New system - appreciate your comments

[VBN]

Hi Chaps. Thinking of finally putting a new system together.

I have selected the following parts and would be interested in any comments on any of the items.


Corsair 1GB DDR XMS3200XL Platinum TwinX (2x512MB) CAS2

Asus A8V Deluxe (Socket 939) Wireless Edition Motherboard

AMD Athlon 64 3500 (Socket 939) - Retail

LG GSA-4120BB Dual Layer 12x DVD±RW ReWriter - OEM

Western Digital Caviar Special Edition 160GB 1600JD SATA 8MB Cache - OEM X 2 Units

Abit ATI Radeon X800 XT PE 256MB DDR3 VIVO TV-Out/DVI (AGP) - Retail

Antec Sonata Piano Black Quiet Case - 380W TruePower Silent PSU

Microsoft Wireless Optical Desktop Elite - Retail

I might wait for PCIe AMD 64 motherboards to become available, but otherwise this is what I think I would go for.

Cheers

 

[sHaDdoW]

The psu might be a little lacking but the some of the other people will know for sure

 

[Sampson]

I'm looking at upgrading my own system to similar ram/mobo/cpu.
Was looking at that Asus mobo myself, but heard the MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum was better.
You might want to look into it. (doesn't ahve wirelessness though)
Oh, and unless HL2 is delayed a fair bit again (which, lets face it, isn't that unlikely) you won't get a PCIe a64 mobo before it. (unless your in america, in which case you might... just.)

 

[retrofitter]

http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20041008A8060.html
Wait untill mid month, you'll get some price drops.
As for the PCI-e, get it only if you intend to get an SLI capable mobbo, as you would be paying a big price premeium for the cards.

AGP was introduced in 1997. In 2002 you could still buy PCI video cards.

 

[Asus]

Nice system. It will all run great. Those Antec 380Watt PSU's they include are better than a number of 420Watt PSU's, like mine.

If you wait for PCI-Express for AMD it may be harder to find a PCI-Express gfx card now but it will be nice in upgrading later on.

You shouldn't have to wait very long til Nvidia launches its next chipset. Although they might not release their PCI-Express board right away with the AGP versions. Or that could just be a wait on their SLI board with their single PCI-Express board soon.

 

[sk0t]

System looks Great! - Congrats :cheers:

Personally, If I where to change anything, it would be this:

Mainboard: ASUS A8V Deluxe WiFi-G, if would change this for the MSI k8n neo2, as it has buid-in firewall(chipset) and a gb.lan conencted to the HTT-bus instead of PCI, I also belive it to be a slightly better overclocker.

However, if you have no interest in overclocking or advanced networking, the asus is nice too, and asus mb´s are almost always top.quality.

Harddisks: Western Digital Caviar Special Edition 160GB 1600JD SATA 8MB Cache - OEM X 2 Units - I suspect you will be running those in raid0?

Im quite uninpressed with the performance of most current sata/ide.raid controllers, I would personally get:
1x 36/74gb WD.Raptor 10.000rpm as a fast system disk.
1x 160/200gb (hitachi/seagate) as a storage disk. (adjust size/type as needed) Would bring more flexibility, and higher speed on system disk.

Just suggestions though, you current setup already looks great

 

[Lil' Timmy]

unless you plan on pilling several more disk drives in there, you definitely don't need a higher wattage psu. i'm not sure about the PCIe question, i like the idea of having it.. but retrofitter makes a good point. everything else looks good, imo

http://www.jscustompcs.com/power_supply/

 

[Gorgon]

Western Digital Caviar Special Edition is equal to shity product.

Get the latest WD.Raptor 70Gb x2 hd they are the fastest plus error free drives and last for long time.

 

[Lil' Timmy]

i just must have had bad luck, but i've owned three wd caviar drives in my lifetime, and all three died lprematurely. i use maxtor drives now, never had a problem with one (even though i think they are usually considered inferior).

 

[Gorgon]

i just must have had bad luck, but i've owned three wd caviar drives in my lifetime, and all three died lprematurely. i use maxtor drives now, never had a problem with one (even though i think they are usually considered inferior).

Maxtor drives are excellent but nothing can touch the raptor. :hmph:

 

[Asus]

Harddrives die all the time, most of the time from heat, friction and stress in general. People generally pick the drives that they have had the least issues with. Even if they don't know why they went bad.

I've had a number of Maxtor drives die on me and 1 WD drive. All three of those drives were replaced by the manufacture under the warranty and this was when Maxtor had a 3 year warranty as well.

Personally, I pick the drive that either:
a)performs better
b)has the best warranty
c)seems to run quieter

And WD OEM and Hitachi drives have a 3yr warranty and Raptor drives have a 5 year warranty. Most of the other manufactures have 1 year warranties.

 

[VBN]

Thanks for all the advice chaps, most appreciated.

 

[johnnypoopoopant]

wow nice comp VBN...wish i could afford a 939 soket cpu :bonce: <----- btw what is this guy suppose to be or doing??