Building your own PC.

Lydesia

Right i understand there are a few related threads but if i got a few helpful replies i would be happy! I got a dell machine about a year ago (I kno!) But anyway, the retar*ed thing does not have an AGP slot. I figured this out after opening it and having a look where i could sit my new graphics card that i bought in peats for 220 quid. Then after doing nothing put the cover back on the machine failed to boot. -.- The diagnostic light spelt a memory module failure and a PCI bus failure, which was nuts as i did nothing, anyway, im blabbering. i got it fixed after a while.

Basically im going to build a PC, i want a powerful PC for gaming and power heavy multimedia applications. I know Komplett do motherboards but can anyone link me to a nice AMD board (with agp slot) and RAM and the rest.
I have a moniter and speakers, keyboard and all that. So any help and links i will love you long time.

Nukem

Hang on there now horse.First things first.
If all the questions you asked are to be answered more info required.
Whats the budget.What are you using the comp for.Are you a novice.
More info the better everyone understands what you want

stuey

well before you get back with Nukem's questions which we do need, I will recommend going for a AMD Socket 754 64bit CPU. I think everybody will agree with this. My personal preference for motherboard nowadays is the MSI K8N NeoPlantium

http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=300050&cks=PRL

I am very very impressed by it. If you buy Epox I will hunt you down and kill you!!!

Lydesia

More info, righto.
Budget is about 1000 but i do have a moniter ect. As i have said im going to be using it for "gaming and power heavy multimedia applications"
so i would be looking for about a 3GHZ AMD board, 1GB ddr-ram, an AGP slot.
I would be looking for about a 200 GB HD aswell.
Im not a newbie, im familiar with computer archtecture but i have never built a PC before and dont know what parts are compatible with which.

Lydesia

Righty im gonna go check that link out. Cheers.

Nukem

And your off!
Ok read that you bought a gfx card,spec and all that please.
Mobo the one above is sweet.The CPU is up to you as long as it fits the mobo.S-ATA for the 200GB @Komplett probably the best.Ram either www.shop4memory.com or www.Komplett.ie or anywhere you find it cheap.
www.xcase.co.uk for cases and PSU's and DVD drives yada yada (komplett.ie)

Also try
www.dabs.co.uk
www.overclockers.co.uk
www.elara.ie
www.komplett.ie
www.xcase.co.uk
www.jes.de
www.pc-look.com
and about a 100 others here

Lydesia

You rule!
Ive been told that nVidea cards suck and i should get a radeon 9800pro.
So i was going to bring it back to Peats, what do you think?

Nukem

UH?
All down to your own presonal preferences ATI , nVidia whatever.
9800pro is gettin old the,6600gt is better or a plain 6800 if you can afford it.
Are you thinking AGP or PCI-E? Think you said AGP but if your bringing the card back?

Andrew Fotzpatr

was thinking of doin the same myself..
am goin to get this

http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=118126&cks=PRL

a 9800 pro

have 512 ram gonna get another 512 (1024)

have a 160g hd and an 80 gig

and i heard the audigy 2 sound systems are good..

anyway should cost me around 700 euro and should be pretty fast..

Andrew Fotzpatr

oh and about peats etc...they suck if u have a credit card buy off the internet..
for example in pc world the 9800 pro is 310 euro..its 220 euro off komplett..
saw a small computer shop off jervis street that sold the 9800 pro for 450 EURO..rip off Ireland

Lydesia

Yeh i have a credit card and i totally agree its a rip off buying it in the shops. The only reason i did it is because i dont know much about graphics cards and wanted some advice. Guess i should visit boards.ie more often,

One question..Can you get a half decent graphics card that will fit a PCI slot?

Nukem

Lydesia wrote:

One question..Can you get a half decent graphics card that will fit a PCI slot?

No! Its like stepping backwards .And i know what your thinking you have an integrated Gfx and no AGP slot.Get a new mobo and a new Gfx.

Bet ya i can nearly guess the Dell spec
Integrated intel Extreme crapness
80Gb / 120 gb
256 ram and its a DELL 2400 (Am i close)

jozi

Just something i trew together on www.jes-computer.de, prob so imcompatible parts and i'm sure some of them can be got else where for less.

Antec P160 Aluminium (no psu) 125.00 EUR
HDD IDE 200GB Western Digital WD2000JB 103.90 EUR
MB ATX S754 MSI K8N Neo Platinum 54G 129.99 EUR
CPU AMD Athlon 64 3000+ Box Newcastle 139.99 EUR
DDR PC400 1GB Corsair TWINX1024-3200C2 224.99 EUR
psu be quiet! 450W Black 2 Lüfter 75.99 EUR

Total €799.86

As i'm just not 100% up to date one these new 64bit mobo i wasn't sure what gfx card was compatible, nvidia6600gt (PCI-Express) is about €200 on jes and a radeon 9800pro (AGP)about the same.

Jozi

stuey

Ill just give you my two cents

AMD 64 give best bang for buck
Corsiar Ram is the best easily available ram (komplett.ie)
Epox mobos suck
MSI mobos are my new hot fav
Q-TEC Everything suck
Western Digi Hard Drives are most realiable
Komplett.ie soundest pc company to buy from

Lydesia

Nukem wrote:

Get a new mobo and a new Gfx.

