My Dream system specs, well sorta:-)

[Locut0s]

Ok so I'm just dreaming here. I say sorta in the subject cause I'm actually thinking of building this system, I just don't know where I'm going to get the money, I only have about $1000 at the moment and right now I don't have a source of income, well ok $20 a week alowance. I've been mapping out my next system for a while now and here is the conclusion I've come to:

Athlon XP 1900+
Soyo SY-K7V Dragon Plus! Mobo
512 - 1 Gig RAM Maybe more given how cheap ram is now.
4 - 5 x WD 100 Gig 7200 RPM Thats 400-500 Gigs!!
Gainward CARDEXPERT GeForce3 PowerPack
Sound Blaster Audigy Platinum EX, yeah I know about the Soyo onboard sound but when your dreaming
Cambridge Soundworks MegaWorks 510D(not out yet) or Klipsch Promedia 5.1
Sony CPD-G500 21" monitor
NIC card

The reason for the extra NIC card, in adition to the integrated one, is that I'm sharing my cable modem connetion now. I suppose I could get a hardware router and ditch the extra NIC but that would only push the cost of the system higher. I really like the Soyo boards ability to run the RAID IDE channels as either RAID or normal Ultra IDE. I would probably go with normal IDE, since I have little experience with RAID and I do not really need the security that RAID 1 offers. Just think of it, if you had the money this baby could potentially allow you to outfit your system with upwards of 1000 Gigs, that a TERABYTE!!! And thats assuming you have a CD-ROM or something.

 

[Locut0s]

Oh yeah I forgot, if ATI can get their drivers up to par with Nvidia then I might go with the ATI 8500DV All-in-Wonder Radeon card. And from the looks of their recent driver releases they are on their way.

 

[AMDPwred]

Hehe, by the time you saved up enough for that setup a whole new line of top end products would be out

 

[Alex]

locotos:

ya can have only 4 ide devices unless theyre in raid...

so if ya ahd 4x wd hd then do cdrom, burner, dvd etc?

 

[DN]

Well, out of that pile of stuff, I have the Audigy X-Gamer sound card (I love it), Western Digital 100Gb ATA100 7200 rpm hard drive (I love it) and Sony CPD-G500 21" .24 2048x1536 monitor (I love it).. However, I'd suggest either the Cambridge SoundWorks DeskTop Theatre 5.1 3500 (DTT3500) (I have these and yes, again, I love it) or the Creative Inspire 5.1 Digital 5700 (Inspire 5700) instead.. There's a good comparion between both here.. You can also check out this site for a lot of good information on all sorts of audio related hardware..

 

[Guilty]

<< locotos: ya can have only 4 ide devices unless theyre in raid... so if ya ahd 4x wd hd then do cdrom, burner, dvd etc? >>



This isn't true, as Locut0s said the RAID controller can act as regular ATA100 channels, so it's 8 ATA devices. Second, every integrated RAID controller I've encountered can do this, the A7V*'s Promose, the Abit KT*'s HighPoint, don't buy the Dragon based on this.

 

[Locut0s]

<< Hehe, by the time you saved up enough for that setup a whole new line of top end products would be out >>



That's probably true But the beauty of it is the price won't change too much a top of the line system now costs about as much as a top of the line system 10 years ago.

 

[Locut0s]

<< I'd suggest either the Cambridge SoundWorks DeskTop Theatre 5.1 3500 (DTT3500) (I have these and yes, again, I love it) or the Creative Inspire 5.1 Digital 5700 (Inspire 5700) instead >>



I already have the SoundWorks DeskTop Theater 5.1 2500 (DTT2500) so there isn't much point in upgrading to the 3500. The link you posted for the comparison review seems to be broken. And the other link, I know about that site, infact that's where I read about the MegaWorks 510D. The 510D is supposed to be CS's answer to the higher end market and is supposed to replace the SoundWorks Desktop Theater line, from the preview it looks poised to be a killer system, only time will tell. As for the Inspire I'm looking at the site now:

Subwoofer Power: 30 watts RMS
Satellite Power: 7 watts RMS per channel (4 channels)

Whereas the 510D is suposed to have the following:

Subwoofer: 150 watts RMS
Satellites: 60 watts RMS x 5

Here is the preview of the 510D:

http://www.3dss.com/reviews/MegaWorks/MegaWorks.html