• Some users have recently had their accounts hijacked. It seems that the now defunct EVGA forums might have compromised your password there and seems many are using the same PW here. We would suggest you UPDATE YOUR PASSWORD and TURN ON 2FA for your account here to further secure it. None of the compromised accounts had 2FA turned on.
    Once you have enabled 2FA, your account will be updated soon to show a badge, letting other members know that you use 2FA to protect your account. This should be beneficial for everyone that uses FSFT.

Building new computer

D

DarkElite

Weaksauce
Joined
Jan 7, 2004
Messages
101
Anyway, I'm buiding my first desktop (Im 16) and my budget is basically what I make off of these auctions (I'm hoping for a total of $1000-$1100). I can spend about $75 over what I make there.

So here is my plan so far, I'm buying mostly from www.zipzoomfly.com, because of free s/h, and low prices.

The case is final, and I'm an ATI so don't bother recommending Nvidia.

Specifications for my desktop with a budget of $1100

Item Price Store Finalized? Retail/OEM/Used Shipping/Tax
---- ----- ----- ---------- --------------- ------------

Processor
-AMD Athlon 2600+ 1.91ghz $85 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n

Motherboard
-Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe $92 Zipzoomfly x r free 2nd day air/n

Video Card
-C3D ATI Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB$214 Newegg x r FedEx 2 day $12

Memory
- GeIL GL5124000DC 512MB $153 Zipzoomfly x r free 2nd day air/n

Optical Drive
-Sony DWU18ABK DVD±RW $72 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n

Case/PSU
-Antec Sonata 380W $110 Work x r n/a n/a

Hard Drive
-WD1600JD SATA $108 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n

Network Card
-Linksys 802.11g PCI $0 n/a,Friend x u n/a n/a

Cooling
-BL Cooler Master Aerogate II $47 Xoxide x r S/H$5.18 Tax$2.40
-Vantec VTX-C01-BK HD enc. $38 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n
-Tt A1725 Volcano 11 + Xaser $30 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n
-Thermaltake A2018 DC Fan $18 Zipzoomfly x r free 2nd day air/n
-Artic Silver 5 $12 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n

Monitor
-Use one already owned $0 n/a x u n/a n/a

Other
-Logitech Ultra X Keyboard $34 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n
-Black Floppy $15 Work x o n/a n/a
-VGA monitor extension cable $6 Newegg x o Fedex Saver s/h $4

Total $1034





The formatting messed up a little, I wrote it in notepad. Tell me your ideas and give suggestions!!! :D
 
i figure it this way get an athlon 2500+ overclock to 3200+ its so simple for like 60-70, an nf7-s board 70. get an 6800u for 270? u have to check newegg for that. and that should be good for now, i see no reason to get pentium anymore, amd is much better for gaming, especially cost wise.
 
sorry, but I said I like the ATI/Intel combo, I understand how AMD is better price to cost ratio etc., but my comp just would'nt feel right without a Prescott and Radeon.

Thanks anyway
 
trust me, i've had intel for about 13yrs, and the computer i'm on now, kicks its ass in everyway possible. i switched, time for u too.
 
I dunno, i'd have to think about it

I'd want at least a 3200+, and the mobo has to be Asus, or possibly A-Bit. It needs to have dual channel memory, onboard sound, built in sata controller, and not a need but gigabit ethernet would be nice.
 
Main question: Are you planning to OC this system at all? (Either now or off in the future?, you need to be sure)
 
I'd never go AMD either. Big Intel fan here; especially after seeing the AMD processor on fire a couple years ago... looks like your Dell is doing better than your HP :D

Good luck!
 
Ok, heres the deal, if I only make about $1000 off ebay, I'll get an AMD setup. But, if I make $1100+ I'll get an Intel setup. Im willing to give AMD a chance, I can always sell the board and proccessor an buy an Intel board and chip later if I need to.

