Critique my build.

[dc5]

again, there will be no gaming on this computer

ANTEC Life Style Series Black Case With 380W Power Supply

MSI "K8N Neo2 Platinum" NVIDIA nForce3 ULTRA Chipset Motherboard For AMD Socket 939

AMD Athlon 64 3000+, 512KB L2 Cache, Socket 939 64-bit Processor - Retail

Corsair Value Select 184 Pin 512MB DDR PC-3200

Western Digital 120GB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive

NEC 16X Double Layer DVD±RW Drive, Black, Model ND-3520A BK

i'll probably just choose a geforce fx 5200 or something similar. i'm not sure if the msi neo plat. motherboard is really necessary. are there any other motherboards you recomend that features a nforce chipset and supports socket 939?

thanks.

 

[ts3433]

Epox EP-9NDA3+ ($126) or EP-9NDA3J ($100)

 

[Zap Brannigan]

What about a sound card? I would highly suggest the Audiotrak Prodigy 7.1 sound card. I have personaly compared it (Audiotrak Prodigy) to the M-Audio Revo 7.1 and Creative Audigy 2. To my ears the Prodigy sounds the best.

 

[dc5]

Originally posted by: Zap Brannigan
What about a sound card? I would highly suggest the Audiotrak Prodigy 7.1 sound card. I have personaly compared it (Audiotrak Prodigy) to the M-Audio Revo 7.1 and Creative Audigy 2. To my ears the Prodigy sounds the best.

no sound card required. i'm trying to lower the price on this thing as possible.

 

[Zap Brannigan]

If it is not for gamming; why not go with the far more affordable AMD XP series of CPU?

I have an XP2800+ OC'd to 3200+ speeds. Works great for games, music et cetera.

 

[dc5]

Originally posted by: Zap Brannigan
If it is not for gamming; why not go with the far more affordable AMD XP series of CPU?

obsolete. i'd rather go for a athlon 64 2800+ socket 754 instead.

 

[Zap Brannigan]

Obsolete only in upgradability. By the time you would need to upgrade to play "todays" newest multimedia; socket 754 CPU mobos will be "obsolete". Also you may want to look into Intel depedning on what multimedia apps you will be running since you did mention this is non-gamming.

 

[dc5]

Originally posted by: Zap Brannigan
Obsolete only in upgradability. By the time you would need to upgrade to play "todays" newest multimedia; socket 754 CPU mobos will be "obsolete". Also you may want to look into Intel depedning on what multimedia apps you will be running since you did mention this is non-gamming.

maybe "multimedia" was a bad description. i'd definatley not look into intel, since this is a budget build. if i want to go the cheap route, i would choose a athlon 64 2800 w/ a chaintech motherboard. thanks for the suggestions though.

 

[ts3433]

Zap has a very good point--depending on the exact things this is used for ("multimedia" is quite broad), you might be able get away with a passively cooled, underclocked, undervolted mobile Barton.