New Rig (finally), Help Me Please!....

[cpt_azad]

k, after so fuckin long i'm finally building my new rig (to handle doom3, hl2 and future games in all of it's glory). here's wat i'm ordering, suggest other parts please:

Ordering:

MEMOERY: http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc....-220-010&depa=1 DUAL CHANNEL 2x1GB (2 gb total) RAM PDP SYSTEMS ordering in 1 week or if i feel like it, when i've got all the parts listed (gotta save those pennies )

MOBO: Suggest a good one that goes with the ram listed above
(184 pin of course) and also, has to be 8xAGP

PROCESSOR/CPU: Suggest something that's easily OCable and fast, i was thinking intel pentium EE HTT ones say 3.2 ghz or higher, i don't want AMD's because up to date i thought AMD 3000+ was 3 ghz only to find out it wasn't even 2.6 , i need something above 3 ghz atleast, suggestions needed

HARD DRIVE: http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproductdesc....-145-048&DEPA=1 250 GB HITACHI HDD 7200 RPM, definately need the space, now i'm not a tech guy but can i get 2 of these? or will there be complications (like i said i'm a n00b, will i have enough IDE cables, and wtf is RAID ? and if i get 2 of these will i have to set it up in a RAID format, like i said, no idea on HDD and how they work, no idea wat RAID is either)

CASE: now, i need something that is nice looking and has enough a PSU (is 420W enough? i'm thinking of getting a high end vid card as well so that could be a huge factor), this one i found is 420W and has 7 FREAKING FANS :
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc....-133-107&depa=1

HEATSINK/COOLING: i want my new rig to be as cool as possible, literally, now i have no idea wat a heaksink does but all i know is it's important (is it that thing that's attached to the processor chip and on top of my fx5200??) please suggest something unless heatsink already comes wit the CPU/PROCESSOR

CD/DVD DRIVES: already have a cdrw and a dvdrw at home

MONITOR: suggest a good flat screen 21" atleast, can't seem to find one on newegg only LCD's

VIDEO CARD: ahh yes, now wat to do? should i just grab the 6800 GT or wait for the 512mb to hit the market? here's the link (6800), i'm willing to pay: http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproductdesc....-122-195&DEPA=0 oh , and is this wat a heat sink is? cuz this is freakin huge
: http://www.newegg.com/app/Showimage.asp?im...-122-195-05.JPG

SOUND CARD: anything good 5.1 channel atleast

am i forgetting something? please give me other suggestions for these parts like better parts and stuff, except for the ram, i kinda made my mind up on that. help a guy out, my budget is 4200 dollars, and an additional 600 dollars in 2 weeks thanks to all for suggestion, remember, this is supposed to be a gaming rig

edit: i'm an idiot, added a sound card , am i missing something? pls do tell!

[Twist3r]

if you get a good enough mobo you wont need a 5.1 channel sound card

for prossesor i would go AMD, they overclock good and there cheaper

edit the AMD athlon XP 3000+ is suppost to be equal in speeds to a Intell 3.0 ghz
im not sure how that works but thats what i read some were

[tesco]

Originally posted by Twister@8 August 2004 - 22:48
if you get a good enough mobo you wont need a 5.1 channel sound card

for prossesor i would go AMD, they overclock good and there cheaper

edit the AMD athlon XP 3000+ is suppost to be equal in speeds to a Intell 3.0 ghz
im not sure how that works but thats what i read some were

ya supposed to be, it's close, but not quite there...i'd say the 3200+ is same as 3.0ghz p4.

but only way you'll see difference anyway is in benchmarks.


how about a athlon xp 2500+, oc it to 3200+ speeds (very easy...buy some arctic silver 5).

[ricochet]

I reccommend tying down that heat sink on the 6800. It might take off with P.C.

I wont do a RAID 0 hard drive config again.... I might do a RAID 1 tho...

[cpt_azad]

Originally posted by ricochet@8 August 2004 - 20:01
I reccommend tying down that heat sink on the 6800. It might take off with P.C.

I wont do a RAID 0 hard drive config again.... I might do a RAID 1 tho...

just read ur thread , definately going with a raid 1. so i'm prob. gonna end up buying 2 of those 250gb, so doesn't matter which one is the master and which one is the slave (they're bought the same HDD). as for AMD, i did hear somewhere they are very easily Overclocable, is it possible to OC say a amd athlon XP 3000+ to speeds of 3.4 or maybe 3.6 ghz? that'd be freakin sweet, and i've already ordered the 6800 GT (my dad's the best ). the ram will be here shortly as well. anymore suggestions?

