7200 rpm

7/5/2008 12:14:58 PM

then yea, depending on how small that drive is, I'd use it just for OS and program files and use a Media harddrive for pretty much everything else, you may notice a performance gain, and it makes reformats a breeze. The only instances I've heard of people installing JUST the OS to a drive (and partitioning it to allow for a page file partition) and leaving it at that are really anal bastards who benchmark, but just an OS/programs drive would probably be best if you can do it.

[Edited on July 5, 2008 at 12:22 PM. Reason : .]

7/5/2008 12:21:45 PM

^^typically when you hear that they are referring to a 10k rpm hard drive

since most of the common files being put in memory are operating system files, the faster the drive the OS is on, the faster your computer will startup, load applications, etc. but since these hard drives are somewhat limited in size, it's very common to have a 2nd hard drive that's 320+GB for storage that's just a 7200rpm drive.

7/5/2008 12:34:38 PM

Yeah i have my OS/Programs on the 10k Raptor 150GB, and my media/storage on the 2 Tbyte drives.

7/5/2008 12:37:03 PM

Take two 150 raptors and put it into RAID 1. You can find a decent mobo to support a basic raid (0/1/5). Have your media drives.



I just put 3-750 into raid 5, and I've never been happier.

7/5/2008 1:46:37 PM

I'm rollin with a Socket 939 3000+ XP and one of the chipset fans have been wobbly for awhile. Thinking about upgrading the mobo/cpu. I don't do shit on this machine, just eager to spend some cash. Are one of the AMD offerings reasonable enough or should I pay a little more for a Core 2. Don't game, don't care about OCing. Sorry, I haven't researched this myself yet, interested to see what your 2 cents are.

7/5/2008 2:12:56 PM

go Core2Duo/P35

7/5/2008 3:25:33 PM

anyone here use ebay a lot to get their parts. As long as the warranty is still good, I guess it's ok to buy stuff from there.

7/5/2008 8:42:20 PM

Prospero,

In your build for <1000$

Why do you use the ASUS P5Q Pro instead of the ASUS P5Q Deluxe

[Edited on July 6, 2008 at 11:34 PM. Reason : ]

7/6/2008 11:33:46 PM

a) because it's $70 cheaper
b) because there was a combo deal ($30 off) with the 4850
c) because i figured you didn't want to pay $70 more for dual gigabit lan

in regards to RAM, anything over DDR2-800 is considered outside of standard DDR2 spec and needs to have increased voltage applied to reach speeds over 800mhz. typically it's 1.8v and 800mhz. since most motherboards default at 1.8v, that usually means memory will drop it's speed down to 800mhz because it doesn't have enough voltage, people most commonly think this means they have faulty RAM. this is not the case. just up the voltage, set the speed & timings to EXACT manufacturer's recommendations, and you'll be fine.

to fix this:
a) insert one stick of memory
b) go into BIOS, up the memory voltage to what the manufacturer recommends
c) up the speed and timings to what the manufacturer recommends
d) restart, if it works, then
e) insert stick #2

other sites i'd recommend for price comparisons:
http://www.clubit.com
http://www.zipzoomfly.com
or always
http://www.pricegrabber.com
http://www.google.com/products
and be sure to check:
http://www.resellerratings.com

[Edited on July 6, 2008 at 11:44 PM. Reason : ,]

7/6/2008 11:39:28 PM

Thanks for the advice. I was on ebay yesterday and saw a Deluxe(ebay) cheaper than the Pro(newegg). Thought about maybe gettin' that instead mainly because it was cheaper.

[Edited on July 6, 2008 at 11:48 PM. Reason : ]

7/6/2008 11:47:45 PM

Is G.Skill better than OCZ

I ask because there is a huge difference in the price

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227289

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231166

7/7/2008 7:21:15 AM

^ is it noticeably better? no

7/7/2008 9:50:15 AM

I just bought 8 gigs of G Skill memory....I hope it's worth it.

