Help with budget system?

clv101 · 22 Jan 2008 at 23:42

I'm building a cheap system for a project and looking to get the costs down. I'm reusing an old PATA DVD and not so old but spare SATA HDD.

That leaves me needing the rest for the system unit. This is what I have in mind:

Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775) (£17.61)
Intel Core 2 Duo E2160 "LGA775 Conroe" 1.80GHz (800FSB) - Retail (£49.34)
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L Intel P35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard (£65.79)
OCZ 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 Dual Channel Platinum Revision 2 XTC Series DDR2 (OCZ2P800R22GK) (£32.89)
Asus GeForce EN7300GT-HTD Silent 256MB DDR2 TV-Out/DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (£41.11)
Antec NSK 4480B Mini Tower Case (Black) - 380W Earth Watts PSU (£46.99)

Total with shipping, £266.60

I want to overclock to over 3GHz.

Questions - Is that MB/CPU/RAM the best bang per buck? I want to use a P35 board. I could save a little by getting the 1.6GHz CPU but will that make >3GHz just a bit harder?

How is overclocking with that MB? I hear power might be a problem?

yantorsen · 22 Jan 2008 at 23:56

it only has 6 phase power doesn't it? that mb?

clv101 · 23 Jan 2008 at 00:12

Only? I think the issue is that it doesn't have 6-phase. My question is, whether that's a problem or not?

clv101 · 23 Jan 2008 at 00:15

Another interesting thought - it turns out my year old Asus P5N-E SLI (650i) will support Wolfdale!! Maybe I should replace the 1.8 E4300 running at 3.2GHz with an E8200 and use the old E4300 for this new system.

yantorsen · 23 Jan 2008 at 00:17

clv101 said:
Only? I think the issue is that it doesn't have 6-phase. My question is, whether that's a problem or not?

no it does have 6 phase I think, and the higher end boards have 8 phase? maybe I'm wrong.

yantorsen · 23 Jan 2008 at 00:18

clv101 said:
Another interesting thought - it turns out my year old Asus P5N-E SLI (650i) will support Wolfdale!! Maybe I should replace the 1.8 E4300 running at 3.2GHz with an E8200 and use the old E4300 for this new system.

yeah probly will support it with a BIOS update, though don't know how well it'll clock the new gen cpus.

clv101 · 23 Jan 2008 at 00:29

yantorsen said:
no it does have 6 phase I think, and the higher end boards have 8 phase? maybe I'm wrong.

I think all the other P35 DS3 boards do (like yours) but the 'L' one doesn't. One of the reasons it's cheaper.

clv101 · 23 Jan 2008 at 10:36

Has anyone had much luck overclocking the E2160 (or similar) on the GA-P35-DS3L?

yantorsen · 23 Jan 2008 at 16:36

clv101 said:
Has anyone had much luck overclocking the E2160 (or similar) on the GA-P35-DS3L?

there's a E2xx series offical thread in the CPU forum, and a DS3 Official thread in the mb section, may be worth a look there.

clv101 · 23 Jan 2008 at 18:29

Went for this lot in the end:

Asus 7300GT Silent 256MB DDR2 DVI HDTV PCI-E Graphics Card
Intel E2160 Socket 775 Pentium Dual Core 2x1.8Ghz 800FSB Retail Boxed Processor
Antec Black NSK4480B ATX/MATX Mini Tower - With 380W EarthWatts PSU
Arctic Cooling AC-FRZ-7P Freezer 7 Pro Socket 775 Processor Cooler
Gigabyte GA-P35C-DS3R Socket 775 8 Channel Audio ATX Motherboard
4GB: 2x OCZ 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 Dual Channel Platinum Revision 2 XTC Series DDR2 (OCZ2P800R22GK)

£285 including delivery.

Went with the Gigabyte DS3R in the end, only slightly more and 4GB now that OCZ stuff is so cheap.

yantorsen · 23 Jan 2008 at 23:24

ahhh, that motherbaord can be a nightmare with 4 dimms btw, (mine is 2x2gb dimms), just to warn you, you may not have any problems.