My Intel setup is as shown in my first post, If I go AMD it will look somthing like this:processor

-AMD Athlon 2600+ 1.91ghz $91 Zipzoomfly x r free 2nd day air/n

Motherboard
-Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe $92 Zipzoomfly x r free 2nd day air/n

I will overclock the proccessor to at least a 3200+ as soo as I get it. My friend has a 2600+ and he overclocked it to 2.52Hz, I don't even know what the xx00+ equivalent of that is!

Anyway, the A7N8X-E looks like a real nice board to me, so I really want that. Second in the lineup (and out f stock) would be the ABit NF7-S.

Tell me if this looks like a good idea. :)
 
So sorry I went off-topic ... will never do it again ... :rolleyes:

Since you're building a new PC from scartch ... I highly suggest an AMD64 ... check your budget, you won't need to go all out now ... it will be better on the long run ...
 
Please stop being obsessed with your *history* with AMD. Get over it. There's a new AMD in town and they're better than ever. They won't go on fire like a spontaneous combustion paranoia psycho anymore. They've been attending rehab. Now, they're good to go.

Just so unfortunate that you may have one problem with the AMD processor in your experience. The other 300 people with their AMD's are all happy. Being stubborn, straight ahead for Intel only shows you as ignorant. There's no need to shy away from AMD. Just read the reviews, they even prove you wrong! :eek:

-J.
 
I'm looking to get between $215-$275 for the HP laptop, but I'm selling it on eBay right now. If you want to place a bid you could probably get it for $275.
 
GeForceX said:
Please stop being obsessed with your *history* with AMD. Get over it. There's a new AMD in town and they're better than ever. They won't go on fire like a spontaneous combustion paranoia psycho anymore. They've been attending rehab. Now, they're good to go.

Just so unfortunate that you may have one problem with the AMD processor in your experience. The other 300 people with their AMD's are all happy. Being stubborn, straight ahead for Intel only shows you as ignorant. There's no need to shy away from AMD. Just read the reviews, they even prove you wrong! :eek:

-J.
Click to expand...

You're Fanatical About AMD. I'm Fanatical about Intel. Let's leave it at that and not try to convert the heathens (eachother).
 
I'm still a fan of Intel by far even though I am now giving AMD a go. But lets not turn this into a flame war, please tell me if my setup is good and what suggestions you have. I am buying the 2600+ and going to overclock it way high up to 3800+ or more.

I really like the asus board mentioned in my last other post, so I will go for either that or the A-Bit NF7-S.
 
1. Why go with a Prescott? You gonna cook bacon on this thing? Those things runs extremely hot and aren't any faster than a Northwood. I assume you are building a Socket 478 system. The Northwood is a few dollars more on ZipZoomFly and it's worth it as it runs A LOT cooler.

2. I went with an Intel 875 board. Expensive (I'm like you and I don't care) and it won't overclock past 4 percent. I didn't and still don't care to do overclock so no big deal. I have a friend who is EXTREMELY happy with the Abit board and they overclock like crazy. Don't know much about the ASUS Motherboards.

3. ATI Radeon 9800 Pro is a great choice. Just don't buy it from ZipZoomFly as their cards are overpriced. I used ZipZoomFly to build my computer also but I already had a video card. I don't know why but they are high on video cards but they are. Pick one up from newegg for 199.00.

4. Nothing I can say about the RAM. I went apeshit and bought 2 Gigabytes of Corsair XMS Pro series RAM for mine and it's awesome.

5. After researching and reading reviews for what seemed like hours, the only Optical Drives I saw that had absolutely no negative reviews were ASUS drives. I went with an ASUS DVD Rom drive and it's the best one I've ever owned. Can't recommend ASUS enough on their drives.

