monitor. Lian Li pc60 case. Plexwriter 8x4x32. Western Digital 45 meg HD w/2 meg of cache. Pioneer slot loading DVD drive. Videologic sirocco crossfire speakers. My mouse, and my keyboard

 

[Johnny Rotten]

Sounds similar to my pending upgrade...

3ghz P4
1 gig of corsair xms 3200LL ddram (4 x 256 probably... according to intel and anand 4 dimm slots are faster than 2 dimm slots. Not sure if there is a real world tangible benefit tho)
Audigy 2 for sound
2 x 36 gig WD Raptor drives (10K rpm, 5 yr warranty)
GF3 Ti200 (waiting on ATI's '9900')
19" NEC 912SB diamondtron.

Im kinda waffling on the monitor though as LCD's are just sooooo sexy and samsung has a all new 16ms panel coming out in the 4-6 weeks. Decisions decisions...

 

[Forbidden Donut]

Sounds similar to my pending upgrade...

3ghz P4
1 gig of corsair xms 3200LL ddram (4 x 256 probably... according to intel and anand 4 dimm slots are faster than 2 dimm slots. Not sure if there is a real world tangible benefit tho)
Audigy 2 for sound
2 x 36 gig WD Raptor drives (10K rpm, 5 yr warranty)
GF3 Ti200 (waiting on ATI's '9900')
19" NEC 912SB diamondtron.

Im kinda waffling on the monitor though as LCD's are just sooooo sexy and samsung has a all new 16ms panel coming out in the 4-6 weeks. Decisions decisions...

Yeah, I was tempted to wait for the 9900...but my guess is that it'll come out at 500 dollars, so the 9800 pro for 300 will be fine and then, as was suggested by a forum member here, I can sell that for 150 in a year and pick up a 9900 for a bit more than that

And yes, LCD's are indeed sexy My only issue with them is that I use my computer for music/movies/gaming and work. I'm not very keen on the off angle issues with LCD's, although they've gotten much better. Also, a 19 inch LCD would cost me a fortune, and I need at least a 19 inch monitor.

 

[BRiT]

You may want to look into the following deal from Dell (taken from TechBargains.com). Looks like it would save you some money. With the extra parts you could use them or just EBay them off to help cover cost of the other items.

PowerEdge 400SC Server, Aug 9

Drop to $324 on Sunday. Dell Small Business has the PowerEdge 400SC Server now available with 3.2Ghz P4 again. Celeron 2Ghz 128MB DDR333 ECC/40GB 48x CD, 1 yr on site warranty $324 shipped free. Faster P4's available. 3.2Ghz +$499, can't buy the CPU for $640+! (Thanks Stony, Matt)

Select Servers, Choose PowerEdge, Choose PowerEdge SC Server, Customize it, Customize and Price on right column $349, No OS/Keyboard/Mouse - Continue

FAQ on the 400SC. This machine is a high end Intel 875P chipset board with 400/533/800Mhz Bus CPU support, dual channel DDR400 memory, AGP 8x video card slot, Gigabit Ethernet, Serial ATA interface. Newegg sells a board like this for $160 alone. Dell's similiar Dimension 8300 desktop starts at $699. It does run Windows XP.

 

[Forbidden Donut]

You may want to look into the following deal from Dell (taken from TechBargains.com). Looks like it would save you some money. With the extra parts you could use them or just EBay them off to help cover cost of the other items.

PowerEdge 400SC Server, Aug 9

Drop to $324 on Sunday. Dell Small Business has the PowerEdge 400SC Server now available with 3.2Ghz P4 again. Celeron 2Ghz 128MB DDR333 ECC/40GB 48x CD, 1 yr on site warranty $324 shipped free. Faster P4's available. 3.2Ghz +$499, can't buy the CPU for $640+! (Thanks Stony, Matt)

Select Servers, Choose PowerEdge, Choose PowerEdge SC Server, Customize it, Customize and Price on right column $349, No OS/Keyboard/Mouse - Continue

FAQ on the 400SC. This machine is a high end Intel 875P chipset board with 400/533/800Mhz Bus CPU support, dual channel DDR400 memory, AGP 8x video card slot, Gigabit Ethernet, Serial ATA interface. Newegg sells a board like this for $160 alone. Dell's similiar Dimension 8300 desktop starts at $699. It does run Windows XP.

My first impulse was that this was a great deal, but after looking at the numbers a little more closely, I'm not convinced. A P4 3.2ghz processor can be had for ~$650. Add the motherboard I'm using and your total is about $800. Now, the dell deal is is base price of $324, plus $499 for the 3.2 ghz processor, which brings us to approximately $825 dollars, not counting tax. Add in the tax, and you're looking at close to 900 dollars. I'm willing to guess that the numbers for a 3 ghz processor are similar.

My last concern is that Intel usually makes custom board for dell cases that usually aren't exactly ATX form factor, and I'd prefer to keep this in my Lian Li case. I know for sure that this isn't the board 875P board the intel has released for resale, because that board (the one listed in my original post) has onboard support for SATA raid.

Thanks for the heads up though! If I somehow misinterpreted the numbers, please let me know.

 

[Malo]

why an Intel brand motherboard? IMO they have never had many options for BIOS tweakin and any OC'ing you may want to do.

im getting new PC next week and going for either Abit or Asus 875 chipset board.

 

[Forbidden Donut]

A couple of things first: This is not a machine for overclocking. I want this thing to be stable as a rock for a long time, hence the intel brand mobo and crucial ram.

It's actually been shown that at stock speeds, the intel brand boards perform a little bit better than the brand OCer boards (asus, abit and the like), likely because those boards relax some of the internal timings to allow for a smoother overclock. Since I'm not going to be overclocking, I'm choosing what seems to be the ultimate in both speed and stability. With the intel board I can still tweak ram timings, which is good enough for me since I don't plan on doing any overclocking.

 

[Malo]

ah ok, I didn't realise you could still do timing..... and I didn't notice that sentence at the start of your post

I agree that Intel boards are a good choice for stability

 

[Forbidden Donut]

ah ok, I didn't realise you could still do timing..... and I didn't notice that sentence at the start of your post

I agree that Intel boards are a good choice for stability

I actually based most of my information here off of an [H] review of the board where they did direct comparisons to the Abit IC7-G (http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NDYwLDE=). The intel board usually comes out ahead...it just can't do any drastic changes to the FSB.

Either way, I think this is the best choice for a non-overclocking system.

 

[AAlcHemY]

I didn't see any cpu cooling in your posts. A SLK900 with 92mm fan on top shoud be quiet. For the rest, a nice looking machine.

 

[Forbidden Donut]

After further investigation, I'm not sure that I'm gonna go with the 9800pro deal at compUSA. The rebate says it's internet only, and after adding tax and shipping, the total price is comparable to what I can grab at a place like newegg. I can get a Tyan 9800pro for $340 at newegg, or a gigabyte one for $352. Does anyone know if this compusa deal HAS to be shipped?


As for the cooling, I was just going to use the stock intel hsf. I've heard that they're completely adequate, and reasonably quiet. If this isn't the case, let me know!