Help me with a new PC

[FelixofMars]

Don't buy any ASUS stuff that my advice, they use them at work at they are cheap tat, or expensive cheap tat, they overheat badly, I was stupid enough to get an ASUS motherboard for my home PC and guess what that overheats playing games.

The Cheiftec cases are good though, solid, easy access, and cool looking.

[wazy15]

Here is my final list before I order it (all prices exc VAT)

Abit NF7-S VER 2.0 nForce2 SKT A 400DDR 8xAGP SATA Firewire 5.1 Sound LAN Retail Box 063401 34 ?51.02 ?51.02

AMD Athlon XP2600 333mhz 512 L2 Cache Barton Retail Boxed Inc Heatsin & fan 3 year warranty- 055148 303 ?53.23 ?53.23

Maxtor 6Y120M0 120gb Serial ATA 8mb Cache 7200rpm - OEM 048385 264 ?49.35 ?49.35

Panasonic Floppy Disk Drive Black 1.44MB 3.5 inch internal - OEM 043087 348 ?3.77 ?3.77

Corsair (VS512MBKIT400) 512MB (2 x 256MB Matched Pair), DDR400 / PC3200, non-ECC, Unbuffered, CL2.5, Lifetime Warranty 054473 55 ?53.65 ?53.65

Antec Sonata Midi Tower in Piano Black Trupower 380W PSU - 9 Drive Bays 047659 131 ?59.49 ?59.49

Nec 8x DVD Dual R/RW IDE BLACK Burner - OEM 058481 *3 days ?37.75 ?37.75

Sapphire Atlantis Radeon 9800 PRO 128 MB DDR 8x AGP DVi & TV-Out 047511 1 ?119.99 ?119.99


?428.25 (exc VAT)

?509.09 (Inc VAT)

Ebuyer put the 9800 PRO up by ?10 today I think thats everything I need, however as far as the harddrive is concerned, I can get the new Seagate Baracudda? 7200.7 (ATA) 120GB for ?57 inc VAT, however should I pay the extra and get the Maxtor SATA drive? Lastly, the Maxtor drive is OEM, however the Antec powersupply has SATA power connectors and I also presume the motherboard has SATA connectors with it? Also, where to buy Arctic Silver 5 from?

Waz

[Ciaran]

I have a NF7-S and a SATA HDD.


When I overclock i get errors on my HDD and windows normally fails to boot. When I run it stock I have no problems at all.


EDIT: I've only talked to one or two other people on the overclockers forums, last time I talked to them they couldn't find another solution either. At the moment I'm trying to unlock my xbox hdd so I can put windows on that and hopefully by pass the fault.


I'd advise you to buy an ATA HDD with that motherboard.

[H-Man]

If it's not too late - get a xp-m 2500 over a xp 2600.

Great chips for the money

[Freddo]

Cirian your problem sounds like your not locking the pci/agp buses, but thats just a guess, and wazy I would recomend you get a standard PATA drive on account of it makes windows much less hastle to install.

[NeilMcRae]

In my experience Asus make the best PC components, they aren't cheaply made and they work under extreme load very well.

[Super Stu]

Hmm, fair play: my Asus 4200 clocks like a bugger.

[wazy15]

Abit motherboards are supposdly popular amongst overclockers and are meant to be good quality. The SATA drive is only ?3 more than a PATA equivalent and I thought SATA could transfer data a small bit faster? Why is SATA such a pain?

Waz

[Super Stu]

Ciaran, is that altering the fsb or a simple multiplier clock?

Wazy, Abit are quality and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. I've had nothing but Abit boards since my p200.

[wazy15]

Nice to hear Stu, however, I do have a bit of extra cash and I am contemplating the jump to Athlon64

Thing is, do you still think that in the coming years AMD will be making a lot of 32 bit processors? I think it might go onto 64 bit, so I might just upgrade to that. Costs a fair bit more though, but might be better for future proofing! Either way, I might not go for the retail versions, as I will probably getting a better fan and compound (Arctic Silver 5), any recommendations? Somebody stop me from buying

Waz

[Ciaran]

When I overclock it I put the FSB to 200 and the multiplier down to 10.5. It runs perfect for a couple of days then one day when I'm starting it up the it goes straigh to a blue screen. Normally with a corrupted ntfs.sys file or a file called "system".

BTW I also reccomend abit motherboards, this is the first big problem I've had with them.

Sorry for the hijack wazy. Blame Stu

[Super Stu]

I don't think AMD will be making any 32bit processors now. I haven't checked AMD's roadmap in an age, but it was certainly intimated that Barton was the last 32bit core. In fact, don't AMD have 4 64bit derivatives out at the moment? Opteron, A64, A64 FX and the new Semperon.

No idea on future proofing, as it remains to be seen how far forward these boards will allow for expansion (this is where a quality board helps). That said, you'll all get extra performance for free when win64 comes into its own.

[capcom_suicide]

I don't think AMD will be making any 32bit processors now. I haven't checked AMD's roadmap in an age, but it was certainly intimated that Barton was the last 32bit core. In fact, don't AMD have 4 64bit derivatives out at the moment? Opteron, A64, A64 FX and the new Semperon.

No idea on future proofing, as it remains to be seen how far forward these boards will allow for expansion (this is where a quality board helps). That said, you'll all get extra performance for free when win64 comes into its own.

See here:

http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20040728/index.html

AMD's AthlonXP + The Athlon64= Sempron

Cheers

C_S

[Super Stu]

Ah, I see. The review linked from hexus.net didn't make that entirely clear.

However, none of us are interested in low cost processors


edit - ah yes, El Reg sum it up quite nicely. More of a rebrand than a new processor, as such. Makes sense.

[wazy15]

Hmm.......now I am confused! As the XP is getting discountinued I reckon it is better to go for an Athlon64, this means I will be spending extra cash I was hoping to order everything today, but looks like I will need to read some reviews on the different boards! Can anyone who knows much about Athlon64 boards recommend me a good one, as I don't have time to research!

Waz