Building a Computer - 2nd opinions

MacLeod

Ive decided to build a computer instead of buying one for no other reason than I think it would be a lot of fun.

Im pretty settled on most of the components and wanted to get some thoughts and input from you guys. Ill be building this piecemeal - buying a component as I get the funds together.

Uses will be primarily for internet (forums, Apple trailers, Youtube, Hulu) and iTunes with occasional Photshopping. While Im not a gamer the new PC games do look interesting so I want it to be a capable low end gamer with potential to upgrade later if I wanted to. Its also going to be a severe BUDGET compy. With a baby due in August, WAF is not very high so the more this is off the radar the better.

Antec 300 case. Already bought this. Got it for $60 shipped and it looks mean as hell. Top mounted fan is cool and plenty of room. Seems well built.

Antec 650 watt PSU. I know 650 watts is overkill but should I get into gaming and want to beef up my video card, this should give plenty of headroom. I wanted a good quality brand and Antec seems to be regarded as quality gear.

Corsair 4 GB DDR2-800 RAM. Ill be running Vista 64 bit so 4 GB should be enough to run everything smoothly and Corsair seems to be a quality brand.

LG DVD drive/burner Dont need anything fancy here. No interest in Blu-Ray or even DVD playback - just need something to read CD-ROM's and burn some music CD's and an occasional home movie to DVD.

Western Digital Caviar Black 640 GB hard drive. I know WD is a top brand and the one in my trusty 9 year old Sony is a WD and still works like a charm. 32 MB cache, dual processors and 640 GB for $75 seems like a solid piece.

Now the parts Im not 100% on is the CPU and motherboard. Im almost certain Ill be using this AMD Athlon X2 7750 Its $60 shipped and while its 2.7 Ghz stock, itll overclock stable to 3.10 without raising the voltage. This should be PLENTY of muscle for what Ill be doing - even with light gaming on a modest monitor. I know Intel has better CPU's but this one is competitive with the E7### series but at half the price. Also, the AM2+ will be easy to upgrade as the AM2+ socket is still going strong whereas Intel is dropping its 775 socket.

For motherboard Im clueless. Its almost overwhelming the info out there on mobos. What I think I know so far is that Asus and MSI are considered the best quality boards with Gigabyte getting an honorable mentions. Looking for one under $100. Im leaning towards this Asrock A790GHX mobo for $92. It seems to get good reviews wherever I look and has decent onboard video so I can get my system up and running while I save up for a GPU later.

The GPU will be something like this Geforce 8800GTS which seems to be a lot of beef for $110.

So thats what Ive come up with so far. Id appreciate any thoughts, opinions or insights. This is my first build and Im a rookie so feel free to be blunt and tell me Im an idiot.

Serendipity

Looks good.

For me, cheaper is better, so I would personally go with "last year's" stuff.

But what you have there is fine!!

ben62670

Everything is solid. It looks like you have read some of my build sheets. Every single brand of MoBo out there has their good and bad boards. I have gone Intel just because I like the solid reliability of Intel brand MoBo's. One piece of advice I give on MoBo selection is to get one that has been out for a while. I am guessing you are shopping at NewEgg. Read the reviews. Parts with lots of good reviews usually mean the part is solid.
Have fun
Ben

dudeinaroom

not too shabby. I'd go with Intel over AMD. Built my first AMD comp a while back and wish I would have stuck with Intel. As far as hard drives go for a little more coinage you could have a terabyte drive, just sayin'.

MacLeod

I looked heavily into Intel because their chips are always on top in the benchmarks but the AMD chips are never far off and they cost considerably less than the Intels.

