Would someone in the know please critique

[Slammy1]

Well, I already made the purchase, but I was wondering about any potential problems.

What I bought:
Western Digital Caviar Special Edition WD800JB 80GB ATA/100 7200RPM Hard Drive w/8MB Buffer
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition Single (Full Version)
Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 Processor 2.4GHz, 800MHz FSB, Socket 478 Retail
Kingston HyperX KHX3500/256 256MB DDR433 PC3500 Memory w/Heat Spreader Retail
Asus P4P800 Deluxe i865PE P4 (800FSB) Skt478 DDR ATX Motherboard w/Audio, LAN, RAID/Serial ATA Retail

What I have:
ATI 9700 Pro All-In-Wonder
Sound Blaster Live mp3 with Digital I/O-2 to my receiver
3 X 23 GB Seagate Elite UW SCSI 5400 RPM
Pioneer 10/40X DVD 305 SCSI
Yamaha CRW2100S 16X/10X/40X SCSI
AHA2940UW Pro Ultra Wide SCSI Card
USR 56k PCI Modem
ViewSonic VX990 (19? LCD) Display
Logitech Wireless Keyboard/Mouse
Enermax EG365P-VE FCA (350W)
10-bay Server Case

 

[LED]

It's all good Sammy1 :wine:...next upgrade would be to add a stick of RAM and the Soundcard

 

[Slammy1]

Thx LED. Yes, those are upgrades in the works. I was also planning on migrating my OS to an SATA chain, but I wasn't happy with current selection. 10k is just a lot of heat and power on my 350W, and Seagate only offers 1 year warranty. Here's hoping it arrives b4 the weekend .

 

[ProviaFan]

That looks good IMHO. I have a WD 80GB SE drive also, and they're great.

BTW, you should probably plan on throwing in some more RAM in the near future; 512MB total would probably be fine unless you do lots of multitasking or play one of the few new RAM-intensive games.

 

[LED]

You'd be surprise what the Enermax can handle...Got a 450 wt working 3 Vid cards (Matrox MM, ATI9700 and V5500) 2 Raptors (they do not run hot), Audigy2, Modem, 3 Optical Drives, Floppy, and IDE...plus Fan Controller and a lotta USB stuffs...not to mention a Barton 2500 OC and a bunch of lights and Fans

 

[Slammy1]

Originally posted by: LED
You'd be surprise what the Enermax can handle...Got a 450 wt working 3 Vid cards (Matrox MM, ATI9700 and V5500) 2 Raptors (they do not run hot), Audigy2, Modem, 3 Optical Drives, Floppy, and IDE...plus Fan Controller and a lotta USB stuffs...not to mention a Barton 2500 OC and a bunch of lights and Fans

That makes me feel better. Sorry for the delay in response, I'm at work and had to wait until lunch. GG already has it packed, so there's a chance I might get it by this weekend. Just one last question... Since a RAM upgrade seems necessary in the near future, will it work to throw in a single 512 MB chip or do I have to upgrade in pairs? Just curious, perhaps I need to save this question for when I do upgrade. Thanks again for everyones' responses. For the price conscious, it was $680 shipped.

EDIT: I guess I'll need to change my snail avatar soon.

 

[LED]

No need to upgrade the RAM in pairs and you might consider adding a 512MB stick

 

[thatsright]

Originally posted by: LED
No need to upgrade the RAM in pairs and you might consider adding a 512MB stick

Ahh Slammy from What I understand, if your going to be buying a new P4c CPU and your motherboard, then you'll want to get the peak memory performance from running your DDR RAM in Dual Channel mode. You do seem like a Speed freak what with all of your SCSI stuff, and running any amount of memory in single channel mode, your missing a lot of possible performance with your new system.

Are you getting 1 or 2 sticks of Kingston Ram, you didnt say? You need two sticks of the same type of ram for DC to work.

Are you only getting 256MB total for your new system, I really think you would need at least 512 especially with your Video Card.

Hope this helps.

 

[thatsright]

----Bump-


CAN SOMEONE please tell me what the 'Bump' means? I keep on seeing it in the AT forums

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: thatsright
----Bump-

CAN SOMEONE please tell me what the 'Bump' means? I keep on seeing it in the AT forums

When you reply to a thread, it sends it back to the top of the thread listing for that forum. If you've made a thread, and it's fallen down a few pages where nobody would see it, and you want to send it back to the top, you might make a "bump" post if you can't think of anything else to say.

*bump*

 

[thatsright]

Originally posted by: jliechty

Originally posted by: thatsright
----Bump-

CAN SOMEONE please tell me what the 'Bump' means? I keep on seeing it in the AT forums

When you reply to a thread, it sends it back to the top of the thread listing for that forum. If you've made a thread, and it's fallen down a few pages where nobody would see it, and you want to send it back to the top, you might make a "bump" post if you can't think of anything else to say.

