New Build: Does this look ok

mysticsniper · 26 Apr 2006 at 15:40

My friend has asked me to build them a new computer, for under £800. I have selected this little lot.

Your opinions please

CP-147-AM AMD Athlon 64 3500+ Venice 90nm (Socket 939) - OEM (CP-147-AM)
£96.95 £96.95
MB-088-AS Asus A8N-E nForce4 Ultra (Socket 939) PCI-Express Motherboard (MB-088-AS)
£59.95 £59.95
MY-079-CS Corsair 2GB DDR XMS3200C2PT TwinX (2x1GB) CAS2 (MY-079-CS)
£129.95 £129.95
GX-121-SP Sapphire ATI Radeon X1800 XT 256MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-121-SP)
£144.95 £144.95
FG-000-AR Arctic Cooling Freezer 64 Pro CPU Cooler (Socket 754/939/940) (FG-000-AR)
£15.95 £15.95
CD-031-NE NEC ND4570 16x16 DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter (Silver) - OEM (CD-031-NE)
£22.95 £22.95
CA-025-EN Enermax Liberty 500W ELT500AWT ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CA-025-EN)
£61.95 £61.95
HD-046-WD Western Digital Caviar SE16 250GB 2500KS SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (HD-046-WD)
£54.95 £54.95
CA-038-LL Lian-Li PC-7 PLUS Silver Aluminium Midi-Tower Case (No PSU) (CA-038-LL)
£47.95 £47.95
SC-039-CL Creative Sound Blaster Audigy SE 7.1 Sound Card - Retail (SC-039-CL)
£24.95 £24.95
Subtotal £660.50
VAT £115.59
Total £776.09

semi-pro waster · 26 Apr 2006 at 15:43

I'd buy slightly cheaper Ram like say Geil Value and go for a 3700 San Diego as the 1mb cache will also help along with the speed boost. Otherwise the rest looks fine, I don't think you need 500w either but it does allow for expansion in the future at least

mysticsniper · 26 Apr 2006 at 15:44

semi-pro waster said:
I'd buy slightly cheaper Ram like say Geil Value and go for a 3700 San Diego as the 1mb cache will also help along with the speed boost. Otherwise the rest looks fine, I don't think you need 500w either but it does allow for expansion in the future at least

Ok, cool. I thought that the Corsair RAM would be more suited to the ASUS mobo, than the cheaper memory out there?

semi-pro waster · 26 Apr 2006 at 15:58

mysticsniper said:
Ok, cool. I thought that the Corsair RAM would be more suited to the ASUS mobo, than the cheaper memory out there?

I don't know of any reason it should be, the Corsair is more designed for overclocking than the Geil but Geil Value is good solid Ram and is compatible with pretty much everything and at stock speeds I doubt you'd notice any difference whatsoever

sinister_stu · 26 Apr 2006 at 16:16

He's right. You'd be much better off going for cheaper RAM and the 3700 SD core with extra cache.

mysticsniper · 26 Apr 2006 at 17:10

Ok, changed the list now, and have gone for the 3700 SD, GeIL memory, and changeed the case to a Silverstone Temjin, and still saved some money

MB-088-AS Asus A8N-E nForce4 Ultra (Socket 939) PCI-Express Motherboard (MB-088-AS)
£59.95 £59.95
GX-121-SP Sapphire ATI Radeon X1800 XT 256MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-121-SP)
£144.95 £144.95
FG-000-AR Arctic Cooling Freezer 64 Pro CPU Cooler (Socket 754/939/940) (FG-000-AR)
£15.95 £15.95
CA-025-EN Enermax Liberty 500W ELT500AWT ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CA-025-EN)
£61.95 £61.95
HD-046-WD Western Digital Caviar SE16 250GB 2500KS SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (HD-046-WD)
£54.95 £54.95
SC-039-CL Creative Sound Blaster Audigy SE 7.1 Sound Card - Retail (SC-039-CL)
£24.95 £24.95
CP-150-AM AMD Athlon 64 3700+ San Diego 90nm (Socket 939) - OEM (CP-150-AM)
£114.95 £114.95
MY-046-GL GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC3200 Value Dual Channel Kit CAS3 (GE2GB3200BDC) (MY-046-GL)
£101.95 £101.95
CA-007-SV Silverstone Temjin TJ05 - Black (No PSU) (CA-007-SV)
£52.95 £52.95
CD-030-NE NEC ND4570 16x16 DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - OEM (CD-030-NE)
£22.95 £22.95
Subtotal £655.50
VAT £114.72
Total £770.22

semi-pro waster · 26 Apr 2006 at 17:21

Looks good, I've just noticed the Audigy in there, you probably don't need it because the onboard sound should be pretty good but there is no real harm in having it and the Audigy is fairly cheap.

If you did decide to ditch it and your friend plays at high resolutions then you can just get the X1800XT 512mb into the budget(~£60 more than the 256mb) but that is probably overkill to change that as well.

mysticsniper · 26 Apr 2006 at 17:29

semi-pro waster said:
Looks good, I've just noticed the Audigy in there, you probably don't need it because the onboard sound should be pretty good but there is no real harm in having it and the Audigy is fairly cheap.

If you did decide to ditch it and your friend plays at high resolutions then you can just get the X1800XT 512mb into the budget(~£60 more than the 256mb) but that is probably overkill to change that as well.

I went for the 256Mb model as my mate only has a 19" monitor and at the moment they are using 1024x768 due to their old PC, so 1280x1024 will be fine for them.

Thanks

xirokx · 26 Apr 2006 at 19:27

what will you be using the system for?

change: CD-030-NE NEC ND4570 16x16 DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - OEM (CD-030-NE)
£22.95 £22.95

to a pioneer dvd 111 as the above dvd rw is rather noisey so I have heard....

what res will u be gaming at?

I would prob change the mobo to a MSI on DFI if you will be overclocking...

The MSI is around £64

Personally I would go for an Antec 500w Neo PSU because I believe they are better that the enermax

Why did you change the case? The lian li pc7 is a lovely case?

wilders · 26 Apr 2006 at 21:20

I've got that NEC dvd drive and it's fine,quiet etc....stick with it.

The rest of the system (revised) looks excellent....