new pc - thoughts?

nick_riviera

Hoping some of the folks here can offer some advice.I'm currently in the market for a new machine to replace my existing 4 year old steam powered box.I plan on using it for gaming(inc Half Life 2),as well as for the internet,some development work,etc.I'm clueless when it comes to putting hardware together so I'm planning on getting the PC through Elara.So,any thoughts on this spec?

Intel D865GBFL mobo
Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz 800MHZ
512MB DDR PC2700 RAM
Western Digital HD 120GB 8MB cache
ATI Radeon 9600 Pro 128MB
Integrated sound
AOC 19" CRT Monitor

With dvd and cd writer,this comes to about 1700(about my max budget).I suppose my main questions would be:

Is the Pentium worth paying extra for over an Athlon,or would I be better off going for the Athlon and saving money to spend on other parts of the system?

Are the AOC monitors any good?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated guys,thanks!

Col_Loki

The Intel 800FSB "C" chips are definetly the way to go with your budget, if it was tighter then an Athlon system would be on the cards.

That Pc2700 Ram will NOT work with the system, you need Pc3200 Ram .

The graphics card is a good one but is very expensive from elara and i would recomend getting that seperatly from www.komplett.ie (save over €100) .

I personally would recomend getting a motherboard other than an intel........... mainly for performance reasons.

The 19" AOC is a pretty decent monitor (have it myself) and im very happy with it.

The WD 120gb hard drive is also the same drive as mine and its fantastic....

€1700 would go a long long way if you were building the system yourself or if you knew someone who could build it for you, your talkin top of the range...........

Dempsey

I got the 512Mb kit EL DDR PC-3200 Platinum Dual Channel - OCZ from shop4memory.com. Free Delivery in Ireland and It benchmarks very high. Get that.

I recommend th ABit IC7-G, have that aswell very good board. Everything else seems ok. Make sure you buy SATA harddrives cos the cables are way neater and its faster

Creamy Goodness

if your going to get a motherboard make sure it's the ABIT IC7-G MAX 3 series

the improvements over the MAX2 is cool

i only wish i updated a month later

but the IC7-G is a cool board

BArra

i only wish i updated a month later

happens to everyone

you make a purchase and soon enough something better has come out and you wish you waited