General > General info Somewhat hot tub related
New computer
badval:
I wanted to build a very high-end machine on a budget of $2,000. Got it finished Wednesday and it is by all means a killer machine!
It scores over 10,500 on 3dMark05 and over 6,000 on 3Dmark06 with nothing overclocked - not many machines in this price range can do that.
It is absolutley DEAD SILENT. Very slight whir sound from the power supply fan & you can hear the optical drives spool up from time to time, but there's no way around those things (on air cooling w/ a reasonable budget). Even during intense gaming or benchmarking it stays silent.
Everything came from newegg.com
Using the new Core2 Duo Intel processors and new Intel motherboard chipsets (975x, 965x) can be tricky as they're picky about certain things - esp memory. If you're thinking about a serious machine you can use my "recipe" below.
The Case $58 - Very nice case for the money. Sure there are cheaper ones, but don't skimp here. Includes a 450W power supply, but I swapped it out - might be a perfect way to save a few $ by using it.
The Motherboard $170 - MSI makes good stuff at good prices. Their manuals are pretty good compared to some other top name brands too.
Video Card $260 - eVga GeForce7900GTO - this is by far the best "bang for the buck" high-end card on the market today. It almost triples the performance of my ATi X850XT, which is also a very strong card.
Power Supply $50 - only a little bigger than what came with the case, but I wanted silence & stock supplies are typically noisy (& often questionable quality). **Opportunity to save $50 by using the stock one.**
Processor $509 - Intel Core2 Duo 2.67GHz. Don't let the GHz fool you - this is an upgrade from a 3.2GHz dual-core PentiumD and absoulutely smokes it performance-wise, while using much less power and running cooler!. ** opportunity to save $300 by going with the E6400 2.13GHz version w/o much loss in performance (probably wouldn't notice in "real world" apps)**
Memory $250 - 2GB Crucial PC5300 DDR667. Motherboard supports DDR800, but all these new Intel chipsets downclock to 667 when running in dual-channel, so it doesn't really make sense to pay extra for the higher speed.
Hard drives $190 - 2 x 320GB SATA-II. I'm not running RAID -0, but could with this setup to get better disk performance. Motherboard supports all the common RAID configs. **Opportunity to save $95 by only using 1 HDD or more by using a smaller one**
Monitor $250 - 20.1" LCD widescreen. It's inexpensive for it's class but by no means "cheap". this widesreen is awesome and runs at 1680x1050 resolution. This has a 5ms (milliseconds) response time which is about the best LCDs get. What that means is that there is no "ghosting" in games or movies that is the bane of 12ms & some 8ms LCDs. **opportunity to save $ by using your old monitor or going with smaller screen**
Optical Drive 1 $30 - Lite-on 16x DVD +/- RW + DL
Optical Drive 2 $30 - Sony 16x DVD +/- RW + DL. 2 DVD burners are overkill, but i wanted to compare actual performance and noise of both burners. **opportunity to save $ by only buying 1 DVD burner**
Sound card $72 - Creative Audigy 4. Not top of the line, but very good performance. **Opportunity to save $ by just using the motherboard's onboard sound, which in this case is actually pretty good!)**
Operating System $140 - Windows XP Pro. **Opportunity to save $ - use media center or home edition & knock off $40-$60**
Case fans $30 - 2 of these ($15 ea) 120mm fans. The case comes with one, but it runs a little faster so it makes a little noise. These are expensive for what they are, but are dead silent. the tradoff w/ 800rpm fans is that they don't push a lot of air. in this case, it doesn't matter - the processor runs cool, the video card vents to the outside, & the heatsink fan blows right to the back of the case. the video card & CPU do not exceed 65C under intense load.
CPU heatsink $30 - Used Arctic Silver 5 thermal compound & not the junk that came pre-applied. Dead silent even under load and you can orient it so the fan blows in whatever direction you want. 10x better than the stock Intel fan!
