Seeking advice on new computer

[Duke777]

Well I finally decided to upgrade my old (really really old) computer. Due to some real life changes I no longer need a computer a two different places but just at one place 😉

Anyway... I currently have a P2-233, 384MB SDRam, onboard sound, VooDoo3 PCI etc. so I really can't play a lot of games anymore right now (and I am mostly a gamer, do programming too).

I was thinking about buying:

Athlon XP 1600
512 MB DDR Ram
60 GB Harddisk (can always buy another 60 GB one if needed)

Will keep my: 17'' inch screen, keyboard, mouse and zip-drive from the old computer.

What I am unsure about as of yet:

Motherboard+Casing+Cooling combo. From what I've read so far the Athlon XP needs some hefty cooling right? KT266 is the motherboard to go with? If anyone could give me some a list of good motherboards to get --> 🙂

Geforce2 vs Geforce3 Ti200: Should I go for a cheap GeForce2 (MX-400 for example) and upgrade to GeForce3 when the prices drop? Or should I go straight for the Ti200 (Ti500 is just too expensive).

SB Live! (OEM) vs SB Live! (Retail). OEM is 40% of the Retail's one price... should I go with OEM there?

CD R/RW. I am looking for write speed mainly and I had some bad experiences with CD R that refused to read some (burned) cd's. So if anyone could tell me one that does both well...

As you can probably see I am on bit of a budget (not too much though *hehe*). Oh and I live in Europe so prices may differ a bit from those in the USA.

Thanks in advance

 

[Daovonnaex]

<< Well I finally decided to upgrade my old (really really old) computer. Due to some real life changes I no longer need a computer a two different places but just at one place 😉

Anyway... I currently have a P2-233, 384MB SDRam, onboard sound, VooDoo3 PCI etc. so I really can't play a lot of games anymore right now (and I am mostly a gamer, do programming too).

I was thinking about buying:

Athlon XP 1600
512 MB DDR Ram
60 GB Harddisk (can always buy another 60 GB one if needed)

Will keep my: 17'' inch screen, keyboard, mouse and zip-drive from the old computer.

What I am unsure about as of yet:

Motherboard+Casing+Cooling combo. From what I've read so far the Athlon XP needs some hefty cooling right? KT266 is the motherboard to go with? If anyone could give me some a list of good motherboards to get --> 🙂

Geforce2 vs Geforce3 Ti200: Should I go for a cheap GeForce2 (MX-400 for example) and upgrade to GeForce3 when the prices drop? Or should I go straight for the Ti200 (Ti500 is just too expensive).

SB Live! (OEM) vs SB Live! (Retail). OEM is 40% of the Retail's one price... should I go with OEM there?

CD R/RW. I am looking for write speed mainly and I had some bad experiences with CD R that refused to read some (burned) cd's. So if anyone could tell me one that does both well...

As you can probably see I am on bit of a budget (not too much though *hehe*). Oh and I live in Europe so prices may differ a bit from those in the USA.

Thanks in advance >>

As for the mainboard, nForce mainboards are actually proving now to be faster if you put the DIMMs in the right slots. I recommend the following:
Case: Antec 1040 midtower (includes fans and a 400W antec PSU) or a Lian Li PC 6x USB (includes fans, but not a PSU--buy a 350W antec PSU for this one)
Mainboard: Asus A7N266-E (this way no sound card is required), but if you only need 3 PCI slots (and an AGP) and no onboard RAID, you could try the Abit A7m
RAM: 2xCrucial DDR 266MHz PC2100 SDRAM DIMMs, put one in the 1 socket, and move the other one around until you find the highest performance
Cooling: Vantec FCE-6030D HSF (cheap, and very good) attached to CPU via Arctic Silver II or Nanotherm (ASII is preferrable)
Hard Disk: IBM Deskstar 60GXP series. While you wanted a 60GB (that is possible with this), I'd recommend getting 2 or 3 smaller 60GXP drives and putting them in RAID level 0.
Graphics: OEM Radeon 8500 or OEM GeForce 3 Ti200 (find one with the fastest RAM chips possible)
Sound: Integrated onto nForce chipset
CD/DVD drive: Lite-On or Pioneer 16x DVD-ROM (or a generic CD-ROM of at least 48x)
CD-RW: Yamaha CRW3200E-VK

EDIT: Try finding places to buy your components from British Pricewatch