[(>Zero Cool<)]

hi, ok re your hard rives, I am no expert but as far as I know you will be cool with two of them , really depends upon how many sata connectors your moboard has. Most boards have two ide connectors each cabe running off these splits into two giving you a total of four devices connected. Ide stuff would include your optical drives i.e cd/dvd etc. there is a preferrabe way to set them up as I believe that with both hds on the one main cable it takes longer to transfer but you can crossd that bridge when you come to it, it isn&#39;t a major issue.

Ok dunno if you got all this but here is my setup which may make things clearer.

I have an abit ic7 max 3 mobo. In ide slot 1 I have a cd drive and a hd. In slot two I have a dvd drive and another hd. My board has six sata connectors so I could add another six hd I have one at the mo so I have five slots free. you cannot connect optical drives to sata connectors so you may wish to have all your hd connected to sata leaving your ide cables for optical drives. depends on your setup. sata is supposed to be a little faster than ide I think, but not a great deal in it at the mo. remember you will need a big case to hold multiple drives and still be able to be keep cool.

as for your ram would you not be better to get less ram at faster speeds as even a slight overclock would max out your ram. this is a great article about my moboard but worth a read re ram speeds etc.click it basically says your chosen ram would be a bad idea if you plan on oc&#39;n a lot.

hope this helps you a bit

ps dunno much about raid sorry, cept ants don&#39;t like it , oh nd re sata I don&#39;t think they have master and slave settings all the same

[silent h3ro]

Maybe you should wait a little longer for 64 bit win XP (which should be out soon)then the chip prices will lower and get a 64 bit cpu. Thats what i&#39;m doing anyway...

[cpt_azad]

Originally posted by HardcoreGamer@8 August 2004 - 20:32
Maybe you should wait a little longer for 64 bit win XP (which should be out soon)then the chip prices will lower and get a 64 bit cpu. Thats what i&#39;m doing anyway...

hmmm, u have a good point. and zero cool is also right, i can cancel the ram order, wat&#39;s a good company that makes ram that&#39;s not to hard on OCing, i want it to be dual channel and atleast 2 gbs (i wanted 4gb, but then realized wtf was i thinking). nice read there zero cool, i guess i can attach the 2 HDD by sata leaving the ide for the optical drives. but then how do i use a master/slave config with sata? any good mobo suggestions? i looked at ur&#39;s zero and i&#39;m kinda iffy, nforce seems to be a good brand as well asus.

[(>Zero Cool<)]

Originally posted by cpt_azad+9 August 2004 - 07:12--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (cpt_azad @ 9 August 2004 - 07:12)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-HardcoreGamer@8 August 2004 - 20:32
Maybe you should wait a little longer for 64 bit win XP (which should be out soon)then the chip prices will lower and get a 64 bit cpu. Thats what i&#39;m doing anyway...

hmmm, u have a good point. and zero cool is also right, i can cancel the ram order, wat&#39;s a good company that makes ram that&#39;s not to hard on OCing, i want it to be dual channel and atleast 2 gbs (i wanted 4gb, but then realized wtf was i thinking). nice read there zero cool, i guess i can attach the 2 HDD by sata leaving the ide for the optical drives. but then how do i use a master/slave config with sata? any good mobo suggestions? i looked at ur&#39;s zero and i&#39;m kinda iffy, nforce seems to be a good brand as well asus. [/b][/quote]
Hi

re ram, do you really need 2 gb? corsair ram is very good but expensive , ook here you know how to work it

As for the sata you don&#39;t set master slave you just plug em in, no settings needed

As for mobo, I like mine but there are a few good ones out there, my advice is to check review sites. Rember to make sure the board is suitable for your chip and poss for future chips. I use the onboard sound which is fine on mine which will keep me going till I win the lotteryI

[(>Zero Cool<)]

Originally posted by cpt_azad@9 August 2004 - 03:38
k, after so fuckin long i&#39;m finally building my new rig (to handle doom3, hl2 and future games in all of it&#39;s glory). here&#39;s wat i&#39;m ordering, suggest other parts please:

