Critique the purchase!

[EZ_Grendl Nighthunter]

Tell me what you think. This is what I hope to pick up next month.

secure.newegg.com/app/Wis...?ID=570013


suggestions?

[EZ_Ubernome]

Motherboard is probably overpriced, you don't need RAID, you can find another one with Serial ATA but without RAID.

I had the Enlight case(2002 model), ended up giving it away because it was heavy(steel) and cramped(Midtower), not to mention it was a pain in the butt to remove the side panels. There are alumium full towers you can pick up at the same price.

Never really liked Seagate HDs...besides, serial ATA technology is still rather undeveloped. I'd just buy a regular drive by WD or IBM.

[Ruccus]

I'd get a flashier case, but that's just personal preference.

Do you know you're buying 4x256mb of memory, not 2x512mb? And you might want to get Cas2.5 instead of Cas3; you can get two 512mb Mushkin Blue PC3200 sticks for $176 or two 512mb Geil Golden Dragon cas2 6-3-3 1T PC3200 for $182.

[EZ_InvisiBill]

You have a retail CPU and another heatsink for it. I haven't bought anything lately, so I don't know exactly how they're doing it now. But in general, the retail CPUs are the ones with the heatsink "permanently" attached. It's more permanent on some than others... I don't think you could remove the one on the old SlotA Athlons without breaking the plastic casing, for example. You might save a few bucks and have less work to do if they sell OEM CPUs.

I think the 2.8GHz is the hot one right now, good for overclocking and stuff. I'm not sure how much more that would be, but it might be something to look into.

I had one of those little slot fans. I don't think it really did much good, except when it was right next to a Voodoo3 without a fan (to give you an idea how long ago it was). I remember seeing another type of slot cooler back then too. It was a duct about the size of a regular expansion card. It was longer than regular cards though, so the end was past them into the middle of the case. It had two little (40mm?) fans which could be swiveled up and down. It would basically pull air from the middle of your case and exhaust it out the slot. -------------------------
Invissibill
Llibisivni

[Biggwin]

Yeah, I would also pick on the case, just a personal thing.

I didnt see a video card or CD drive listed, you going to be useing existing stuff?

[Lisboa]

Retail heatsinks are never permanently attached.

[Ruccus]

You're mistaking the IHS (heat spreader) for the heatsink, InvisiBill.

The heat spreader is part of the processor; all P4s have them and generally you shouldn't remove them. The retail processor comes with a heatsink (not attached to the processor, or anything like that) and a three year warranty, but it's only a few bucks more than an OEM version and it's nice to have a spare around. When my Volcano 7+ fan started acting up, I was able to replace the heatsink with the stock intel heatsink instead of havign to run the V7+ without the speed toggle (it's very loud when at full speed).

[Lisboa]

You could save a little money buying hard drive and memory watching the sales. I think you may need a better PSU as well, especially since you are going to overclock.

[EZ_Grendl Nighthunter]

Thanks for the advice all!

In fact I did not realize I had gotten the wrong size RAM. I thought I had 512s. DOH! I am completely clueless when it comes to RAM... Does brand really matter with it?

Regarding the SATA. Does it not improve speed of the HD considerably? It was my understanding that it made a difference. (not 1st hand info) If its not a marked improvement, I would have no problem with a regular IDE. As far as brand goes, I really dont have any idea of which company makes the better product, I had just had good service with Seagate in the past (with a bad 40gigger I had of theirs) so I decided to go with them.

The case... Well, I like Enlight cases because of the easy access for the drive bays (the CD-Roms on rails, & the 3.5 bay snapping out completely). I also liked the front USB ports. Its not that I am not open to other suggestions, I just built a couple systems with Enlight boxes, & thought they were pretty serviceable for the price. I would welcome suggestions for like priced cases, with nifty features. In fact, if it werent for the fact that I am near desititute, I would likely blow wads of cash on case/cooling.

The cardslot fan I chose to help dissipate some of the heat from the vid card. With the Zalman fan having that giant hood on it, I was afraid it would restrict the egress of heat from the rear fan, & thought that the card fan might help in this. Again, I would welcome thoughts.

The MOBO, well, I picked it because it did offer RAID support, & I considered the possibility of eventually picking up another hd, so I could take advantage of it.... But its not a priority. I just didnt have a clue on what to go with.

