First Timer. Need Serious help with my First Build

[albeezar]

Hi guys, I’m new here. Need some serious help on building a new PC. I’ve never built my own computer before.

My computer is basically 6-7 years old without having changed any core components. I basically used the computer until it decided to brake on me, which it just did. I’m pretty sure it was only the video card, but I’ve wanted to upgrade for a long time so I took it as my sign.

It’s an Intel Pentium 4 CPU 2.4 Ghz
512 RDRAM (*faints*)
GeForce 4 Ti 4600

Whenever I buy things, I usually like to go for the best. But I realized that is very costly in the world of computer hardware, especially with my limited budget. So I wanted to go for a
$500-1000 price range. I was going to go for more than that, but I seriously think I can build something good for that range.

I’m a PC gamer and will be using the computer for gaming (along with the obvious other things like browsing the web, watching videos, music, school work). I would like to gear myself well enough to play any upcoming games of the future, with ease. I’m probably planning on playing Age of Conan, so I’m going to need to get ready for that (not sure if that requires great system specs to play). As well as all the other day to day things like all my Steam and Blizzard games and whatnot. I don’t care about Crysis, but it would be nice to be able to have the ability to play it.

I do have certain parts that I’m going to recycle though. I have:

BENQ FP93G X 19 inch Monitor 1280x1024
Speakers, mouse, keyboard
Hard Drives.
Optical Drives (Some lite-on, I’m not sure of specifics) DVD drive + CD RW drive

Sorry for these following noob questions:

1. When I say “optical drives” I mean I just have a DVD Drive and a Cd RW that came with my dell 6 years ago. Is there any reason to update this to something else? I mean, I don’t really need to burn DVDs. But does the speed or “oldness” of it matter in anyway to my new build? Is it possible it won’t be compatible with my new rig, or does it really not make a difference?

2. How much does Hard Drive really matter in terms of gaming? I’ve read a lot of things but I’d like a final verdict. My main hard drive (the only upgraded part of my PC) is a Seagate 160GB ULTRA ATA/100 7200 RPM 8MB Cache. Will it make a lot of difference to my overall gaming/general computing experience to have something else? (Speed wise)


Now my one other problem is that I live in Hawaii. So I don’t get free (or cheap) shipping from some newegg products like a lot of you lucky mainland guys. So for a tower, I am probably going to buy that here since it will be another 100 just for shipping of the case. I think I can get an Antec 900 here. So I’ll probably use that as my case, unless there are some objections to that?

Ok so other than those things, I’ll need everything else (I think). So I guess that would be a new mobo, ram (I would like 4 gigs), graphics card, CPU, and I guess a power supply. Am I missing anything? Oh, I have Windows XP Home right now. So not sure if I will need to buy the 64 bit vista for the 4 gigs to register? Or can I Just use windows XP home?

So the Antec 900 will cost me about $125 (unless someone suggests a different case, which I’ll need to buy on the islands). So all together, I’d like the best bang for my buck at around 500-1000. I’d be very happy with like 600, but don’t skimp if it’s going to mess with my performance. I’m ok with up to 900-1000. Will there be a huge difference in performance with 600 dollars worth of parts than 1000? Or not so large difference?

Thanks a lot everyone! I really appreciate the help, coming from a first timer.

 

[darkhunter139]

/Kind of a newb so wait for other to chime in I dont want to mis lead you but here is my two cents


Just get new hard drive and optical drives. You can get new sata DVD drives for like 20-30 bucks. Its not worth using you're old ones

Same with the hard drive. You can get a much faster 250-500 gig hard drive for around 100 dollars. (unless the one you upgrades is a sata drive)

And do you have an extra copy of XP you can install onto a new PC? Is so that will work fine. It will only recognize 3.5 gigs or something like that but thats not really a big deal and it will save you 100 bucks

 

[horrorshow]

Sorry, I'm feeling a little lazy at the moment and don't feel like posting a bunch of links.

For your budget, get:

Intel Core2Duo e6750 or the new 8400
4 gigs of dd2 800 (I hear G. Skill is pretty good these days)
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX All Solid Capacitor Intel Motherboard
8800GT (get Evga IMO)
Antec/Corsair 600+W power supply

Keep your optical drives and the seagate if you're trying to save money. (you can only support 2 IDE devices without a controller card, so just keep your dvd burner and the seagate)

In my experience, SATA isn't THAT much faster than IDE

 

[crhscoog]

$255- Q6600 2.4 G0 SLACR (clubit.com)
*e8400 is so overpriced right now so no reason to get it.