6. I realize money is a factor with you on the case, but you might think of getting a Coolermaster Praetorian from the same site. 99.00 for the black one and you still have to buy and install a power supply. I can't tell you how big of a difference there is between these two cases. We're talking Volkswagen Bug compared to Lamborghini here. The praetorian is aluminum with a power supply cage, retractable motherboard tray, two intake fans on the front, one exhaust fan on the top and one exhaust fan on the back. These cases are AWESOME.

7. For just a little more you could get a Western Digital Raptor (10000 RPM) hard drive. Unless you need massive storage, that's the way I'd go. I put two of them in a Raid0 and am happier than hell.

Basically if I were you, I'd go with a Northwood, Abit IS7, Video card is fine (just buy it at Newegg), RAM is fine, go with ASUS drives (They Rock), if at all possible go with a Praetorian and possibly an Antec Tru 480 or 550 PSU (Expensive but worth it) and look into the Raptor Hard Drives. In a Raid 0 if you can afford it.

Buy the way, you should have put a Reserve on that dell laptop. If it goes that cheap I'll be sick for you. Friend of mine just sold a two year old Inspiron with a 1.6 P4, 128 Megs of Ram for 800.00.
 
tjr1973 said:
1. Why go with a Prescott? You gonna cook bacon on this thing? Those things runs extremely hot and aren't any faster than a Northwood. I assume you are building a Socket 478 system. The Northwood is a few dollars more on ZipZoomFly and it's worth it as it runs A LOT cooler.

2. I went with an Intel 875 board. Expensive (I'm like you and I don't care) and it won't overclock past 4 percent. I didn't and still don't care to do overclock so no big deal. I have a friend who is EXTREMELY happy with the Abit board and they overclock like crazy. Don't know much about the ASUS Motherboards.

3. ATI Radeon 9800 Pro is a great choice. Just don't buy it from ZipZoomFly as their cards are overpriced. I used ZipZoomFly to build my computer also but I already had a video card. I don't know why but they are high on video cards but they are. Pick one up from newegg for 199.00.

4. Nothing I can say about the RAM. I went apeshit and bought 2 Gigabytes of Corsair XMS Pro series RAM for mine and it's awesome.

5. After researching and reading reviews for what seemed like hours, the only Optical Drives I saw that had absolutely no negative reviews were ASUS drives. I went with an ASUS DVD Rom drive and it's the best one I've ever owned. Can't recommend ASUS enough on their drives.

6. I realize money is a factor with you on the case, but you might think of getting a Coolermaster Praetorian from the same site. 99.00 for the black one and you still have to buy and install a power supply. I can't tell you how big of a difference there is between these two cases. We're talking Volkswagen Bug compared to Lamborghini here. The praetorian is aluminum with a power supply cage, retractable motherboard tray, two intake fans on the front, one exhaust fan on the top and one exhaust fan on the back. These cases are AWESOME.

7. For just a little more you could get a Western Digital Raptor (10000 RPM) hard drive. Unless you need massive storage, that's the way I'd go. I put two of them in a Raid0 and am happier than hell.

Basically if I were you, I'd go with a Northwood, Abit IS7, Video card is fine (just buy it at Newegg), RAM is fine, go with ASUS drives (They Rock), if at all possible go with a Praetorian and possibly an Antec Tru 480 or 550 PSU (Expensive but worth it) and look into the Raptor Hard Drives. In a Raid 0 if you can afford it.

Buy the way, you should have put a Reserve on that dell laptop. If it goes that cheap I'll be sick for you. Friend of mine just sold a two year old Inspiron with a 1.6 P4, 128 Megs of Ram for 800.00.
Click to expand...

Hey thanks alot, If you read my later post you will see that I have switched over to an AMD 2600+ and an Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe mobo. I'm planning to overclock it way high to 3800+ or more! (I have a friend who is a extreme overclocker and can give me help if I need it.)

I actually took a long look at the Preatorian (sp?) cases and I almost went with one, but we have a brand new Antec Sonata at work with an Antec Truewatt 380W+ PSU that I can get for $110. I just love how the Sonata looks.

