LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner with LightScribe Black SATA Model LH-20A1L-05 - OEM
$41.99

COOLER MASTER Centurion 5 CAC-T05-UW Black Aluminum Bezel, SECC ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Retail
$49.99

Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3320620AS (Perpendicular Recording Technology) 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM
$79.99

ASUS M2N-SLI Deluxe Socket AM2 NVIDIA nForce 570 SLI MCP ATX AMD Motherboard - Retail
$139.99

BFG Tech BFGW6600GTOCX GeForce 6600GT 128MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 Video Card - OEM
$79.99 (39.99 after mail in rebate)

ePOWER ZU-550W ATX12V Version 2.0 / EPS12V 550W Power Supply - Retail
$54.99

CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model TWIN2X2048-6400 - Retail
+
AMD Athlon 64 X2 3600+ Brisbane 1.9GHz Socket AM2 Processor Model ADO3600IAA5DL - OEM
$183.00(153.00 after rebate)


for a total of $656.31 after tax and shipping
I play a lot of sports games and such, nothing too too intense, plus I am looking for a system i can upgrade at a later time whether its to a quad core or a better video card(s) or both


The other question i had was, on newegg where i will buy these, when it says OEM, what accesories do i need to buy as well?(heatsinks, sata cables etc.)

5/8/2007 12:29:55 PM

Quote :

"BFG Tech BFGW6600GTOCX GeForce 6600GT 128MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 Video Card - OEM $79.99 (39.99 after mail in rebate)"

:sigh:

5/8/2007 1:12:23 PM

more like

/message_topic.aspx?topic=472002

:sigh:

5/8/2007 1:18:58 PM

looks good, although a Core 2 Duo 6420 w/ nforce 650 chipset would run about the same and be a lot better performer...

if it says OEM for CPU it means chip only, you'll need a CPU cooler (heatsink & fan)

OEM typically means part only, no accessories, no box, no user manual, no cd's, nothing but bare part

you're video card is fine you won't need anything for it as long as your PSU comes with a PCIe power cable. for your hard drive you'll need a SATA 3.0Gb/s cable as well as one for your burner.

5/8/2007 1:21:13 PM

is buying an 'open box' item the same thing as when it says oem?

i could save like 60 by buying my mobo as the open box version

5/8/2007 2:54:31 PM

no, open box means that the product was a 'return' and they are reselling it.

check the site's open-box policy, typically the refund period is shortened, warranty may be shortened, and all the retail parts may not be included, it could also be blemished or missing packaging... it really varies... there are people that have perfect 'like-new' open-box items but it's risky, that's why it's so cheap

5/8/2007 7:18:27 PM

Quote :

"Core 2 Duo "

thats the direction id go in

avoid open box unless you want a headache.

good call on the 2gb of ram


btw search for "computer", there are a ton of threads on this topic.

5/8/2007 7:36:57 PM

change of plans, i decided to go c2d

XFX GEFORCE 6800 XTREME 256MB PCI EXPRESS 1GHZ DDR3 DUAL DVI/TV
$105.75

COOLER MASTER Centurion 5 CAC-T05-UW Black Aluminum Bezel, SECC ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Retail
$45

Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3320620AS (Perpendicular Recording Technology) 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM
$79.90

ePOWER ZU-550W ATX12V Version 2.0 / EPS12V 550W Power Supply - Retail
$51.43

INTEL CORE 2 DUO E6600 2.4 GHZ
+
ASUS P5N-E SLI
+
CRUCIAL 2GB DDR2 667 cl5
$423.36

LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner with LightScribe Black SATA Model LH-20A1L-05 - OEM
$41.99


for a total of $783 after shipping

this better, any advice?

5/8/2007 11:00:16 PM

seems like you could get a better video card for $100 (maybe an ati x1800 or something), but know next to nothing about video cards...someone help him out there.

and i always try to reduce the biggest bottleneck in any PC, the hard drive. i would get a 10k rpm hdd for your primary hard drive (or the fastest 7200k if theyre competing with the 10ks yet)

5/9/2007 12:05:24 PM

i could add 8800 gts for an additional 200 dollars, or add a 150 gig raptor for about the same

5/9/2007 1:37:54 PM

RAAAAAAID.

:

[Edited on May 9, 2007 at 2:09 PM. Reason : ]

5/9/2007 1:45:40 PM

I think you should also throw some D's on that bitch.

5/9/2007 3:09:21 PM

the seagate hdd he chose will suffice.. the perpendicular recording is known to have performance/speeds close to a 10k rpm drive. Bad thing about 10k drives is their failure rates are higher.

what i don't understand is why you're going with an e6600 and then skimping on the graphics card with a 6800. if you're doing nvidia.. go with at least a 7000 series or an ATI x1k series card.


look into DDR2 800 ram.

5/9/2007 5:31:36 PM

Meh, it makes sense if he only plans on using the card until cheaper Directx10 cards come out.


