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if hindsight is 20/20 : what would you have done different on your new system?

X

xSauronx

Lifer
topic says it all
as for me, i would have gotten the radeon 8500 128, instead of the 64; with a tv out just in case. i think itd last me longer than my 64 will, prolly sell this soon and get the 128mb
and i shoulda shopped around for my mobo a little more, prolly coulda had it for a little bit less
and shoulda bought pc2700 instad of 2100, so i wouldnt have to oc my ram, not that its giving me a problem, but for a few bucks i should have gone for it
and shoulda checked hot deals a couple more times for a hard drive, tho mine isnt bad


so, new systems are getting built around here every day, what would you guys have done different after having yours a few weeks. what do you think you did wrong, and what could you have done even better?
 
i'd have gone scsi earlier and bought 4 drives instead of 1 and a raid controller as well


and i would have gone dual instead of uni processor😉
 
Nothing really, I shopped around and got great deals on nice components and everything runs fine 😀
Ok one thing, My case an antec sx1040 type case (actually made by chenming which I got it from w/ a window for dirt cheap a while back) came w/ a 400 watt psu too. Pretty loud fans but it works great and got it practically free 🙂 I think I might buy a quieter psu soon, it's not too bad.
 
I wouldnt have bought my video card at best buy. (I payed $150 for a ti200 in june). But BB made up for it thanks to that spanking hot ti4200 deal.

-brian
 
I would have not gone the PC-1066 RAMBUS with my P4 because now when I upgrade to Athlon XP-2800+ I will need to but DDR
 
I would have gotten a better operating system I HATE WIN2K PRO. I also would have gotten another seagate drive, instead of getting a seagate and a wd, because the wd one makes too much noise. Also I think that I would have gotten a scsi drive to put my os and some games on because that would speed up loading times. Also if I could have afforded it I would have gotten a 21" monitor.
 
I bought by Athlon system right before DDR became mainstream. I got
a KT133A chipset with SDRAM. I would have waited a month and got an AMD 760
board with DDR if I could do it over.....
 
Ive always done alot of research into the products before I purchase them, and then I get it at a good price point. Im very pleased with my current rig. I learned from my older systems not to buy cheapo parts, so all the things I should have done I did with what I have now. I just wish I had enough cash for a Sony 24" CRT.
 
In general.
A better case. Forget the cheapos for $30.
Less money on a high end video care I didn't need.
Better fan/heatsink...definitely copper or copper core. Quiet.
Too much emphasis on high wattage power supplies. Quality is better. Heavier the better in general.
Some people just don't need a big hard drive.
Don't scrimp on the DVD rom drive or CD-ROM or RW drive. Get a lite-on if you are on a budget. Not Benq, Acer, optorite, Polaroid
etc. Best is Plextor, TDK, Teac, Sanyo.
Get a laser mouse.
Get a good monitor...after all it's what you have to stare at.
Never buy the high end processors. Too much price premium.
Get a big case. Mid or full. Cool better and easier to work on.
Buy a cheap modem. Your probably gonna use broadband anyway.
Onboard LAN is great. Get it if you can.
Onboard sound usually sucks except for nForce. You're better off with a $30 Ensoniq 1370 sound card.
Flat, planar speakers have no depth.
Always get a satellite (not planars) /sub if you want to listen to music. Running it through your stereo is a great idea.

Mac
 
No regrets really. Maybe wish I held out for awhile and waited for the ATI 9700 instead of buying the Ti4600, but eh, thats the way it goes.
 
woulda (shoulda) bought PC2700 instead of PC2100
Shoulda gotten 350W or even 400W instead of 300W (it's still going strong, but, I think it's getting stressed at times)
woulda gone with a smaller case (I love my case, but carrying it to LAN parties is killing my back

otherwise, I'm completely happy with my system 😀
 
Would have gotten a P4B533 instead of a P4S533 - only for the sake of PCI/AGP lock.

Would have shopped elsewhere for RAM. I got all my parts from directron.com, but their RAM selection is quite poor relative to newegg, etc. Would have gone for PC2700 C2 ram from a good vendor rather than 2.5 CAS generic brand stuff.

Other than that, I'm a pretty happy camper. Fong Kai 320 is a great case, and I don't anticipate replacing PSU / fans for noise reduction any time soon, despite my initial plans. Waiting a few months to upgrade from onboard audio was a good decision (well, I was just penny-pinching at the time). Just a few minutes ago, I ordered an Audigy 2 plus Logitech Z-640 5.1 speakers, neither of which was available at the time I put my system together (I think - if they were available, I'm sure the prices were higher at the time).
 
I would have gone to a SCSI primary drive with an IDE storage drive. I miss my old scsi rig and 10 second boots with the X15 cheetah...
 
*might* have gone with a northy instead of a palomino, but its still fast, and the northy woulda been a lot more $$.

probably would have gone with a less expensive HSF (say an AX-7)

neither of those were out at the time, though. and its kinda nice having a pound and a half of HSF on your processor
 
I would have saved up a little more and gotten the 3 drives needed for a RAID 5 (or is it RAID 0+1?)setup instead of a RAID 0. Think that's about it. My main system is perfect as it is.😀
 
I try to learn from past experiences.....
These will be in the system I am building in a month or so
A raid motherboard and use it to install 4 more IDE
A higher quality monitor, which is the main interaction I have my the computer
An all in one video card
 
I would have gone with a dual cpu board for the increased PCI (64 bit/66MHz) bandwidth, and bought 4 Cuda IVs (when they were selling for like $80 at NewEgg) so I could run them in RAID 5.

-Mike
 
Should have stayed away from from Via and creative stuff, oh, not forgetting the notorious crap 2d of nvidia cards I have.
 
I think I would buy mid range video cards and not splurge.

Oh tdk doesn't make their own cdr burners macro2
from cdr labs
"the latest addition to TDK's CD-RW drive lineup are based on the LTR-40125S from Lite-On"

so, not to be rude but they are not better than lite-on, they are more expensive because they have a pretty faceplate and tray. Of course since lite-on makes them they are good too.
 
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