My proposed rig? any comments? advide V. Welcome

[soulflyfan]

I'm building a new rig over the summer, my athlon xp 2400, radeon 9600 pro, 512MB of ram is a cheap peice of pants, and loves nothing more than crashing and corrupting. I've listed the specs of my propposed rig below, and would like any advide on good buys and ways to improve. i'll be keeping my monitor, optical drives, floppy, mouse and keyboard

Athlon 64 3200+ 1 mb cache S754
MSI K8T800 neo Motherboard
2 x 512 MB corsair PC3200 cas 2.5
Thermaltake Venus 12
Thermaltake Xaser III supertower case (black with window)
Antec smartpower 400 watt PSU
Sapphire Radeon 9800 pro 128mb
Seagate barracuda 120GB 7200 rpm 8Mb cache
Creative inspire p380 2.1 speaker system

It all weighs in at around £850 (GBP)

So what do you think? any room for improvement, any flaws, anyone had probs with any of the hardware?

 

[myocardia]

No, no, no! Do not buy either Corsair or Kingston's value ram. If you want either of those two brands, get the Corsair XMS or the Kingston HyperX. And you probably should just get an Antec case. Most come with a power supply (an Antec psu, of course), and they have excellent cooling. Mine has two 120mm fans and a removable hd cage that sits directly in front of the intake 120mm. No hard-drives failing because of heat, that's for sure! Everything else looks like it will be an awesome system though.

 

[BoomAM]

Originally posted by: soulflyfan
I'm building a new rig over the summer, my athlon xp 2400, radeon 9600 pro, 512MB of ram is a cheap peice of pants, and loves nothing more than crashing and corrupting. I've listed the specs of my propposed rig below, and would like any advide on good buys and ways to improve. i'll be keeping my monitor, optical drives, floppy, mouse and keyboard

Theres nout wrong with your system, apart from the video card, its better than mine, and mine plays every game out in high res.
You might want to wait a few months till 939 hits retail.

Athlon 64 3200+ 1 mb cache S754
MSI K8T800 neo Motherboard

Not a bad combo, but as above, wait till 939.

2 x 512 MB corsair PC3200 cas 2.5

Despite what the other guy said, its good memory, if you dont tweak or OC at all. Its from a good manufactuer, so the supports there, but dont expect good OCing results out of it.

Thermaltake Venus 12

I`d go for a ThermalRight solution myself.

Thermaltake Xaser III supertower case (black with window)

Yet again, despite what the other guy said, this is basically a Antec case, just with a different Facia. If it comes with a Thermaltake PSU, then its a pretty good PSU anyway.

Antec smartpower 400 watt PSU

I think you mean "TruePower", and its probably a 430W PSU, unless Antec have got another range out recently.

Sapphire Radeon 9800 pro 128mb

I`d wait a bit for the vid to be honest, R42x isnt far off, and the 9800s will probably take a price dive because of it.

Seagate barracuda 120GB 7200 rpm 8Mb cache

A good, quite drive. Good choice, you might want to consider a second drive, 60gb+, for Windows and data, and have the 120gb for backups and games. Dont forget to make a few partitions on each drive as well.

Creative inspire p380 2.1 speaker system

Does the MSI Mobo have onboard sound? If not you`ll need to buy a Sound Card as well.
Not bad speakers, but get some Logitech ones intead, i think their cheaper and better.

 

[Gagabiji]

Originally posted by: BoomAM

Originally posted by: soulflyfan
I'm building a new rig over the summer, my athlon xp 2400, radeon 9600 pro, 512MB of ram is a cheap peice of pants, and loves nothing more than crashing and corrupting. I've listed the specs of my propposed rig below, and would like any advide on good buys and ways to improve. i'll be keeping my monitor, optical drives, floppy, mouse and keyboard

Theres nout wrong with your system, apart from the video card, its better than mine, and mine plays every game out in high res.
You might want to wait a few months till 939 hits retail.

Athlon 64 3200+ 1 mb cache S754
MSI K8T800 neo Motherboard

Not a bad combo, but as above, wait till 939.

2 x 512 MB corsair PC3200 cas 2.5

Despite what the other guy said, its good memory, if you dont tweak or OC at all. Its from a good manufactuer, so the supports there, but dont expect good OCing results out of it.

Thermaltake Venus 12

I`d go for a ThermalRight solution myself.

Thermaltake Xaser III supertower case (black with window)

Yet again, despite what the other guy said, this is basically a Antec case, just with a different Facia. If it comes with a Thermaltake PSU, then its a pretty good PSU anyway.

Antec smartpower 400 watt PSU

I think you mean "TruePower", and its probably a 430W PSU, unless Antec have got another range out recently.

