My new build, thanks to Anandtech forum help

[KLC]

I've spent the last several days chewing over Newegg's website, using search functions here at Anandtech and asking several questions. I think I'm ready to order tomorrow. This is for general office/internet use, photoshop for digital photos and video downloading and editing. No gaming.

1. Intel Q6600: already bought for $200 at Microcenter. Thanks again Marc Venice.

2. Western Digital 500 GB SATA drive: already bought at Microcenter for $105

2a. Western Digital 250 GB SATA drive: from old system for clean video downloads.

3. ASUS P5K-E, I need firewire for video downloading

4. Sapphire HD 2600XT good price, 512 mb GDR3, 128 bit

5. 2 x 2gb A Data DDR2 800 RAM great price and one of ASUS's qualified vendors

6. Vista Home Premium 64 to use the full memory.

7. Samsung SATA CD/DVD burner highly rated

8. Antec Sonata III case and 500W PS I didn't consider this since it doesn't have a front panel firewire port, then I found #9

9. internal card reader with USB and firewire ports

10. Dell 22" wide screen monitor not the highest rated but a nice price

I'll go with the stock CPU fan and see how noisy it is and how well it cools. If I need something more I'm thinking of this.

That's it I think. Thanks to everyone on the forums for the help.

 

[chinaman1472]

Seems like a solid build. I think A-DATA is a little lower on the tier rankings for RAM manufacturers but at $63 for 4GB, I'd definitely take it too.

Extra cooling, get an Arctic Freezer 7 Pro.

 

[DSF]

Looks pretty good. If low noise is important to you, you might want to replace the stock Tri-Cool with something quieter.

This fan is incredibly quiet as the exhaust in my Solo:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...185057&Tpk=SY1225SL12L

 

[KLC]

DSF, does that Scythe fan plug into the motherboard for automatic control? One of the things I didn't like about the Sonata II was the manual speed fan, which hasn't changed in the Sonata III.

Thanks for the comments.

 

[Roguestar]

Looks pretty good from here, well researched. :thumbsup:

 

[TheJian]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814127286
8600GT for $10 less than your card and it smokes it by 30%+ in many games. You might not be gaming but who knows what you may end up doing (or who you'd sell the card to down the road perhaps). Why shaft yourself 30%-40% (in most of the games that is, some were ties roughly)?

http://www23.tomshardware.com/...4&model2=854&chart=277

Just bought that card for my sister, BTW toms benchmarks are with the NON Overclocked edition. The card above is the OC model. If you really need 512MB that much get this one:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814127310

Again about $10 cheaper ($20 mail in rebates on both cards).

Check any resolution or game. No point in going home with 30% less performance. I checked 1280x1024 and 1024x768 and the 8600's smoke the 2600. Plus you get DirectX 10 for Vista (since you chose that OS) that is better than ATI/AMD's. Nvidia currently has the best DX10 drivers last I checked. The last page in that article shows avg over all games tested you can extrapolate the 1328+10% to be about 1450 for the 8600GT (256mb) vs the 2600XT's 1061 (512MB). That's an avg FPS of 35% or so faster.

My sister has this 22in (due to newegg reviews):
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16824009102

Check out the 500+ reviews on it, also the model before has over 800 reviews. I'm not bad mouthing Dell, but both of these monitors have 5 EGGS. I own a Dell 24in myself and also a Dell Inspiron 9300 laptop so I'm not a Dell hater (also I'm Dell certified...I'm a PC tech). Just a monitor FYI since I just bought one for sis and the nephew/sis love it.

For the Vidcard just punch in 8600gt at newegg for a complete list. If you want lifetime warranty get XFX. Just make sure you register the card on their website otherwise 1yr! NOTE that the OC edition should be about 8-10% faster. It runs at 580 vs 540 GPU clock and 1600 vs 1400 for memory. So add 10% to toms benches for the 8600GT and look at the 2600 losses. It was a quiet card while running Serious Sam 2 All night (used it for burning in after Prime95 to check out the card before handing it over to sis).

Nice part choices though, just though you might want to know about a few more choices before plunging in. You may not have been aware of the benchmarks since you're looking for an office PC. Good luck.

 

[DSF]

Originally posted by: KLC
DSF, does that Scythe fan plug into the motherboard for automatic control? One of the things I didn't like about the Sonata II was the manual speed fan, which hasn't changed in the Sonata III.

Thanks for the comments.

It plugs into the motherboard, but it's only 3-pin, so there's no speed control. Even running full speed though, the fan is almost completely silent. I say almost because although I can't hear the fan, I don't imagine any fan is totally silent.

 

[KLC]

TheJian, thanks for the info. I'll take a look at the 8600GTs. I was aware of the Acer monitor but hadn't seen that price. I have had 2 previous dell monitors and have been very pleased with them but I'm going to think this over.

