Mike f n Reevz
10-31-2010, 01:18 AM
Alright, I have recently joined the Air Force and when I get my sign on or enlistment bonus I would like to custom-build a computer or have somebody who actually knows what they're doing build me 1 once I get the parts.
I have an idea of what i would like to get, but do not know a whole lot about this kind of stuff, and I will link the items below. So, if you happen to know anything about these parts, think they're good, bad, or know of anything good for a low price please let me know.
Motherboard: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128444
Processor: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103849
Hard Drive: http://www.walmart.com/ip/Western-Digital-WD7501AALS-Caviar-Black-Hard-Drive/13055851
RAM: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231277
Video Card: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161349
Case: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119225
Fan: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835186134
H2O I Dont Know
10-31-2010, 01:42 PM
Alright, I have recently joined the Air Force and when I get my sign on or enlistment bonus I would like to custom-build a computer or have somebody who actually knows what they're doing build me 1 once I get the parts.
I have an idea of what i would like to get, but do not know a whole lot about this kind of stuff, and I will link the items below. So, if you happen to know anything about these parts, think they're good, bad, or know of anything good for a low price please let me know.
Motherboard: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128444
Processor: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103849
Hard Drive: http://www.walmart.com/ip/Western-Digital-WD7501AALS-Caviar-Black-Hard-Drive/13055851
RAM: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231277
Video Card: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161349
Case: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119225
Fan: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835186134
perfect picks except how will u power it hahaha lol this one or the 750Watt ill recommend this link is for the 850watt http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139009 its up to u which on to get and also how many harddrives / optical drives / floppy drives(if any) u want to power and ect.... but have to say u did a very good job picking out some parts there lol
Dark Reality
11-01-2010, 08:05 AM
PMS Silent Jo's (Jen's) hubby here. I go by Dark Reality around the Interwebz, and I'm known for writing long posts. But I'm not here to BS you or tell a story; Jen said you wanted some advice, so go brew yourself some coffee or tea, this might take a bit.
First off, what do you want this computer for? (Well, first off, you're going into the Service, what do you need a computer for? but that's your business, can you even take a computer into the Armed Forces?) If you say gaming, you could save a crap-ton of money by just getting an Xbox 360 or a PlayStation 3. Microsoft and Sony have both done a hell of a job, I gotta hand it to Sony, even as a 360 "fanboy", they both made good systems. Consoles are simple and easy. You build the best rig you can mass produce at just above what the market will bear, sell it at a slight loss, and then require that all games licensed for it run just fine on that specific hardware. The tradeoff for the consumer is huge. You get the equivalent of a $1500 gaming rig for about $300-400, you don't have to wait for games to install, activate, authenticate, and verify, you can just pick up and play. And I used to be such a PC enthusiast, but since the Xbox 360 and the PS3, consoles are the smart option this generation. Last generation -- PS2, Gamecube, and XBOX -- it really could have gone either way. The one before? N64, Dreamcast, PS1 -- it was a no-brainer to have a PC.
Can't sell you on a console, eh? Well, if you want a gaming PC, you'll want one that won't be obsolete in a year or so. But the secret to building an awesome computer isn't buying the best parts (though, if money is no object, that's different -- but then, you want to be talking to Falcon Northwest, not doing it yourself -- look 'em up, see what the rich geek has under his desk). It's finding the "sweet spot". That in mind, I'll rate your choices:
CPU: You went with the hexa-core (six-core) AMD Phenom II for $260. I haven't priced hexa-core chips, but when I was looking at quads, I was looking at Phenom IIs around $150, until I discovered the Athlon II X4, $99 and all it's missing is the L3 cache. I don't really know what that means, and there isn't a website I've seen that can explain it simply enough. So it can't be that big a deal. Unless you want the best, I'd take a hard look at the Athlon II X6 line and see if you can't get something almost as good for a heck of a lot less. (However, now that the X6s are out, I realize I should stop debating on dual vs. quad as quad is now the "middle" multi-core level... hopefully the Phenom II X4s have gone down some... maybe I will get one, if the prices are fair(er).)
Motherboard: When I was looking at mobos, the 790GX was the top AMD board and USB 3.0 was a distant ship on the horizon. I know nothing about the 880GA, but the price is very nice. Gigabyte is a good brand, that's what I built with back in '05. Fair warning, it was the second component to fail (after the power supply). The CPU socket died... nearly 5 years after I built it. So don't be discouraged by that. It was a great mobo until it died. Now it's a great decoration. PMS Silent Jo can confirm, it's behind/to the right of our TV.
RAM: Haven't heard much about G.Skill but the ratings are good and the price is right. I'm a memory snob -- I'll generally only use Corsair... (long pause) ...or OCZ or Patriot, but sometimes you pay for a name. It's the numbers that matter, anyway. I would also point out that fancy heat spreaders can prevent you from filling your RAM slots. And I assume you know about DDR, or Double Data Rate? You see on that mobo, you have two blue slots and two white slots. Let's call 'em Blue 1, Blue 2, White 1, White 2. You can put your RAM sticks in both 2's or both 1's, but not both Blue's or both White's. So you get fancy RAM with heat spreaders, and you stick 'em in Blue 2 and White 2, just to give 'em that extra quarter inch of space from the CPU, and it runs great. Well, you decide you want more RAM, so you get a stick of RAM, so you put it in White 1. And you look surprised when your PC doesn't boot. Oops. With DDR, you can have just one, but you won't get DDR. You can have two. Can't have three in any way, shape, or form. But you can have four. But only if they fit, LOL.
