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Best Athlon MoBo for Full Sized Tower with Temperature Sensor and Case
On Mon, 14 Feb 2005 23:53:19 -0500, Thomas Collins Jr
wrote: For cost, I have $3000 to spend and want the following: AMD Althon 2 200GB+ Raid Drives SATA EIDE ability to use my 3 Disk Drives Western Digital 250GB, PlextorCombo 20/10/40-12A, Plextor 712 A/SW. Built In Lan (Optional, I have a 3Com PCI Card) 256MB Graphics Card Full Sized Case with Temperature Sensor/Readout Motherboard with at least 4GB Memory and Bios/Temperature Sensor 400+Watt Power Supply TV Tuner Card Ability to run two Monitors up to 19" either VGA or DVI I'm not looking for "Bleeding Edge" and I've been happy with my Celeron 667 for 5 years, now I upgraded to a Celeron 1.3GHz Tualatin-Core so this computer will satisfy my needs for another year. See the funny thing there is $3000 is a heck of a lot of money. My neighbor bought a 6800 GT 1 gig a mem etc for $2500 when a few months ago when it was really expensive, I thought he got rooked and he still didnt hit 3000. Your first option is get an AMD 64 939 retail CPU(with fan) which speed ? The lowest is 3000 and its plenty fast around 159-165 or so - it kind of fluctuates nowadays since it seems like all the online retailers are using some software that micro manages prices due to supply and demand at almost a daily rate. The 3200 I think was around 180-200 and the 3400 $280 or so. I dont think theres a huge difference but the 939s OC very easily and some say the higher multiplier on the 3200 etc make it easier to do since you can change the multiplier downward but not upward on the chips giving you more flexibilty with the FSB settings or so they say. Havent tried it yet cause Im waiting for my darn video card. Next decision --- motherboard PCI express or AGP ? If you choose PCI express you have to get a PCI express video card which is no big deal for you since you want to buy a new one. The other is it can limit the PCI slots you have. Most cards are still PCI and the PCI express MBs come with smaller PCI x1 slots too which displace some older PCI slots. Generally you have PCI express x16 video slot (replaces AGP) , 2 1x PCI express slots, 3 PCI slots. So you lose two PI slots compared to a full older board. There is one new board the MSI which they managed to squeeze 4 PCI slots. The main problem with PCI express theres this strange lag , slowness in new products recently. Though you can buy nvidias new cards they seem a bit late in AGP versions and theres just enough supply it seems to keep prices up. Their nforce4 PCI express boards are slow in coming and ATIs new video cards ---- they were WIREDs vaporware list at the end of the year. Im still waiting for my 800XL a month later as are many others from them and though others are offering finally 800XLs its in such small qtys that they demand 100 bucks or more over MSRP ! So heres another thing --- some prices may or may not be a lot lower in the next few months. Whenever this logjam breaks video cards may tumble a lot in price, and so would SLI and ULtra PCI express MBs. However I said that in dec and prices and supplies still stink ! So you have the choice ---- Nforce3 250 (or even VIA boards) for your 939 AmD 64 chip meaning decked out but with AGP and PCI slots. The MSI nforce3 neo platinum is picked by many here because it won a shoot out at Anandtechs website way back in June or July. I think its going for $130-150. If you pick Abit and Asus --- I think they have VIA chip boards which were also mentioned as good by Anandtech. If you go PCI express these are really new so they could have the usual bugginess. And there arent a whole lot to choose from yet -- I think VIA chipset PCI express are still not out yet. So you have nforce4 - Chaintech Vn4 (cheapest ULTRA board 125 or so) 3 PCI , MSI Ultra board $159 or so with 4 CPI slots and there are Gigabyte boards. There are several around $200 SLI boards nforce4 by Asus , Gigabyte etc. I think there are 3 basic chipsets in the new nforce4 line budgetbasic/Ultra/SLI. SLI is to run two video cards at the same time to get extra speed mainly for gamers with lots of $$$$$ to burn. I bought the Chaintech VN4. A good card is the 6600GT probably the most popular card that has very good performance that doesnt take you into the nosebleed range. Its around $180-200 and comes Im pretty sure now in AGP and PCIE. Get a decent full tower case. I like the Chieftec style cases by Antec. They have that full tower case with the vents in front and door. They generally offer it with an older style 400 watt PS the kind with the 18 pin plug. You could get an empty case and then buy a fancy PS with a 20 pin plug. The one caveat is its an older style case meaning it isnt as deep as some of the new ones. I think its great otherwise but some of the new ones though smaller are deeper to accomodate the longer video cards. Those few inches can make a big difference. I think the 6600 like the 6800 is longer than the usual card too though you can usually work around it --- it can get really close to the 3.5 drive cage creating a problem with any drives there. I dont know about the temp readout. You can buy that seperately and you can get that in some smaller cases Ive seen, My neighbor got one with temp readout and bubble lights at a gross out $120. If you want to spend more wait for the ATI 800XL 256 mem for $299 -- which is supposed to bust the video world wide open with 6800GT performance at $100 cheaper. This is the one Im wait for. THey are gouging people now selling non-ATI versions for $100+ markup. WHen its finally releases in huge numbers itll drop all video card prices probably. Virtually all the decent cards have two outs - one DVI and one analog in which you can adaptors for (two analogs). Ive heard SOME 800XLs have two DVI outs but I think the ATI 800XL does though some of the non-ATIs do I think. All you need is some decent DDR 3200/400. Theres a lot of stuff on