$45- 2x1gb G. Skill DDR2 880mhz
*no need to go to 4gb yet. if you like xp no reason to get vista then since the next os is coming out in a few years like 2010 or 2011 forgot the headlines i just saw and too lazy to look at em

$90- Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L
*great budget board. good at oc as well

$170- 9600gt 512mb (EVGA or XFX)
*sufficient for your gaming.

$70- corsair 450vx
*good brand psu

=$620

prob buy another hd and optical drive too. newer harddrive should make load times faster and new optical drive will read/write cds and dvds faster..

these prices are estimates and dont include any rebates thats bound to be with some. i didnt include them because its not something you should rely totally on. use it as a bonus.

 

[9mmx19]

If your trying to save money - I say just keep the drives. If your optical drives are working theres no real reason to spend money on that. In terms of gaming your HD isnt going to affect FPS or anything, just load times. And even then your Seagate should be fine.

The Gigabyte DS3L and ABIT IP35-E are popular value recommendations around here.

You should be able to get 4GB of DDR2 RAM for less than $100 - esp if you consider rebates.

For video card The 9600GT is the cheapest "good" card. If you can find that for 100-150 go for that. The next steps up are 8800GT (under 200) and 8800GTS (200-250). It just depends on what you want to spend. Lots of rebates around in the deals forum for these.

CPU really depends on if you want to OC. If you want really cheap you could get an E2180 (80) and OC a little. I have a E4500 (130) and OC to 3.3GHz (But I have 3rd party cooling). High end suggestions are of course the E8400 and Q6600 but those are a bit expensive right now (250+). These though you wouldnt have to OC as much or at all for top gaming performance.

For power supply an Antec Earthwatts is good and cheap. Any Corsair is also a popular recommendation around here but they are more money. Check out the PSU finder on their page to get an idea of what you need.

Same disclaimer as the post above: prices are just guesses/off the top of my head. No idea how much itll be in Hawaii.

 

[tiraides]

Today, $1000 is enough for a good gaming rig, even shipped to Hawaii. I can't really quantify the difference between a $600 rig and a $1000 rig, but it is noticeable. The problem is that shipping will be a bitch -- you'll probably spend around $50-$100 on shipping, depending on where you buy everything from. Getting the case locally is a good idea, but if I remember from the last time I was in Hawaii, the variety/selection of parts suck and the prices are too high.

You'll need a 64-bit OS if you want to fully utilize all 4GB of RAM. Otherwise, based on the video card you use, you'll only have "access" to around 3.2GB - 3.5GB. You may want to check the EULA for your XP Home disc, as there are limitations in transferring OEM licenses to new computers. If you decide to get a 64-bit OS, you might as well go with Vista Home Premium. It's cheaper than the 64-bit version of XP Pro (the only 64-bit version of Windows XP) and it's better supported drivers-wise.

While you could reuse all of your IDE drives, most of the motherboards we recommend here only have one IDE/ATA slot, which powers up to two IDE/ATA drives. (I would question using CD/DVD drives over five years old though... with a new system, they're most likely to give up the ghost. Plus, it's not that more expensive to replace an optical drive....) The newer games also require more storage... so does Vista, if you end up getting it... so you may want to look at a second/larger capacity hard drive at some point in the future.

If you want to be able to play Crysis, it would be best to acquire the 8800GT. While the 9600GT would play most games on your monitor just fine, Crysis is designed to tax video cards with its high visual settings. Plus, getting a card (slightly) better than what you need will help in the long run, allowing you to play more of the newer games longer, before you end up replacing the card.

A word of warning, though: The DS3L and the IP35-E are bare bones compared to other P35 motherboards. They have four SATA slots, one IDE/ATA slot, one PCI Express x16 slot, and two PCI slots. Though the DS3L has legacy ports, neither board has additional features like RAID, multiple Ethernet ports, or eSATA.

