Rebuilding an existing PC, need some advice......

[Xcellere]

Hey everyone, I've been out of the PC hardware scene for about six months now, so I need some advice. My mother is the accountant for our company, and I built her a PC about a year ago (Asus K8V SE Deluxe, A64 3200, a gig of value RAM, a Seagate Barracuda, and a generic PSU.) The HD recently died and now we have to recover all our accounting info on it.

So, I'm going to switch out a few components, namely the PSU, motherboard, and the hard drive (I want two hard drives, one as an OS drive and one as a backup). What are reliable, long lasting components to handle this? I'm thinking an OCZ PSU, and not sure about the mobo or HDs. Also, integrated video is fine being they don't do anything graphics intensive.

 

[Fern]

I like Fortron and Enermax. PCP&C are very good from what I read etc. Just too expensive for me.

Why not do a Raid 1 setup? Just splitting the OS & proggies from data doesn't do much to protect against a failing HDD.

Can't help on the mobo thingy

Fern

 

[Xcellere]

I was thinking about RAID 1, but I only need a few small files (Quicken files) backed up, so there's no need really to backup everything that goes through the OS on the main drive.

 

[Kernel32]

save your money on a 2nd hard drive and just buy a cd or dvd burner to backup the Quicken files.

 

[Xcellere]

Can someone give specific products?

 

[phaxmohdem]

If you want the best reliability go SCSI. IF you want normal low cost HDD's that are reliable, I'd suggest Seagate or Western Digital.

How large a hard drive(s) are you wanting? and also why do you want to switch the mobo?

 

[Xcellere]

The hard drive can be very small, like 70GB.

 

[phaxmohdem]

I've had very good luck with this particular model of HDD: WD800JB

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822144122

Cheap to. If you don't need much space for a back up drive, just find a 20GB drive or something. Again... Why the mobo switch? Is something wrong with it?

 

[Xcellere]

I guess I'll stick with it. The computer fails to start nine times out of ten, so I'm hoping it's the PSU causing at. Which PSU would be the best? I've heard bad things in the past about Enermax.

 

[Xcellere]

Anyone? Which PSU?

 

[biostud]

Seasonic S-12 380W lowest noise, reliable, high efficiency.