My first PC build, please critique

Roads · 07-10-2006, 08:57 PM

I am building my first PC. I should have it completed somtime in august. I am new to this stuff but I have been doing my research. This PC will be used to run the latest games aswell as web surfing and such. Keep in mind that I am building this on a budget. If something is a little slow now then I will change it 6 months from now.

Case - COOLER MASTER Centurion 5 http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16811119077
PSU - Antec SmartPower 2.0 SP-500 ATX12V 500W http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16817103937
Mobo - ASUS A8N-SLI Premium Socket 939 http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16813131540
CPU - AMD Athlon 64 3700+ San Diego http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16819103539
RAM - OCZ Titanium 2GB (2 x 1GB) http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16820227056
Video Card - eVGA 256-P2-N562-AX Geforce 7900GT http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16814130028
HDD - Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3320620AS (Perpendicular Recording Technology) http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16822148140
Optical - NEC Black 16X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16827152058

I have already purchased the case and PSU. I am waiting for the release of conroe to get everything else due to the prices drops. Please give me some feedback. What is the bottleneck here?

Slackr89 · 07-10-2006, 09:22 PM

not familiar with that cpu but everything else looks good. imo its a nice setup.

mrjack · 07-10-2006, 09:42 PM

You should be able to get a nice X2 processor for the current price of the 3700+ after the prices drop.

rahving · 07-10-2006, 09:56 PM

Setup looks good, no bottleneck for gaming at all. I would however recommend socket AM2 for upgradability reasons. The only possible hitch in that is if you wanted a single-core cpu with 1MB of cache. I don't know when the AM2 3700+ is slated for release, if ever.

Looks good, regardless of what you ultimately decide to go with.

Roads · 07-10-2006, 10:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mrjack

You should be able to get a nice X2 processor for the current price of the 3700+ after the prices drop.

I was originaly going to go with this setup,
-AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ Windsor http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16819103735
-ASUS M2N-SLI Deluxe Socket AM2 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131013.

But I got turned off of AM2 after hearing about RAM issues and the CPU not really utilizing the DDR2. Also AM3 is only like 6 months away. This being my first build, compatability, ease of use/iinstallation, and tried and true products make me feel more comfortable. Newer products scare me...

m0nk3ys1ms · 07-10-2006, 10:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Roads

I was originaly going to go with this setup,
-AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ Windsor http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16819103735
-ASUS M2N-SLI Deluxe Socket AM2 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131013.

But I got turned off of AM2 after hearing about RAM issues and the CPU not really utilizing the DDR2. Also AM3 is only like 6 months away. This being my first build, compatability, ease of use/iinstallation, and tried and true products make me feel more comfortable. Newer products scare me...

I think you would be much happier with that choice instead of the 3700+.

Roads · 07-11-2006, 05:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by monkeysims

I think you would be much happier with that choice instead of the 3700+.

Is there going to be much of a performance difference between the 3700+AM2 and the 3800+ 939?

Roads · 07-11-2006, 05:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by monkeysims

I think you would be much happier with that choice instead of the 3700+.

Is there going to be much of a performance difference between the 3700+ 939 and the 3800+ AM2?

rahving · 07-11-2006, 09:28 AM

No, you won't see hardly any difference between the two. The 3800+ runs at 2.4Ghz stock while the 3700+ runs at 2.2Ghz stock. The 3700+ makes up for most of the difference in games with it's 1MB of cache vs the 3800+'s 512MB.

Ultimately, they are extremely close to one another bench-wise, both being excellent gaming cpu's let alone less intensive tasks such as web surfing, etc. With socket AM2 and the 3800+, you'll save quite a bit of money, have access to DDR2 memory, and be better off upgradability wise.

wicked859 · 07-11-2006, 10:03 AM

Dude, I would go for the am2 x2, thats what im getting and I haven't heard anything about it not utilizing its ddr2 ram, Any1 I have talked to loved everything about it.

