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building a new (less insane) system, recommendations welcome

MrDudeMan

MrDudeMan

Lifer
i posted a while ago about building an insane system that would be the fastest one possible to build...but then i realized that was totally stupid and here i am all "learned up" about the computer i want to build

i want to be able to play counterstrike, everquest, and maybe a few other games of the sort, but nothing extremely graphic intensive like..i dont even know, just nothing huge

most of all, i want it to be really clear in 2d (which is why i got the g2 mx w/ dual vga, it has super clear 2d)

i also want it to be very fast internally (such as copying and pasting large amounts of files >500mb)

cd burning is fast enough with a 24x so i dont need any faster than that

i would get a dvd-drive, but i just dont see a use for it

i was going to get a big hard drive, but then i realized, i dont do anything to where i would need more than 20gb, so im going to stick with my 20gb 7200rpm ata66 western digital (this may counter-act what i said about internal speed...i dont know, you tell me)

it needs to be powerful enough and have enough resources to do something like play counterstrike on one monitor and talk on AIM or surf the net in the other monitor....

so here it is...


what i have:

windows xp
19'' and 15'' monitor
geforce2 mx w/ dual VGA
Netgeat FA311TX 10/100 NIC
24x10x40 Lite-On CD-RW
20.5gb Western Digital 7200rpm ATA66
Logitech Optical Mouse
a random keyboard...oh well it works
BJC2000 Color Printer

what i need/want:

Pentium4 1.6a (or 2.0a if it comes down)
*do i need extra cooling for it? or can i use the retail HSF to overclock a little? by that i mean 1.6 -> 2.2 or 2.0 -> 2.4*
P4B266-C (i dont know a lot about p4 boards, but this one sounds pretty good...any other good ones?)
256mb DDR ram (dont know which speed is the best for what the money is worth, what ive heard is PC2100)
good speakers...but under like 65 dollars (max) creative inspire 4.1 any good? someone toss something out
c-media 5.1 support sound card (its only 17 dollars shipped and ive heard it sounds pretty good, so whatever)
click here to see the case (is this good enough?)



am i missing anything? or will that make a full system?

p.s. should i get heatspreaders for the ram? aftermarket cooling for the northbridge?

p.s.s i have a lot of panaflo L1's for case cooling


let me know what you guys think!

thanks!
 
Personally I would have went with an ati vid card.

So I guess all you need is the motherboard and proc? Have you decided on which ones to get? I almost forgot you will need to get ram too. remember if you are using rd ram to get it in pairs and to also get those things to go in the empty memory slots. (sorry not up to date with rambus. 🙁 it seems the rd ram is a better performer for the northwood cpus.

I don't know anything about audio stuff. I have my comp. hooked up to an old fender amp (= mono sound) I have seen the speaker sets you are talking about, but have never heard them. Bestbuy has them setup in their store in my area, but the sound would be different then at home.


Good luck with the build.

Will

 


<< Textdo i need extra cooling for it? or can i use the retail HSF to overclock a little? by that i mean 1.6 -> 2.2 or 2.0 -> 2.4* >>



A retail HSF would be more than adequat. I would suggest getting the new Northwood version of p4 would will soon be dropping in price. It has a bigger internal cache and will be a better performer. That is, if you can wait for the price to stablize on the CPU.
 
i planned on getting a northwood =)


the geforce2 mx w/ dual vga is better for games than the radeon VE im pretty sure


i thought about RD-RAM and DDR...im not sure which to get at this point...RD-RAM is better for games, but is it more expensive?

i dont know which route to go...im getting a p4 either way, just not sure what mobo/ram combo to get...any help?


also, those speakers...any recommendations?


and is that case adequate?

thanks for the replies so far!!
 
i need a sound card that can support 4.1 though...and that all needs to be under 65..well i guess 75 is ok too
 
I would go for the Sound Blaster Live 5.1 (36 shipped @newegg). Personally, I don't think sound really gets much better if you spend more on a newer card.
 
i *still* recommend a SCSI system if you do large file transferring, if not SCSI, try IDE raid.

as for CS, hell, you can play it with a voodoo5 no problem (really good framerates too) i never tried everquest but i don't see many points to upgrade. a good graphic card would be a... geforce 4 ti 4600. If not, geforce 3 ti 500 is also good. if you prefer some video editing and all those goodies get a AIW radeon 8500!!!
 
i have a geforce2 mx with dual VGA and im getting a PCI dual VGA card, the matrox g200...would both of those be good enough to play counterstrike? im guessing the geforce2 would be better...

 


<< to see the case (is this good enough?) >>

Case looks good to me although I am still wondering what that round part is on the bottom! I personally like this one from NEWEGG check it out! Also I see that you have dual monitors, maybe consider going with Matrox G400-550 dualhead or ATI 8500! Also good choice on the processor I hope you will be OC that damn thing! I also would recommend a faster hardrive atleast ata100 and 7200rpm's, that would be your bottleneck. And if your going with win XP make sure you have lots of ram it loves it I usshally put 512 in my systems but 256 should just make it! for the sound I would recommend GTXP although its kinda expensive so I guess get the cheapy if you want to take a chance with one of the most important parts of your system! Good luck though hope everything goes together well for you!
 
Just a quick thought, doesn't the new Everquest expansion reccomend 512mb or RAM? And if you're running XP too (which I never would... go Win2k) then I would def up it to 512mb.
 
It seems a shame to have such a good processor with that vid card. The Radeon 8500 has dual display and it will obviously play your games better too.
 
actually they dont get pissed...if they did, the would lock it and ban people, i wait until its on the 7th page, then i bump it again, or usually 3 hours, whichever comes first...


i dont want to spend a ton of money on this thing, i was just curious if that stuff was good....


and the c-media chip set is awesome! sound is important, but its rediculous to spend so much money on a sound card when you can get one that is just as sharp for 18 dollars shipped...

i used to be a win2k fan, but winxp is a little more stable if you ask me...it fixes itself if you lock it up or if something is unstable, which is very cool

i guess ill pu 512mb of ram in it, but idont know why, ill never need it probably...and i play shadows of luclin, i used to have 1gb pc133 sdram, i took a 512 out and it performed the same, so i figure 256mb DDR which is much faster will perform well, but i guess you are right, i should go with 512

as for the graphics card...the geforce2 mx plays games just fine...i have used it on EQ...it works perfect IMO

and i have no use for a radeon 8500...spending that much cash for useless options, just seems like a waste to me..i would never use it

i got a TV tuner card with vga/svideo/tvout for 20 dollars....it looks the exact same as the radeon on the cable tv, but i dont need it to play games, i have the geforce!

i would get a faster hard drive, but i dont need any more space and i dont have the extra cash to lay down for a good one...although i might trade some stuff for a SCSI raid setup....

thanks for the replies, i dont even remember everything i just typed, so if it was stupid just ignore it
 
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