New PC

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Led_ZePPelin

New Member
Hello, I'm new if you haven't already noticed, I decided a few days ago, to make my own pc, I used the site www.overclockers.co.uk to collect my hardware, and was just wondering about your veiws on my computer.

This is what i have:

Intel Pentium 4 "Northwood" 3.2GHz (800FSB) with HT Technology - Retail (CP-030-IN)
Price: £159.95 (£187.94 Including VAT at 17.5%)

Abit IC7-MAX3 "Canterwood" (Socket 478) Motherboard (MB-039-AB)
Price: £109.95 (£129.19 Including VAT at 17.5%)

Corsair 512MB DDR XMS4000PT CAS3 (MY-031-CS)
Price: £85.00 (£99.88 Including VAT at 17.5%)

Sapphire ATI Radeon 9800 Pro Ultimate 128MB DDR TV-Out/DVI - Retail (GX-038-SP)
Price: £159.95 (£187.94 Including VAT at 17.5%)

Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 9 120GB ATA-133 8MB Cache - OEM (HD-013-MD)
Price: £52.50 (£61.69 Including VAT at 17.5%)

AOpen H600B Super Tower Black Pearl Windowed Side Panel 350W PSU (CA-007-AO)
Price: £64.95 (£76.32 Including VAT at 17.5%)

Samsung SM352-B 52x/32x/16x CD-RW/DVD Combo (Black) - OEM (CD-006-SA)
Price: £27.00 (£31.73 Including VAT at 17.5%)

ThermalRight SP-94 (Socket 478) Cooler (HS-011-TR)
Price: £32.00 (£37.60 Including VAT at 17.5%)

Coolermaster Aero Blower Fan (FG-004-CM)
Price: £5.95 (£6.99 Including VAT at 17.5%)

Vantec Spectrum Fan Card (FG-004-VA)
Price: £9.25 (£10.87 Including VAT at 17.5%)

Thermalright NB-1 Chipset Cooler (HS-016-TR)
Price: £11.95 (£14.04 Including VAT at 17.5%)

Total: £736.50 (844.19 Including VAT at 17.5%)
 
Praetor

Praetor

Administrator
Staff member
Indeed a nice, stable PSU is very important for performance oriented machines. I would reccomend at least a 400W PSU by either Thermaltake or Entec. I would reccomend a Vantec PSU (since I use one) but i would stay away from their "Stealth" line of PSUs because they dont evacuate enough heat out of the box fast enough. :)

- As for processor selection, you might be interested in perhaps getting the P4C-2.8 or even the P4C-3.0 and if you need the performance, overclock the system -- the price jump to the 3.2Ghz proc (IMO) is not worth it.

- Dunno what the prices are like across the lake (i'm in Canada) but at least here the Western Digital 160GB 7200 8MB ATA133 drives can sometimes be cheaper (or the same as) the Maxtor120GB (and in some peoples opinion, WD makes better drives)

Other than that, good parts all around :)
 
L

Led_ZePPelin

New Member
Thx 4 the info guys, but i just noticed that on the webby i'm using, the P4 3.4 GHz is cheeper than the p4 3.2GHz, go figure :confused: and the WD hard drives are more expensive, but ya get wot ya pay 4 :D i hope :p and psu wise, Antec TrueBlue 480W PSU?
 
L

Led_ZePPelin

New Member
Cooler

Now that the psu is sorted... The CPU cooler realy has been making me think... Because I have the Abit IC7-MAX3 with the OTES cooling system, there isnt much room around the CPU (so i've read in reveiws) also the northbridge cooler doesnt affect the temperature *aparently* because its round and it also decreases the amount of space around the CPU, so my problem now, is finding a cpu cooler that is small enough to fit between the OTES cooling system and the northbridge cooler, but still have good cooling potential. I have had the idea of replacing the northbridge cooler with a Thermalright NB-1 Chipset Cooler. Is that a good idea?
 
Praetor

Praetor

Administrator
Staff member
northbridge cooler doesnt affect the temperature *aparently* because its round and it also decreases the amount of space around the CPU
Click to expand...
Not entirely the right reason: the Northbridge gets adequate cooling from a (relatively) large Aluminum heatsink (like on ASUS boards) or a smaller copper-aluminum heatsink with a low profile fan (like most other boards). Some brands have a medium-large aluminum heatsink with a fan on it however that's not entirely neccesary :)

That OTES thing is pretty kewl however yoy will want to make sure your case supports that fan otherwise the fan will be exhausting (or is it intaking) via a piece of metal. As for your HSF, both Thermaltake and Aerocool make smaller P4 HSFs that are more than good enough for the cooling job.

Thermalright NB-1 Chipset Cooler. Is that a good idea?
Click to expand...
Like I said before, active cooling isnt really required but of course, every bit helps. You'll probably want a copper or mixed heatsink though. The reason I say "large Aluminum + no fan" or "copper + fan" is because copper is very good at absorbing heat -- and not so great at passive dissipitation and thus a fan is almost a neccessity otherwise copper will rapidly lose its effectiveness (notice that virtually all all-copper HSFs have fans with the exception of very specialized products). Aluminum however, while slightly less effective at "absorbing" heat, it is more effective at "passively dissipitating it" and has a higher threshold before it loses its effectiveness. I believe this is the main reasoning behind why ASUS boards dont have northbridge fans (and the fact that those fans pushing a couple CFM will end up brinigng more dust than air)
 
L

Led_ZePPelin

New Member
I'vr changed case to Antec PlusView 1000AMG Metallic Gray File Server Case, because it has no PSU, and looks good, and if i bought the other case that i mentiond, i would be wasting money on a psu that i wouldn't be using. Right I've forgotten what I was going to say... Ah yes, the site for the case doesnt say that it DOES support OTES, but it also doesn't say that it DOESN'T support OTES... so i'd be guessing that it doesn't :( ah well i can always cut a hole in it can't i? :D muahahaha
 
Praetor

Praetor

Administrator
Staff member
Yes you can always cut a whole in the case... and if it doesnt say so than it probably doesnt support it :)
 
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