Ordering this tonight

sjt269

sjt269

sjt269

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11 Dec 2004
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PC spec 8.jpg



Looking to order this tonight, get it delivered on Thursday or Friday, and have it up and running by the weekend. Any suggestions or improvements?


The 300W PSU isn't for this PC, it's for another one. I'm taking the 480W Antec Neopower from my old PC for my new one, and I'm buying a cheaper PSU as a replacement to put into the current system, which is being passed onto a relative as an internet/office/solitaire machine.


I know 4Gb of RAM is a little overkill, but I run several large plugins in my recording software that are around a gigabyte each (piano and drums plugins, namely) and I'd rather have the extra 2Gb as a sort of buffer. With RAM prices as low as they are, it's a small price to pay for peace of mind. It's a price that could have bought me another hard drive, or lined my wallet for a little while, but I can't complain, really.

Also regarding graphics cards, I know the new ones are out soon, but there seems to be no evidence that the new cards will be either faster or cheaper than the current ones. Besides, with the 2900 Pros overclocking so readily to XT speeds and beyond, and at only £170, it's a great price.


The cooler...here is a problem. Can a Freezer 7 fit onto a P35 DS3P board without being obstructed by the Northbridge heatsink? And just how easy is to install? Having never built a PC from scratch before, I'm a little intimidated by the horror stories of large coolers snapping motherboards, and similar things. I'd be happy to stick with the reference HSF if I thought I could reach 3Ghz without excessive temperatures, but since reaching 3Ghz is dicey in itself, I suspect the temperatures will be a little toasty. I've just this moment realised that I forgot to add a wireless PCI card to my spec, so if the Freezer 7 could go, I could add a wireless card for no net cost difference...hmm. Maybe I'll just bite the bullet and spend another £20...it's money that I don't have, but I can probably find it. Hopefully. :o



Any and all suggestions welcome and will be most gratefully recieved :)


Thanks in advance
tTz
 
well the hardrive if yuou could spare an extra £14 ytou could get a 500gb thats on special

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/productlist.php?&groupid=701&catid=14&subid=940&sortby=priceAsc

as for th artic pro7. its more of a medium size coller compared to some abut is very very good for the money. it wont snapp your motherbaord and unlike the big huge coolers that cost more. you dont need any special mounting solution . it just connects with 4 pins you ush down one in each corner just like the standard cooler that comes with the card. but is a lot better. as for fitting on that particular mobo with the northbridge i dont know maybe someone else has that cooler mobo combo.

oh and are you running windows vista ??? if you using standard windows xp that only supports 3gb ram.
 
It is indeed XP that I'm using, and I know it only supports 3Gb of RAM, but I think I'd be better off with 3 than with 2. I must admit, that's the one point that I'm fairly unsure about. The recording software is pretty RAM intensive, so more RAM is always better, but I honestly don't know if I'd be just as well with 2Gb. There's always the option of buying two now, and two later, which I haven't forgotten, but I kind of feel that I'd rather build a PC and not have to fiddle about upgrading it anytime soon.

As for hard drives, I'm just as happy with the 320Gb. It's double what I have now, and I retain the option of buying another one if and when I need one. As a matter of fact, two hard drives were planned, but budget constraints won out in the end. Though if I dropped the RAM to 2Gb, I could go for the 500Gb and still have a net lower cost...



Another big question I forgot to ask is this: what cables come with the components? I don't have any spare SATA, IDE or power cables to use. As a matter of fact, I've lost the cables that came with my PSU (modular design) so I can't even find a single PCI-E connector for the graphics card. This presents a slight problem, since the card requires two. But I also need a SATA and IDE cable, and if they come with the motherboard, I'd be delighted.
 
Wiggins said:
Would the 380w Earthwatts be enough, especially if your clocking the 2180 within an inch of its life?
Click to expand...


It's not for this PC, I said that in the OP. I also called it a 300W instead of a 380W, but near enough. :p

It's a 480W Antec unit that I'll be using in this build. If I can find the cables for it. :o
 
tTz said:
It's not for this PC, I said that in the OP. I also called it a 300W instead of a 380W, but near enough. :p

It's a 480W Antec unit that I'll be using in this build. If I can find the cables for it. :o
Click to expand...

Sorry Dude,

Cant read for **** today :o
 
Right, well, I noticed that the number of Lian Li PC7s in stock just halved (from a massive 4 to a less massive 2) and so I placed my order quickly before they run out of stock. That's the system ordered.

I ended up halving the RAM to 2Gb - if I want more, I'll buy more in a few weeks/months. I'm managing with 512Mb atm, so 2Gb should be an improvement, though I'm unsure if even that will get everything running 100% okay. We shall see, I suppose.

Also, I found out (thank God for the search function) that the DS3P and the Arctic Freezer 7 make a pretty tight fit, but by filing/sawing a small part of the Freezer 7 off, it all fits nicely. I'm still pretty worried about that, but I can always sell the Freezer 7 on if it doesn't fit properly.


Oh, and I found my PSU cables, hiding away in a drawer that I had forgotten about in a cupboard that I had searched thoroughly about four times. My perception is weak, methinks. :p
 
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Cool man, I just ordered the exact same case and RAM.

tTz said:
Right, well, I noticed that the number of Lian Li PC7s in stock just halved (from a massive 4 to a less massive 2) and so I placed my order quickly before they run out of stock. That's the system ordered.
Click to expand...


Looks like that was mine and yours. xD
 
Heh, well I chose Thursday, so I'll let you know how it goes. Assuming our lovely couriers actually deliver it on Thursday. Knowing my luck, it'll turn up sometime next week. ;)


:edit:

My order status is at 'security validation', which hopefully means they're checking the card details are right, rather than me having entered something wrongly...
 
The only problem I had with this motherboard was Acronis True Image 10.0. So I downloaded the update for version 10 and it took 50 mins to image a 3GB partition, then failed to restore from the image. Now I have Acronis True Image 11 and all is fine. :)
)
 
Funny you should say that, I was just sitting here wondering about True Image. I've got a 5Gb-ish image of a clean install of XP from my current hard drive, and I was wondering if it was transferable to the new one...it would save a lot of time installing. Then again, I don't suppose it'll make a lot of difference if I have to fight with True Image in the first place, plus the hard drives are different sizes. Manual install it is then. :p
 
tTz said:
Funny you should say that, I was just sitting here wondering about True Image. I've got a 5Gb-ish image of a clean install of XP from my current hard drive, and I was wondering if it was transferable to the new one...it would save a lot of time installing. Then again, I don't suppose it'll make a lot of difference if I have to fight with True Image in the first place, plus the hard drives are different sizes. Manual install it is then. :p
Click to expand...

You are welcome to try it but after trying everything I could find, I even installed XP instead of Vista to see if this was the problem.
 
WarBird said:
i would suggest a better aftermarket cooler if you're going to o/c a lot
Click to expand...


1) Too late

2) I'm not paying those ridiculous amounts of money ;)

3) I'm not really confident enough to install some of those monsters

4) I'm not looking to o/c it to its limits - I'll see how far it goes within a decent temperature range


:edit:

And my order is still at security validation. :(
 
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