New self build machine.

T

timtheenchanteruk

New Member
Its been a looong time since I built a pc from scratch (IIRC it was an AMD 500Mhz processor, and jumpers on the M/B to set speeds/voltages!!), the last couple were bundles/barebones sytems,

Im needing to make a system for my hobby of live theatre, it will be used for audio and video playback, a bit of audio and video editing, but not much (thats what I built my home machine for)

I cant seem to find a barebones I like (or can afford) so Im looking to go the whole hog and build myself.
now, how do I make sure the M/B processor and RAM are all compatible with each other?

Ive seen a couple of M/Bs with pretty decent onboard graphics, (radeon 3000) with dual head out, so looking along these lines, I do need somthing that will come with playing back HD video without issue, but dont need a huge gaming card. I need it to be pretty quiet, so another reason for no seperate GPU.

Also, as its to be used in theatre, it will have a good soundcard fitted to it, so I dont care about 5.1 onboard when Im fitting a 24Ch card.

I need a reliable make (think I have gigabyte in my machine here, no problems in the last 18 months)

looking at 2Gb RAM, with capacity to expand if in the future.

I will also be fitting SSDs in raid 1.
DVD burner
HDD caddy to use for a normal HDD for backup/archiving
It will be running XP pro, stripped back to be boring, but relaible, with only software used on it, cubase, vegas, VLC, cue playback,

hope its not a big ask here!!!
 
Missed the biggest part: Your budget.

To see what RAM/MoBo/CPU is compatible, you need to know this.

Make sure your CPU socket on your MoBo is the same as your CPU. For the one I picked out, they're both AM3 sockets.

For RAM, make sure its the same kind (DDR3) and the same speed. (1600)

Sounds like you need a good dual core. AMD is cheaper, so if price is an issue, go AMD. Nothing wrong with AMD either. Here's a quick setup I whipped together:

MoBo with ATI 4250:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130585

CPU:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103903

RAM:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145252

PSU:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182006

HHD:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148727

It's barebones so you need a SATA cable:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812226004

Sound card:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16829132006

Total: $359.93

For SSD, it depends on what you need it for. For a boot drive, 32GB will due. For fast startup for programs, look into 64GB or 120GB. Just depends on what you will be willing to spend.

For the DVD drive, look on amazon. Plenty of good drives there. Newegg seems to have very few drives.

Be weary of using XP. Don't get me wrong, I love XP. My favorite. But they are stopping support for it. Getting a 64-bit win7 will be much better. Plus Win7 works better with SSDs. Saying that, I can't find if your CPU is a 64 or 32 bit.

If you do go to Win7, get 4GB of RAM. It'll be faster.

All you need to do is pick out a basic mid ATX case and you should be set.
 
Few tips, if you're doing ssd's in RAID 0 for speed, go for more RAM! The limit on xp x86 pro is 3.5gb, so I'd put in 1 x 4gb dimm and leave the other 1 -3 slots empty incase you want to go 64-bit down the road and put 8-16gb in.

You can do an Asus M4A88T board, with a Phenom II x4 for a pretty good price. It will have Radeon HD 4250 graphics, VGA, DVI and HDMI outputs.
 
cheers, the setup you linked together is around the budget Im looking at for these bits,
don't need the soundcard though, I've got one of these
http://www.rme-audio.de/en_products_hdsp_9652.php

Case will be a rack mount, that's on order, this will be mounted in a shock resistant rack case for transportation.

This is also my main reason for SSDs, don't really need the speed of them, its more to do with resilience to being moved around, would be looking at a pair of 64s, raid 1 for redundancy, not more space.

I'm pretty confident with the insides of PCs, do a bit of repair for friends etc, but that's just replace like for like, so thats easy.

Re win 7 over XP, Ill be waiting a bit, I have 7 64 on my main PC, but the software I use for cue playback is still in beta for windows 7, so Id prefer to hand on a bit (cant complain, the software is written by an enthusiast for the theatre, and its dont in his spare time)

thats all really helpful, so thanks,
 
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