I recycled the keyboard, speakers, & mouse from stuff I had around here, but otherwise, this is a good blueprint for everything you need.
Vinny:
Good news on the computer .... Bad news - it just became obsolete! ;) ;D
badval:
Just realized the end of this got cut off.
recycled the keyboard, speakers, & mouse from stuff I had around here, but otherwise, this is a good blueprint for a very high-end computer for about $2,000. Those prices don't include shipping & are rounded to closest $1, but several of the items had rebates or free shipping, so shipping charges were a wash. Also newegg only charges sales tax in states they have physical locations (TN, CA, & NJ I think). You could also follow this & my ** money saving ** ideas to build something very similar for around $1,350 or less.
Pound for pound, dollar for dollar, and decibel for decibel this will far exceed anything you can grab at BestBuy or order from AlienWare. If you're thinking of going with the new Intel Conroe (Core2 Duo) and don't want to break the bank buying off the shelf, or experiement around figuring out what will function well with the picky 975x/975x chipsets, follow this blueprint & you're all set! You're also "future-proof" for Windows Vista in DEC/JAN.
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My geek friend at work today had the question/comment "why use an nVidia graphics card on a motherboard that supports crossfire?" My answer was that there is nothing to be gained with anything on the market today by going crossfire or SLi vs using this single card. The nVidia 570 chipset motherboards are suspect (and their continual delay of the 590 chipset makes them even more suspect IMO) with Conroe. The old adage of Intel processors on Intel chipsets still holds true. It simply isn't worth the money, heat, or noise to go with a single ATi video card, let alone 2 of them. Especially with the release of DirectX 10 (or D3D10, Windows Graphics Foundation 2.0, whatever they're calling it today) right around the corner when this superb card is available for such a low price.
sledjunkie:
I stopped building my own computers about 7-10 years ago, when it actually became cheaper to buy a pre-built machine as opposed to building you're own.
So why did you build such a state of the art system? Extra money to spend? Hobby?
Are you a PC Gamer?
I bought this system from Dell's refurb outlet store 6 months ago (which I highly recommend)
Dimension 5150/E510: Intel Pentium 4 Processor 620 w/HT Technology (2.8GHz,800FSB)
1 GB DDR2 NON-ECC SDRAM 533MHz (2 DIMMs)
128MB PCI Express ATI Radeon X300 SE
16X DVD ROM Drive
16x DVD +/- RW w/dbl layer write capability
80 GB EIDE Hard Drive (7200 RPM)
Genuine Windows XP Media Center 2005
$358.00 total, after shipping.
badval:
That's a good price. I bought my mother the exact same one except it only has the DVD-RW drive & not the 2nd optical drive., but got it from the regular Dell site & it came w/ a 19" flat panel & free shipping. Was about $600 delivered w/ my whopping 10% employee discount.
Why do I do it? I like to play some games, but nothing that really needs all that. Kind of a hobby & I like to tinker with that sort of stuff. I work from home a lot, copy movies, surf forums like this one, etc. so I spend several hrs a day at the computer so I want it to be exactly what I want. The one this replaced is a very strong machine, but it was kind of loud - I hate a computer that has a constant noticeable buzz or gets loud when it starts working hard. Plus, I've been reading such good stuff about the new Intel chip architecture & wanted to try it out. There really was no big change in the entire Pentium4 series - clock speeds crept up & up, HT & then dual core were introduced, but no real improvements were made. Depending on what apps you run, you could be hard pressed to tell the difference between a 1.8GHz Pentium4 & a 3.4GHz PentiumD. The netburst architecture of that series had limits and the improvements felt like more of a marketing ploy than any real performance gain. The Core 2 Duo is a whole new architecture and process. It is truly a huge improvement in both synthetic benchmarks and real-world applications.
BTW - Dell is in the last week of it's fiscal quarter right now, so this is the time to shop the refurb website. Deals get better as they try to empty that inventory completely.
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