And 10k drives are a waste of money:

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/03/12/cheap_raid_ravages_wd_raptor/

5/9/2007 5:37:42 PM

Whats your budget? Investing money for an e6600 and then get a 6800 is pretty worthless. I would either get a cheaper cpu or spend more on a comparable graphics card. The 6 series is now like 3 years old. Look at a 7900gs if you want a good, decent, but cheap nvidia card. Look into ATI's card's since their x1900's are pretty powerful for their cheap price. Otherwise, the best bang for the buck card is a 8800gts 320 card; you can find them for about 250ish after rebate.

I'd also look at getting a better PSU. If your planning on investing and upgrading in the future, get a good PSU such as antec, thermaltake, coolermaster... efficiency is more important than the wattage number and I don't see them mention it on the epower POS.

Btw, ASUS sucks. They make good motherboards, but... they have tons of problems with them of what simple people can't deal with and their tech support is pretty bad. I built one with that same p5n-E sli and another Pentium D system with a different ASUS board. Both systems were picky as hell with Ram. Make sure the ram you get is compatible, since most 1.9v modules tend to make the board not boot up at all. Using cheap 1.8v ram seems to be compatible with them of what I find. If you're not a tech-savvy person, I'd just avoid ASUS all together.

If you really want to use a SATA dvd burner because it saves you of using an IDE cable, just to note, there's no real difference between SATA and the old IDE dvd burners. That'll save you another 20 bucks or so.

[Edited on May 9, 2007 at 9:57 PM. Reason : ]

5/9/2007 9:55:37 PM

id like to stay around the 800-900 range. the one guy was right, i am trying to stick with a cheaper video card until the dx10 cards come down a bit

5/10/2007 4:59:30 PM

Quote :

"i could add 8800 gts for an additional 200 dollars, or add a 150 gig raptor for about the same"

1) i'm saying i think you should be able to get something better than a 6800 for/around the $100 you want to spend (like the ati cards iand jbaz mentioned above). the 6800 is an olllllld card.

2)you can get a 36gb raptor for $100, a 74GB for $140, then add on a slower massive ide/sata drive for cheap storage (and backup for the smaller drive)

Quote :

"Bad thing about 10k drives is their failure rates are higher."

i haven't heard about reliability problems with the raptors, got any links or anything on that?

Quote :

"And 10k drives are a waste of money:"

just because you can set up a raid which outperforms a raptor doesn't automatically make that raptor a waste of money. some people don't want to deal with the risk/headaches of a striped raid setup.

5/10/2007 5:40:59 PM

Btw, my latest machine only costed 900 bucks. Its an e6600, 2GB 667 ram, 320GB HDD, DVD burner, 8800 GTS 640MB, Intel mobo, ultra case, ultra 500watt psu. If you shop around, you can get what I have for the same price.

I got the case and psu free after rebate and I've had a few ultra PSU's in the past and they are quite good (and still work), even though they aren't antec. For being free, it powers my 8800GTS very well. I don't overclock so I really don't need extra power. Mind you, Ultra is a better brand then epower or any of those generic brand POS'. They work and I've never had one problem with them.

5/10/2007 6:34:46 PM

RAID 0 - increased cpu activity, chances of failure double, transfer data is increased, but not access time, and the added risk of data loss, double the heat, double the power, needs a driver to be recognized, etc...

i know because i ran RAID 0 and a raptor side by side for >6 months, then i didn't see the value in RAID 0 over the raptor, i figure i could lower my power consumption, lower the ambient temp in my case, and had just as good, if not better load times in BF2 do to reduced access time with the raptor... so i sold both 160gb's and got a 320gb drive for storage

it's not a COMPLETE waste of money, but if you have the money it's well worth it imho.

and 10k drives are not less reliable, i've had mine for 2 years no issues and it has 5-year warranty same as all seagates

5/10/2007 9:59:19 PM

If you're concerned about a 6800 not being fast enough, I can say with a fair amount of confidence that it'll do for now.

I just made a system with an e6400 and 2g of 667, but kept my "old" X800pro. IIRC X800pro's aren't too much slower/faster than 6800's, and I can play BF2 and Oblivion at 1200x768 on "high" plus max AA without any frame-rate issues.

It would certainly not be worth it to upgrade at the moment.

5/10/2007 10:03:18 PM

the 6800 is still a very capable card, but with better choices out there for the same or similar price, its cost to benefit ratio is much smaller. There's a huge performance increase from the 6 series to a 7 series such as the 7900gt or even an over clocked gs (which performs almost on par with a 7900gt). Even then ati's x1950's are better then the 7900gt's for an average price of 150ish. You could probably find them cheaper.

5/11/2007 12:08:35 AM

Quote :

"1200x768 "

but i play on 1680 by 1050 and a 6800gt would choke...


that's why i have a 7950gt

and

/message_topic.aspx?topic=472002

[Edited on May 14, 2007 at 10:53 AM. Reason : c]

5/14/2007 10:52:57 AM