Need motherboard, processor and memory

Jon12345

Jon12345

Jon12345

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Joined
5 Feb 2003
Posts
365
I currently have an ATX system with a P4 CPU and old nasty RAM. The PC is used as a workhorse, where it does regular number crunching and also acts as a Server for the office Outlook email client.

So, I am thinking of going for the following spec:

- ATX motherboard supporting SATAI or more.
- 2Gb DDR2 RAM with dual channel support.
- Q6600 Quad CPU.

A graphics card is not that important since I am not using it for games or anything like that. Do most motherboards nowadays come with graphics built in that would run at 1024x768? Do they all have on board sound?

What motherboard would you recommend?

I have a ATA hard drive and so will be using this with the new system. But since I will be doing a chipset change, I might need two IDE channels on the new motherboard due to needing both a Optical drive and my IDE hard drive and they can't run effectively on the same IDE socket. Are two IDE channels rare nowadays on a motherboard that would support a Q6600?

What memory would you go for?

Thanks,

Jon
 
Most motherboards have onboard sound but not graphics. Have a look at the P35 chipset, although most of them have only a single IDE channel (supporting up to 2 drives on a shared channel).

Memory - there is a geil 2 x 2GB module that looks quite tasty, any PC6400 RAM should be good enough.

Graphics - get a 2400 Pro if you're not bothered about games, there are some nice passive ones available.
 
What is your budget here?

Most motherboards don't come with onboard graphics unless they are mATX form factor although I've seen a couple.

Almost all motherboards now will only have one IDE channel, this isn't a huge problem since it doesn't really matter if you have optical and hard drives on the same channel - they don't operate at the speed of the slowest device and haven't for quite a number of years. Of course they can't both send data at the same time but that would apply for any two devices on one chain. If you really wanted to though you could go for an add-in IDE card but it is probably about as cheap to buy a SATA DVDRW frankly.

Memory I'd go with any decent PC6400 DDR2, as an example OcUK have the OCZ Platinum Series 2gb PC2-6400 for about £30 at the moment.
 
As said above you can get a SATA DVDRW for less than £20 so replace your current one with one of these.

RAM get whats going cheapest through OCUK for that week. Much the same in a worrkhouse type machine like yours will be
 
Just checked it out and yes, it does seem idea.

So, are we saying that if I go for a P35 chipset with one IDE channel that I can use my IDE hard drive and dvd writer at the same time for a Windows Repair install, if needed?
 
Jon12345 said:
So, are we saying that if I go for a P35 chipset with one IDE channel that I can use my IDE hard drive and dvd writer at the same time for a Windows Repair install, if needed?
Click to expand...

Yes, it should work fine although obviously if buying new I'd suggest SATA since the cabling is neater and only one device per chain.
 
melbourne720 said:
Memory - there is a geil 2 x 2GB module that looks quite tasty, any PC6400 RAM should be good enough.

Graphics - get a 2400 Pro if you're not bothered about games, there are some nice passive ones available.
Click to expand...

ram - i have had good experiences with the geil ram - have 4gb of it in my rig and it is very easy to get on with

gfx - i used a 2400 whilst my last card was rma'd and although it didnt run anything well, i managed to get css and hl2 on there at a nice 80fps - and thats with passive cooling. so for a basic server installation it would be more than adequate!
 
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