Recommendations for fresh new build.

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Obstacle 1

n00b
Joined
Dec 4, 2008
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5
UPDATE LATER IN THREAD

1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc I will be mostly doing music production (ableton, fruity loops, various other recording software maybe with protools in 6 months or a year), browsing the internet, watching and downloading a lot of tv shows and movies and downloading and storing a lot of music.

2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included? trying to keep it under roughly $1500 AUD

3) Where do you live? Brisbane, Australia

4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. Please be very specific. I need basically the whole computer - including monitor. all components and except keyboard and mouse.

5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model. none

6) Will you be overclocking? in all likelyhood no

7) What size monitor do you have or plan to have? 22 inch LCD - don't know which one to get

8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC? In the next week or two

9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? etc. Firewire would be good, I am unsure of anything else I would need.

Heres what I've selected so far based on recommendations:

Intel Core 2 Duo E8400.............................................................................$265
Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3L P45...................................................................$192
G.Skill DDR2 4G(2x2G)PC6400 800Mhz - G4GBQ......................................$95
Sapphire HD4670 512M GDDR3 PCIE 2*D TVO HDMI.................................$137
Western Digital 640G SATAII 7200 rpm HDD...............................................$99
Samsung 22X DVDRW Black SATA Vista Support.......................................$27
CoolerMaster Centurion 534 Aluminum Bezel Case Black with 460w power ...$144

this totals around 929 australian. Any specs you would recommend changing at all for the price/performance point and what do you recommend for a 22 inch monitor these days?

Thanks
 
No gaming at all? One of the biggest parameter you missed out on. Q6600 as CPU for those tasks btw.
 
Let's go with this setup man. You can order these from umart.com

Case/PSU - Antec Sonata III MiniTower Case - Piano BlackW/500W PSU for $187
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=5

CPU - Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 for $309.00
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=5

Mobo - Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3L for $189.00
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=5

Ram - G.Skill 4gig DDR2 800 for $72.00
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=5

Video - Asus RADEON HD4550 512MB DDR3 PCIE2.0 DVI HDMI for $118
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=5

HDD - Western Digital 640G SATAII 7200 rpm HDD (WD6400AAKS) for $99
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=5

Optical - Samsung 22X DVDRW Black SATA Vista Support(SH-S223F/BEBN) for $27
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=5

Monitor - Samsung 2243BW Wide Black 5ms for $279.00
http://www.umart.com.au/newindex2.phtml?bid=5

Review of Samsung 2243BW 22”

Also, consider this Asus VW222U 22” monitor. It’s slightly cheaper than the Samsung and it’s pretty good.

$1,280 AUD total with 22" lcd.
 
The DS3L doesn't have Firewire, though. Not sure how important that is, since you mentioned it would be nice, but chose a board that didn't have it.
 
firstly thanks everyone

so will this run a 64bit vista os? i'm unsure as to how to find this out, i don't really care but i'm just seeing what os to get. And is the quad core performance worth the upgrade? i mean its not a lot of money but yeah
 
64-bit Vista is recommend so you could utilize 4GB or more RAM. So yes, HG's build can run Vista x64 just fine. Get Vista Home Premium, as most people don't need the additional features that Vista Ultimate provides.

The Q6600 will help with multitasking as you could use the two additional cores to run separate programs or background services. If your music production programs are optimized for use with quad cores (check the vendors' websites for confirmation), you could see even more noticeable improvement over an E8400.
 
thank you so much everybody, everything you've said has essentially checked out.

Lastly for my ram, I'm definately going the g.skill 2x2gb pack but the thing is on umart there are several different varieties that are slightly differently priced from each other:

G.Skill DDR2 4G(2x2G)PC6400 800Mhz(F2-6400CL4D-4GBHK)
Internet Price: $94.00

G.Skill DDR2 4G(2x2G)PC6400 800Mhz(F2-6400CL4D-4GBPI-B)
Internet Price: $105.00

G.Skill DDR2 4G(2x2G)PC6400 800Mhz(F2-6400CL5D-4GBNT)
Internet Price: $72.00

G.Skill DDR2 4G(2x2G)PC6400 800Mhz(F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ)
Internet Price: $89.00

does anyone know the difference (if any?) between these because I can't find it anywhere.

thank you
 
Get the $72 (AUS) G.Skill set. There isn't any noticeable difference between the four kits.
 
Obstacle 1 said:
thank you so much everybody, everything you've said has essentially checked out.

Lastly for my ram, I'm definately going the g.skill 2x2gb pack but the thing is on umart there are several different varieties that are slightly differently priced from each other:

G.Skill DDR2 4G(2x2G)PC6400 800Mhz(F2-6400CL4D-4GBHK)
Internet Price: $94.00
Tight timings, useless for the most part, unless you like wasting money and running benchmarks all day.
G.Skill DDR2 4G(2x2G)PC6400 800Mhz(F2-6400CL4D-4GBPI-B)
Internet Price: $105.00
Tight timings w/ uber heatspreaders, useless for the most part, unless you're trying to break OC'ing records.
G.Skill DDR2 4G(2x2G)PC6400 800Mhz(F2-6400CL5D-4GBNT)
Internet Price: $72.00
Standard timings, no heatspreaders -- basic value kit.
G.Skill DDR2 4G(2x2G)PC6400 800Mhz(F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ)
Internet Price: $89.00
Standard timings w/ standard heatspreaders; mainstream kit.
does anyone know the difference (if any?) between these because I can't find it anywhere.

thank you
Click to expand...

Jeez, they charge $17 for heatspreaders. :rolleyes:
 
UPDATE

So I had a bit of a cash delay.. only getting round to purchasing the PC now.

Heres the list:

CPU - Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.4ghz $309.00

Motherboard - Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3 P45+ICH10R DDR2 1200 1600MHz $189.00

RAM - G.Skill DDR2 4G(2x2G)PC6400 800Mhz (4GBPQ) $89.00

GPU - Asus EAH4650 512M DDR2 $105.00

Hard Disk - Western Digital 640G SATAII 7200 rpm HDD $99.00

DVD Drive - Samsung 22X DVDRW Black SATA Vista Support $27.00

Case - Antec Sonata III MiniTower Case - Piano BlackW/500W PSU $187.00

Monitor - Samsung 2243BW Wide Black 5ms $279.00

+mouse and keyboard and OS.

Its been about a month so are there any upgrades you would recommend before I pull the trigger on this?
 
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