Hard drive: First thought: Get it from Newegg. Second: You don't want that big a hard drive for your C (system) drive. A, because the bigger the drive is, the longer it takes to format it. B, generally a bigger drive is slower than its smaller counterpart. Sure, it's rated the same, but it's got more data to dig through. Simple physics. In other words, two Ferraris, same engine, same car, same specs, same driver, same road... 15 miles is gonna come a lot sooner than 75 miles. Specs are the same but the distance is greater. C, most importantly, if Windows screws up, that's a lot of data to lose in a reformat. Do what somebody else said, get an SSD or a Raptor for your system drive, then get a 2TB drive for your data.
More on little system drive + big data drive: In addition to the smaller drive booting faster, there's a "file" called the pagefile that Windows uses for virtual memory. By default this is on your system drive, meaning your system drive is always being accessed by it. You can move it to another drive however, taking a load off a drive that's already running your OS and programs. Also, PortableApps. Look 'em up. Despite the branding, they're not just for flash drives. Take or leave the stupid launcher, but the apps themselves can be unpacked (all the installer does) to any folder, and ran from there. These apps won't muck up your system, though you can assign them as defaults for opening files. Forget about it if you won't be reinstalling often, but how bad does it suck when you reformat and you have to Reinstall. Everthing.? If you don't know, trust me, it blows. Get Portable Firefox, Portable VLC, Portable XnView, and whatever else tickles your fancy (leave Portable uTorrent alone -- it's buggy and the "real" uTorrent is portable enough as it is -- drop it in a folder on your data drive and just run it from there). Migrate your existing Firefox profile to the Portable one, if you have one. Set these apps as default. Make shortcuts to the apps on your desktop, and back the shortcuts up on the data drive. Then something happens, Windows is being a butt, so you wipe your C drive, you reinstall Windows, you put your shortcuts on the new desktop, and hey, everything just works again. This kind of "modular" computing isn't for everybody, but I use it, and PMS Silent Jo uses it (well, I make it transparent for her, for her it's pretty much just like real apps) and it works good.
Video card: Holy hell, Batman! I don't know much about ATI cards, but it seems to me you could probably get a good nVidia card with 1GB of DDR5 for less than that! That just seems stupidly expensive. Check this out -- skip the video card entirely (for now). I didn't see it on the mobo page, but the 790GX mobos all came with some kind of ATI Raedon 4200HD. I bet with that, a good CPU, and good RAM, you could probably run most games on decent settings. Just depends how serious you are about gaming. If you do need a video card, this is where the "sweet spot" comes in. Enter the specs you want (1GB, GDDR5, SLI/CrossFire capability) into Newegg's advanced search, and see what's cheap, see what's expensive, and look in the middle. I'm willing to bet your ATI card is closer to the expensive end. You can probably get your video card cost down to $150-200, still get a great card, and put the money you save into more RAM. 4GB is fine, but 8GB is twice as fine, and 8GB plus a less expensive card will take you farther than 4GB plus that card.
Case: I have a $200 case and I love it. If that case would have been available in 2005, I probably would have used it. Can't say anything bad about Cooler Master, haven't heard anything bad, either.
As others have said, you'll need a PSU (power supply) as that case doesn't come with one. Everyone loves to talk about watts, but you also want to look at rails. An 800W PSU with one rail is not going to be as good as a 600W PSU with four. Now, I'm not so good at explaining what they do, but it has to do with stability. The more the merrier, but I think 4 is the max. Read reviews, and of course that goes for any part you buy. The Newegg reviews are a good place to start, but try to find in-depth reviews from Maximum PC, PC World, and other tech sites. If somebody who reviews a lot of tech says something's bad, well, they have a lot to compare it to, so it's probably true. If they say it's good, again, consider their experience -- probably true as well. If they give it a middle-of-the-road review, it's probably just decent, which is fine. (A lot of glowing reviews might drive a product's price up, too.)
As for other stuff... nobody uses floppies anymore. A floppy drive in a modern computer is a joke at best. Still, if you have any use whatsoever for floppies (dear God why?) you can get an FDD pretty cheap, and possibly even in a black bezel to match your case, and that mobo has a port for it, and all power supplies seem to still have them. And DVD burners can be had for about $20 and don't vary much; however for the kind of paper you're looking to throw at this project, you might consider swapping the Phenom II X6 for an Athlon II X6, a cheaper video card... and springing for a Blu-ray burner.
With regards to monitors, I have NO idea. I had one picked out when I drew up the budget for the new rig I was gonna build this year... and it was just a matter of researching them. LCD monitors, unlike trusty ol' CRTs, have one resolution, so for the sake of HD, try to get one that does 1920x1080. If it doesn't, you don't get HD. If you have a digital HDTV (as opposed to the rare CRT ones that came out first) you can actually use that as a monitor. It's tricky to do with nVidia; if you've got your heart set on ATI, I hope it's easier. If the old adage of nVidia=gaming; ATI=multimedia holds true, it should be easier. Also, they say the best thing you can do for your computer is to get a bigger monitor. I don't even remember the brand -- it was either Samsung or ViewSonic -- but we were gonna get a 23" monitor with the full HD 1080p for under $200. Maybe $179, maybe $199, it was definitely north of $150 though.
Anyway, I hope that helps...