So, here's the deal... I haven't built a Desktop in years, and now I'm finalizing my build for my "at home" PC. Mostly going to be used as a seedbox w/transmission running for remote torrent management. Some gaming is desired, but will be addressed later in the body of the questions.
Setup as is:
Case: Antec Three Hundred
$69.99 - $15 rebate - $22 discount code = $32.99 w/free shipping from buy.com, slickdeal
PSU: Antec Earthwatts 430 Watt
$47.99 - $30 rebate = $17.99 w/free shipping from newegg, slickdeal
CPU: AMD Athlon X2 BE-2400 Brisbane 2.3GHz 2 x 512KB L2 Cache Socket AM2 Dual-Core Processor
$39.99 w/free shipping from newegg, slickdeal
CPU Heatsink: ASUS Triton 75 Fanless CPU Cooler
$37.99 w/free shipping from buy.com
Thermal Compound: OCZ Freeze Extreme Thermal Conductivity Compound
$13.99 w/free shipping from buy.com
Memory: OCZ Gold 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel
$39.99 - $20 rebate = $19.99 w/free shipping from newegg, slickdeal
Hard Drive: Western Digital Caviar Green WD6400AACS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive (bare drive) - OEM
$62.00 After Discount w/free shipping from newegg, slickdeal
Hard Drive #2: Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD7500KSRTL 750GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
$139.99 - $7.00 instant rebate w/free shipping (not very slick at the time, but I wanted one) = $132.99
Motherboard: Asus M2N-SLI Deluxe
Free from my cousin as a gift, used
Video Card: Who knows what
Free from my cousin, used and passive cooled, but old.
Additional Case Fan: Scythe S-FLEX SFF21E 120mm
$14.99 w/free shipping from newegg
Mouse: Logitech MX 518 Gaming-Grade Optical Mouse
$35.53 - $15 Rebate = $20.53 w/free shipping from buy.com, slickdeal
Keyboard: IBM Model M made in 1986 I think (wiki it, it's a beast and I love it)
Free from local freecycle request
Monitor: Hanns·G HW-191APB Black 19" 5ms Widescreen LCD Monitor 300 cd/m2 700:1 Built in Speakers
$149.99 (but I think I got it for less than that) from newegg
Optical Drive: Plextor CD/RW - Model PX-W5224TA
$23 shipped from a forums.thinkpads.com transaction
$23 + 150 + 20 + 15 + 132 + 62 + 20 + 14 + 38 + 40 + 18 + 33 = $565 (or less)
Not bad right?... I'm on a budget and wanted to build this guy as cheaply as possible. While I was at it, I really wanted to make this machine use as little power as possible for when it's just sitting there running torrents. That's where the Earthwatts PSU, Western Digital Green Power hard drive, and the 45w AMD CPU come into play. So here are the questions.
1. I happened to realize that I have components in my list that turned out very well rated on the SPCR site. I am specifically referring to the PSU and the Scythe fan I had laying around. So I thought to my self since I was going for low power, why not go for low noise as well. This led me to wonder if I could get away with passively cooling the CPU. It is a low wattage and I figured a nice enough heatsink might be able to dissipate the heat well enough. That's why I splurged on thermal compound and the sink, to give it as fair a shot as I can. Thoughts? There are spots on the case to mount more fans (included, but I may need to purchase quieter ones for this purpose) to increase airflow in the case itself.
Fan: http://www.silentpcreview.com/article63-page2.html]Recommended Fans | silentpcreview.com[/url]
PSU: http://www.silentpcreview.com/article699-page2.html]Recommended Power Supplies | silentpcreview.com[/url]
Heatsink: http://www.silentpcreview.com/article30-page2.html]Recommended Heatsinks | silentpcreview.com[/url]
Since this would accomplish both purposes (low power/low noise) it is a very interesting idea and I'm hoping to make it work out.