The Athlon 7750 is $60 shipped at 2.7 GHz. The only Intel offering is the E5200 2.5 GHz which the AMD beats in most game benchmarks and most of the app benchmarks. Now the E5200 can be overclocked to almost 4 GHz but I dont want to have to rely on redlining my CPU to get it to perform better than a non overclocked AMD chip that cost $20 less. To get the same performance Id have to move up to the $120 E7400. Plus since AMD is continuing the AM2+ socket, I can upgrade to the new chips AMD will be coming out with without having to upgrade my motherboard. Intel is moving up to a new 1136 (I think) socket and are not coming out with any new 775 socket chips. So to me, when budget and value are more important than sheer performance, I think AMD is the best choice.

I thought about getting the 1TB hard drive but Ive got an 80 GB drive on my 9 year old computer and its still got 33 GB of free space left! So I figure 640 GB should last me about 20 years!

tcrossma

My personal experience is: do not rely on overclocking, period. If you want to go faster, get a faster chip. I've overclocked plenty over the years, and there's usually some measure of unreliability and it's always in the back of your mind that you're pushing things too far. Just not worth it as far as I'm concerned.

I'd recommend getting a good mainstream (read: been around and has good reviews) Gigabyte motherboard. Asus and MSI can be good, but in the case of Asus I have found they cater more to overclockers and I personally haven't had great reliability with MSI over the years.

Looks like a good build you have there. Since you're not into heavy gaming, that machine will be more than enough.

ben62670

I hear ya on the AMD route. My post was more for general info. If you were buying the latest and greatest the intel boards have proven over the years to be solid. Just read the reviews. Also I have built many puters for myself and others with the thought of upgrading. I have only upgraded cards, and memory. By the time it came to wanting a new proc it has been best to ditch the board and proc and go new.

exalted512

I'd say +1 to a TB drive. With a kid on the way, theres going to be a lot more pictures and videos than you were before. 1 TB and you could download the internet

You could take your old hard drive and get an enclosure like this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817392029

Then you effectively have a external HDD that can be taken with you. More importantly, back up all your important pictures and stuff to it in case your hard drive in your comp fails. In fact, me and my brother both have this and I save my stuff on mine, as well as his. That way, God forbid, if one of our houses are lost due to something, we still have everything saved on another HDD else where. We both have our parents stuff on ours as well. Much better to be safe than sorry!

My current MOBO is MSI and I havent had any problems.
-Cody

disneyjoe7

I'm an AMD fan also, more bang for buck IMHO.

MacLeod

Thanks for the input guys.

On the hard drive - $75 is getting to the top of my budget. The motherboard and possibly PSU were the only things I wanted to spend $100 on because they would be the things Id keep in the system for many years while I upgrade around them. I think 640 GB will be more than enough for a while and I figure if I get heavy into gaming and fill that one up I can always buy a 1 TB later down the road when theyre down around $60 and toss it in there for extra storage. Ive got 5 5.25 bays in this case so Ive got room to grow.

After 2 days of reading tests, articles and reviews I think Ive decided on this Gigabyte motherboard.

It supports all the AMD chips all the way up to the 125 watt Phenom II series, has a dual BIOS, holds 16 GB RAM that can run up to 1333 MHz, Crossfire compatible if I ever get serious into gaming and want dual GPU's, claims to have big beefy components for durability and a host of other options. Doesnt appear to have onboard video tho so Id have to get a video card before I could get things up and running. Still for $110 this might be worth the investment for a mobo that would last several years and be good for several levels of upgrading.

ben62670

Looks like a good board. I have the intel version of that board:) Very solid. Only complaint is 2 pci slots. The 8 usbs on board itself are great!

tcrossma

Nice looking MB. And I agree with you about the HD. Christ, 640GB is HUGE... I'm not sure why everyone thinks they need a TB these days

renowilliams

Looks like you've done your homework to me and what you intend to build, based on your planned usage will work. I have the 8600 gts and it does more than I need. I use my computer to send video to my avr. Your set up will be fairly close to what I have with the exception of a soundcard. I use a rather expensive Asus Xonar D2X.



You should be happy with your build.



Have fun!!!

petrym

Good picks, I'd make a 60/80 GB OS/programs partition and store data on the other partition.

