Upcoming (~budget) build

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Saribro
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Joined: Wed Aug 09, 2006 3:15 pm

Upcoming (~budget) build

Post by Saribro » Mon Feb 12, 2007 3:33 pm

I'll list the components with prices in Euros and some motivation on them. Comments are always appreciated but may be otherwise ignored due to budget- and availibility-restraints :).

ASUS M2NPV-VM (77,90)
The only cheaper boards available are ULi and VIA based, and this one has a good featureset and layout.

MICROSOFT Windows Vista Home Premium 64Bit Edition UK OEM (109,00)
Gotta have an OS.

Value 1024MB 667Mhz PC5400 PREMIUM Valueram DDR2 (84,90)
Single stick leaves more upgrade options open and costs little performance (probably none in the stuff I use), Sempron AM2 apparently only supports upto DDR667, so I took the savings

ICY BOX IB-360U-BL External IDE 3.5 inch HDD Enclosure kit USB 2.0 met licht (Silver) (35,90)
To put my old IDE drives in.

AMD SEMPRON 3200+ 64bit AM2 Boxed with cooler (54,90)
A64 X2 3600+ fell within consideration but isn't available, so I took the cheapest C&Q-supporting processor there is (according to these forums).
Sticking with the boxed cooler for now, will see how that turns out before deciding to spend more.

ANTEC Performance Case P150 Zilver 430W PSU (150,00)
Good stuff, love the modular PSU, padding, cable-routing-space, HD mounting options,...

WESTERN DIGITAL 250GB 16MB SATA II (7200/300) WD2500KS (75,50)
Large enough, cheap enough, SATA. Don't need much.

DVD-RW SATA SAMSUNG Wit Internal DUAL LAYER 18X +/- Writer Bulk SH-S183A (36,90)
Decided to go SATA here too, white should match the case.

MSI NX7600GS-T2D256EHL, Passieve Koeling, Geforce 7600GS, 256Mb DDR3, TV-out, DUAL DVI, HDTV, Retail (104,90)
Integrated graphics were probably a little borderline for me. Passive cooling, fast enough, cooler doesn't have huge extremities on it's backside that could block potential bigger CPU coolers, one of the cheaper 7600GS's too.

Total (729,90)


Thoughts?

wjdashwood
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Post by wjdashwood » Wed Feb 14, 2007 8:14 am

Personally I'd go for a X2 3800+ as it's an absolute steal after the recent price reduction. I'm planning on building a system with the same motherboard as you but onboard graphics would be fine for me so I'll be spending the money on better RAM.

Saribro
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Post by Saribro » Wed Feb 14, 2007 9:33 am

wjdashwood wrote:Personally I'd go for a X2 3800+ as it's an absolute steal after the recent price reduction
Unfortunatly that hasn't sunk through the channel yet here, I'm still looking at a EUR 135 chip, and I'm not sure I'm willing to spend it for that.
I suppose it wouldn't hurt to wait a week to see how that evolves.

wjdashwood
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Post by wjdashwood » Wed Feb 14, 2007 9:36 am

Yeah I would definitely wait for the prices to drop with your retailers over there. Some great bargains to be had over here.

teejay
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Post by teejay » Wed Feb 14, 2007 11:09 am

Where are you from/where are you ordering from? You copy-pasted "Passieve Koeling" (a.k.a. passive cooling)... are you Dutch by any chance? If so, you can get most parts quite a bit cheaper by surfing around a bit... might even save you enough money to get that X2 (which would be a good investment).

PS: filling in your location in your profile helps us giving advice.

peerke
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Post by peerke » Wed Feb 14, 2007 12:04 pm

Saribro: If you're Dutch checkout "tweakers.net" and search their pricewatch for lowest prices on those components.
For your proposed setup: No obvious bad choices, but I don't see the benefit of the SATA Samsung DVD-drive over a normal IDE model. You can just do "cablegami" to tuck the IDE-ribbons out of the airflow. I think SATA-cables are easier in theory but in practice I find them stiff and hard to bend in the desired shape or place.

Saribro
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Post by Saribro » Wed Feb 14, 2007 12:51 pm

peerke wrote:Saribro: If you're Dutch
I'm not :D.
peerke wrote:I don't see the benefit of the SATA Samsung DVD-drive over a normal IDE model.
I can't see a disadvantage either, the price is the same, and I get to disable another device in BIOS (IDE controller, obviously), which means another potential cause of problems (of whatever sort) pre-empted. Oh, and bragging rights? :D

ronrem
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Post by ronrem » Wed Feb 14, 2007 1:02 pm

The Semprons are great for Passive (Ninja) cool. You may even get away with replacing whatever case fan with something in the 800 rpm area.

I recently lost a Western Caviar that had run less than a year....as it sat a few months before I set it up,it was past Warranty. My much older Quantum,having the OS/Apps is still solid..so I'd tend to trust Samsung or Seagate more than Western for now.

I don't know Euro's but noticed New Egg is now doing the X2 3600 OEM without the required bundle,and price dropped a bit to $105. It may be a few weeks before a good Euro buy is there but the price diff is fairly mild.
The 65 nm process for sure helps run cool,though there has been little focus on how cool.

the 2800 semprons are freakish cheap,yet are a chip with the power of the Bartons and P4's that were the Gamer chips just a few years ago. the 2800 has no C + Q,but undervoled a bit runs so cool you can do passive on the CPU and have the minimun case exhaust.

Saribro
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Post by Saribro » Thu Feb 15, 2007 8:36 am

ronrem wrote:I recently lost a Western Caviar that had run less than a year....as it sat a few months before I set it up,it was past Warranty. My much older Quantum,having the OS/Apps is still solid..so I'd tend to trust Samsung or Seagate more than Western for now.
Well, the WD drives I have are doing nicely, but I'll consider this.
I don't know Euro's but noticed New Egg is now doing the X2 3600 OEM without the required bundle,and price dropped a bit to $105. It may be a few weeks before a good Euro buy is there but the price diff is fairly mild.
I've actually found an X2 3600+ for EUR 99 in a shop I didn't consider at first because they've always been significantly more expensive in the past :). Huray for me.

wjdashwood
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Post by wjdashwood » Thu Feb 15, 2007 8:40 am

Is it logical to think that the X2 3600+ will kick out less heat due to it having half the cache? If so it would make a great processor even better.

Saribro
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Post by Saribro » Thu Feb 15, 2007 3:48 pm

wjdashwood wrote:Is it logical to think that the X2 3600+ will kick out less heat due to it having half the cache?
Hehe, unfortunately, no. Less cache means more memory activity, which actually means higher consumption :) (but not enough to really care about in desktop or even mobile systems).

wjdashwood
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Post by wjdashwood » Fri Feb 16, 2007 12:35 am

Saribro wrote:Hehe, unfortunately, no. Less cache means more memory activity, which actually means higher consumption :) (but not enough to really care about in desktop or even mobile systems).
Wouldn't that depend on the algorithms being run and how much cache they use? I just seem to recall reading on here somewhere that cache contributes a large part to the overall power usage and heat produced by the processor. Probably just my memory going! :D Or do power management features power down certain chucks of cache when not in use these days?

Saribro
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Joined: Wed Aug 09, 2006 3:15 pm

Post by Saribro » Wed Feb 21, 2007 4:32 am

Well huray, 2 days after I order the 3600+ form that other store (still ~2 weeks till it comes in :/), it gets listed on the first one where I'm getting all my other parts. Luckily, the price difference is only €5.
Now I just have to fetch the cash from the bank, drive around, pay, assemble,... :D

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