Recommended Manufacturers

[Lamsey]

OK, many people are asking about what's good and what's not.

The only way to find out for sure is to research yourself at impartial sites like Tom's Hardware Guide or Anandtech. But, to give you a head start, here is a list of manufacturers who have a good reputation for certain types of product:


CPUs

AMD are good value for money but high-end Intel chips are slighlty faster (due to very high clock rate).
There are lots of threads in Hardwareworld about AMD/Intel - read them and do your own research before making a decision!


Motherboards

Asus are probably the best high-end motherboard manufacturer. For mid-range or budget systems, I've had good experiences with Elitegroup.


Motherboard Chipsets

For Intel systems: the Granite bay chipset from Intel.
For AMD systems: nVidia nForce2 all the way!


RAM

Crucial have an excellent reputation for reliable RAM, as do Corsair (thanks for reminding me Soul184&#33


IDE Hard Drives

Western Digital and Maxtor make reliable, high, performance hard drives.


CDROM/CDRW/DVD drives

LiteOn and Teac are good.


Video Cards

nVidia Geforce cards are affordable and powerful, but ATi are currently the performance kings.


Sound Cards

Two words: Creative Labs


CRT Monitors

Ilyama, Philips, and LG all have good reputations.


Mice

Logitech make good, reliable mice of all kinds.
Genius make very good budget mice - they make decent optical wheel mice for less than £10.


Printers

HP make the highest-quality printers but they can be expensive to buy and run.
Epson make less robust printers, but they are more inexpensive.




This is by no means an exhaustive list - I don't have enough experience to make recommendations about everything. Please add your own, but please be impartial and make sure your views are well-founded.

[ooo]

corsairis good ram....

cdrw.... acer.... u forgot speakers klipsh, altec, logitech

mice/keyboard
logitech, microsoft

sound cards
hercules...

[Lamsey]

cdrw.... acer....

I think Acer are now called Benq.

I didn't forget speakers, I just don't know enough about them...

and how did I forget Corsair RAM? editing first post now...

[ooo]

ahh icic...

[ooo]

you should have something abuot cases...

[Lamsey]

Again, don't know enough... I just buy cases from my supplier, they tend to have good ones.
I don't know about approved brand names.

Anyone got any ideas?

[ooo]

Originally posted by Lamsey@29 March 2003 - 23:17
I think Acer are now called Benq.

are you sure? there is an acer and there is a benq... i saw two websites

www.acer.com
www.benq.com

umm well cases are for looks arent they...

http://xoxide.com/chenming.html

i like these cases...

[Lamsey]

Make sure that any case you buy is roomy, has adequate cooling facilities and has a AMD or Intel approved PSU.

So, not just for looks...

[slammy_dunken]

Cases:
Cooler Master <--- Definitely

Optical Devices: (ex. CD-ROM, CD-RW)
Plextor
TDK
Lite-On

Videocards:
ATi <--- Still king after 6 months
Any other cards powered by R300 (Radeon 9700) or R350 (Radeon 9800) chip
nVidia <--- Still makes the most reliable drivers

Printers:
Epson <--- Prints really well

Speakers:
Klipsch <--- Best sound, ever
Logitech <--- Same sound as Klipsch, but cheaper

Gaming Accessories:
Gamepad: Thrustmaster Dualstorm (I think)
Joystick: MS Sidewinder
Steering Wheel: Logitech MOMO

[ooo]

altec for speakers are not bad at all...