Sami

MacLeod wrote: »

On the hard drive - $75 is getting to the top of my budget.

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10009440&prodlist=froogle

74.99 shipped.

WilliamM2

Everything looks good, except the power supply. Antec used to make great power supplies, lately they have more failures than any brand we've used at work.

As far as the hard drive, if you are sure you will never need the space, spend a little more, and get 2 500GB drives. Run them in RAID1 and never worry about being down, or losing data to a drive failure.

Hillbilly61

I've built 10 computers over the years. Great fun! It was especially more so as a father/son activity ... to the point that he shopped out (wise choices within the budget) and built on his own a PC when he was twelve years old.

You've made some good choices so far. I like WD Caviar products. Don't worry too much about going to 1 TB. The key is to get humogo buffer memory and 7200 rpm rotation.

You have not bought a board, nor a video card. Boards are the key. Being an Intel adherent (more overclockable IMHO), I cannot help you too much on an AMD specific one. There are huge differences between Intel and AMD architectures. A generality: Go for as big as a bus speed that the processor and the memory can handle, but don't over buy. Look up your processor specs, as that is where the data bottleneck usually forms.

Some brands I have had good success with are ASUS and Gigabit. Recommend that you shop their offerings. Experience indicates that ASUS is higher performance, but are more easily fried (since you menition "playing games" like overclocking). I have found that Gigabit boards are more stable, but are less than the best performers. It's a trade off ... reliability, verses, performance.

Finally, graphic cards are a world into themselves. DEFINITEY pick up one with a solid processor and lots of memory. It will make a sluggish P.C. run like a champ by off loading the graphics work from the CPU.

'hope this helps!

ben62670

Sami wrote: »

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10009440&prodlist=froogle

74.99 shipped.

IBM/Hitachi deathstar. I'll pass.
Any one ever defrag a 1TB drive?
Another vote for partitions. I like to have 3 smaller partitions of different sizes(to help identify them during OS installs) so I can dual, or triple boot. One or two real big ones for data. Also 64bit Windows OS's are not all that. They still are having some driver issues.
Ben

ben62670

WilliamM2 wrote: »

Everything looks good, except the power supply. Antec used to make great power supplies, lately they have more failures than any brand we've used at work.

As far as the hard drive, if you are sure you will never need the space, spend a little more, and get 2 500GB drives. Run them in RAID1 and never worry about being down, or losing data to a drive failure.

I am running raid 0 on my 2 raptors, raid 0 on my 2 250's, and raid one on my data drives. The problem with raid 1(mirroring) is that if one drive is hit by a virus the the other gets it too. Also a severe lightning strike, or theft... renders having the second drive useless. Obviously I do like to raid, but don't let it fool you into thinking you are totally safe. External backups are a must.
Ben

Hillbilly61

ben62670 wrote: »

IBM/Hitachi deathstar. I'll pass.
Any one ever defrag a 1TB drive?
Another vote for partitions. I like to have 3 smaller partitions of different sizes(to help identify them during OS installs) so I can dual, or triple boot. One or two real big ones for data. Also 64bit Windows OS's are not all that. They still are having some driver issues.
Ben

Dam, does anyone (outside of the pro circle) remember partitions anymore? The cluster overhang with current OS's is awful, as the disk allocation space alloted is well outside of current desktop that OSs well handle. Memory has become so darned cheap that it does not matter anymore for home use.

WilliamM2

ben62670 wrote: »

The problem with raid 1(mirroring) is that if one drive is hit by a virus the the other gets it too.

How's that any worse than any other drive setup? I run 4 500GB drives in two RAID0 arrays, and backups are always a must. But the truth is, most users don't backup any data, no matter how easy you make it for them.

I do monthly Ghost images to protect the operating system partition from any mishaps. Even with all my data backed up, who wants to install again?