 

[Roguestar]

The 8600GT is terrible, the 9600GT is better if that's what you were thinking of.

 

[Magusigne]

Originally posted by: Roguestar
The 8600GT is terrible, the 9600GT is better if that's what you were thinking of.

I agree.

I'm not sure your precise purpose, but right there you'll have a bottleneck on an otherwise superb system. 9600GT or the MSI heatpipe 8800GT @196.

Now if your not doing anything other than playing minesweeper and the occasional w/e game then 8600GT might fit your purposes. I'm just saying there is your bottleneck.

 

[Magusigne]

Originally posted by: Powernick50

Originally posted by: Roguestar
The 8600GT is terrible, the 9600GT is better if that's what you were thinking of.

I agree.

I'm not sure your precise purpose, but right there you'll have a bottleneck on an otherwise superb system. 9600GT or the MSI heatpipe 8800GT @196.

Now if your not doing anything other than playing minesweeper and the occasional w/e game then 8600GT might fit your purposes. I'm just saying there is your bottleneck.

Also Throw on another burner :thumbsup: I love having 2x so I can have one free if I'm doing a 30 minute lightscribe, and hey, there only 30 bucks.

Well...That was supposed to be an edit...not a reply...lol but hey w/e

 

[KLC]

I'm running into a little glitch. I did a little more investigation and that internal card reader/firewire port is apparently a piece of junk. I can't find a good card reader with firewire port so I may ditch the Sonata III and get an Antec Solo with PS.

If anyone knows of a quality card reader that has a firewire port I'd appreciate it. The two I've found have lots of negative reviews.

Thanks again for the comments, I'm considering everything before I buy.

 

[Magusigne]

Can You afford to go off your budget a bit for the Video card or are you looking to spend under 100 or ?

 

[KLC]

I can afford to but I don't know if I need to. I'm not going to do games on this, mostly photoshop and video editing. I have read a few photo forums that say 512 memory helps so that was my first criterion. After that it was reliability and current technology, but not the newest tech.

I know there are better cards out there but that gets into more power draw, more heat, more cooling, possibly more noise. Is that a good assumption?

 

[Magusigne]

Originally posted by: KLC
I can afford to but I don't know if I need to. I'm not going to do games on this, mostly photoshop and video editing. I have read a few photo forums that say 512 memory helps so that was my first criterion. After that it was reliability and current technology, but not the newest tech.

I know there are better cards out there but that gets into more power draw, more heat, more cooling, possibly more noise. Is that a good assumption?

That is a very good assumption. However alot of the older cards (I'm not knowledgeable enough to know) will draw ALOT more power and produce more heat. Quite a few of the ATI cards are power hogs (not sure about these ones).

So if your not really gaming then yes your current choice would do fine. My Personal Opinion however would be buying an XfX 9600 and then when you decide to upgrade you could sell it for quite a little bit compared to an older card with a non transferrable warranty.

In all honesty your graphics card choice should work for your purposes, you could probably spend less if you wanted too.

Lets see what some other people say. (I do say for 30 more dollars get another burner though)

 

[KLC]

After doing some reading and thinking I've decided to get the EVGA 9600GT

I also dropped the Sonata III because of not finding a good firewire solution. I ordered the Antec Sonata Plus 550 from Amazon, $150 with free delivery, although it is out of stock right now, I'll see how soon it's available. So, the reviews say it is a long card and Antec reviews talk about the snug space inside. Does anyone know if I'll have trouble fitting this card in?

 

[chinaman1472]

You shouldn't. I have a mid-size ATX tower and had no problems fitting a 8800GT. I had to rearrange the hard drives and put one above the card and one below the card. Unless you plan on running 3+ hard drives in the case, it shouldn't be an issue. No manufacturer is going to design cases now that won't allow you to fit new generation video cards.

It'll be a little tight, but it's doable.

 

[Roguestar]

Originally posted by: KLC
After doing some reading and thinking I've decided to get the EVGA 9600GT

Good decision.

 

[TheJian]

Perhaps you a Roguestar should read his "precise purpose" which was in his post:
"'I've spent the last several days chewing over Newegg's website, using search functions here at Anandtech and asking several questions. I think I'm ready to order tomorrow. This is for general office/internet use, photoshop for digital photos and video downloading and editing. No gaming."

NO GAMING. Just an office/Internet PC does not require 9600GT which is roughly $100 more than the card I recommended. The cheapest 9600GT is $170 after rebate. The XFX card (while yes a transferable warranty, I mentioned XFX before for lifetime wrty) is $186. That's $110 more than what I recommended. IF he has picked a 2600XT after doing homework a card that avg's 30%+ more fps in gaming (when gaming isn't part of his equation anyway) should be MORE than adequate. Besides with video/photo editing in mind his money would be FAR better spent on 8GB and a $50 heatsink to overclock that quad! A tuniq tower would be great and quiet. Both Photoshop and Premier will take all the memory you can throw at them.

