Someone give an ex-hardware addict a little help, eh?

[konichiwa]

Ok I admit it. I got out of the game. I used to come to the General Hardware forum at least once a day, used to read every AT article as well as Tom's Hardware, Sharkys, AGN, etc. I have, however, not been so up on my information lately. Perhaps it's due to a lack of spending money, perhaps it's due to a general non-interest in constantly upgrading my computer.

I, however, want to upgrade it now. For the last few hours I've been reading posts on the GH forum as well as trying to read some of the newer AT Hardware articles, and I find myself totally overwhelmed. Last I was really into hardware was when the 733MHz Pentium III-E was all the rage because it could be overclocked to 1GHz and more.

Now I sit here with a Pentium III Katmai 500MHz with 256MB of RAM and a TNT1 video card. Yes I know I am outdated but I wish to redeem myself. Perhaps it's due to an increase in spending money, perhaps it's due to a newfound interest in gaming and high performance computing.

So ... after all that ranting ... anyone want to give me a quick catch up on the current hardware situation? I know AMD has their 'XP' processors, which last I heard are not really as they may seem (1800XP isn't really 1.8GHz, just a marketing ploy? Or has that changed as well?) and Intel has their P4. What about chipsets, video cards, RAM? I think I remember reading about Intel switching from RDRam to DDR?

*sigh* It's a lot of information when I haven't followed it for 9+ months. Anyone?

 

[AndyHui]

Tough to bring you up to date eh?

Lets see...I'll start with Intel.

The Intel Northwood is the latest version of the Pentium 4, with significantly better outlook than the old Willamette. With 512KB of cache and extraordinary overclocking prospects, this is one great processor. Only problem is that top of the line is pricy, still, but better than before.

There are 3 choices for chipsets: Intel i845D (with DDR SDRAM support), Intel i850 for RDRAM, and SiS 645 with PC2700 DDR.

On the AMD front, we have the Athlon XP line of processors. Performance is to the point where clock speed does not seem a good indicator of performance. An Athlon XP's clock speed is less than it's "Quantispeed"..... Prices are exellent for these processors.

Chipsets: AMD760 (on it's way out, effectively), VIA KT266A, SiS 735, 745.

That's a start, anyway.

 

[BreakApart]

konichiwa, it might be easier too just catch you up on the "type" of computer you wish to build...surfing/gaming? hardcore gaming? Seti number cruncher? Video Editing Machine? or all around family computer?

Narrowing down the field, should get you back into things...

 

[konichiwa]

Gaming/Hardcore Gaming, what's the difference?

Gaming nonetheless

 

[BreakApart]

For a gamer/hardcore gamer...

Video hands down is "Geforce3 ti" series, budget screamer is the Ti200 overclocker, where the money is no object gamer will go for the Ti500.

Gamer will go with 2400+DDR memory hands down, unless your going the Intel route then RAMBUS would be the choice. SDRAM is gone from the hardcore gamers menu,so you can skip all that.

Motherboards: the old names are gone, the new kings are EPOX, Shuttle, TYAN-(dual AMD boards)

Sound Cards: Live series is dead too many conflicts with various parts. Audigy seems too be getting alot of attention.

Speakers: highly rated, best bang for the buck, Logitech z560 $140

Harddrives: Maxtor has been selling Quantum drives lately, company buyout. IBM had a rash of defects 75series, 60series is doing good though. WD has been giving drives away lately, can't say they have been the highest quality though,might be why they pushing them so cheap.

Well, that's enough for now i need to get some more beer...

 

[zzzz]

<< Motherboards: the old names are gone, the new kings are EPOX, Shuttle, TYAN-(dual AMD boards) >>


umm..
Abit/Asus are still fine..Abits TH7-2 and Kr7a-raid are the best boards in the respective chipsets. (Albit a bit pricy)

 

[BreakApart]

<< the best boards in the respective chipsets >>



lol...that was funny.
Abit has a horrible quality control record-IMHO

They are good boards, but best? No way.

 

[zzzz]

Kr7a raid
TH7
KG7-raid

These are anandtech reviews for the via KT266a, Intel 850 and AMD 760 chipsets respectively. And this is not the only site that found these boards to be the best.

 

[Mota331]

<< IBM had a rash of defects 75series, 60series is doing good though. >>



The first part I would agree to, they do have a lot of problems. I would have to dissagree with the second part because I read an article in MaximumPC either this month or last month that said IBM is going through a lawsuit because of the 75GXP series being so unreliable, one guy had to send back the same IBM 75GXP 4 times due to the same problem.
If you are looking for Performance buy risk Quality go for IBM.

But if you want Semi-Good Quality, Great Price, and EXCELLENT Customer Service go with Maxtor, if you have to RMA the drive, For example, if your Maxtor fails, and you send back a 40gig, you will recieve a 60gig in return, and same as if you send in a 60gig, you will recieve an 80gig in return.