I will check out the Video cards on Newegg and buy that if its cheaper.

As for the optical drive, it's sony and cheap so thats "good enough"

I want a large hard drive, its SATA so it should be plenty fast, and I can't afford a raid.

As for the Inspiron, its up to $740 now and I have 400+ views and 22 watchers, I'm expecting it to go way up at the end. I had a reserve on it but I took it off because people hate it and to put a reserve on that cost me $18!

Thanks alot I'll relook those video cards.
 
only thing i can say is that u have a good setup going the only thing that WILL limit u in your overclocking is the ram, and the antec 380w it doesn't have a high amperage on the 12v rail so bumping your voltages may cause some instability in your overclock. even though some may disagree, as i told u before when u feel safe, run prime95 for 24hrs for a great stable overclock and i highly doubt u will get to a 3800+ on air.
 
Well I would be happy with oc'ing to a 3600+, can you explain to me how the RAM will limit my overclocking? and is there another type of ram that will not limit me (hopefully cheap, aka $80-$90 a 512 stick)

thanks
 
DarkElite said:
Well I would be happy with oc'ing to a 3600+, can you explain to me how the RAM will limit my overclocking? and is there another type of ram that will not limit me (hopefully cheap, aka $80-$90 a 512 stick)

thanks
Click to expand...
ram pretty much helps u raise the fsb of the computer so a great ram like the corsair xms series will allow u to reach 225fsb and possibly higher because it has heatspreeders and is better built with quicker ram timings as well. so pc3200 which runs a 200fsb may only go up to 225 at 1:1 ram timings but pc3500 may be able to go higher as well as pc4000. its really a crapshoot with ram, if u want to overclock then 2x256 sticks will be fine, if u want to run games quicker and still overclock 2x512 is a good choice. i'm running PMI turbo memory (cheaper but not as good as corsair and kingston hyper x also fairly new, its something different so why not test it out) which is pretty quick it can go up to 225 but i can't really test because i have something thats limiting me that may be the psu, the ram itself, the voltage of the ram, the voltage on the cpu, the cpu itself, or the mobo. ask your friend he should help u out, whats his setup?
 
From what I've seen you don't "HAVE TO" overclock your RAM or FSB. You should be able to just overclock your CPU if you want to. Friend of mine is running an Intel 2.6 P4 Northwood on an Abit IC-7 at 3.33 Ghz and he doesn't have his RAM overclocked at all the last time I checked. He messed around with doing that for a while but just went with the CPU overclock. Don't have any idea what AMD CPU's are going for right now, but don't forget that the Northwoods are hella good overclockers DarkElite. Like I said before, I'm not an overclocker and that's why I just bought the fastest Northwood available at 3.4. The Prescott's don't overclock very well from what I hear, but the Northwoods do.
 
jen4950 said:
You're Fanatical About AMD. I'm Fanatical about Intel. Let's leave it at that and not try to convert the heathens (eachother).
Click to expand...

I am by far, not an AMD fanatic. I don't even like things. But AMD is more attractive. I go for whichever is the best buy. I have nothing against an Intel. In fact, I have about 2 PC's equipped with Intel and 2 PC's with AMD. What's your point?

-J.
 
DarkElite said:
Well, im selling both my laptops on eBay, to get money to buy a new desktop
Click to expand...
primea said:
<off topic> At what price would you sell the HP laptop ... I am not comfortable with ebay ... and have never bought there once ... </off topic>
Click to expand...
...I will remind you all of one of the rules you agreed to when you posted, namely:
(16) No BUYING, TRADING, or SELLING anywhere with the exception of the For Sale / Trade forum. The FS/T forum has it's own set of specific rules. Please read their rules before posting in that forum.
Click to expand...
....please edit your posts appropriately, which includes removing the links....or, I can do it for you. Your choice..... :rolleyes:

end </threadcrap>

Thank you - B.B.S.
 