07-10-2006, 08:57 PM	#1 (permalink)
Roads New Member Join Date: Jun 2006 Posts: 12	My first PC build, please critique I am building my first PC. I should have it completed somtime in august. I am new to this stuff but I have been doing my research. This PC will be used to run the latest games aswell as web surfing and such. Keep in mind that I am building this on a budget. If something is a little slow now then I will change it 6 months from now. Case - COOLER MASTER Centurion 5 http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16811119077 PSU - Antec SmartPower 2.0 SP-500 ATX12V 500W http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16817103937 Mobo - ASUS A8N-SLI Premium Socket 939 http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16813131540 CPU - AMD Athlon 64 3700+ San Diego http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16819103539 RAM - OCZ Titanium 2GB (2 x 1GB) http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16820227056 Video Card - eVGA 256-P2-N562-AX Geforce 7900GT http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16814130028 HDD - Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3320620AS (Perpendicular Recording Technology) http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16822148140 Optical - NEC Black 16X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16827152058 I have already purchased the case and PSU. I am waiting for the release of conroe to get everything else due to the prices drops. Please give me some feedback. What is the bottleneck here?

07-10-2006, 09:22 PM	#2 (permalink)
Slackr89 Bronze Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Canada Age: 19 Posts: 76	not familiar with that cpu but everything else looks good. imo its a nice setup. __________________ Computer Lie #1: You'll never use all that disk space. Computer Lie #2: That's more RAM than I'll ever need. Computer Lie #3: Oh yeah, it's compatible with everything. Computer Lie #4: There's no harm in trying - nothing can go wrong. Computer Lie #5: The manual explains everything.

07-10-2006, 09:42 PM	#3 (permalink)
mrjack VIP Member Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: Finland Age: 17 Posts: 2,323	You should be able to get a nice X2 processor for the current price of the 3700+ after the prices drop. __________________ Main rig: Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 @ 3GHz \| MSI P7N Zilent 2x2048Mb OCZ Titanium 800MHz DDR2 Samsung Spinpoint T166 320Gb SATAII Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 250Gb SATAII Western Digital Caviar SE 160Gb SATAII MSI NX8800GT OC 512Mb @ 660MHz/950MHz Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio \| Antec Truepower Trio 550W

07-10-2006, 09:56 PM	#4 (permalink)
rahving Silver Member Join Date: Jan 2006 Posts: 195	Setup looks good, no bottleneck for gaming at all. I would however recommend socket AM2 for upgradability reasons. The only possible hitch in that is if you wanted a single-core cpu with 1MB of cache. I don't know when the AM2 3700+ is slated for release, if ever. Looks good, regardless of what you ultimately decide to go with. __________________ My system. cpu - AMD Athlon 64 3500+ Orleans mobo - AM2 Foxconn memory - 1 GB PQI ddr2 533 hard drive - WD 80GB Serial Ata floppy - NEC black cd/dvd - Lite-On 16X DVD video card - Geforce 7600GT case - Antec SLK1650B

07-11-2006, 09:28 AM	#9 (permalink)
rahving Silver Member Join Date: Jan 2006 Posts: 195	No, you won't see hardly any difference between the two. The 3800+ runs at 2.4Ghz stock while the 3700+ runs at 2.2Ghz stock. The 3700+ makes up for most of the difference in games with it's 1MB of cache vs the 3800+'s 512MB. Ultimately, they are extremely close to one another bench-wise, both being excellent gaming cpu's let alone less intensive tasks such as web surfing, etc. With socket AM2 and the 3800+, you'll save quite a bit of money, have access to DDR2 memory, and be better off upgradability wise. __________________ My system. cpu - AMD Athlon 64 3500+ Orleans mobo - AM2 Foxconn memory - 1 GB PQI ddr2 533 hard drive - WD 80GB Serial Ata floppy - NEC black cd/dvd - Lite-On 16X DVD video card - Geforce 7600GT case - Antec SLK1650B

07-11-2006, 10:03 AM	#10 (permalink)
wicked859 banned Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Hohenwald, TN Age: 16 Posts: 644	Dude, I would go for the am2 x2, thats what im getting and I haven't heard anything about it not utilizing its ddr2 ram, Any1 I have talked to loved everything about it.

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