Sapphire Radeon 9800 pro 128mb

I`d wait a bit for the vid to be honest, R42x isnt far off, and the 9800s will probably take a price dive because of it.

Seagate barracuda 120GB 7200 rpm 8Mb cache

A good, quite drive. Good choice, you might want to consider a second drive, 60gb+, for Windows and data, and have the 120gb for backups and games. Dont forget to make a few partitions on each drive as well.

Creative inspire p380 2.1 speaker system

Does the MSI Mobo have onboard sound? If not you`ll need to buy a Sound Card as well.
Not bad speakers, but get some Logitech ones intead, i think their cheaper and better.

Darn you BoomAM! I was going to tell him about 939! 😉

 

[InlineFive]

Originally posted by: BoomAM

Seagate barracuda 120GB 7200 rpm 8Mb cache
A good, quite drive. Good choice, you might want to consider a second drive, 60gb+, for Windows and data, and have the 120gb for backups and games. Dont forget to make a few partitions on each drive as well.

Erm, why would he want to do this? The only instance where getting a second drive is useful is if you (1) need lots of storage space or (2) have a tiny Raptor as your boot drive. If you wanted to keep partitions for Windows and Data seperate just make a small 6GB (or so) partition on the 60GB drive for Windows and the Paging File and save the money for something else.

-Por

 

[soulflyfan]

Thanks for the quick reply guys. the motherboard does have onboard sound, and the power supply is the solution series SL400 from antec. would it be worth getting a lower watt true power solution. The Xaser 3 is going for £72 with no psu, and the psu about £50

Thanx

 

[BoomAM]

Originally posted by: PorBleemo

Originally posted by: BoomAM

Seagate barracuda 120GB 7200 rpm 8Mb cache
A good, quite drive. Good choice, you might want to consider a second drive, 60gb+, for Windows and data, and have the 120gb for backups and games. Dont forget to make a few partitions on each drive as well.

Erm, why would he want to do this? The only instance where getting a second drive is useful is if you (1) need lots of storage space or (2) have a tiny Raptor as your boot drive. If you wanted to keep partitions for Windows and Data seperate just make a small 6GB (or so) partition on the 60GB drive for Windows and the Paging File and save the money for something else.

-Por

Data security.
If you need to reinstall windows, or C: gets infected by a virus, or your windows drive fails, you dont have to worry about your data as it`ll be stored away on a completly seperate drive. Which can also hold the swap file.

 

[InlineFive]

Originally posted by: BoomAM

Originally posted by: PorBleemo

Originally posted by: BoomAM

Seagate barracuda 120GB 7200 rpm 8Mb cache
A good, quite drive. Good choice, you might want to consider a second drive, 60gb+, for Windows and data, and have the 120gb for backups and games. Dont forget to make a few partitions on each drive as well.

Erm, why would he want to do this? The only instance where getting a second drive is useful is if you (1) need lots of storage space or (2) have a tiny Raptor as your boot drive. If you wanted to keep partitions for Windows and Data seperate just make a small 6GB (or so) partition on the 60GB drive for Windows and the Paging File and save the money for something else.

-Por

Data security.
If you need to reinstall windows, or C: gets infected by a virus, or your windows drive fails, you dont have to worry about your data as it`ll be stored away on a completly seperate drive. Which can also hold the swap file.

Partitions can do this for a whole lot cheaper.

-Por

 

[soulflyfan]

ok guys, to clear up, i'll likely salvage my current 40GB 5600rpm Baraccuda for backup, as its pretty much silent and is in pretty good condition

 

[BoomAM]

Originally posted by: PorBleemo
Partitions can do this for a whole lot cheaper.

-Por

You`ve misread my post, either that or magical hard drives are now in existance.
If the HD fails, it doesnt matter how many partitions you have, you`ll lose the data. Hence why a second drive will be safer to store your data.

 

[BoomAM]

Originally posted by: soulflyfan
ok guys, to clear up, i'll likely salvage my current 40GB 5600rpm Baraccuda for backup, as its pretty much silent and is in pretty good condition

It`ll be 5400RPM.
And it`ll be fine as a secondary drive for backups.

 

[caz67]

Go for it, you can't win, playing the waiting game.

 

[Cerb]

I'd go to a different case & PSU. Antec combo (Sonata...?), maybe.
Zalman or Thermalright heatsink
For gaming, get a sound card.
Audigy2 ZS, FI.
If you're going for CAS 2.5 RAM, go cheap. Otherwise, get nice RAM (unless where you are, the Corsair is dirt cheap).

Don't wait for 939. It's safe wait for video cards, as Nvidia is starting to send out production chips, and manufacturers are saying less than a month to stores (if you'll have enough of a budget for new cards), but socket 939 isn't worth waiting for.