Community Service - help a silly n00b build an A64 system!

[xenxes]

Oh no! Not another one of these! I know I know, I spent 5 hours reading the forums but I'm a whore and I want specific suggestions tailored to me.

Background:
poor, lived in a cave for past 2 years, survived on a p4 1.7ghz compaq 64mb radeon 7000 laptop which is falling apart piece by piece. I am not going to OC due to stupidity and a profound fear of combustion.

I've already decided against waiting for the 939 SLI boards b/c: 1. I can't afford 2 6800gts, 2. I can't afford 2 6600gts, 3. 2 nvidia cards are very loud. In 1.5-2.5 years I'll be trashing everything and buying anew. Currently possess some left over scraps from the dell 8400 deal last week (listed on bottom)

Classic Conundrum SOLVED!: 754/939 (90nm) ?

Going w/ 754 for greater price/performance ratio, upgradability isn't an issue since I'll be getting whatever's almost new 2 years from now.

Also: 3400+ >= 3500+ in quite a few benchmarks

Still Need/Please Suggest:
1. motherboard? -> K8T Neo-FIS2R or something from nF3 chipset (I am not going to OC, so whichever is faster, I can't find any comparative benchmarks either so I can't decide..)
2. memory? (need at least 1 gig, possibly 2 gigs later)
3. 2nd HD, need >=200gb, SATA? IDE? Whaaa?
4. anything else you deem an improvement and/or very wrong with my existing setup


Current Decision and System Build:
CPU: 754 3400+ 1MB L2
MOBO: MSI K8T Neo-FIS2R?
RAM: ---

VIDEO: 6800 GT
MONITORS: Dual 2001FP :evil:
SOUND: Chaintech 7.1
SPEAKERS: ---

1st HD: 160gb sata :evil:
2nd HD: ---

DVDRW: Generic Dell 16x DL DVD+RW :evil:
DVDROM: Generic Dell :evil:

CASE: ---


...to be continued

Legend: :evil: = already bought

 

[Hajime]

Mobo: DFI Lanparty UT NF3 250gb hands down.

Proc: Go for a 3200+ (512kb cache, 2.2ghz) instead of that 3400+ - 1mb of cache doesn't really make it worth the extra cash.

Ram: If you go AMD, just get Corsair value or Crucial value ram.


Pretty much sums up a decent system. May want to go with the Chaintech VNF-250 if you don't plan on OC'ing, however.

 

[Budman]

Originally posted by: Hajime
Mobo: DFI Lanparty UT NF3 250gb hands down.

Proc: Go for a 3200+ (512kb cache, 2.2ghz) instead of that 3400+ - 1mb of cache doesn't really make it worth the extra cash.

Ram: If you go AMD, just get Corsair value or Crucial value ram.


Pretty much sums up a decent system. May want to go with the Chaintech VNF-250 if you don't plan on OC'ing, however.

I dont know when you got your info from but the Chaintech VNF-250 is a very decent overclocker.

 

[Rapsven]

He didn't say it wasn't a bad OCer, it's just that it's very cheap for its price point.

 

[Hajime]

What Rapsven said - it's a decent overclocker, but because of that, it's very stable and it is among the cheapest of the NF3 boards out.

It's not worth paying, what, an extra $50 for a mobo whose features you won't use now, right?

VNF3-250 results in him having some basic OC'ing, plus a very stable mobo for $50 less - which he could put into parts that he would need more. I.e., more ram.

 

[xenxes]

Well I still can't decide on a motherboard:

K8T Neo-FIS2R -> I know this is the fastest VIA chipset
what about nF3? I was thinking about the MSI one.. I don't know, I guess they all differ like within 1% in terms of speed