2. This is somewhat dependent on point 1, but you tell me. I'm looking at playing some games on this PC but the new card terminology / ratings are beyond me. Is there a rule of thumb that could be followed in picking out a suitable video card that would allow me play a certain level of games? I'm very much looking forward to Fallout 3 in particular and I'd much rather get the video card for $60-70 bucks (or more or less) on a slickdeal video card and enjoy it on my PC instead of my xbox 360. Moreover, does my choice of mobo/CPU affect this? I'm already locked in on the mobo/CPU so I'm skrewed if it does, but I'm just not keyed in to how important that interaction (Mobo and CPU and GPU) is. I have 4 memory slots, so bumping up to 4 gigs is an option.
Quick sample of recent slickdeal offers for price comparison education:
http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?t=963905]eVGA GeForce 8400GS 256MB PCI-Express Video Card $15 After $10 Rebate - SlickDeals.net Forums[/url]
http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?t=963835]Gigabyte Radeon HD4870 512MB PCI Express video card $200 After $40 MIR - SlickDeals.net Forums[/url]
http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?t=957615]PowerColor HD 3850 512MB GDDR3 Video Card $58 after $25 MIR - SlickDeals.net Forums[/url]
Note: I understand that a huge vid card could very well skrew my power consumption/volume issues, but I could even remove the dang thing if there was going to be extended periods of time without gaming (class keeping me busy or vacation).
3. As you may have noticed, I did not mention what OS I'd be running. I haven't decided. I have vista 64 bit (ultimate) on my thinkpad and I'm liking it but not opposed to sticking with XP. Assume anything is an option (not linux) since I have access to almost anything in that department. Effects on power consumption, related cpu/memory usage, and gaming should be noted and prioritized. I know (heard) that no 32 bit OS can use 4 gigs of ram. So dunno how important that is or isn't.
4. Transmission can supposedly be sent commands via dropbox. This is something I heard mentioned on lifehacker and am curious to hear more about. Any info? Other options are welcomed, I'm a total seedbox noob. Ideally, remote control power would be simple and probably limited to adding the occasional torrent, looking at status, and stopping one. But mostly just adding a torrent here or there from another location would be nice.
http://www.transmissionbt.com/]Transmission[/url]
5. Lastly, I'm thinking of partitioning my primary hard drive (the one mentioned above) to maximize performance as mentioned here.
http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?t=759070]Newegg has the New Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM - 129.99 + Free Shipping - SlickDeals.net Forums[/url]
Reference posts to save you time looking through the long list...
http://forums.slickdeals.net/s...=10385101&postcount=13]SlickDeals.net Forums - View Single Post - Newegg has the New Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM - 129.99 + Free Shipping[/url]
http://forums.slickdeals.net/s...=10385139&postcount=16]SlickDeals.net Forums - View Single Post - Newegg has the New Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM - 129.99 + Free Shipping[/url]
http://forums.slickdeals.net/s...=10388254&postcount=56]SlickDeals.net Forums - View Single Post - Newegg has the New Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM - 129.99 + Free Shipping[/url]
http://forums.slickdeals.net/s...=10388624&postcount=63]SlickDeals.net Forums - View Single Post - Newegg has the New Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM - 129.99 + Free Shipping[/url]
http://forums.slickdeals.net/s...=10388955&postcount=70]SlickDeals.net Forums - View Single Post - Newegg has the New Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM - 129.99 + Free Shipping[/url]
They get into the technical benefits of various partitioning strategies in this post and I think I might look into (since I haven't formatted/installed anything yet) going with what they recommend which is creating 2 partitions, the first one being big enough for the OS and OS dependant apps, the second for.... well, I'm not so sure I understand that part yet.
Specifically look at the post 13... that kinda describes the situation I'm in. I have other drives I can use for data storage, or random apps for that matter.
I asked a buddie of mine that got his B.S. in Comp Sci from GA Tech and is currently getting his Master's at UC San Diego in Comp Sci and he said the theory / pracitce is sound he's just not 100% keen on trying to outthink your OS and it's "journaling file system"... his reply was very informative and if anyone wants to see it I can post it at length here once I get his OK.