Because certain deals were available elsewhere, I decided to configure this "wish list" from NewEgg and ZipZoomFly. I was able to make an estimate on the shipping, but it may change when you finally order everything. Remember that the following is just one possible configuration out of a myriad of possibilities:

$125 - Antec 900 case (estimate - bought locally)
$90 - Abit IP35-E ($30 mail-in rebate)
$190 - Intel E6750
$83 - A-DATA 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 800 dual-channel kit
$0 - Seagate 160GB IDE hard drive (already owned)
$28 - Samsung SH-S203B SATA DVD burner
$230 - EVGA 8800GT ($30 mail-in rebate)
$89 - Corsair VX550 550W PSU ($15 mail-in rebate)
$100 - Vista Home Premium 64-bit OEM DVD
=====
$935 - Subtotal (not including shipping, taxes, and/or rebates)

Estimated shipping charges: NewEgg - $36 ZipZoomFly - $24

If you want to overclock, you may want to downgrade your processor (to ensure you'll find one under budget) and/or pick up one of the following:

Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro HSF - $22
Scythe SCNJ-1100P Ninja HSF - $36
Tuniq Tower 120 HSF - $45
ZEROtherm Nirvana NV120 120mm HSF - $45
Thermalright Ultima-90 HSF - $46 & Panaflo FBA09A12M 92mm Fan - $3
Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme HSF - $57 & Scythe S-Flex SFF21E 120MM Case Fan - $14

The Freezer 7 Pro is the only one you need for the E2xxx/E4xxx series processors, but it's ineffective with the E6xxx/E8xxx series dual-cores and all of the quad-cores.

If you want to save money, you could use your DVD burner in place of the Samsung drive and try to use your XP Home CD instead of the Vista x64 DVD. Also, if you see something that you want on sale (at lower than NewEgg prices) go ahead and pick it up. The amount you spend on taxes would probably be less than the potential shipping costs.

 

[hossdaddy]

ok heres my 2 cents,

cpu: Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 Conroe 2.66GHz LGA 775 65W $189.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115029

mobo: GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS3L LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX All Solid Capacitor $89.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128059

psu: SeaSonic SS-500ES ATX12V 2.2 / EPS12V 2.91 500W $69.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151040

ram: G.SKILL 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 $44.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231098

video card: MSI NX8800GT 512M OC GeForce 8800GT 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 $219.99 - $30 mir
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127329

hd: Western Digital Caviar SE WD3200AAJS 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s $72.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136098

dvd burner: LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner With 12X DVD-RAM Write Black SATA $25
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106070

Total: $713.93 - $30 mir = $683.93 + shipping.

Notes:
cpu - top performer and value, its available. If you are interested in overclocking you will want to look at an after market cooler. Somthing like this would do nicely
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835186134 Of course you would also need some thermal paste which your local shop should have.
hd and dvd burner - although hd`s can last longer 5 years is avg and yours looks to be 6-7 yrs. Both are sata which is faster than your current ide drives(kinda llike buying a porsche and putting in the lowest grade fuel)
mobo - it will run the newest 45 nm cpu`s right out of the box and is stable as heck and oc`s nicely.
case - I did not reccomend one because as you said the shipping would be ridiculous. if its available in Hawaii check out this one
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119106 cases are very user specific but just make sure it comes with at least 2 x 120mm fans to provide some decent airflow.

- overall the system should chew through just about anything youu throw at it.

Good luck!

 

[wtburnette]

The build tiraides listed is a good one, but I'll recommend some replacement parts I have experience with:

$150 - P5K-E/Wifi mobo
$250 - Q6600 Quad core CPU
$100 - WD 500GB SATA HDD
$115 - Corsair HX620 620W PSU

My reasoning for the Asus board is that I'm very familiar with it and can heartily recommend it without reservations. It's not a stripped down basic board, so it has plenty of features, plus it's fast, stable and in my opinion it looks great. The reason I recommend the Quad core CPU is because it does make a difference. My current system (soon to be upgraded to a Q6600) has an E6400 running @ 3.2Ghz, but my son's system loads up levels faster in most games we play with his Q6600 system running at stock speeds. We both have the same amount of RAM and I have the faster hard drive. Our video cards are comparable. That leads me to believe the extra 2 cores make a difference. The reason I recommend going with a SATA HDD is to eliminate IDE entirely. The new Intel boards use a third party controller for the IDE as IDE is no longer native to the chipset. Because of this, you'll get better performance overall if you don't use IDE and go totally SATA in your system. Not to mention SATA is at least slightly faster and routing the cables is easier and cleaner looking. Finally the PSU recommendation is more for extending the life of the system more then anything. Even if you add beefier components in the future, the PSU can remain the same for quite a while.

I'm not big on AData memory either, but there are tons of other options there. Any decent 4GB kit should be under $125, so go with whatever you're comfortable with. I would also normally recommend an 8800GTS 512MB card for a video card, but if you're keeping a 19" monitor running 1280x1024, that would probably be overkill. It's something to think about if you plan to get a bigger monitor down the road, plus the cooling is better then on most of the 8800GT's, but the GT should perform very well with a 19" monitor.

Good luck with your build...