Also, I am not going to OC. I am deathly afraid of it!!! hehe

Please respond guys, I appreciate your brains!

[EZ_Saltiness]

I recommend www.newegg.com/app/viewPr...127&depa=1 for a case. Double the price but worth it. I just bought one. It's very quiet (even with my FX5900), has all drives on rails, front USB, firewire and sound and looks pretty slick too (in the minimalist sense). The PSU it comes with is virtually silent and has more than enough power plugs. It's also ridiculously easy to open. The only downside is that it's heavy so if you LAN a lot, it might not be the best choice. Edited by: Saltiness at: 1/21/04 12:32 pm

[Biggwin]

I doubt as a gamer the raid will be of much use to you but it is your system.

I just did a quick search on the case that I have, this company calls it a casemaxx but i honestly believe that they are remarketing another case... all that aside I love the crap out of this case. The only down side to me personally it the height of the case, which is about 1 bay to many for my needs

This one comes with some extra stuff like LED fans, grill covers and some other misc stuff. How ever over all it is a kick butt case. There are no sharp edges, they fold all the aluminum ontop of itself so it is very hard to cut your knuckles when working inside the case.

The one i bought had front panel USB and firewire. It has a lockable front door (i have a 3 year old who likes to stick stuff where it doesnt belong), if you dont want the door it is easily removeable, it also has a huge removable side panel that also locks.

The HD bays are completely removable from the case with just a lever. The CD bays all have rails and so you dont lose the rails they mount to the bottom of the case when you are not useing them.

But like i said i just did a quick search to find the same style case that i bought, it might be worth it to look around and compare prices Edited by: Biggwin at: 1/21/04 12:37 pm

[EZ_Grendl Nighthunter]

I like that case alot Salt, but its more than I can pay for one.

I also like your cas Bigg, but while it is closer to my price, I would have to buy a PSU seperately.

Thanks though!

[Biggwin]

The case from Newegg

[Lisboa]

SATA improves disk copying speeds, not disk acess speeds. It doesn't do much really, but it's cheap enough that i spent the money on an SATA adapter.

You really shouldn't use a generic 360W powersupply on a system you are obviously planning to overclock (or you wouldn't be spending money on the heatsink and fan). The generic or obscure PSU companies often fib about their power wattage. Edited by: Lisboa at: 1/21/04 1:17 pm

[Ruccus]

I love my Antec SLK3700AMB (looking at Newegg it's $65 and comes with a 350w Antec power supply), though if you get it you'll want to go with black media drives (my white DVD and floppy drives stick out like sore thumbs when the case door is open). Also, some Antecs (the SLK3700AMG included) use 120mm fans, so you may want to get something like a Vantec Stealth 120mm fan instead of the 80mm if you go with an Antec with supports 120mm fans. My Antec has rails and front mounted USB ports, and a great looking metalic bronze paint job to boot.

I'd suggest SATA if you're getting a new hard drive primarily because it's the future standard - in several years there may not be a way to plug an IDE hard drive into a new motherboard without using a PCI card, but there will be SATA connections on motherboards for many years. Also, if you get a SerialATA hard drive now, and want to use Raid at a later date, you can go with the less expensive non-Deluxe version of the P4P800 (which has SATA Raid, but not PATA Raid). You might want to go with a 120mb drive though; the extra 40mb only costs about $25, and if you're looking to go Raid at a later date, in the future the 120mb drives will drop in price more than the 80mb (giving you a better value when you're restricted to buying a 120mb SATA drive to pair with your current drive).

Geil is decent inexpensive memory (there's a different between cheap and inexpensive, and I'd have to say Geil is inexpensive), and the price of their individual Cas2 PC3200 stick looks good (for some reason it's even less than half the price of the 2x512mb two pack of PC3200). But Kingston and Mushkin are good as well; just try to get Cas2.5 or lower memory so it'll be decently fast.

With regards to the cardslot fan, I doubt it's necessary - with decent case circulation you shouldn't have any problem regardless of the hooded processor fan. I'm more interested in making sure my computer is quiet, so I only run one 120mm case fan and the stock intel heatsink.

[EZ_InvisiBill]

Quote:You're mistaking the IHS (heat spreader) for the heatsink, InvisiBill.

