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Haven't built in YEARS... help w/decisions

L

LanceM

Senior member
I haven't put together a PC in ages... it's been closer to a decade than I'd like to admit. Therefore, I need some AT opinions. Heck, maybe I completely got something wrong. I wouldn't be shocked.

Anyway, here goes.

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Thermaltake Dream Tower
Thermaltake W0022 Purepower Butterfly ATX 12V 480W
MSI K8N NEO4 Platinum nf4U
AMD Athlon64 3500+ 939 with a Thermaltake A1772
Mitsumi Floppy 7-in-1
SAMSUNG 120GB SATA (haven't heard anything bad about it... yet. And it's cheap!)
Corsair Value Select 184 Pin 512MBx2 DDR PC-3200
Likely a 6800 vanilla...either Leadtek or MSI 256 PCI-E
And some random, on-sale DVD drive
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How does it sound? If you suggest something like a 6800GT or an SLI board, something else has gotta go... my budget basically allows for this setup and nothing more. So basically if one higher price component goes in, another has to become cheaper.

Anyway, are there any comments on noise, heat, speed, incompatibilities, etc.?

A sincere thanks to anyone that helps out, or even to those that simply don't bash. 🙂
 
my only advice would be to get a winchester (939) of your cpu
the winchester uses a 90nm core, while newcastle and clawhammer use a 120nm core
 
besides suggestion of 3200 winchester with the 6800GT,
replace motherboard for $50 cheaper.

you picked neo4plat U with one pci-e slot so i'm assuming you're not going for SLI upgrade route.

look at the chaintech or ecs version of the nf4-u 939 boards.
 
>> bump down to a 3200 and used the saved cash for a 6800GT

Or go the other direction:

If you play games at 1024x768 instead of something higher, you could drop down to a 6600GT and either spend the extra now or set it aside for upgrading the graphics card next year.
 
Thanks.

Yep, I'm watching some Winchesters. Probably will stay with the 3500 unless a ton others tell me to switch (I'll have to check if dropping to a 3200 will offer me enough for a decent GT). I've been searching the motherboard forum like crazy for thoughts on boards, but many of the posts are either A) more questions or B) several months old before many people had them. Oh well! At least I've caught up on many, many years of hardware. Still a ton to relearn, though.

To DaveSimmons: I'll probably be running at 1280x1024 all the time.

Thanks again!
 
>> To DaveSimmons: I'll probably be running at 1280x1024 all the time.

Then you definitely want at least a plain 6800, and the 6800GT would offer some future-proofing for when companies start to push the Doom3/HL2 game engines. The 3500+ is also a good idea to keep the 6800 fully fed.

In your place I'd save up an extra month or two if necessary to do it right and not have to cut back the video or CPU. You've already gotten the benefit of AMD's price cut, but if you wait a little the PCI-E 6800GT prices might drop a bit too.
 
Haha, yeah... I'm trying hard to wait. 🙂 Just seems like everything on my old home PC (from good ol' y2k) keeps falling apart, and it's costing me $50-100 here and there to fix it every so often (just replaced the ram the other week).

I'm certainly looking for price cuts, though. Maybe I'll sell something on eBay... I'm sure I've got some extra junk around here somewhere!

EDIT: And nothin' sayin' I HAVE to play at the best quality all the time. I just want to run well enough at 1280x1024 for my Samsung 710T.
 
Winchester, baby! Lower power consumption and easier to cool. (That's what I would use if I was building a new system from scratch today.)
 
drop down to a 3200+ and get the 6800GT, it will perform better and there will be little to no difference in the 3200+ than the 3500+ when u overclock it
 
I'd look at a case that has dual 120mm fans. for better cooling & less noise ie.
Compucase LX6A19 $40
Chenbro GameBomb 2 $200
GlobalWin YCC-61-f1 $140
CM STacker $180

Also I'd get a better power supply. ie Sparkle, Antec, Enermax, PC Power & Cooling or Zippy. in the single rail 480w range.

As far as NF4 Ultra mobo's there's the DFI Ultra-D (have one no problem), Chaintech VNF4 (getting one next week), Asus A8N-E(next week).

You'd probably be fine w/ the retail heatsink that comes w/ the 3500+ retail cpu..

As for a dvd writer I'd get the NEC3520a for $61 .

Regards,
Jose
 
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