7/7/2008 9:55:51 AM

you missed the deal, i believe both the 2gb & 4gb were on sale...

check out this deal instead:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227298

7/7/2008 10:30:53 AM

or this: (preferred)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145197

7/7/2008 12:38:28 PM

What separates all these quality wise.

Why is G.Skill so much more $$$

7/7/2008 1:34:50 PM

go look again, the g.skill is back down to $109 + free shipping

they are all good brands

7/7/2008 2:02:03 PM

Oh wow crazy. I almost bought that G.Skill yesterday too.

Glad I didn't.

7/7/2008 2:04:20 PM

What kind of Video card do you guys recommend that is ~$150

7/7/2008 7:59:41 PM

those are absolutely insane memory prices.

I've seen 2x1gb sets for 15-25 bucks all over the place. Just get two of em for 4gb. No need for 100 dollar memory at all.

150 dollar video card = Radeon 4850 on special.

7/7/2008 8:04:52 PM

ddr2-800 yes, but you can't double rebates either, so unless you're ok with different brands, different latencies, different voltages i wouldn't recommend it...

$150 = Radeon 4850

[Edited on July 7, 2008 at 9:06 PM. Reason : .]

7/7/2008 9:06:37 PM

What's the difference between the 4850 and EVGA 8800GT


Also sorry for all these noob questions

[Edited on July 7, 2008 at 9:11 PM. Reason : ]

7/7/2008 9:11:36 PM

Quote :

"150 dollar video card = Radeon 4850 on special."

Best deal hands down.

Quote :

"What's the difference between the 4850 and EVGA 8800GT"

http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/ati_radeon_4850_4870_performance/page12.asp

Bunch of benchmarks all over the place. 4850 is more powerful and on average only a little more than the 8800gt. One 4850 for 150$ or 2 4850's for 300-350$ is probably the best value you're gonna get.

Right now it seems like AMD hasn't perfected thier sli drivers yet and 2 4850's usually bench the same as 2 4870s. This will probably change after a few driver updates, but there's really no game you need more than one 4850 for.

7/7/2008 11:02:11 PM

Quote :

"or this: (preferred) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145197"

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10008006

7/8/2008 11:32:24 AM

now THAT's hot

7/8/2008 11:42:49 AM

I picked up that memory and my case from there. Got my PS from Buy.com and the rest from newegg.

7/9/2008 3:56:32 PM

Does newegg do price adjusting if the price dips down below what you bought it for.

7/9/2008 4:48:56 PM

usually, if it's like within a week you can get lucky.

7/9/2008 4:56:45 PM

sweet

7/9/2008 5:00:22 PM

Is a 4850 for $160 better than a 9800 GTX for $190?

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10008793

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10008198&ps=pn4

7/10/2008 1:45:32 AM

yes, a 4850 is slightly faster than a 9800GTX

7/10/2008 2:03:13 AM

4 Questions.

1. Is this case/PSU combo good? It's antec and comes with a 500w antec PS. Should that be enough for a 4850?

http://www.buy.com/prod/antec-sonata-iii-super-mini-tower-w-earthwatts-500w-power-supply/q/loc/101/204559259.html

2. In a computer used mostly for gaming, what would the differences be in a Core 2 Duo and a Core 2 Quad, other than $100. I'm 90% sure I'm not going to be doing any overclocking.

3. Is there any problem with transferring hard drives directly from an old machine to a new one?

4. how much of a performance hit would I take by using 2 monitors?

7/10/2008 2:53:45 AM

^^

Quote :

"yes, a 4850 is slightly faster than a 9800GTX"

No the 9800GTX is slightly faster than the 4850. Usually gets 3-5fps better. I think there's a couple benchmarks that the 4850 beats it by a little but mostly the 9800gtx comes out on top.

http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/amd_radeon_hd_4850_geforce_9800_gtx+/page7.asp

7/10/2008 10:14:22 AM

depends on who you read.

see this review...
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341

[Edited on July 10, 2008 at 10:20 AM. Reason : .]

7/10/2008 10:19:23 AM

^ahhh yeah. I think the 4850 scales better with cross fire too.