Qwertyman said:
ram pretty much helps u raise the fsb of the computer so a great ram like the corsair xms series will allow u to reach 225fsb and possibly higher because it has heatspreeders and is better built with quicker ram timings as well. so pc3200 which runs a 200fsb may only go up to 225 at 1:1 ram timings but pc3500 may be able to go higher as well as pc4000. its really a crapshoot with ram, if u want to overclock then 2x256 sticks will be fine, if u want to run games quicker and still overclock 2x512 is a good choice. i'm running PMI turbo memory (cheaper but not as good as corsair and kingston hyper x also fairly new, its something different so why not test it out) which is pretty quick it can go up to 225 but i can't really test because i have something thats limiting me that may be the psu, the ram itself, the voltage of the ram, the voltage on the cpu, the cpu itself, or the mobo. ask your friend he should help u out, whats his setup?
Click to expand...

I will look some more at different RAM and see if I can go pc3500 or higher.

Heres a full update:

Processor
-AMD Athlon 2600+ 1.91ghz $85 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n

Motherboard
-Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe $92 Zipzoomfly x r free 2nd day air/n

Video Card
-S ATI Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB $214 Newegg x r FedEx 2 day $12

Memory
-1024MB Corsair DDR-400 $170 Zipzoomfly x r free 2nd day air/n

Optical Drive
-Sony DWU18ABK DVD±RW $72 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n

Case/PSU
-Antec Sonata 380W $110 Work x r n/a n/a

Hard Drive
-WD1600JD SATA $108 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n

Network Card
-Linksys 802.11g PCI $0 n/a,Friend x u n/a n/a

Cooling
-BL Cooler Master Aerogate II $47 Xoxide x r S/H$5.18 Tax$2.40
-Vantec VTX-C01-BK HD enc. $38 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n
-Tt A1725 Volcano 11 + Xaser $30 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n
-Thermaltake A2018 DC Fan $18 Zipzoomfly x r free 2nd day air/n
-Artic Silver 5 $12 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n

Monitor
-Use one already owned $0 n/a x u n/a n/a

Other
-Logitech Ultra X Keyboard $34 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n
-Black Floppy $15 Work x o n/a n/a
-VGA monitor extension cable $6 Newegg x o Fedex Saver s/h $4

Total $1051
 
DarkElite said:
Processor
-Pentium 4 2.8E GHz $178 Zipzoomfly x r free 2nd day air/n

Motherboard
-ASUS P4P800 i865PE $94 Zipzoomfly x r free 2nd day air/n

Video Card
-ATI Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB $233 Zipzoomfly x r free 2nd day air/n

Memory
-1024MB Corsair DDR-400 $170 Zipzoomfly x r free 2nd day air/n

Optical Drive
-Sony DWU18ABK DVD±RW $72 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n

Case/PSU
-Antec Sonata 380W $100 Work x r n/a n/a

Hard Drive
-WD1600JD SATA $108 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n

Network Card
-Linksys 802.11g PCI $0 n/a,Friend x u n/a n/a

Cooling
-BL Cooler Master AerogateII $47 Xoxide x r S/H$5.18 Tax$2.40
-Vantec VTX-C01-BKHD enc. $38 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n
-CM ACC-U72 Vortex Dream $28 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n

Monitor
-Use one already owned $0 n/a x u n/a n/a

Other
-Logitech Ultra X Keyboard $34 Zipzoomfly x o free 2nd day air/n
-Black Floppy $10 Work x o n/a n/a

Total $1112
Click to expand...

1) since the s478 is going to be phased out, you should go for the high end boards. look for a 875 chipset board.
2) the northwood processors may be a little cheaper and will be slightly faster.
 
acascianelli said:
1) since the s478 is going to be phased out, you should go for the high end boards. look for a 875 chipset board.
2) the northwood processors may be a little cheaper and will be slightly faster.
Click to expand...

I'm not getting Intel anymore!!! Read my last post!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top