Western Digital is also EXCELLENT in performance with their 100gig SE (8meg Buffer) but they are pricey and I haven't heard anything bad about their Customer Service, so I would check into that if I were you.

With MB's I have a ECS K7S5A Chipset: SiS 735 and have not had a bit of problems with it. If your looking for good performance equal in that of a $100-150 MB, supports all AMD Duron/Athlon chips up to the XP 2000+, and don't want to spend a lot, go for this board, you can pick one up for about $50.

Video Cards, Hands Down! GEFORCE 3 TI500. I have the card and love it.

Sound Card, also Hands Down! SoundBlaster Audigy Platinum or just any of the Audigy series cards are great. If you have or don't want to take up a 5.25 bay you should go with the SoundBlaster Audigy Platinum EX, it has the external control bay, the Audigy Platinum has the internal control bay. That should run you about $200-$250 for the Platinum EX, and about $150-200 for the Platinum.

Hope I helped you out.

Go to www.pricewatch.com for the lowest possible prices.

 

[BreakApart]

Man i was hoping you wouldn't do that...reviews DO NOT take into account build quality and expected life of the product.

Take a trip with me in the way back machine-2 years.....

Anandtech rated the MSI KT133 board the best, then placed all their servers on those boards-(you remember that?)
Well, it took less than 1year for every one of those boards to fail. Abit has the same reputation, they fall apart over time. Heck, 2-3 years ago Abit had the hottest selling board on the market BXchipset, the majority of those boards all failed within a year-(i watched 5 of them fall apart) keyboard problems, USB problems, mouse port problems, the list goes on and on.

Quote Anadtech.com
"ABIT has never been known for producing the highest quality products and our standard metric puts ABIT quality at approximately average. In spite of this, the board was still extremely stable during our tests. "

Another Abit Quality Control link->
Systemlogic.net

and another Xtremetek.com

Quote Overclockers.com
"ABIT's KT7A is an acceptable board up to about 150 FSB, depending on RAM quality and ABIT's erratic Quality Control."

I wish you the best with your Abit...

 

[Willoughbyva]

I am not a real hardcore gamer, but I have heard that the Geforce 4 will be out soon.

Ati seems to be doing pretty good with their Radeon 8500.

Both Intel and AMD are doing well with 2 gig+ cpus.

I guess the thing to do is read up on the cpu's and see which one you think you might like. AMD and Intel are both neck and neck with their lates offerings. One does this better the other does that better.

After you decide on the CPU then you can decide on the chipset you are wanting to use.

Then you might try looking at motherboard features and see what you like- onboard raid, on board lan, etc.

Then you can decide on the Graphics card you want. You might want to look at the latest reviews for the graphics cards comming out soon.



From my own personal stand point i found upgrading my computer all the time very expensive (though I did learn al lot about computers), so I decided to get a XboX. Now I don't really have to worry about the latest and greatest, I just have to go buy the game I want.



Good Luck

Will

 

[BreakApart]

Mota we do agree, i should have worded the IBM explaination better ...

<< IBM had a rash of defects 75series, 60series is doing good though. >>

I was saying they had a rash of defects, and the defects were with the 75series drives. Many reports of this on the net.
Then i mentioned the 60 series is doing very well, so far no hint of the 75series troubles with them.

Sorry, i should have worded that better...

 

[HouRman]

I just built a computer for a friend a week ago for less than $500, and we just took a trip to fry's.

Soyo P4S Dragon Ultra
2 + 4 USB 2.0, 6 pci, 3 PCI2700 DDR, 5.1 audio,
2 ata166 HD slots, with 2 Raid slots, built in 10/100 ethernet.
Pentium4 1.7 Gigahertz
Includes HSF
Combo = $279

Venus P4 ready medium ATX case w/ 425w PS $79
256 megs of PC2100 DDR (Chips by Elixer) $52

He is reusing his Monitor, keyboard, mouse, CDrom, Hard drive, Speakers, and Voodoo3 3000 PCI Graphics card. We didn't have a windows CD so we just swapped the Hard drive, hehe.

His old computer (An NEC combo w/K6-2 3dnow 450mhz) was not capable of playing Quake3 with more than a few frames per second at the lowest quality and resolution.

With his new P4 Quake 3 performance w/ PCI voodoo3
high quality setting 1024x768 (42 fps)
high quality setting 800x600 (67 fps)

Took us an hour to build it and everything went smoothly. He was so happy to finally be able to play quake3. It should be even better once I reformat and put XP pro on it and he gets a Radeon 8500.

Oh, we got the stuff at fry's cause he's not allowed to buy things on the internet.

I recommend you consider the ATI Radeon 8500. It's performance is comparable to a Geforce Ti500 and the price has dropped to the $170 for OEM range. With the improving drivers the Radeon looks to be a pretty good card. Without ATI our only choice will be Nvidia.

 

[Ryan]

Go with an AMD solution