 

[engiNURD]

Wow, thats a lot of reading. I'll just agree with tiraides, lol. And thats an E6750 tiraides recommended, not the E6700.

If you can get the Antec 900 for $60, go for it. Otherwise, I don't think its worth more than that. You'll be better off getting a cheaper case, and spending your money on parts that give you more performance, like a CPU, vidcard, or HDD.

1) not really, unless you use your optical drive a lot.
2) yes, upgrading to a new WD 640GB drive would help immensely with performance. the HDD is one of the slowest components in a system right now.

 

[tiraides]

Boy, I love all the "your build is good, but..." commentary.

I'll spare enginurd the pain and resummarize my main points:

• Add shipping into your overall budget. Since you live in Hawaii, expect to pay around $50-$100, if not more, for shipping charges.
• If you use your XP Home disc, you'll only see around 3.2-3.5GB of RAM. You'll need a 64-bit OS to have full access to all 4GB of RAM.
• If you can, to offset your spending, try to find local deals for items. If the item's price is around NewEgg's (or it's lower), get it. The taxes cost less than the shipping charges.
• Four people, including me, have recommended the 8800GT. That should tell you something...
• If you can, replace the hard drive and the DVD burner. (I believe that you only need one optical drive, especially since you've admitted that you don't use it much.) If you can't afford to now, save up and replace both of them soon.
• If you could only replace one of your IDE drives now, replace the hard drive. You could get up to 500GB of storage capacity for under $120.
• Choose a motherboard with all of the features that you feel you need. Also take future upgrading and overclocking into consideration.
• Get the Q6600 if you can afford to, or otherwise, the E6750. The E8xxx dual-cores are overpriced right now (and the prices won't come down soon). If you plan on overclocking, get an E2xxx/E4xxx dual-core and the AC Freezer 7 Pro HSF.

Here are lists of P35 motherboards and cases for you to look at. I'm only suggesting them as options.

Abit IP35-E Intel P35 Motherboard - $90
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L Intel P35 Motherboard - $90
MSI P35 Neo2-FR Intel P35 ATX Motherboard - $113
DFI BloodIron P35-T2RL Intel P35 ATX Motherboard - $120
Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS3R Intel P35 Motherboard - $122
Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS3P Intel P35 Motherboard - $151
Abit IP35 Pro Intel P35 Motherboard - $170
Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS4 Intel P35 Motherboard - $180

Just to help you out: If you don't need RAID, more than 4 SATA ports or legacy ports, then the IP35-E is a good choice. If you like the IP35-E but need legacy ports, check out the DS3L. If you need 5 SATA ports, 2 eSATA ports, and a second PCI-E x16 port, then get the Neo2-Fr. If you want heavy overclocking abilities and six SATA ports, check out the Blood Iron. If you want 8 SATA ports, RAID, and legacy ports and high overclocks, than the DS3R is a good choice. If you want the DS3R but need Firewire and a second PCI-E x16 port, then go for the DS3P. If you want something that can overclock pretty damn high along with eSATA ports and firewire connections, than the IP35 Pro. Note that the IP35-Pro seems to have problems with the Wolfdale CPUs.

Cooler Master Elite 330 RC-330-KKN1-GP ATX Case - $35
Cooler Master Centurion 534 ATX Case - $50
Cooler Master Centurion 532 ATX Case - $55
Cooler Master RC-690-KKN1-GP ATX Case - $62
Antec NSK4480 ATX Case With Antec Earthwatts 380W PSU - $70
Cooler Master Mystique RC-632S-KKN1-GP ATX Case - $85
Lian Li PC-7B Plus II Silver ATX Case - $90
XClio Windtunnel ATX Full Tower Computer Case - $110
Antec Sonata III ATX Case with Antec Earthwatts 500W PSU - $110
Antec P180B ATX Case - $90
Antec P180 ATX Case - $115
Gigabyte Aurora GZ-FSCA1-ATB ATX Case - $110
Antec P182 ATX Case - $124
Thermaltake Armor VA8000BWS Full Tower ATX Case - $130
Lian Li PC-A16A ATX Case - $150
Thermaltake Armor VA8003BWS Full Tower ATX Case - $150
Cooler Master Stacker RC-830-SSN2-GP Full Tower ATX Case - $150
Cooler Master Stacker RC-832-KKN1-GP Full Tower ATX Case - $150
Coolermaster Cosmos 1000 RC-1000-KSN1-GP Full Tower ATX Case - $153

 

[HardwareGuru]

Holy cow these are long posts. I'm lazy to read it LoL.