What Cables Do I Need For Build

[Mr Zero]

Please tell me which power/data cables I need to purchase for the items listed below. Several items are OEM so I know I'll probably need something. The motherboard I have selected comes with: D Bracket 2, Serial ATA Power Adapter, 2 pcs Serial ATA Cables, and Round Cable (IDE?) as can be seen at the bottom of link provided.

Can you please tell me what cables I am missing for a complete setup (HDDs, DVD, Video)?
Do I need extra cables to hook up the front USB/Firewire ports on the case?
Should I go ahead and upgrade the heat sink for the CPU or is the stock acceptable for Non-OC'ing?

I want to order everything needed at once so I don't have to run to the store when I do my build. Obviously, I am not very knowledgeable so if you see anything missing from my list below please let me know what I need specifically. Thanks for any/all help.



MSI nForce3 250 Chipset Motherboard for AMD Athlon 64 Socket 754 CPU, Model "K8N Neo Platinum" (MS-7030) -RETAIL

AMD Athlon 64 3400+, 512k L2 Cache, The Only 64-bit Windows Compatible Processor - Retail

Corsair Value Select (Dual Pack) 184 Pin 512MBx2 DDR PC-3200 - OEM

Cooler Master Praetorian SILVER ALUMINUM MID-TOWER CASE, Model "PAC-T01-E1"

Western Digital Raptor 74GB 10,000RPM SATA Hard Drive, Model WD740GD, OEM Drive Only

Seagate 200GB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive, Model ST3200822AS, OEM Drive Only

Antec 550W Power Supply, Model "TRUE550" -RETAIL

Pioneer Black DVD+RW/-RW Drive, Model DVR-108, OEM

BFG nVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT Video Card with Doom 3, 256MB GDDR3, 256-Bit, DVI/TV-Out, 8X AGP, Model "BFGR68256GTD3" -RETAIL

Samsung Black 1.44MB 3.5inch Floppy Disk Drive, Model SFD321B/LBL1, OEM Drive Only

Microsoft Windows XP Professional With Service Pack 2 -OEM

Arctic Silver Premium Silver Polysynthetic Silver Thermal Compound, Model "Arctic Silver 5", 3.5-gram( 1 cc. ) tube

 

[Boonesmi]

since both of your harddrives are sata (and 2 sata cables come with mobo) and the mobo also has 1 ata100 cable, so you can use that for your pioneer (and also you can add a 2nd optical drive). so you should be good on the cables

all the stuff for hooking up front usb ports will be with the case.

and the antec powersupply will have plenty of connectors for everything



so you really should be all covered, and not have to buy any

 

[Boonesmi]

ohh, and your retail hsf will be more then acceptable for a non-overclocked system (heck the retail hsf could even handle some overclocking 🙂 )


also, antec makes great powersupplies!!! but the one you have listed is really overkill for your system. a high quaility 350w would be way more then your system requires, and would cost half as much... but it has to be high quality... an enermax 350w is soooo much better then a generic 550w!!!

here are a couple other powersupplies you might want to check out

http://www.newegg.com/app/View...=17-103-444&depa=0

http://www.newegg.com/app/View...=17-154-013&depa=0


the enermax is a killer powersupply, i use a similar one to run a dual opteron system. the allied one is more budget, but still extreemly capable (ive used 400w allied powersupplies in several athlon64 builds, they work great)

 

[ts3433]

If you're using a retail HSF you probably don't need to waste cash on AS5. (A heatsink usually includes its own TIM, but the AS5 could lower temps a small bit. Not worth it though.) The case will have its own cables for the front ports to connect to the motherboard's headers.

And as was said above, the PSU is overkill. I'd go with a nice 350-430W.

 

[mechBgon]

You might find this photo guide for first-timers useful along the way. I bet you forgot all about the snacks, for example 😀

 

[Mr Zero]

Will I need a separate ATA cable for the floppy drive??

Thanks for the useful info, guys. That's what makes this forum great.

 

[mechBgon]

I've never seen a retail-boxed motherboard that didn't come with a floppy cable. You should be ok. At Newegg, you can click the photo links to see what-all they give you, and you might be able to verify that the floppy cable is one of them if they're all spread out. Floppy cables are narrower than ATA cables.

 

[billyjak]

WD makes a better cable to lock into the Raptor, highly recomended.
I fried 2 raptors using the cheap sata connectors because my hard drives sat right in front of my case door closing and hit the sata cables breaking the tab off the cheaply built sata connectors.Look Here for connector

 

[Boonesmi]

Originally posted by: Mr Zero
Will I need a separate ATA cable for the floppy drive??

Thanks for the useful info, guys. That's what makes this forum great.

yeah as was mentioned above, the floppy drive doesnt use an ide cable... it uses a cable thats not as wide

and here is all the stuff thats actually included with that mobo http://www.newegg.com/app/Show...mage=13-130-457-10.JPG and yup there is a floppy cable in there 🙂

also that floppy disc in the pic will have the drivers needed to install winxp on an sata drive