A new motherboard? so you mean a new PC or can i simply change the motherboard? didnt think you could do that.
aha, you are very close, is a 2350 with 120GB, 512 RAM.


Thanks

Lydesia

Cheers man, nice spec and price.

Lydesia

Thanks for the suggestions.

Nukem

Huh?
If you wanna new Gfx it means new mobo all that.And especially if you are changing to AMD.Means new CPU AS AMD and Intel have different sockets.So basically new system.

jozi

stuey wrote:

Komplett.ie soundest pc company to buy from

Second that after having a monitor fail on me within warrenty they took care of everything mind you i'm still waiting on samsung for the replacement

Jozi

Da_cOmRaDe_MiKe

302880 Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 160GB S-ATA
118498 TwinMOS PC3200 DDR-DIMM 1024MB Dual Pack
118498 TwinMOS PC3200 DDR-DIMM 1024MB Dual Pack
120245 Sapphire Radeon 9200SE Atlantis 128MB
300693 Q-Tec Midi tower ATX L-MD02, Black
117721 Abit IS7 Mainboard for S478/800mhz
100727 Sony Floppy Drive 3,5" 1,44MB MPF-920
123710 Intel Pentium 4 3.2 GHz Boxed PC800
109113 MS Coa Label Microsoft Win XP Home Eng
109128 Manualer Microsoft Win XP Home Eng
109915 Royalty Microsoft Win XP Home
110861 MS XP Home Eng
122619 Sony CD recorder 52x/32x/52x IDE black
122633 Trust 1600P 2.1 Soundforce

total cost = €1011.74 including vat and delivery...

thats what im going with.
from komplett. so i would agree.. they are completly 1000000% better than anything ive seen anywhere else.

Nukem

Just a few quick questions 2Gb and that Gfx ?????????????????
For what.And Qtec its your money :rolleyes:

jozi

Da_cOmRaDe_MiKe wrote:

109113 MS Coa Label Microsoft Win XP Home Eng
109128 Manualer Microsoft Win XP Home Eng
109915 Royalty Microsoft Win XP Home
110861 MS XP Home Eng

What are they?
Seriously ditch the qtec psu as nukem sugested, you will regret buying it!
How about 1 gig less ram and a better gfx card??? Remember more memory on the gfx card doesn't mean its better, 128mb is enough for probabbly most/all games.
I you have a resonable stereo at home check has it got a aux in, if so all you will need is a stereo mini jac to stereo phone cable to connect pc to stereo, may be better quality sound to??
Have a look at one of the stickys for more indept info before spending your hard earned cash its worth holding out till you find the best value for money vs performance products. A upgrade in the near future is more expensive than getting it right now

Jozi

HungryJoey

I hope you aint gonna use the Power supply with that Q-tec case ?> If so ...id recommend not to !! I bought a Q-tec 450watt PSU and it only has 12A On the the 12V RAIL and thats one of there better products. I recommend u buy a seperate PSU , you will run into dificulties later on man...
Also , ditch the 2GB Idea and get rid of that 9200SE !! A GeForce 4 would be beter then that awful 9200SE...9200Pro is bad enough but the whole "SE" ( S**T Edition)...If u dithch the 2GB thing and you can get ure self a 9600XT or something alot better. Look out for 9550's. They are killer cards for the money...can be overclocked like hell...

As said near the top of the thread...the MSI K8N NEO is a great Board...I realy like MSI's boards these days but the K8N NEO is jsut a great board...

stuey

yeah I agree with everybody really. 2gb of ram seems like a great idea. but if everthing else up there isn;t on a par with it you are wsting you money. go for a 9600XT at least. I know hardcore gamers will say pish to a 9600XT but it is excellent value for money. See if you can aford to upgrade to a 9800xxx all the same.

Plus i would go for Western Digital Hard Drives and Corsair Ram. This is from personal experience. If had Twinmos ram die on me twice before. Corsair is rock solid in my opinion. Better for overclocking afaik

Lydesia

Is radeon or nVidea better? My god i have such conflicting opinions on this

jozi

Lydesia wrote:

Is radeon or nVidea better? My god i have such conflicting opinions on this

Thats a matter of opinion.

i've had both and was happy with both of them, buy what ever is best value for menu. Check some benchmarks.

Jozi

Slutmonkey57b

Socket754 is dying and is being replaced by socket 939 - prices on the 939 chips have dropped recently, but beware, the new 90nm chips are NOT always compatible with the current crop of 939 boards - get your buyer to guarantee the bios supports winchester chips before purchase.

Socket754 is great for a budget system, but if you're spending that cash on a system and don't have to buy a monitor, then I'd go for either 939 (AMD) or 775 (intel).

Slutmonkey57b

Mike that's an appaling spec. Everything is arseways.
1: Buy NOTHING from q-tec.
2: SATA offers little improvement on PATA at the moment, not until SATA II or SATA/300 is supported. And you have to load drivers from a floppy to get windows to install on one.
3: Who needs a floppy anyway?
4: Buy a DVD burner not a CD burner.
5: You don't need 2 gigs of ram
6: You need more than a 9200se.

Pauleeeeeeee

stuey wrote:

If you buy Epox I will hunt you down and kill you!!!

What's wrong with Epox mother boards...?


I have one ( I built a new computer last christmas though) and it hasn't given me any trouble.