Upgrading System - S939 - Questions :)

T

TicTac

Limp Gawd
Joined
Dec 5, 2005
Messages
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I hope this should be here rather than the AMD cpu section.

With AMDs price cuts, I have decided my next computer upgrade will move to an x2 dual core as it would be too expensive for me to sell most of my system so I could buy new mbs and RAM for Conroe.

I have lots of questions and stuff, because I don't want to buy the wrong things!

My current system:

Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe (keeping, no reason to sell – but see chipset fan below)
AMD Athlon 3500+ Venice (hope to sell for about £40)
1x 1gb G-Skill 3,4,4,8 PC3200 (PHU1) (hope to sell for about £35)
NEC ND3540a (keeping)
Soundblaster Live 5.1 (keeping – perfectly happy with sound quality from itunes)
Antec Smartpower II (selling – prob get around £35)
Seagate Barracuda 160gb 7200.9 8mb cache (keeping for storage)
Delux LCD case (not big enough, too boring – selling for not much, prob bout £10 lol)

These are my requirements:

As quiet as possible – I sleep in the same room as my computer, so I want it to be nearly silent so it doesn't keep my awake!
I am not a heavy gamer – I multitask a lot with multimedia though.
I have £400 to spend + what I get from selling some of my stuff already.

CPU

I am pretty sure I want to go for the X2 3800+ Manchester as I will be overclocking. I don't think the extra prices for anything upwards of that are worth it for me, especially as buying a 4600+ or something, would mean I would have to buy worse RAM, and maybe a worse PSU too.

Price: £99 - http://www.komplett.co.uk/k/ki.asp?sku=320788

Heatsink

I am leaning towards a Scythe Ninja Plus. I will probably keep the stock fan rather than change to a Yate Loon as it seems quite a lot of trouble for little difference.

1)On average what is the overclock that can be achieved with the x2 3800+ on good air like this?
2)I assume this heatsink will fit on an Asus A8N-Sli Deluxe?

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Scythe-Ninja-...ryZ67861QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

RAM

I want 2gb, but not sure which to get. DDR500 looks what I want, but seems quite expensive. The G-Skill 3,4,4,8 HZ looks good, but I have read that there are compatibility issues with the A8N-SLI series.
3)Is this true? Should I look for different ddr500? This ram seems the cheapest and best of ddr500.

Case

I think I'll go for the Antec P160W. . There don't seem to be many other good windowed cases below the £65 mark. This case would be plenty bigger enough for the Scythe Ninja yes? .http://www.komplett.co.uk/k/ki.asp?sku=304339&view=detailed

I can't find many good shops in the UK that sell good fans. . .e.g. I can't find any Nexus/Yate Loon 120mm fans here. . .Does anyone know of somewhere?

What other fans are as quiet?

HD

Raptor 74gbADFD – I really want fast loading and boot times, so I think this would be good?

PSU

I will have 3 or 4 usb devices as well. So would the s12 430w be ok, rather than having to get the s12 500w?

Any advice, comments or info about any of this? I may have some more stuff soon ..
 
TicTac said:
CPU

I am pretty sure I want to go for the X2 3800+ Manchester as I will be overclocking. I don't think the extra prices for anything upwards of that are worth it for me, especially as buying a 4600+ or something, would mean I would have to buy worse RAM, and maybe a worse PSU too.
Click to expand...

why crappier ram or psu?
 
zero_vertical said:
why crappier ram or psu?
Click to expand...

The faster CPU is more expensive, and he would have to skimp money on the RAM and PSU.


To the OP:
Don't spend a lot on DDR right now, unless you're planning to keep this computer for longer than the next 18 months. You don't need crazy expensive overclocking RAM to overclock your CPU, although it does help. You can probably hit 2.4 GHz easily with that 3800+, and pushing it past 2.6 isn't out of the question.

If you work with large multimedia files, the Raptor may be worth it to you but it is very expensive per GB. That money might be better spent on an Audigy 2 card and some into your power.
 
First off, I agree with your choice of HSF, and if you're overclocking the lower end models make more sense (x2 3800). There isn't really any way to guarantee any overclock out of it, but you shouldn't have much of an issue getting a few hundred mhz out of it...

As for your memory question, you're right in figuring that that kit doesn't work well with the A8N series. You could consider the DDR500 kits from OCZ or any of the other big names, but to be honest since memory bandwidth doesn't have much of a performance effect on AMD procs you could just go with a DDR400 kit and run a divider. If you'd like more specific recommendations on kits that will work well for you, post your memory question in the memory section.

The P160 isn't my cup of tea in terms of looks, but I believe it's quality is relatively good. A lower cost but very good alternative is this Centurion 5 case from CM. They do have a window version, but you'll need to check out your sites to see the prices.

If you really want a bit faster of a boot time, get the raptor but in all honesty it's incredibly expensive for what you get. In my opinion it'd be a better idea to get a quicker 16meg cache drive for 50% of the price and over three times the storage. But again, if you really want that performance, the raptor is the drive to get.

That S12 430 will be fine for what you need. Save that incredible leap in cash needed to get to the 500W model.

If you need recommendations as to decent fans, here is a list with a good bunch of choices.
 
Thanks very much for the info so far.

2 more questions:

1)http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Akasa-Mini-Ch...1QQihZ005QQcategoryZ80151QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
Would this chipset heatsink be nearly silent, but effective also?
2) http://www.memory-configurator.co.u...DR_PC3200_NT_Series_3_4_4_8_module/index.html
Is my RAM. I will probably buy another 1gb of it. Although if I can get a good deal on eBay a 2gb set with better timings, and maybe ddr500, may pop up, and after selling my RAM may only be £10-20 more expensive. Hmm. Anyone know if that MemoryC shop are reliable?
 
PSU

Would I be able to get by with the s-12 430w rather than the 500w s-12? I think the wattage is fine, but should I be worried about only 29A on the 12v rail if I'm overclocking?

Thanks - answers to my above questions would be much appreciated as well.
 
As I already mentioned up above, the 430 will be fine. You haven't listed a video card though... If you're really worried, find something more substantial like this. That 500W unit is completely wasted on a computer like this, and costs far too much.

I have no idea about that chipset cooler; if you're looking for something reputable from a good name, you could go passive with a heatsink from zalman, or something more hardcore (still very quiet) like this. Swiftech also makes some good chipset HSFs like this.
 
quadnad said:
As I already mentioned up above, the 430 will be fine. You haven't listed a video card though... If you're really worried, find something more substantial like this. That 500W unit is completely wasted on a computer like this, and costs far too much.

I have no idea about that chipset cooler; if you're looking for something reputable from a good name, you could go passive with a heatsink from zalman, or something more hardcore (still very quiet) like this. Swiftech also makes some good chipset HSFs like this.
Click to expand...

Thanks very much for the info, I will have a look at those mb heatsinks. With the PSU, I was just checking because I thought I had read somewhere that you must have more than 30A on the 12v rail for OCing but I'm probably wrong.
 
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