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Out of the loop, looking for system recommendations

S

smp

Diamond Member
A friend of mine needs a new computer, this is no gaming rig or high end workstation .. just a good, solid computer that'll do everything a regular user will want and have a decent life cycle. I've been out of the hardware loop for a while now and could use some pointers.

Good P4 chipset?
Good AMD chipset?

What're the current favourites here?

(not an AMD vs P4 thread, if those are still popular .. dunno)
 
budget system .. nothing outlandish.
I just want to get an idea of what the current standards are .. ie, when I got my last computer the nForce2 was a favourite, and a while before then on the AMD side it was the kt133a and even before then was the BX!
You know .. 🙂

Not so worried about budget ATM.
 
Yes, budget is first, then "that people do" or a "regular user will want " doesn;t really help either. My only suggestion at this point is that the AMD (winchester in specific) take less power and produce less heat right now than just about any other chip. Venice will change that soon (the new Athlon64 chip suceeding the winchester)
 
If you're going to buy all new, I would start with a AMD Sempron 2600+ cpu and a socket 754 K8M800 chipset motherboard, maybe a Biostar or Gigabyte board, they're some of the lower priced ones. The price is not too far off from an older socket A nForce2 IGP system with a Sempron 2400+.
 
I just really want to narrow down my options guys .. I'm not entirely new to this I don't need a part by part breakdown .. just an idea of which chips and chipsets are popular right now. I can figure out how many features I want out a given motherboard, video card, case, power supply etc...

I'm just in the dark about what's what these days.
ie, socket 939 vs 754 .. what's on it's way out, what's on it's way in .. on either platform?

And 'regular user' means plenty to me, I'm saying that she's not in a niche computer user segment ie; video, 3D animation, graphics work, gamer etc
You know, a regular user, like the type of computer than an ATer would build for their mom 🙂



 
Originally posted by: cubby1223
If you're going to buy all new, I would start with a AMD Sempron 2600+ cpu and a socket 754 K8M800 chipset motherboard, maybe a Biostar or Gigabyte board, they're some of the lower priced ones. The price is not too far off from an older socket A nForce2 IGP system with a Sempron 2400+.
Click to expand...

Thanks, what about the nForce 3?
Is it possible that the VIA board is better?! It used to be the opposite.
 
I think NF4 is just about as good as you're going to get now. It just came out for 754 solutions too, but there are a lot more options with it if you go 939.

NF3 is good too.

I've looked at the graphs in the CPU/Chipset area several times showing the performance differences and to be honest the Via chipsets looked very competative to me also. I went with a Soltek Via board myself.
 
id say thats a solid system that ribbon reccomended....

Also you can still get a decent Nforce2 board...theyre pretty cheap and reliable
 
Originally posted by: AtaruMoroboshi18
Ribbon, I'm starting to see a pattern in some of your posts...
Click to expand...

Imagine that. 😛 Do you expect the specs of the solid reliable quiet budget computer to change quickly?

"You know, a regular user, like the type of computer than an ATer would build for their mom"
 
Originally posted by: ribbon13
Originally posted by: AtaruMoroboshi18
Ribbon, I'm starting to see a pattern in some of your posts...
Click to expand...

Imagine that. 😛 Do you expect the specs of the solid reliable quiet budget computer to change quickly?

"You know, a regular user, like the type of computer than an ATer would build for their mom"
Click to expand...

update your prices 😛
 
Originally posted by: smp
Originally posted by: cubby1223
If you're going to buy all new, I would start with a AMD Sempron 2600+ cpu and a socket 754 K8M800 chipset motherboard, maybe a Biostar or Gigabyte board, they're some of the lower priced ones. The price is not too far off from an older socket A nForce2 IGP system with a Sempron 2400+.
Click to expand...

Thanks, what about the nForce 3?
Is it possible that the VIA board is better?! It used to be the opposite.
Click to expand...
Pretty much every system I've put together for people over the past two years has been with integrated video. On the Athlon 64 side of things, nVidia does not have any chipsets with integrated video, which is where the K8M800 boards shine. MSI even makes a full ATX board with the K8M800 chipset.

Difference between socket 754 & socket 939 is 754 is single channel memory interface, 939 is dual channel memory interface. They both have good cpu support, so no worries there. Socket 754 does offer a $78 Sempron cpu, versus the cheapest socket 939 cpu is $146.

Then you can see here, with the new Sempron socket 754 cpus, there's almost no reason to consider a Socket A system anymore, the $$ difference is only a couple bucks.
 
For a comparison with Ribbon's machine, here's what my budget build comes out to:

IN WIN MicroATX Mini Tower Case With 300W PSU
NEC 16X Double Layer DVD±RW Drive, Beige, Model ND-3520A
SONY Beige 1.44MB 3.5Inch Floppy Disk Drive
Seagate 80GB 7200RPM IDE Hard Drive, Model ST380011A
Mushkin 184 Pin 256MB DDR PC-3200
BIOSTAR "K8VGAM" VIA K8M800 Socket 754
AMD Sempron 2600+ 1.6GHz, 128KB L2 Cache, Socket 754

$357 shipped @ Newegg
 
Chipsets:

Intel: Intels own 915P or 925X (prefereably the 915) or hold out for 955 and dual core
AMD: Nforce 4 (Dual core upgradeability)
 
Originally posted by: YOyoYOhowsDAjello
Originally posted by: ribbon13
Originally posted by: AtaruMoroboshi18
Ribbon, I'm starting to see a pattern in some of your posts...
Click to expand...

Imagine that. 😛 Do you expect the specs of the solid reliable quiet budget computer to change quickly?

"You know, a regular user, like the type of computer than an ATer would build for their mom"
Click to expand...

update your prices 😛
Click to expand...

Which ones are incorrect except for the burner was off by $2?
 
Originally posted by: ribbon13
Originally posted by: YOyoYOhowsDAjello
Originally posted by: ribbon13
Originally posted by: AtaruMoroboshi18
Ribbon, I'm starting to see a pattern in some of your posts...
Click to expand...

Imagine that. 😛 Do you expect the specs of the solid reliable quiet budget computer to change quickly?

"You know, a regular user, like the type of computer than an ATer would build for their mom"
Click to expand...

update your prices 😛
Click to expand...

Which ones are incorrect except for the burner was off by $2?
Click to expand...

Hardrive is $137 + free 2 day shipping

 
Originally posted by: ssvegeta1010
Chipsets:

Intel: Intels own 915P or 925X (prefereably the 915) or hold out for 955 and dual core
AMD: Nforce 4 (Dual core upgradeability)
Click to expand...

Any Socket 939 compatible chipset should be fine for dual core chips.
 
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