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Custom built computer help...

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So newegg.com is a good place to buy this stuff? Do they have a good return policy? And why is their stuff so cheap? Is some of it used?
 
Newegg's return policy is *definately* better than fry's. Go ask around. Trust me on this 🙂. Fast shipping and great customer service. Not to mention extremely good prices. Which is why wherever you see people linking to sites, it's 99.9% of the time to NewEgg. And no, nothing's used unless they explicitly say so (if it is, it should say "Refurbished" on it).

To tell you the truth, if you're really willing to put the time into learning how to build, and building it yourself... by all means go for it. If you prefer to have a pre-assembled package, don't bother building. Building requires extra work, but you get a better price and more customizability in the end.
 
Originally posted by: The Pentium Guy
And I don't think that Fry's computer is a good deal. For $1300 you only get 512MB of RAM and an X300. Pretty pathetic deal if you ask me. If you're into prebuilts: www.ibuypower.com for price and www.buyABS.com for service. (ABS = Always Better Service).
Click to expand...


So you really don't think I should go with the Fry's computer? I just built a custom computer on ibuypower.com for $1500 with everything I need. But does ibuypower have good customer support? And how are the warranties? I just hate buying things online because I always worry about returning things.
 
Yeah for sure. If you're playing games don't even bother with the X300 on that fry's computer. Not too sure about ibuypower's warantee or anything like that
 
So what if I wanted to get a Pentium 4 processor? I'm going to be doing a lot of video editing with this system.

What kind of motherboard/CPU would I need to get? (what socket, etc...)
 
The PIV is definitely better at Video Editing (to a point) but a major advantage in going the AMD64 939 motherboard route is the dualcore upgrade path (in six months or a year) which will dominate Intel even in Video Editing (as long as the program is mult-threaded of course).

AMD is about to release dualcore (two cores on one cpu) so six to nine months down the road will no other upgrade needed you could get a second core. If your video editing program is multi-threaded the AMD dualcore will blaze by the Intel dualcore (as of right now)
 
Originally posted by: Chode Messiah
Case-Antec or Lian-li
Motherboard- Msi,DFI,Asus-------nForce4
Power Supply-Antec,Seasonic,OCZ--------380w or higher (also, check for good amps)
Processor-AMD------------------------------------3200+or3500+and up (90nm)
Graphics Card-MSI,eVga,Asus,BFG,xfx---------nVidia 6600 or 6800 series,or ATi (x800 series)
Hard drive-Western Digital,Seagate,IBM----------7200rpm or more(80gb or more)
Optical Drive-Plextor,Samsung,Lite-On-------------DVD+/-RW
Ram-OCZ,Corsair,Crucial,Mushkin-----------pc-3200 or higher(512mb-1gb or higher)

Welcome to AT forums! Enjoy the Computer:thumbsup:
Click to expand...

Hey....Don't forget the VIA K8T890 chipset boards...They're on par withe nForce 4 and they're not expensive...Also, the VIA Northbridge memory controller is also about just as good as the itegrated one....I know I'm going to get me one in my upcoming A64 purchase.
 
Ok.

1st. DO NOT BUY ANYTHING YET!!!!! YOU ARE NOT READY!!!! You have to do a lot more reading and research before you get this right. Newegg is the best online store there is. Period Not always the best prices but for what you are doing I would recommend buying everything from then with some exceptions: I will give you exceptions later.

I have been there and done that. Hope this makes it a little easier.

1. All of the things you will need including cables, screws, etc. (the little stuff) will come with the parts you buy.
A. Screws will come with your case
B. Cables will come with your motherboard and your Hard Drive.
C. More screws and cables will come with your cd/rom or dvd/rom
2. You will need the following that you will have to supply yourself
A. A comfortable phillips screwdriver
B. A good pair of tweezers
C. A magnifying glass
D. A tube of glue stick
E. Plastic cable ties.
F. A flat head screwdriver that has a little length.

If I am missing something I am sure somebody will add it.

Now as to the actual system you are building: Forget you ever heard of the word overclock. Ingore anybody mentioning it yet. It is sometime down the road.

Now to what system to put together:

A little tutorial:

1st thing: THIS WILL ALL BE EASIER IF YOU CAN UNDERSTAND THAT THE COMPUTER IS THE MOTHERBOARD AND EVERYTHING ELSE GETS ATTACHED OR CONNECTED ONE WAY OR ANOTHER TO THE MOTHERBOARD!!!!!

