Building a computer from scratch

[670bird]

I am building a computer from scratch and I am open to any suggestions as it seems things change so fast it makes my head spin. Here are my current specs: AMD Athlon XP 2500 Barton CPU and fic AU13 NForce 2 motherboard w/ 5.1 audio, 2 Seagate Barracuda serial ATA 80 GB hard drives . Mid tower case w/350W power supply, 2 80mm fans one on top and one in side glass, temperature gauge. Now I am thinking of using a memorex cd rw 52X 24 X52 a Radeon 9500 or Prophet 9700 and windows 2000, dvd rom, floppy drive, and v92 modem or more likely DSL. And at least a cpu fan also if not 2 more fans. Any suggestions???????????????

[omalleytrading]

I've never built a PC, so take this advice for what it's worth...

I would go with a larger Power Supply. The price probably won't change significantly, but more power never hurts -- expecially if you're going to have lots of components.

[akinsey]

I agree with omalley, bigger and namebrand power supply; make sure its AMD certified since you're going to be using the Barton. GL!

[originel]

if your going to be building an amd system like that i would recommend 6 case fans, not 2. two front, two back, and the one side and top. really the side and top aren't that important, it's the front and back that are important because they direct airflow over the process which cools it more. obviously you need a CPU fan (it takes about a second or two for an uncooled AMD to reach 600 degrees, saw a cool video on tom's hardware doing that).

Why are you going with the two hard drives? personally i would go for a single 160GB instead to allow for future growth. but going with serial ATA and seagate sounds good.

Also i would recommend getting a Lite-on or a PLextor CD-RW drive. i've owned both memorex and plextor drives and the memorex has caused me a lot of problems (as i've heard they've done to other peopel). The plextor has been really awesome though, and it's fairly cheap. the lite-on is less than the memorex anyways and a lot of people here swear by them.

I would recommend a more powerful PS too. 350 isn't very much. also make sure to get a good quality one as it can make a huge difference. Also what type of case are you going to get? i would recommend the cheiftec dragon series (or antec or enermax equivalents) cause they are just amazing cases.

I'm not very familiar with the radeon series, but i'm assuming that the prophet is ATI based, right? if so i would definitley go with a 9700 over a 9500.

looks good but looks like you left out the ddr...hehe...but yes a good p/s is a must and you might think of going with something larger especially with your set-up. you need to go with a good hs/fan as well.

[Omardeth]

yes you will want min 400w psu .
also for the price of the sata hard drives ( 160 gig's worth ) you could get 2 WD WESTERN DIGITAL "SPECIAL EDITION" 120GB 7200RPM EIDE HARD DRIVE MODEL # WD1200JB - OEM with 8 mb cache for less . thats like getting 3 80 gig drives and haveing some left over money . also rememebr they are really new so they might be buggy still . also i'm personally not a fan of FIC motherboards . i would go with the MSI ABIT boards they also have sata if you are going to go with sata .

good luck

[poopeyhed2]

Sounds like a good system..

Memorex drives ARE Lite-Ons, just rebadged. I don't know why they'd give problems

And the Prophet is a Hercules card which uses the ATI chips.

If you have any problems, you know where to come

[Telexen]

Memorex bad...it doesn't matter who made it...what it is...if it has Memorex on it it's BAD.

[twistedbrntucker]

Originally posted by omalleytrading
I've never built a PC, so take this advice for what it's worth...

I would go with a larger Power Supply. The price probably won't change significantly, but more power never hurts -- expecially if you're going to have lots of components.

I have a MSI K7N2G-ILSR nForce2 and with it, I am using an Antec TruePower 480 watt "TrueBlue"

Oh Yeah Mushkin RAM PC3200 Level 2 2x256 in dual channel. Oh Yeah
Mushkin

[RedFury]

Isn't the Serial ATA interface for HDD's supposed to be just THAT much faster, like the upgrade from usb 1 --> usb 2.0

I'd be all over the serial ATA if I could afford it. Speed, not to mention thos nice tiny cables that afford better airflow without having to spend extra money on rounded cables ( not to mention that I've noticed alot of boards give you 2 ATA connections so you could theoretically have an slower WD special edition drive as a back up drive, and the SATA drives as your performance drives )

I'm swearing by Lite-On for Burners, and cannot recommend enough having a slot loading DVD drive ( pioneer 106s/2 ). If I could get every drive with slot loading capability I would. I hate trays. Once you go slot, you'll never go back

Power supplies have been covered well. Get a name brand supply, one with a known good reputation. You may bet a 500w powersupply from an unknown for a "steal" but I wouldn't put to much faith in it being one to give you stable voltage like a quality unit. You're better off spending the extra 10 bucks on the better brand and save yourself potential headaches down the road.