Ordering:

MEMOERY: http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc....-220-010&depa=1 DUAL CHANNEL 2x1GB (2 gb total) RAM PDP SYSTEMS ordering in 1 week or if i feel like it, when i&#39;ve got all the parts listed (gotta save those pennies )

MOBO: Suggest a good one that goes with the ram listed above
(184 pin of course) and also, has to be 8xAGP

PROCESSOR/CPU: Suggest something that&#39;s easily OCable and fast, i was thinking intel pentium EE HTT ones say 3.2 ghz or higher, i don&#39;t want AMD&#39;s because up to date i thought AMD 3000+ was 3 ghz only to find out it wasn&#39;t even 2.6 , i need something above 3 ghz atleast, suggestions needed

HARD DRIVE: http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproductdesc....-145-048&DEPA=1 250 GB HITACHI HDD 7200 RPM, definately need the space, now i&#39;m not a tech guy but can i get 2 of these? or will there be complications (like i said i&#39;m a n00b, will i have enough IDE cables, and wtf is RAID ? and if i get 2 of these will i have to set it up in a RAID format, like i said, no idea on HDD and how they work, no idea wat RAID is either)

CASE: now, i need something that is nice looking and has enough a PSU (is 420W enough? i&#39;m thinking of getting a high end vid card as well so that could be a huge factor), this one i found is 420W and has 7 FREAKING FANS :
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc....-133-107&depa=1

HEATSINK/COOLING: i want my new rig to be as cool as possible, literally, now i have no idea wat a heaksink does but all i know is it&#39;s important (is it that thing that&#39;s attached to the processor chip and on top of my fx5200??) please suggest something unless heatsink already comes wit the CPU/PROCESSOR

CD/DVD DRIVES: already have a cdrw and a dvdrw at home

MONITOR: suggest a good flat screen 21" atleast, can&#39;t seem to find one on newegg only LCD&#39;s

VIDEO CARD: ahh yes, now wat to do? should i just grab the 6800 GT or wait for the 512mb to hit the market? here&#39;s the link (6800), i&#39;m willing to pay: http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproductdesc....-122-195&DEPA=0 oh , and is this wat a heat sink is? cuz this is freakin huge
: http://www.newegg.com/app/Showimage.asp?im...-122-195-05.JPG

SOUND CARD: anything good 5.1 channel atleast

am i forgetting something? please give me other suggestions for these parts like better parts and stuff, except for the ram, i kinda made my mind up on that. help a guy out, my budget is 4200 dollars, and an additional 600 dollars in 2 weeks thanks to all for suggestion, remember, this is supposed to be a gaming rig

edit: i&#39;m an idiot, added a sound card , am i missing something? pls do tell&#33;

ok

you are gonna need a good power supply to keep all your stuff going.

as for cooling heatsinks are very important if you are gonna overclock. overclocking causes your cpu/gfx to run hotter, heat is not good so you wanna keep things as cool as poss. The heatsink is the piece of metal normally copper or suchlike that sits on the top of your cpu, your gfx card and your chipset and conducts heat away. There is a fan attached to the top of the heatsink to cool thing down, ridiculously I can&#39;t remember if it blows the hot air away or blows cold aif on to the chip

It is very important to get a good cooler if you are gonna oc a lot.

re your case make sure it has good ventalation and plenty of space for cool air to move around for the same reasons.

You might wanna get some cable tidys to keep the cables nice and neat to again allow good airflow.

Oh btw not all sata drives come with cables so make sure you have these.
My board came with ide cables, sata power cables and data transfer cables but this is not allways the case.

ok If I think of anything else I will post back.


edit also be careful some heatsinks will be very big, just saw the one on your gfx, so remember that they have to fit inyour setup, your gfx card will prob take up two expansion slots due to the heatsink, as in it is so big you couldn&#39;t fit another card next to it. also remember that may want to upgrade later...much later....so allow specs that cater for this. oh and canI come and play at your house

edit 2. remember when buying a cpu that the top end chips won&#39;t overclock as much as the lower end ones as they are already near their max, some cpus oc better than others, again check this out. you could save money by buying a lower chip and oc n it. e&#39;g I have a two point six p four running at three but it was obviously cheaper than a three gig one at the time I bought it. check reviews and forums for better info. eg my cpu tops out at three point two five whatever you do