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Good setup Yoshi :)
If they have Radeon 9500Pro, you should think to get that instead of TI4200, since its a better card, and should be in the same price range, but beats 4200 performance wise in every way.
Your setup its pretty much what I will be getting in my PC as well.
And yes, make sure you get a good fan to cool all the stuff inside
I often wonder the same thing. I've got four OSes on this harddrive with masses of room to spare. What I'd do with 100+gigs? Beats me.Quote:
Originally posted by Dragonmaster Dyne
why must people always get such big hdd's? i got by with a 4gig for years and finally caved in and got a 40gig with my new rigg.
Then again, I also say the same thing about most recent computer advancements. I'll be amazed the day I think I need a processor that's over 2ghz. Hell, my 500mhz P3 in my laptop works just fine. The general slump in computer sales recently is with good reason, most people just don't need this stuff.
Well, If you are not PC gamer, then sure, you dont need fast CPU, or Big Harddrive, or Powerful Video Card.
But if plan on playing some of newest games, than all that stuff comes into play. Slow processor wont be able to run new games, since most of games nowdays, require 1Gig-2Gig hard drive space, and you want to keep all of them installed, you need bigger drive. And Fast Video Card is MUST nowdays.
Imagine a day when programers had to program better to get more out of a game, instead of requiring more hardware.
Seems like eons ago.
We are nearing the capacity of Silcon, some much current is being drawn by new CPUs, current leak is becoming a problem. We may see a thinning of the herd the in PC gaming area soon.
Nope, no thorough-bred for me. :( But then my system isn't overclocked (yet).Quote:
Originally posted by Dragonmaster Dyne
hey phlegm do you have the t-bred core or the original? i also have the volcano 7 on mine (1800+ t-bred core) and have that puppy up to 2.0Ghz and it runs at a cool 35C with a healthy workload.
Yeah, but ATI's still a bitch when it comes to drivers, and the 9500 Pro is more expensive than the Ti4200. My advice would be to stick with the ti4200 for now, wait until the next generation of nvidia cards come out, wait until they drop in price, buy one and sell your old GeForce 4.Quote:
If they have Radeon 9500Pro, you should think to get that instead of TI4200, since its a better card, and should be in the same price range, but beats 4200 performance wise in every way.
But if you want the best performance you can get right now, then yes, you should buy the 9500 Pro.
My personal thoughts follow -Quote:
Originally posted by Yoshi
Board: AZZA VIA-KT400 DDR400 WITH 10/100 LAN, USB 2.0 + 8X AGP Main Board
CPU: AMD Athlon XP 2600+ @ 2.13 GHz Quantispeed
RAM: 512 MB PC3200 DDR
HDD: Western Digital 80 GB 7200 RPM Ultra ATA-100 w/ 8 MB Cache
GPU: nVidia GeForce 4 Ti-4200 128 MB DDR w/ TV and DVI-Out
Sound: Creative Labs Sound Blaster Live Value 5.1
OS: Windows XP Home
Check and double check the mainboard - reviews, company track record for updates, support etc etc. I would reccomend an MSI board.
I would ditch the DDR 400 unless the prices are the same (or less) for the 400 stuff. Stick with the more stable and (sometimes) faster preforming 333.
Get the highest quality RAM you can afford - big brand names (Crucial, Mushkin, Corsair etc)
Ditch the SBLive!! :eek: The sound is terrible compared to the cheaper Turtle Beach Santa Cruz. The SC even tops the Audigy in most tests and competes on par with the Audigy 2. Driver support for XP/2000 is great and the price is nearly impossible to beat.
The TI4200 is very difficult to beat at it's price point because of monster overclocking options - some overclocked models can match a stock Ti4600.
Thanks for the feedback, Six. I'll head back over and see what I can fiddle with.
Well, If sound not of big importance, look into Motherboard with sound card. Some are using pretty good chipsets, and that will save you some money too.
Sure, TI4200 is cheap, but it wont beat new Radeons New Features wise, and with Anti-Aliasing and Filtering (X 4,6,8), 9500 beats TI4600. Plus unlike TI4200, it supports Direct X9.
Gygabite mainboards are pretty good choice. They not very expesive, fast and reliable. And have lots of features.
www.pricewatch.com
Look for good prices for AMD chipsets... Athalon 1800 - 1900 is a good budget priced chip though you could do better. I scouted a MoBo with an Athalon 1800 included for 160 from a good vendor.
Not sure how good the vendor is? www.eopinions.com
You can get a good/great PC for 300 - 500 dollars. If you don't mind spending more I suggest some additional cooling for the Athalon (they could use it - stock fans for those suck) and may be a nice nice nice ATI 9700 :) Those are swank cards... and if you hold of for a bit (patentice pays off) ATI will slash that price when the nVidia FX comes out to undercut them. Isn't competition great :) Used to be I was on the NV side but ATI mixed things up a bit.
Looking at the 800 dollar range - you can get a board that fully used the potential of those cards (8x AGP).
HHD's are keen things - I suggest a basic 7200 RPM IDE internal HDD with an 8MB cache (makes things a hell of a lot faster) but if only the best will do - SCSI Raid configuration is the way to go. Forget about access times... and forget about being cheap too. RAID inherently requires mutiple HDDs and all SCSI (which are more pricey than the IDE counter-parts). It's one thing I love about a good computer is low access and seek times.
Fuck the OEM's or buying Windows outright. If you don't have WinXP already or WinNT/2K then just... errm... borrow them or perchance install Linux (it's not difficult really). That or pay out the ass and really stick it to the man and get a Mac :/ In which case you won't need our help.
Finnally - I cannot stress this enough - a kick ass computer is nothing without a kickass connection. Get broadband if you do not already have it. I've seen lives change by the power of the Cable Modem.
ºTracer
Nitty Gritty:
ASUS or Gigabyte for the MoBo.
AMD 1900 or greater... the lower you go the prices get amazing and they're still damned nice chips.
512 (at least) DDR Ram
120 GB 8MB cache IDE HDD (7200 rpm)
ATI 9500 or 9700 ($$$).
SB Audigy sound card
Deals to be had. That rig can be had for 490 bucks (1900 athalon) case and all (Lan Lei aluminum/plexiglass case - pretty).
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Agree. If the price difference is enough to stomach go with the 9500 (and a quick check to pricewatch indicates it may be less that I thought). So after checkin Anandtech...I modify my suggestion to include the 9500Pro. ;) Even an overclocked 4200 is shaky in comparison.Quote:
Originally posted by Despair
Sure, TI4200 is cheap, but it wont beat new Radeons New Features wise, and with Anti-Aliasing and Filtering (X 4,6,8), 9500 beats TI4600. Plus unlike TI4200, it supports Direct X9.
:D
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