. As technology advances new and better processors are developed. Each generation of processors have physical differences. (The amount of pins that are on them)

The processor gets placed into a socket on the motherboard: Depending on the processors configuration of its pins it can only go into a socket that will fit the processor.

So you have "Socket A", "Socket 478", "Socket 754", Socket "939", etc. (There are many more!!!!)

This is how you get the names of the motherboards: So an Athlon XP chip will fit in a "Socket A Motherboard",

A Pentium 4 will fit on a "Socket 478 motherboard"

The newest generation of AMD motherboards is "Socket 939" So only processors that are socket 939 will fit on this motherboard. These are the newest of the Athlon 64 processors.

The generation before this was the "Socket 754". This was for Athlon 64 processors also.

So you have 2 different groups of Athlon 64 processors: Socket 754 and Socket 939

There are different models of each: They are all fine. Everything depends on your wallet

The generation before was "Socket A" or "Socket 462" Same thing. This encompassed the Athlon XP and plain old Athlon line.

The same goes for Intel (Pentium). I am sure you get the drift.

Now for what parts to get.

The 3 most important variables for what you are buying is the processor, motherboard, and video card. (EVERYTHING ELSE BASICALLY CAN BE THE SAME NO MATTER WHAT YOU BUY)

Now to the video card.

We have just started a new generation of video cards recently.

For years video was either integrated into the motherboard or a video card was attached to a PCI slot (A PCI slot is a place on the motherboard where you can add components) A video card, a modem, a sound card, etc.

Then, around 6 years ago, motherboards started to have a special slot to place a video card. I was called an AGP slot. Accelerated Graphic Performance. This helped make video processing much faster. And the range of quality of video card was great. And improved year after year.

This has been the standard for many years.

Just recently a new form of a video slot was introduced. It is called PCI-Express. It replaces the AGP slot and is now the cutting edge.

If you want to use this new form of video you are going to need a motherboard that has this slot. And of course buy a video card that is a PCI-EXPRESS video card.

I believe, though, that you can only use an Athlon 64 with a Socket 939 board to do this. Remember they all must be compatible. I do not believe there are any Socket 754 boards that have PCI-EXPRESS.

I do not know enough about Intel to tell you what boards have PCI-EXPRESS. You will just have to do that yourself if you want to go with Intel.

Again, How good a vidoe card you want or need depends on your wallet. You will read that the 6600gt is probably the "best bang for the buck" and I can't argue with that.

So:

Motherboard
Processor
Video Card

It seems that going PCI Express is probably the right way to go. Each motherboard has a certain chipset. You will read about Via and N-Force 3 N-Force 4. These are all chipsets. They are the backbone of the motherboard.

Now to the other components:

Ram: Very simple. You want to get 1 gig (2x512) of pc 3200 ddr 400 ram. The most popular is the Corsair Value Ram which you can find for around $80-85 dollars. You will read about super ram, with great timings, with speed up to a billion mhz. Dont get involved. The Corsair Ram will be just fine!!!!

Hard Drive: Seagate Hard drives have a 5 year warranty. The place to buy it is at Outpost. Every other week they run either the 200 gig or the 160 gig with a 50 dollar rebate. Much cheaper than buying it at Newegg.

Now the Optical Drives. The big popular one is the NEC 3200 DVD BURNER. Around 50 at Newegg. But this just depends on what you want. Most work just fine.

Now the Case and Power Supply:

There are many good cases that come with good power supplies. My suggestion is to buy one of them. Read the forums, go to Newegg and read the reviews. Do your homework.
Just know that the most important part to the power supply is the 12v rail. When you see the specs on the power supply you will see this one. The higher the better. After you configure your system ask on the forums what you need on your 12v rail and I am sure you will get the answer from these members.

The motherboard is powered by the power supply with a 20 pin attachment. BUT, I believe, motherboards with PCI-EXPRESS have a 24 pin slot and not a 20 pin slot. You will have to check on this. I might be wrong. It could be something called SLI that need that.

I have 3 suggestions

1. Read
2. Read
3. Read some more

Good luck, Leigh

 
Wow, thanks Leigh, that was really helpful. I'm really glad I found these forums, otherwise I'd be running into walls over here. I'll come up with a system and post it on here just to make sure it's all gonna work out.

Thanks guys.
 
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