No I'm not, I'm just getting out of the loop. =) Haven't had the money to spend on computer upgrades lately, so I haven't been paying too much attention to stuff. The general idea used to be that the heatsink was permanently attached, so you couldn't screw it up, so they could give you a longer warranty. Sounds like there's not really a whole lot of difference between retail and OEM anymore, other than putting a heatsink in the box with it.

Also, i like my Englight cases as well. I've always been impressed with their stuff, even the really basic cheapo cases. But I'm not into the fancy case mods and windows and neon and all that junk either. -------------------------
Invissibill
Llibisivni

[Aiden]

Bill makes a good point though,theres no real reason to replace the pent 4 heatsink/fan with an aftermarket one,except personal preference.

Generally you can even do moderate overclocking with intels retail heatsinks,as the intel cpus generate less heat then the AMD's. Unless you want to go with a quiet system that is,but a slot fan is going to be reasonably loud anyway.

the only other problem i see,is that your round cables might be a bit short,depending on your motherboard layout. I also dont see a cable for your CD-rom drive,and a 12" wont be long enough for both the hard drive and CD.

If you choose that chieftec,you need to pick up a seperate PSU,which will run you another 40-50$.

[EZ_Grendl Nighthunter]

Ok, so I can drop the cardslot fan. And I am not going to overclock, the Zalman was mainly because I like to be sure that the box stays cool, & the hood over the processor blows the air directly into the exhaust fan. You all believe I will be ok with the factory fan?

[Biggwin]

yep

[EZ_Grendl Nighthunter]

Alrighty, so far I have :

1) Chucked the Zalman & the card fan, got an additional fan for the rear exhaust since the case I decided on didnt have one.

2) Got the Geil RAM as suggested (thanks for the catch on that Rucc, didnt realize I was getting 4 sticks of 256)

3) After much deliberation, I decided to stick with teh Enlight case. I would have gladly gone with another, but couldnt find anything in my pricerange that I wanted to work with. I really liked the blue case, but all my components are white. I also REALLY liked the Antec, but its bronze, and again... all white components. What really stood out with the Antec was the bigger fans, & the PSU had a fan that drew air out of the case as well... I couldnt find anything like it in white though. :/

4) I chose a new MOBO. Went with a ABIT 865PE. Seemed to fit the bill, & has 4 slots for RAM.

Here is a link to the updated purchase. Criticism is welcome! Especially with the MOBO!

[EZ_Ragwheed]

Antec Case, beige in color.

Case is nice to work with. Has snap in spots in front-bottom for a fan, and fron-middle (hard drive mount) also *comes with* a rear fan.


Case is *very nice to work with*

Rail system for optical drives, the floppy drive mount is removed from the front for mounting, and the hard drive cages is easily removed for installing. My preferred case.

[Biggwin]

Woot, that is the exact case I bought... that i was trying to explain

[Ruccus]

If you really like the SLK3700AMB, then go for it, even if you have white media drives (though do switch the floppy you're ordering to black). It's got an Antec 350w power supply, rails, front USB ports, a case door, a front fan dust grille/air filter, quick release side panel, a place for two 120mm fans (and includes one rear 120mm fan), and the newegg pictures really don't do its paint job justice - it's like an automotive style metalic grey on a kind of crinkle-textured metal.

I find the only time I'd even have the case door open is when I'm starting up the computer or when inserting or removing CDs/DVDs. When the case door is closed only Superman will know what colour are your media drives, and it has a nice clean look (for everyone without X-ray vision). I'm ambidextrous though, so I have my case on the floor to my left; if you put your case to the right of where you work it may be a bit difficult opening and closing the case door, so you may leave the case door open more often.

I bought mine for over $100cdn a while ago and it was worth it, so in my opinion it's a very good deal at $65usd. The only pain is that the front USB ports have individual connectors (instead of one big plug; probably due to a lack of a standard motherboard USB connection), so it's a pain to initially read each wire and plug them into the proper spot to get the front USB ports working.

[Biggwin]

Hehe, In the case of the USB.

Remember when motherboards first came out with USB. A lot of them used an Add on connection. So you had this plug that ran a wire to an expansion slot on the back of the case.

Well sometimes you can still get ahold of those connections. So what I do is remove the wires from the plug and one by one remove the wires on the connection for the front panel and plug them into the plug so that if it ever does come disconnected when I am moving my case to a LAN party I dont have to worry I just plug the entire thing right back in, with out having to get out the mother board book.