Hillbilly61

ben62670 wrote: »

I am running raid 0 on my 2 raptors, raid 0 on my 2 250's, and raid one on my data drives. The problem with raid 1(mirroring) is that if one drive is hit by a virus the the other gets it too. Also a severe lightning strike, or theft... renders having the second drive useless. Obviously I do like to raid, but don't let it fool you into thinking you are totally safe. External backups are a must.
Ben

I opted out of RAID a long time ago, pretty much for the reason described. RAID is geared for a single drive failure that does not happen much any more. When lightening comes in, then all bets are off where the current is going to find and fry its path to the ground.

I backup my most critical info to off line media, like DVD or, currently being used, an external hard drive. When not backing up, I keep the external drive unplugged from all other sources.

Sami

ben62670 wrote: »

IBM/Hitachi deathstar. I'll pass.

LOL, what year are you living in?

ben62670 wrote: »

Any one ever defrag a 1TB drive?

What's defrag? Seriously, no, I have no need to defrag my drives anymore. Why are you asking? Time it takes to defrag? Would it be any different than defragging two 500GB partitions?

ben62670

WilliamM2 wrote: »

How's that any worse than any other drive setup? I run 4 500GB drives in two RAID0 arrays, and backups are always a must. But the truth is, most users don't backup any data, no matter how easy you make it for them.

I do monthly Ghost images to protect the operating system partition from any mishaps. Even with all my data backed up, who wants to install again?

Sweet William why are you always so defensive? Raid 1 is definitely better than no raid. I also do a ghost after a fresh install, updates, and main programs are installed. Yes the sad truth is most people don't backup, but Mac having baby pics I think he will spend the little bit of time to backup critical data. Also thumb drives are so huge and cheap now that they also make sweet devices to back up critical data:)

Sami wrote: »

LOL, what year are you living in?

What's defrag? Seriously, no, I have no need to defrag my drives anymore. Why are you asking? Time it takes to defrag? Would it be any different than defragging two 500GB partitions?

Those drives are still having issues(mostly laptops(I do data recovery)). I was a huge fan of Seagate's, but lately they have had a few models that are troublesome. You don't defrag your OS partition? I can see not doing your data partition often, but your OS partition gets messy.

bruss

i just finished a build and have the same power supply. I am overclocking a q9400 to 3.4ghz wtih 8GB of 1066 gskill and an ATI 4870. I went with a 500GB caviar. I wanted the raptor but it got too expensive.

give windows 7 a try too.. its pretty cool so far.

Hillbilly61

I too think that thumbdrives are approaching the size of being usable critical info backup media. I don't trust them though. I lose them all of the time!

As far as drives are concerned, I like Seagate's products in general. In analogy to cars though, flawed models appear among all of the brands.

Ben's comment concerning keeping the OS partioned differently from the rest of the data is +1. Microsoft OSs leave too many "bits and pieces" of files laying around and they eventually bog the system down. Right now it has been noticed that if you leave a system with Vista on for a week or so, it will cause the PC to crash or become erratically behaving (we've named a term for the latter "sleep deprived"). XP and earlier OSs have been found to be more prone to this, than, say, DOS 6 in standalone desktop use.

WilliamM2

Sweet William why are you always so defensive?

Who's defensive? I was just explaining my reasoning for Raid1.

You don't defrag your OS partition? I can see not doing your data partition often, but your OS partition gets messy.

Have you tried Auslogics disk defrag? About as fast as Diskeeper Pro, but free. Even 1TB partions don't take long.

ben62670

Never really liked diskeeper. Also I like to have partitions so you can ghost an image to a partition and not have to worry about the data if the OS goes bad.

michaeljhsda2

disneyjoe7 wrote: »

I'm an AMD fan also, more bang for buck IMHO.

+1
Mike

audiobliss

Diskeeper came on my ThinkPad, and I like it quite a bit, so I just installed Asulogic's program on my desktop. Thanks for the info!

Sami

ben62670 wrote: »

You don't defrag your OS partition? I can see not doing your data partition often, but your OS partition gets messy.

No, I don't defrag because there is no need to, they won't get fragmented.