The video card is a waste when looking at his "precise purpose". Do you buy a video card hoping for resale value when you're never going to use it's power? Or do you double your ram/get a good heatsink for overclocking a quadcore when you can get BOTH of these benefits for yourself the entire time you own the PC? Ask any photoshop/premier user what they think of 4GB vs. 8GB Here's an example:
http://www.planetamd64.com/index.php?showtopic=35114
A quick search at google turns up more, but read SCSIraidGURU's post. Runs out of 8GB+page file quick on a quad in Vegas Video/Photoshop CS2 with a few other apps.

"SOME QUESTIONS and ANSWERS
Some of you asked about "GPU awareness." Does Photoshop CS3 "hand off" rendering to the graphics card and will you gain speed if you have a fast graphics card with lots of VRAM? Not at this time. Though I'm sure Adobe is experimenting with this, the current CS3 beta relies strictly on CPU for rendering effects." Also note "Photoshop is a memory hungry application. We recommend at least 4GB if you plan to use Photoshop. If you run other apps simultaneously, you'll want to get 8GB." both from same article.
That's from: http://www.barefeats.com/quad16.html

Also check out:http://xlr8yourmac.com/G5/8GB_.../G5_8GB_ram_tests.html
Here you can see huge performance gains between 2gb to 4gb with 8gb not getting much. But this was with photoshop v7 and only dual core. Imagine feeding a Quad and using photoshop CS3 (3 full revs later). I could go on and on but I think I've made my point. GPU's don't mean squat in PS CS3 so far and memory/cpu's mean a ton more performance.

 

[TheJian]

See my post to powernick50. Save your money on the card. I'd also say (regarding the mentioned post) ignore the 8GB of ram if you only run one app at a time. But if you're a multitasker go for 8GB. I have 6GB. With 2GB things sucked. Added the Adata kit you have (but on a Gigabyte P35-DS3R) and things a smooth all over. I run vm's though so it's easy use up the memory. At the price they're at now (I paid $85) I should go for another pair and dump my 2GB on my dad

I didn't know how much you had for a budget. Of course if a few hundred means nothing to you get memory and a card...ROFL. Note you can toss in the heatsink any time later when you think your machine is slow. Pop one on and overclock the dickens out of your quad. It should do 3.2ghz on the retail as it is though. Most hit >3.4 last I checked.

 

[DSF]

I agree that while the 9600GT looks to be a good card, it doesn't suit your needs.

 

[KLC]

The final system is still in flux, I really am paying attention to everything that's been said. Even contradicting advice is still good, it gives me a starting point. I hope to have everything in place by Friday.

Thanks again to everyone for taking the time to comment.

 

[TheJian]

Agreed on advice. You're not going to go wrong with anything you've got in your list. Know that! It's just a matter of price. For your purpose everything discussed so far is great (by all posters). I guess I'm just used to people always telling me to cut costs so when I saw the card in your post I aimed to beat it performance wise and keep costs the same or better. Blame it on owning a PC business for 8 yrs...LOL. But your original post was fine (except your findings on the Firewire problem part). I'm just used to hearing bang/buck from everyone.

Regarding firewire, have you thought of an extender cable to bring it out front? Card readers can be had for $6. Then again changing the case solves it too (but not the card reader). I have an extender for my audio because I use an audigy2. It's a bit messy but I didn't buy the audigy2 drive at the time. I sure miss my old livedrive.

 

[KLC]

First, thanks again to everyone for taking the time to comment. After considering what I really need here is the final system, except for the monitor...

Intel Q6600

Asus P5K-E

Western Digital 500gb SATA HD

A Data DDR2 800 2x2 GB RAM

Vista Home Premium 32: I know it won't access the full 4 gb but the bigger sticks seemed to be the best value. I dropped the 64 for two reasons. First I rarely multitask, second I was given an OEM copy of 32 from a friend who opened the package and then changed his mind about building his own system.

EVGA 8600GT 512 mb GDDR3 Given my needs I decided this was a good price, good product, good brand.

Samsung DVD

internal card reader

Antec Sonata Solo 550 Firewire on front, quiet, 550W Neo PS.

 

[TheJian]

Check the EVGA, if memory serves it's a 2yr warranty. XFX is lifetime transferable to whoever you sell it to later. You just have to register within 30 days of purchase on their site. To transfer later the buyer has to do the same (or something like that...I only sell them to the first buyer so I never read that far...rofl).

Also with regards to the free Vista: While I'm not a fan of Vista, I like XP, speedy/reliable/secure with a ZA firewall/router and it just got about 10% faster with SP3, but I dual boot my main PC w/vista/xp...SCORE dude. FREE is the best way to get vista. Especially since you'll probably downgrade to XP...LOL No I'm not a total vista hater, just a lot of customers ask how to get rid of it. But when it's free who cares I guess.