*bump*

10-4 there Jilechty: I always wondered. And in the past, if a post of mine wasnt getting the desired replies, usually becuase it had fallen almost of the front of a Forum Main page.

 

[Slammy1]

LOL. It's funny the directions threads take when I'm not around. Just got back from work. I'm getting 2X256 MB of the Kingston memory. Actually, I'm currently running a PIII-850, so I don't know if the title speed freak applies , I've just been watching for my upgrade for a few months now and I was waiting on the Springdale boards. Aside from burn-in, I probably won't even o/c the 2.4, at least until I'm thinking about a CPU upgrade. Well, SCSI <> => speed freak, I just wanted to reduce my MB commitment by moving my drives to an external card, and with the fall of the dot-coms I was able to pick up some cheap drives. I rpobably won't keep up on the HD upgrades for SCSI, but will go the IDE/SATA route instead. Much cheaper. Well, they packed it but didn't ship it yet, so looks like next week sometime. Thanks again for the input!

 

[mechBgon]

Start with your memory timings relaxed to something like 2.5-3-3-6... some people are finding that the boards aren't quite ready for the full 2-2-2-5 yet (BIOS updates may help there). I see Anand mentioned something to this effect in his i865 review.

 

[thatsright]

BTW, right now I'm running Win 98 on a P3 750 Slot 1 with 512MB of Ram so, I know that there will be a Big jump in performance when I upgrade my system. I heard from several people that Installing Xp Pro on the type of system I'll probably throw together, it only takes about 10-15 minutes. Sweet!

Another thing, so Far I have read 4 Springdale MB Reviews, and two say that the 865 chipset is 5-10% faster than the Canterwood Motherboards. But the other 2 reviews say that the Canterwood Boards are 5-10% faster than Springdale? Yeah, I dont get it either.

And also, it seems like Anand's review of the 865 board he did, was rushed, just to get it online for today, as he should of waited to resolve the RAM problems. Could this affect his decision to say that the 865 is 5-15% faster than the 875 Motherboards, perhaps.

Thats my $0.02

 

[Slammy1]

Originally posted by: mechBgon
Start with your memory timings relaxed to something like 2.5-3-3-6... some people are finding that the boards aren't quite ready for the full 2-2-2-5 yet (BIOS updates may help there). I see Anand mentioned something to this effect in his i865 review.

I always shoot default for a baseline on performance. I've learned that lesson, but I am still a relative novice. I need to run it fast for burn in, so I'll get an idea on CPU max speed, but I'll run it slower for routine (depending on how stable and how hot ).

Originally posted by: thatsright

Another thing, so Far I have read 4 Springdale MB Reviews, and two say that the 865 chipset is 5-10% faster than the Canterwood Motherboards. But the other 2 reviews say that the Canterwood Boards are 5-10% faster than Springdale? Yeah, I dont get it either.

I translate that to they're the same speed, depending on application (but the Springdale's cheaper, whee!). Good enough for me. The reason for the XP upgrade is that HT does not run properly on Win2k, Me, or the rest of the Microsoft monopoly. You can run a c-series CPU w/o HT in Win2k, but why? I've had 2k for a while now, I wanted some more buttons to push anyways.

 

[ChefJoe]

Originally posted by: Slammy1

Originally posted by: mechBgon
Start with your memory timings relaxed to something like 2.5-3-3-6... some people are finding that the boards aren't quite ready for the full 2-2-2-5 yet (BIOS updates may help there). I see Anand mentioned something to this effect in his i865 review.

I always shoot default for a baseline on performance. I've learned that lesson, but I am still a relative novice. I need to run it fast for burn in, so I'll get an idea on CPU max speed, but I'll run it slower for routine (depending on how stable and how hot ).

Originally posted by: thatsright

Another thing, so Far I have read 4 Springdale MB Reviews, and two say that the 865 chipset is 5-10% faster than the Canterwood Motherboards. But the other 2 reviews say that the Canterwood Boards are 5-10% faster than Springdale? Yeah, I dont get it either.

I translate that to they're the same speed, depending on application (but the Springdale's cheaper, whee!). Good enough for me. The reason for the XP upgrade is that HT does not run properly on Win2k, Me, or the rest of the Microsoft monopoly. You can run a c-series CPU w/o HT in Win2k, but why? I've had 2k for a while now, I wanted some more buttons to push anyways.

I thought 2k was just supposed to show the HT CPU as a 2nd cpu in win2k. This was going to be an issue in the server and advanced server versions (cause they are limited at a certain number of cpus).