$2,500 system, critique please!

[Mike Altieri]

I have recentaly put together a new computer on newegg. I have a $2,500 budget and will use the system for gaming and some hefty programs as well as a lot of multi-tasking. I'll post my specs below and you can feel free to give me suggestions.


Case - Antec SUPER LANBOY Silver anodized aluminum ATX Mini Tower

Motherboard - ASUS A8N-E Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra ATX AMD

Graphics Card - Albatron 7800GTX Geforce 7800GTX 256MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16

Power Supply - COOLMAX CR-550B ATX 550W "140mm Fan" Power Supply

Processor - AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+ Toledo 1GHz FSB Socket 939 Dual Core Processor

RAM - OCZ Peroformance 2GB (2 x 1GB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) Unbuffered Dual Channel Kit System Memory

Hard Drive - HITACHI Deskstar 7K500 0A31619 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive

Keyboard - Logitech Ultra X 967353-0403 PS/2 Wired Standard Keyboard

Monitor - BenQ FP757-V2 Black Silver 17" 16ms LCD Monitor

Mouse - Logitech MX518 931352-0403 2-Tone 8 Buttons 1x Wheel USB + PS/2 Optical Mouse

CD Drive - NEC Silver IDE DVD Burner Model ND-3540A

Speakers - Logitech X-530 70 Watts 5.1 Speaker


That comes out to about $2,490 with shipping and tax. Any suggestions will be considered and appreciated! Thanks!

 

[redrider773]

meh, second drive would help, you kno, for disk copying. And maybe get a sli ready mobo, so you can get a second 7800GTX later in life, that'd be sweet...

 

[LlamaTronics]

Looks pretty good, my suggestion though... Get another DVD drive also... That way you can copy from 1 to another. Otherwise, you have to rip one DVD or CD, then switch to a blank, and then burn... Just kind of a hastle... A regular DVD drive is cheap anyway, might as well add it and save the hastle!

lol redrider773 - I must have been typing while you posted that... Anyway, I guess my opinion was OK if someone else was typing the same thing...

 

[Mike Altieri]

I acctually do have 2 there, just didn't post that. My bad. I'll look at some SLI motherboards as well. Thanks guys.

 

[XHotxEx791]

Yes, get a sli board, preferrable dfi. Get 2x250GB Sata IIs. Get a better company for the 7800GTx. Don't forget as5 and windows if needed.

Roger

 

[Archangel]

get a sli board, preferrable dfi.

why the DFI? The albatron currently holds the benchmark record

Edit: and i like that processor.. it works fine for me

 

[Mike Altieri]

Alright, i'm gonna make a few changes right now. Thanks guys!

EDIT: How about this motherboard?

 

[Praetor]

Motherboard - ASUS A8N-E Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra ATX AMD

There are significantly superior boards found via MSI K8N Neo4 Platinum orDFI LanParty nf4 Ultra-D

Processor - AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+ Toledo 1GHz FSB Socket 939 Dual Core Processor

Not nearly as major a change but you might consider the 4200+ and OCing it ... the extra 512K per core isnt monumental since AMD proc's have never really been cache starved

why the DFI? The albatron currently holds the benchmark record

Because not everyone can hit the number the top people can hit, DFI or otherwise (hence the primary suggestion is a MSI for its superior featureset)

Edit: and i like that processor.. it works fine for me

Because there are possibly more financially sound options available. I've got a 4400, 4200 (and last week a 3800) here doing video stuff left right and center and with a mild OC the 4200 cleanly sails along just fine

 

[Archangel]

Because there are possibly more financially sound options available. I've got a 4400, 4200 (and last week a 3800) here doing video stuff left right and center and with a mild OC the 4200 cleanly sails along just fine

no doubt about that

 

[bigsaucybob]

personally i would get a smaller hd and maybe go for a 19 inch monitor but thats just me

 

[Mike Altieri]

personally i would get a smaller hd and maybe go for a 19 inch monitor but thats just me

I'm a space whore, I need my space.

I'll take your suggestions into consideration.

 

[Archangel]

but isnt a 16ms screen a bit slow? considering the use of a 7800GTx, ull use it for gaming.

 

[Mike Altieri]

True, although space is probably more important to me. How are CRT monitors for gaming/multimedia/hefty programs? I heard CRT are good for gaming but not multimedia. My younger sibling has a nice monitor, but a shitty computer so I could always take it from him if I end up not liking the monitor.

EDIT: How would this CRT monitor be? How about this one?

 

[Archangel]

well.. as far as i know, there are 8ms tft screens..

 

[gamerman4]

I'd get a 10k RPM HDD if I had that much money. They Raptor seems to have been a very good 10k HDD. More RPMs boost the overall performance of your entire computer because the faster your HD is, the faster it can access info and the faster things will load. Also, a faster HD will make accessing your virtual memory faster and greatly improve speed. You might also want to get 2 and put them in RAID if you know how to.

.....you have a $2500 dollar system and 70 watt speakers?? c'mon man...j/k
I would recommend you get better speakers though, for $100 you can get some Altec Lansing 5.1 90 watts. Altec Lansing makes very high quality sound equipment. They specialize in sound developement. Also, their speaker systems are very sleek and well designed. My dad has some 2.1 speakers and they work great and are very cool looking.