Advice/Comments on NEW SYSTEM

[shezan]

Hello kids, adults, and anything in between:

Getting my parts for my new system tommorow, just need some feedback about the parts listed and some questions answered. Bare with me since I know the parts listed here is bassically 90% of the users on AT forums.

- AMD Barton 2500+
- Abit NF7-S Rev2
- 2x Western Digital 80GB SATA (Will be running on Raid 0)
- ATI Radeon 9800 PRO 128MB

As for the case, thinking about purchasing the Antec 1080AMG or the PLUSVIEW1000AMG. Considering Antec because Thermaltake is way too expensive and I wasn't able to find any other cases that match up to the Antec cases, in the same price range and size. If anyone knows any cheaper ones, then by all means, I'm open to suggestions.

The Power Supply is bassically the same as well, looking closely at either the Thermaltake Silent PP Butterfly 480W or the Enermax 450W EG465P-VE (FC) w/ Fan Control. Looking for a high rated PSU here simply because I don't really want to upgrade the PSU in the future, just the processor, motherboard etc. In Canada, these are the two PSU's in $100 CDN price range I was able to find with some good reviews. Again, heard of others? Lay em down here.

Last but not least, the RAM. I will probably get dual channel since people are raving about it like mad, and it will probably be some OCZ RAM. Either PC3200 DDR400 256MBx2 CAS2 (Premier Series @ $189 CDN) or PC3500 DDR433 256MBx2 CAS2.5 REV.1.1 (Enhanced Latency @ $216). With the Barton 2500+ I will be overclocking it with Thermaltake Volcano 11 heatsink/fan combo. I want to squeeze as much juice out of the system as I can, so I'm going to aim to get the FSB at the highest frequency. From what I've heard, that'll be DDR400. I've heard that having the PC3500 would be more stable since there's more headroom as it runs at DDR433, or would PC3200 surfice? Is Enhanced Bandwidth worth the extra $20 bucks ontop of EL ram? Sorry for the long essay paper :S.

I appreciate any suggestions anyone has to offer, thanks.

 

[mechBgon]

How about using the stock Antec TruePower430 that comes with the AMG1080? They're a respectable PSU and pretty quiet Also, I'd tend to avoid Western Digital drives if they might possibly be using ball-bearing motors. Can you get the Hitachi 8MB-cache drives at a competitive price? because I heard they are quiet (fluid bearings) and fast too.

For the CPU, if you can get a mobile Barton, then you'll probably get a bit more overclock (they're unlocked and default to lower voltage). Hope that helps

 

[Nickel020]

I would rather get a Mobile Athlon as they OC very well and the Barton 2500+ has a locked multiplier. I also think that you should rather get 2x512MB of higher latency RAM rather than going with 2x256MB of low latency RAM.
If you are at all concerned about noise you should get some Samsung HDs. They are the quietest HDs right now and also cheap.

 

[shezan]

I was thinking about getting the Enhanced Bandwidth but I wasn't too sure if it would make all that much of a difference in my case since I'd be O/C to a 3200+. I thought EL would do the job. And I actually want to get a 1 GIG pretty badly, but the double cost is way out of my budget. If I were to gamble I could just buy a 512 now and a 512 later and hope I come out with equal timings, but I'm not sure if it's something I'd like to risk.