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Natural Aspirations

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Dec 17, 2008
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Slowly trying to piece together a decent rig that will last quite a while before needing another upgrade.

1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc
General Web Browsing/Light Gaming/HTPC
2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
Unset budget but have no need to go crazy
3) Where do you live?
Central Pa
4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. Please be very specific.
CPU/RAM/Mobo/GPU/HDD/PSU
5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
I recently purchased a Mini P180/ 22" LG monitor
6) Will you be overclocking?
Not anytime soon
7) What size monitor do you have and/or plan to have?
Have 22" would like to also use as HTPC
8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
Now, near future
9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? etc.
MATX
10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license?
Plan to pick up student copy of Win7

My old 754 rig is not cutting it any more and would like something that will keep up the next few years.

Ive always admired the P180 case and recently picked that up on sale.

MOBO ASUS M4A785TD-M EVO looks like my best option

CPU AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition

PSU Ultra X4 600-Watt Modular Power Supply

No decisions as of yet on the GPU/RAM/HDD's
I am more of a general user but like building my own computers so no need for a top of the line GPU.
A storage drive of 1TB would be plenty and a unsure on a system drive size would be recommended..
 
The Phenom 955 is a good CPU, but if youre not on a tight budget youre probably better off with an overclocked i5 or a i7
 
.enigma. said:
The Phenom 955 is a good CPU, but if youre not on a tight budget youre probably better off with an overclocked i5 or a i7
Click to expand...

Boring copypasta is boring
The 955 is an awesome cpu, don't let the haters get you down...

If you don't need a top of the line gpu I'd go with an ati 5770. ATIs onboard audio decoders means no spdif pass through cable needed if your going HDMI
And if I can make a suggestion as someone who lost a crap load of data, 1TB is a lot to lose. Since drive prices are so cheap, I'd recommend getting two and mirroring them. If one fails you haven't lost anything. I'm using the WD Black drives and have been thus far happy. As for system, I'm sure someone is gonna yell SSD! Personally they're still too cost prohibitive IMO, but to each their own.
Good luck mate
 
Ditch the Ultra PSU. There are significantly better quality PSUs out there for the same price.
$100 - Antec Truepower New TP-650 650W PSU

RAM wise, this is a decent RAM set:
$93 - G.Skill F3-10666CL9D-4GBRL 2 x 2GB DDR3 1333 RAM

GPU wise, the 9800GT should be enough for your needs:
$100 - XFX 9800GT 512MB PCI-E Video Card
 
I would get a Corsair HX750 750W or Seasonic M12D 850W instead of anything else in the ~$100 range.

Good choice on the motherboard & CPU - those are combos in Newegg that gives a discount of $20 I believe.

If you have a Microcenter nearby, they have i5-750s for $150 and i7 920s for $200, which may be very good incentive to go Intel.
 
The HX750 and Seasonic M12D 850W are $40 more... thats 40% more money for power thats not even needed. :( Though, I agree, at $140, the M12D 850W is a great price... still, highly overkill unless going SLI/CFX.

The Caviar Black or Blue 640GB or 1TB drives are fine. The Samsung F3 500GB and 1TB drives are faster.

What games do you play?
 
ScreenHunter_01Dec221853.gif


MOBO
PSU
RAM
CPU


754 is seriously lacking wont even play TF2 without locking up...and no way to OC my MOBO, that I can come up with.

I picked up the 8400 on ebay for $13.50 for a temporary card.

Still need to pick out drives and a better video card sometime after Christmas.

Plan to place this order tomorrow if you have any concerns with my choice please let me know. I wish I had the time to keep up with these things better.
 
The P180 fits ATX mobos. Did you mean the P180 Mini?

The new is a newer stepping and supposedly overclocks better.
 
Ordered MOBO CPU and PSU above I believe they are the best AMD choices for the price and a quality PSU at a decent price.

I am still on the fence about which RAM to purchase, there are a lot of (4GB) choices at nearly the same price. Lower voltage or lower timings? I notice some of the timings have a 2N suffix which I have found little information to describe its importance. 2x2GB or 4x1GB
I am considering the Corsair H50 CPU cooler, it seems to be a quality quiet cooler for a decent price.
 
For $70, I think the H50 is overpriced. It was on sale for $55 at Fry's, which I would consider a decent price. I guess if you really want its quietness, it's $70 price may be worth it to you. Otherwise, a $40 120mm cooler should suffice, like the Hyper 212+.

Lower timings won't provide any noticeable performance difference in real world apps, so the price premium for lower timings aren't worth it, IMO. If the price difference is negligible, then go for it.
 
With RAM, I got some Patriot Viper Extreme Performance series DDR3. 4gb (2x2gb) PC10666-1333mhz 7-7-7-20 @ 1.7v ram. NewEgg has it @ 99.99 shipped (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820220286)

I don't know what your experience(s) have been with RAM brands, but I have been in the PC building game for 11 years. I have used Kingston, Crucial, PNY, OCZ, and Patriot as of recently. I have never had a hiccup with Crucial, OCZ, or Patriot memory.

As far as a CPU cooler goes - you shouldn't really be LIMITED by the mATX form factor of your case, but I don't think the H50 will do you too good in such a small and cramped up case. They perform optimally when cool-ish air is sucked from the outside of the case to the inside, thus raising your systems' general temperature - so even though I like the H50 my vote is against it.

I'd have to view the dimensions of your case in comparison to my old Antec Solo - but possibly you should look into the factory 92mm push/pull configuration on the Cooler Master Hyper N520 CPU cooler - I had a very good experience with it (26C idle on my old E8500 stock - never went over 40C when gaming) and it was relatively quiet. (44.99 shipped - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103057).... ouch.. got mine forever ago for $20 @ Fry's.



If I can think of any other HSF's I'll post them - but the RAM was just a suggestion. Mine overclocks well to 1600mhz and has yet to give me a stability issue.
 
Natural Aspirations said:
I am considering the Corsair H50 CPU cooler; it seems to be a quality quiet cooler for a decent price.
Click to expand...
If you want to go the H50 route, I recommend it highly. It's nearly silent, and keeps temperatures in the low 60's after three hours of Prime95 at 3.8GHz. No performance/space issues with the Mini P180. Not cramped at all, as it's essentially a standard mid-tower with an mATX motherboard tray.

That said, enginurd is right; there are equal/better coolers at better prices. If quiet is what you seek, you might consider the Akasa NERO (or the new "S" model, if you can find it) for just $40. It reviewed very well on FrostyTech, and it is amazingly quiet for a high-performance air cooler. Not surprisingly, Akasa also supplied the fan for the H50.
 
Got most everything in the mail yesterday from the Egg, the drive is coming snail mail from California and will not arrive until the 6th (Boooo!!). I put the system together with an old hard drive and Win7 trial to check it out.

With all the great suggestions from the folks here and reviews I have read on this forum I am quite happy, Thanks a Bunch all.
For now the OE CPU cooler will work quite fine, I plan to keep my eye out for a H50 on sale or something other.

Plan to pick up a 5750 or 5770 in the near future, any big difference. Comparable to a GTS250?
 
Capture.png


Playing around with stock cooler

Got it up to 3.8xx with 19x at 202 but soon after it crashed, but i was trying too many things at once
 
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