The results are in

[callmesteve]

So after months of NOT BUYING stuff, I bought a quick machine for the siblings, and now I'm ready for the machine I want

CASE - TT Shark
PSU - Fortron 530W
MOBO - DFI LanParty nForce4
CPU - Winchester A64 3000+
Heatsink - Zalman Flower
RAM - 1GB (2x512) Corsair Value Select (Dual Pack)
VDO - PNY nVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT
Sound Card - Audigy 2 ZS
DVD-RW - NEC 2510
HD - 200GB Seagate

Can you guys critique this for me? Better PSU or VDO card maybe?

The sound card, DVD-RW and HD's are already bought, and with that the final total is

$1179.29 w/ shipping. If you have any suggestions on lowering the price, be my guest. All comments are welcome.

 

[amol]

change the VDO to another manufacturer

and i havnt heard good things about the Shark, mostly because the side panel is open with the honeycomb panel

although, i :heart: my tsunami

 

[callmesteve]

Originally posted by: Amol
change the VDO to another manufacturer

and i havnt heard good things about the Shark, mostly because the side panel is open with the honeycomb panel

although, i :heart: my tsunami

Haha, I know you love the Tsunami!! lol

PNY is not a good company?? ...hrm this worries me

 

[SickBeast]

This is from a topic in the video forum, I thought it applied nicely here:

Originally posted by: Acanthus
Leadtek, Gainward, Asus, Abit, Elsa (in europe), and BFG do not have any 2d problems.

You can take that with a grain of salt; I have heard of 2D image quality problems with BFG cards.

The concern with nVidia cards is build quality, along with component quality. The cheaper manufacturers tend to cut corners.

I've heard excellent things about the Leadtek and Gainward cards, and Asus and Abit are both premier manufacturers. Good luck! Looks like a seriously powerful computer.

 

[callmesteve]

Originally posted by: SickBeast
This is from a topic in the video forum, I thought it applied nicely here:

Originally posted by: Acanthus
Leadtek, Gainward, Asus, Abit, Elsa (in europe), and BFG do not have any 2d problems.

You can take that with a grain of salt; I have heard of 2D image quality problems with BFG cards.

The concern with nVidia cards is build quality, along with component quality. The cheaper manufacturers tend to cut corners.

I've heard excellent things about the Leadtek and Gainward cards, and Asus and Abit are both premier manufacturers. Good luck! Looks like a seriously powerful computer.

Thanks Sickbeast, I'll definitely have to take a look into that. I guess its not a problem to dish out the extra 20 or so bucks to get the computer made

 

[callmesteve]

Alrighty Amol won me over, I'm getting the Tsunami, and the vdo card I'll be changing to a Gigabyte card. No problems there right?

 

[ribbon13]

Gigabyte really let me down in the K-5 era, but nowadays they get good marks. I reccomend Gigabyte/Chaintech for budget stuff.

 

[ribbon13]

Any particular reason that compelled you to go for a Audigy?

 

[callmesteve]

Originally posted by: ribbon13
Any particular reason that compelled you to go for a Audigy?

I have a chaintech sound card if thats what you're going to try to convince me to get, but I got the Audigy a long time ago for about 40 bucks so I have it lying around

 

[callmesteve]

Originally posted by: ribbon13
Gigabyte really let me down in the K-5 era, but nowadays they get good marks. I reccomend Gigabyte/Chaintech for budget stuff.

I don't really like that phrase "budget stuff" do you have any recommendations on the card? That's in stock @ NewEgg x)

 

[gobucks]

PNY is absolute garbage. I've had 2 GF4 TI 4200's fry on me, with no overclocking or anything. My friend had one die as well. They just make low quality cards. I'd go with a BFG if you can find it, otherwise Gainward, Leadtek, Gigabyte, and Asus all make good cards.

Also, are you planning to overclock? Cause that board's supposed to be awesome at it (1T timings at 318FSB, from what i've heard) but that memory won't get you far. I have it right now, and I'm RMA'ing it, cause it can't go beyond DDR418 at all, and it can't hold 1T timings without errors no matter how slow the speed or relaxed the timings are. Maybe i got the worst sticks ever, but i'm not too impressed. I found Crucial Ballistix PC4000 for $230 at newegg, i ordered it today, I've seen reviews showing they are pretty much the best DDR you can get for the A64. I also had PQI DDR500 ($180), but that gave errors, too, on my Chaintech VNF4/Ultra. It worked on the A8N-SLI i was using before, though, so i think it was just the bios. I downloaded the new bios, and memory faults have stopped crashing windows like they used to, so i think that the problem was definitely from the beta bios rather than a memory issue, so i'd recommend them.

 

[ribbon13]

The only sound cards brands I would endorse are M-audio and ESI. Audiotrak also has a good reputation, but I haven't had any experience with them. If you already have an audigy, are you buying another? if so why? Waste of money IMO.

The video card setup I'm using isn't even on the market yet, but when it is would cost $7000, so take my use of the word budget with a grain of salt.

instock pcie 6800gt
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-130-215&depa=0

 

[callmesteve]

Originally posted by: ribbon13
The only sound cards brands I would endorse are M-audio and ESI. Audiotrak also has a good reputation, but I haven't had any experience with them. If you already have an audigy, are you buying another? if so why? Waste of money IMO.

The video card setup I'm using isn't even on the market yet, but when it is would cost $7000, so take my use of the word budget with a grain of salt.

instock pcie 6800gt
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-130-215&depa=0

Oh its not that I'm buying another one, the computer that I have the sound card in, died on me. So I'm taking out the DVD-RW and the Audigy from it. I've also heard some marvelous things about the M-audio.

The PCI-e card you showed is a little pricy no?

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-125-143&depa=1

Is that a bad card? If I get objections from Anandtech, then I'll go namebrand like BFG

 

[ribbon13]

that was an agp card...

try this
http://www.monarchcomputer.com/Merchant...Code=190659&Category_Code=nvidia-PCI-E

thanks to Poofs for the link