Anyway. Please give me what information you can.
Edit: added additional hard drive i forgot about
Setup as is:
Case: Antec Three Hundred
$69.99 - $15 rebate - $22 discount code = $32.99 w/free shipping from buy.com, slickdeal
PSU: Antec Earthwatts 430 Watt
$47.99 - $30 rebate = $17.99 w/free shipping from newegg, slickdeal
CPU: AMD Athlon X2 BE-2400 Brisbane 2.3GHz 2 x 512KB L2 Cache Socket AM2 Dual-Core Processor
$39.99 w/free shipping from newegg, slickdeal
CPU Heatsink: ASUS Triton 75 Fanless CPU Cooler
$37.99 w/free shipping from buy.com
Thermal Compound: OCZ Freeze Extreme Thermal Conductivity Compound
$13.99 w/free shipping from buy.com
Memory: OCZ Gold 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel
$39.99 - $20 rebate = $19.99 w/free shipping from newegg, slickdeal
Hard Drive: Western Digital Caviar Green WD6400AACS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive (bare drive) - OEM
$62.00 After Discount w/free shipping from newegg, slickdeal
Hard Drive #2: Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD7500KSRTL 750GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
$139.99 - $7.00 instant rebate w/free shipping (not very slick at the time, but I wanted one) = $132.99
Motherboard: Asus M2N-SLI Deluxe
Free from my cousin as a gift, used
Video Card: Who knows what
Free from my cousin, used and passive cooled, but old.
Additional Case Fan: Scythe S-FLEX SFF21E 120mm
$14.99 w/free shipping from newegg
Mouse: Logitech MX 518 Gaming-Grade Optical Mouse
$35.53 - $15 Rebate = $20.53 w/free shipping from buy.com, slickdeal
Keyboard: IBM Model M made in 1986 I think (wiki it, it's a beast and I love it)
Free from local freecycle request
Monitor: Hanns·G HW-191APB Black 19" 5ms Widescreen LCD Monitor 300 cd/m2 700:1 Built in Speakers
$149.99 (but I think I got it for less than that) from newegg
Optical Drive: Plextor CD/RW - Model PX-W5224TA
$23 shipped from a forums.thinkpads.com transaction
$23 + 150 + 20 + 15 + 132 + 62 + 20 + 14 + 38 + 40 + 18 + 33 = $565 (or less)
Not bad right?... I'm on a budget and wanted to build this guy as cheaply as possible. While I was at it, I really wanted to make this machine use as little power as possible for when it's just sitting there running torrents. That's where the Earthwatts PSU, Western Digital Green Power hard drive, and the 45w AMD CPU come into play. So here are the questions.
1. I happened to realize that I have components in my list that turned out very well rated on the SPCR site. I am specifically referring to the PSU and the Scythe fan I had laying around. So I thought to my self since I was going for low power, why not go for low noise as well. This led me to wonder if I could get away with passively cooling the CPU. It is a low wattage and I figured a nice enough heatsink might be able to dissipate the heat well enough. That's why I splurged on thermal compound and the sink, to give it as fair a shot as I can. Thoughts? There are spots on the case to mount more fans (included, but I may need to purchase quieter ones for this purpose) to increase airflow in the case itself.
Fan: http://www.silentpcreview.com/article63-page2.html]Recommended Fans | silentpcreview.com[/url]
PSU: http://www.silentpcreview.com/article699-page2.html]Recommended Power Supplies | silentpcreview.com[/url]
Heatsink: http://www.silentpcreview.com/article30-page2.html]Recommended Heatsinks | silentpcreview.com[/url]
Since this would accomplish both purposes (low power/low noise) it is a very interesting idea and I'm hoping to make it work out.
