Calling out all TECHIES!!!

[imported_IslandTechie]

ok all you techies out there, i need your help!

right now i have an old sony vaio my dad got me for christmas a few years ago. some parts were removed, others upgraded, and some still there.

its a son vaio pcv-rx470ds.
p4 1.5ghz
came with 128mb pc800 RAMBUS ram but upgraded to 386mb
80gb 2mb buffer hdd, removed and replaced with a 120gb 2mb buffer hdd (it was free)
liteon 52x cd
liteon 52x cdrw
mitsumi 1.44fd
standard case with sidewindow and 350w psu
belkin ethernet card (onboard ethernet went out)
geforce4 mx440 64mb, removed and replaced with a ati radeon 9800 pro 128mb

im into gaming and want an AMD 64 3500+ 90nm cpu and thinking about a MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum mb with Crucial Ballistix PC3200 (512mb x 2) or Crucial Ballistix PC4000 (1gb x 2).

nforce4 ? ....should i wait for the nforce4 boards to come out? if i wait for nforce4 boards to be out for a while i will also need to get a PCI-E video card since the 9800pro wont work. what nforce4 board and pci-e card should i get?

sata 300... know of any boards that can support the new sata 300 drives that are due out in 2005?

power supply questions... i was thinking of getting the antec true550w but then i came across a psu by thermaltake. its 680w but has all the connectors you could need. 4 sata connectors, 2 pci-e, molex connectors galore, 20 or 24pin (via an adapter). which is better?

case... saw the cooler master stacker case in an issue of maximum pc and looks great. lots of room, 11 5.25" drive bays possible, a cross blower fan (optional). what do you think of it?
http://www.coolermaster.com/in...t_list&p_class=363

hard drive... i know of the name brands of hard drives like western digital, maxtor, hitachi, seagate. is any one better than another? i want a 250gb for data storage, maybe raid 1 so thatll be 2 250gb hdds. as for the primary hdd, i know raid 0 increases performance. so maybe 2 160gb hdds?

sound... was going to purchase the sound blaster audigy 2 zs platinum for $100 (after rebates) but then a coworker told me about the audigy 4. is there really that much of a difference? looking at the two models on creatives website, it seems like the audigy 2 zs platinum has more options for inputs and outputs in the internal 5.25" drive than the audigy 4 external enclosure.

lastly reagarding the motherboard again... i would like it to have 4 sata connectors, fdd, 2 ide, usb, firewire, ethernet.

any comments would be appreciated.

thanks.

happy holidays and happy new year (soon).

 

[gabemcg]

OK, here we go, I'll see if I can help

don't be supprised if a bunch of people post here criticising my advice
I wont be

unless you plan on doing SLI, and getting 2 pci express graphics cards ($$$), I'd say don't bother with the nf4 chipset, it's virtually the same as the nf3 ut, with support for the 939 chipset/DDR2 (more $$$), and a few minor upgrades. I think that besides the exceptions listed above, the only significant impriovement has been an additional SATA bus, that enables better throughput if all of your drives are SATA (I think it's still too early to tell on that whole sata 300 thing). Plus the Nf4 motherboars retail over $200 when you can get nice nf3 for closer to $100

I just got the DFI lanpartynf3 ut 250gb board, and an athlon64 2800+ with a 1gb corsair value (2x512) and I think that is a kick ass combo. It has everything that you want on board, including nice 8ch audio, nvidia anyRaid, and all the SATA ports you can shake a stick at. bonus----I got the whole package for arround $300.

as for powersupply, I just went from a noname 400w to a antec truepower 380w, and eventhough I lost a few wats, it's definitly an UPgrade. personally, I couldn't justify a 680w thermaltake (a good psu no dobut) for $160 over a 450-550w antec true power that costs 50-100 dollars less. I think that even if you had 2 pci express cards in there, and a bunch of drives, 680 w is gonna be overkill.

Hard drives, any that you listed will work great, everybody has a preference, I prefer WD drives, but I've had good luck with maxtor, and even IBM. Look for bigger caches (8mb and up). A good rule of thumb for buying hard drives, is that if you are paying much more than 50 cents a gigabyte, you are probably paying too much. the exceptions to this rule are external/non standard drives (i.e laptops), high speed (10,00rpm+)/SCSI drives, and the highest capacity drives (which you will always pay alot more for).


Buying Tips:

CHECK PRICEWATCH.COM/ANANDTECH HOT DEALS FORUM
use your best judgement when choosing an online retailer, sometimes lesser known sites will have the best price, but if you are unsure, it's always better to spend a couple dollars extra and go with a well known retailer.

WAIT FOR SALES:

(somethings go on sale often, such as hard drives, memory, optical drives. Somethings stay relativly the same. Some times getting a good deal is half the fun, plus you get some bragging rights.)

CHOOSE PROC FIRST:

Sounds like you've done this already, now decide if you want to go 939 or 754

COOSE MOTHERBOARD SECOND:

whichever chipset you choose, I have always used ASUS boards, and now DFI, and havent had problems with either, I hear good things about that msi board as well, but don't know enough about it to comment.

PICK RAM:

Once you've got the biggies out of the way, pick your ram, this has always been a tough choice for me, but it helps to post on the forums once you know what proc/mobo you'll have, and see what other people are using. From my understanding, unless you are overclocking, top of the line ram can be overkill, but no-name brand can be underdoing it. alot of the name brand manufacturers have a VALUE line of ram, that seems to be just that, a good value. and I've read some reports that the value ram with an A64 will perform as well as it's bigger brother in no OC'd setups.

I wouldnt go with more than 2 sticks, as some mobos dont like it.

NOW CHOOSE HD/OPTICAL DRIVE SETUP

It is pretty important that you do this after you choose your mobo, so you can decide what will be going where, and hopefully prevent the need for an add in pci controller card, or stupid adapters

here's an example of a typical mobo setup fully loaded:

primary master (IDE): main system HD (usually your fastest drive)
primary slave (IDE): media drive (mp3s/videos/random files) as big or bigger than your system drive
secondary master (IDE): burner (cd or dvd)
secondary slave (IDE) : optical drive (any choice, I've got a dvd rom) (note* having both optical drives on same bus is not reccomended for disk to disk burning)

SATA 1/2: matching pair of large drives for RAID array, store your games here


NOW GET THE REST OF THE GOODIES

after you have all that picked out, you can choose your other stuff, like case, fans, heatsinks, add-in cards, power supplys, ect.


Hopefully I've helped, good luck
gabe

 

[dnuggett]

There is no need at all for a PSU with that many Watts available, 380-400 will do you as long as it is a good brand.


There is no need for PC400 RAM really. ValueRAM @32-3500 is the smart choice.

For a vid card I recommend a 6800OC or GT.

Everything else looks good. The mobo and chipset is fine, but a less expensive NF3 is prob a wiser choice if $ is a concern.