-ok so i want to update things. I have an 8800gtx. I was thinking of trying to sell that and get something else but i'd probably get the best performance by getting a second 8800gtx and those two put together will beat any single card.

but my card is still selling for 580$:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130078R

I want to know why it hasn't dropped in price.

Guess i could get this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814133187

[Edited on July 10, 2008 at 10:58 AM. Reason : .]

7/10/2008 10:52:09 AM

now if it was the 9800GTX+... that'd be different... the 4850 is exactly why nvidia released the + version

7/10/2008 10:55:21 AM

OK how does this look?

MONITOR: Acer AL2216Wbd Black 22" 5ms Widescreen LCD Monitor
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824009094

MOUSE/KEYBOARD: Logitech LX310 Black USB Cordless Standard Desktop Laser Mouse Included
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16823126032

MOBO: ASUS P5Q Pro LGA 775 Intel P45 ATX Intel Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131299

VIDEO CARD: ASUS Radeon HD 4850 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 Video Card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121253

CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 Wolfdale 3.0GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115037

RAM: G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231166

HARD DRIVE: Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3250410AS 250GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148262

CASE & PSU: Antec Sonata III Super Mini-Tower w/ Earthwatts 500w Power Supply
http://www.buy.com/prod/antec-sonata-iii-super-mini-tower-w-earthwatts-500w-power-supply/q/loc/101/204559259.html

Plus Vista 64 and a DVD burner

For a total of $1180.

I have some nice logitech speakers already.

7/10/2008 11:44:13 AM

looks great.

[Edited on July 10, 2008 at 11:50 AM. Reason : n/m, not the same]

7/10/2008 11:49:59 AM

nice, get a WD velociraptor.

7/10/2008 11:52:25 AM

8800GS for $73 shipped
http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid=40&threadid=2205807

7/10/2008 12:27:31 PM

ok, my RMA replacement for my DOA WD 640AAKS is finally coming in today. Since I already have one for my media and don't plan on filling that anytime soon and my sata OS drive is dying, I'm gonna put an OS partition on this 640 coming in because I read different places that they have pretty good reads/writes (don't really think access time was much noticeably faster) when you partition the drive to something less than half of its capacity. Anyone know anything about this and want to care to explain?

edit: I may just wait it out until my current OS drive dies (I keep nothing important on this drive anyway) because I'm sick of reformatting. I'm really waiting for OCZ's new line of cheap SSD's to launch anyway.

[Edited on July 10, 2008 at 1:02 PM. Reason : .]

7/10/2008 12:55:04 PM

yes, the western digital AAKS series of hard drives are on 320GB platters versus the more common 250GB platters, this means faster read/write times (1 or 2 platters versus the standard 2 to 3 platters)

http://techreport.com/articles.x/14380/13

[Edited on July 10, 2008 at 1:13 PM. Reason : /]

7/10/2008 1:04:15 PM

Anyone have good recommendations on sites that explain how to build a computer.


This will be my first time.

7/10/2008 4:13:07 PM

^ seriously? make a new friend and watch/help him/her or ask him/her to help you...it's by no means difficult (especially if you actually read/flip through the manuals that come with the components), but the problems you might run into (because you will probably run into SOMETHING) are going to be difficult to solve when you don't even know what you're looking for

7/10/2008 4:29:45 PM

Yeah I didn't think it would be impossible, more worried about those little things or something like you said.

7/10/2008 4:33:34 PM

read all the manuals before installation
always ground yourself by touching the metal case to discharge any static
don't force things into slots, medium force is ok, but know when to stop
if you don't know, ask.

7/10/2008 5:35:47 PM

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=1444

This should help. Oh, and don't do these things . . .

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=1720

7/10/2008 7:04:37 PM

Real quick, I'm not at home with the manuals so I can't look this up.

Is it typical for all the screws to come with the case and none of the other parts to have screws?

7/10/2008 7:43:06 PM

Yeah-- the screws come with the case.

Quote :

"read all the manuals before installation"

psyche!

7/10/2008 9:17:47 PM