sale recently for around $59 or so a stick 512. Sure its not the best expensive brands but it works well. I tried my PNY and Kingston recently on my neighbors AMD 64 when he had problems with his Samsung memory he bought for $75 a stick. It worked fine. Youll obviously be able to over clock better if you get higher than 3200 sticks though and that would cost a lot more though prices are coming down on those too. Hard disks - sales on them ALL the time. FRYs outpost has 200 and 160 gig seagates ALL the time with 5 yr warranties. Buy them whenever theres a sale. Ive heard you have more rebate problems with seagates though. These are rebate sales. Compusa ,Microcenter, Office Max , Office depot etc all have hard disk rebate sales ALLthe time . Compusa us selling some Hitachi( formerly IBM) hard disks 200 gig for I think $89 after rebate. Also Anandtech recommend no RAID for desktops. Negigible performace gains in the real world he says , except for artificial benchmarks which will look much better --- and more risk since if one fails you lose your data. Its been posted here many times before. Plextor has always been a great maker of burners but NEC is also great and way way cheaper. I think its selling for $60-70 now at Newegg etc. 16x dual format and dual layer . Pioneer is also another good maker but also more expensive than NEC. TV card --- I guess the Hauppauge 150 is still the king , Its a hardware encoding card , has the chip to do mpeg2 so it takes a big load off your CPU. which generally enables smoother real time rewind etc in PVR usage . Compusa had the retail pack for 90 - 29 rebate or so a week or two ago. However the OEM version is still being sold on AMAZON for $63-66. There are 3 versions as I posted before recently in fact. Sheesh. 150 retail which comes with software and remote control no FM radio. 150 MCE versions - short card and regular. Both of these come with FM radio but no remote I think. And only drivers no software as low as $63-66. Check Amazon,com its intermittently in stock both versions. People tend to like the second version cause they like to buy a separate remote thats supposedly better suited for MCE etc or has more features etc. And they like to buy their own software either for MCE windows or for WIN XP like Beyond TV etc. There was a possible rival the ATI 550 based chip cards like the sapphire 550 theatrix based on the 550 theater ATI chip new --- but the reviews have been mediocre for it so far. I bought the 150 hauppauge recently but havent had time to set it up yet. Just installed it yesterday. I think the 3000 is enough but lets say you go for the 3200 $200 or so CPU $159 MSI PCI express board I'm on disability so I can only buy one or two parts a month. Right now I have the case, PS and CPU Athlon Fan. I plan on buying the motherboard and CPU next month. This is the area I really need help with. I plan on putting a TV Tuner card in it and as to the other $1500 someone mentioned, I'm getting a 20" Flat Screen DVI and a new high end printer. What do people think of those 4 in 1 printers ie. Fax, Copy, Print, Scan? I know what Cnet Reviews say but I'd rather hear from those who have/had them. 2GB of memory to start with, but I'd like to be able to go up to 4GB sometime. I know this is general info and I have been looking at a lot of hardware sites but I'd like the skinny on what people out there are running and are they happy with certain MoBos, Graphics Cards etc. GeForce Graphics Card is what I was leaning towards, and I like ASUS or Gigabyte MoBos as I have had two of each in the past and they held up well and were generally easy to upgrade. Tom |
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right now there is only one board on the market that I know of for AMD 64
Socket 939 and it is an asus board, that will support PCI Express. |
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On Thu, 17 Feb 2005 15:02:54 GMT, "Jamie"
wrote: right now there is only one board on the market that I know of for AMD 64 Socket 939 and it is an asus board, that will support PCI Express. Yeah its pretty pathetic but theres actually more than one luckily in the US. It may seem like one though because of boards being intermittently in stock at some stores. See check this . Im sure you werent on pins and needles looking like the poor saps who were dying to get one like me. I ended up getting the Chaintech but I see now and I stand corrected -- There are now VIA CHIPSET PCI EXPRESS 939 boards by ASUS !!!!!! And some weird ones - the ATI version for less than 100 microatx with video built in I think ATIs foray into MB chipsets with graphics and a cheapo Foxconn and a lot more variety than I thought . The last time I checked was a few weeks ago. Theres also another MSI available strangely at ZZF and not here. http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...roperty&DEPA=1 |
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On Fri, 18 Feb 2005 23:04:24 -0500, Thomas Collins Jr
wrote: Total Costs $2931.00 Easy to spend $3000 on a ideal Personal System... Tom Im almost wacky now from lack of sleep but before I pass out --- had to do a ton of stuff last night ----- I did a quick look at your list and I maybe wacked out but it adds up to way less than that I think though I may have added wrong. Of course you are paying someone to put it all together so that accounts for a fair margin for profit so it probably perfectly OK. Are you putting this together yourself? Theres are the prices I saw at several decent places: With two exceptions --- Retail AMD processor so no need for fan Hauppauge instead of the Pinnacle. The nvidia is on sale this week . Also didnt include tax and shipping I might have left something out in my wacky state but 219 Processor 200 Ultra 134 HD 148 case 163 Maxtor 129 rebate nvidia 124 Plextor 389 monitor 55 Speakers 100 Hauppauge Tv card w/software 20 cables 336 external HD Power supply? |
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