2. This is somewhat dependent on point 1, but you tell me. I'm looking at playing some games on this PC but the new card terminology / ratings are beyond me. Is there a rule of thumb that could be followed in picking out a suitable video card that would allow me play a certain level of games? I'm very much looking forward to Fallout 3 in particular and I'd much rather get the video card for $60-70 bucks (or more or less) on a slickdeal video card and enjoy it on my PC instead of my xbox 360. Moreover, does my choice of mobo/CPU affect this? I'm already locked in on the mobo/CPU so I'm skrewed if it does, but I'm just not keyed in to how important that interaction (Mobo and CPU and GPU) is. I have 4 memory slots, so bumping up to 4 gigs is an option.
Quick sample of recent slickdeal offers for price comparison education:
http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?t=963905]eVGA GeForce 8400GS 256MB PCI-Express Video Card $15 After $10 Rebate - SlickDeals.net Forums[/url]
http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?t=963835]Gigabyte Radeon HD4870 512MB PCI Express video card $200 After $40 MIR - SlickDeals.net Forums[/url]
http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?t=957615]PowerColor HD 3850 512MB GDDR3 Video Card $58 after $25 MIR - SlickDeals.net Forums[/url]
Note: I understand that a huge vid card could very well skrew my power consumption/volume issues, but I could even remove the dang thing if there was going to be extended periods of time without gaming (class keeping me busy or vacation).
3. As you may have noticed, I did not mention what OS I'd be running. I haven't decided. I have vista 64 bit (ultimate) on my thinkpad and I'm liking it but not opposed to sticking with XP. Assume anything is an option (not linux) since I have access to almost anything in that department. Effects on power consumption, related cpu/memory usage, and gaming should be noted and prioritized. I know (heard) that no 32 bit OS can use 4 gigs of ram. So dunno how important that is or isn't.
4. Transmission can supposedly be sent commands via dropbox. This is something I heard mentioned on lifehacker and am curious to hear more about. Any info? Other options are welcomed, I'm a total seedbox noob. Ideally, remote control power would be simple and probably limited to adding the occasional torrent, looking at status, and stopping one. But mostly just adding a torrent here or there from another location would be nice.
http://www.transmissionbt.com/]Transmission[/url]
5. Lastly, I'm thinking of partitioning my primary hard drive (the one mentioned above) to maximize performance as mentioned here.
http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?t=759070]Newegg has the New Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM - 129.99 + Free Shipping - SlickDeals.net Forums[/url]
Reference posts to save you time looking through the long list...
http://forums.slickdeals.net/s...=10385101&postcount=13]SlickDeals.net Forums - View Single Post - Newegg has the New Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM - 129.99 + Free Shipping[/url]
http://forums.slickdeals.net/s...=10385139&postcount=16]SlickDeals.net Forums - View Single Post - Newegg has the New Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM - 129.99 + Free Shipping[/url]
http://forums.slickdeals.net/s...=10388254&postcount=56]SlickDeals.net Forums - View Single Post - Newegg has the New Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM - 129.99 + Free Shipping[/url]
http://forums.slickdeals.net/s...=10388624&postcount=63]SlickDeals.net Forums - View Single Post - Newegg has the New Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM - 129.99 + Free Shipping[/url]
http://forums.slickdeals.net/s...=10388955&postcount=70]SlickDeals.net Forums - View Single Post - Newegg has the New Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM - 129.99 + Free Shipping[/url]
They get into the technical benefits of various partitioning strategies in this post and I think I might look into (since I haven't formatted/installed anything yet) going with what they recommend which is creating 2 partitions, the first one being big enough for the OS and OS dependant apps, the second for.... well, I'm not so sure I understand that part yet.
Specifically look at the post 13... that kinda describes the situation I'm in. I have other drives I can use for data storage, or random apps for that matter.
I asked a buddie of mine that got his B.S. in Comp Sci from GA Tech and is currently getting his Master's at UC San Diego in Comp Sci and he said the theory / pracitce is sound he's just not 100% keen on trying to outthink your OS and it's "journaling file system"... his reply was very informative and if anyone wants to see it I can post it at length here once I get his OK.
Anyway. Please give me what information you can.
Edit: added additional hard drive i forgot about
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