Upgrading - Any comments on the following?

[John Smith]

Hi,

Decided its time to upgrade...

....not a gamer but want a top notch pc......

thinking along the following lines and would be glad of any comments:-

Motherboard - Asus A8N-E
Processor - Athlon 64 3800 including standard fan
Graphics - Asus 6600GT 128MB PCI Express
Memory - 2 x 1GB Crucial PC3200
Hard Drive - Samsung Spinpoint SP2504C SATA

....also anyone know if the above Athlon and/or graphics card will be
excessively hot or noisy?


Thanks, John

 

[Bob Day]

Hi,

Decided its time to upgrade...

...not a gamer but want a top notch pc......

In that case, it should include ECC memory -- or better yet,
Chipkill ECC memory.

-- Bob Day
http://bobday.vze.com

 

[John Doe]

...not a gamer but want a top notch pc......

Motherboard - Asus A8N-E
Processor - Athlon 64 3800 including standard fan
Graphics - Asus 6600GT 128MB PCI Express

I think that's the way to go, beginning to age but has a good
reputation, should last plenty long for non-gaming. I'm not so sure
about Asus though.

Memory - 2 x 1GB Crucial PC3200

That's a lot of memory, but I suppose you still have one free memory
slot which is probably a good idea.

Hard Drive - Samsung Spinpoint SP2504C SATA

If you want a top-notch PC, you want a 10,000 rpm hard drive. If
necessary, get an ordinary drive for secondary mass storage.

By the way. The USB flash drives are looking very good as
backup/portable storage devices. Backup is very important.

...also anyone know if the above Athlon and/or graphics card will
be excessively hot or noisy?

You might be able to count on NewEgg customer reviews for that
information. I'm not promoting NewEgg, I always go with hardware I
can price at other stores.

The most interesting choice now for me would be monitored type,
whether to go with CRT or LCD. Since you aren't concerned about
gaining, the LCD might be an easy choice assuming you are going for
a new monitor.

Good luck.

 

[John Smith]

I think that's the way to go, beginning to age but has a good
reputation, should last plenty long for non-gaming. I'm not so sure
about Asus though.


That's a lot of memory, but I suppose you still have one free memory
slot which is probably a good idea.


If you want a top-notch PC, you want a 10,000 rpm hard drive. If
necessary, get an ordinary drive for secondary mass storage.

By the way. The USB flash drives are looking very good as
backup/portable storage devices. Backup is very important.


You might be able to count on NewEgg customer reviews for that
information. I'm not promoting NewEgg, I always go with hardware I
can price at other stores.

The most interesting choice now for me would be monitored type,
whether to go with CRT or LCD. Since you aren't concerned about
gaining, the LCD might be an easy choice assuming you are going for
a new monitor.

Good luck.

-----------------
Thanks for that.

When you say not sure about Asus..do you mean you have no knowledge about or
do you mean Asus motherboard and or graphics card could be a bit iffy?...I
could go for alternative make...I just thought Asus seemed ok as the board
I'm replacing is an Asus using AMD 1.7XP...and the existing card is Gforce2
64MB.

Ref monitor..yes would like to upgrade from existing 15" CRT to a
19"LCD...but that's phase 2

Cheers, John

 

[John Doe]

When you say not sure about Asus..do you mean you have no
knowledge about or do you mean Asus motherboard and or graphics
card could be a bit iffy?

I would lean towards a different brand.

 

[John Smith]

I would lean towards a different brand.

 

[TheBitBopper]

Asus built IBMs laptops until IBM sold the division. They are the
leading global manufacturer of mobos and possibly systems.

The faster the CPU/Cache, the more important your memory bandwidth
becomes to minimize the transfer lags. Alas, the very best you can get
from a Socket 939 is 800 MHz (dual channel PC3200).

My pick is currently the P4-630 or higher on an Asus P5WD2 with 2-4G
of dual channel PC6400 DDR2. This gives you a 1.6GHz max theoretical
bandwidth. (Speeds and sizes in ads are always best case, not average
case scenarios). Some video cards use about 256M of system ram for the
texture map. Another reason to put the big bucks into memory speed,
then quantity, then CPU speed.

Even better if you can find it would be a mobo that can actually
deliver the EE's 1GHz FSB to PC8000 dual channel DDR2. Pricewatch.com
will get you the prices. TigerDirect will get you the pics and
descriptions in an apples to apples format so you know what to ask for
over at PW. Try to focus on specs- the hype is way outdated.

BTW- Disk speed isn't anywhere near as important as it's interface
speed. Since disks count as virtual memory and impact startup speed,
I'd go with SATA Raid, aiming at 3Gb/sec.

 

[John Doe]

BTW- Disk speed isn't anywhere near as important as it's
interface
speed.

That's nonsense.

Since disks count as virtual memory

I could use a translation.

and impact startup speed, I'd go with SATA Raid, aiming at
3Gb/sec.

Startup speed? Try upgrading from Windows 98 to a decent operating
system and startup speed (by itself) will become much less
important.

 

[TheBitBopper]

Read the specs very carefully on the IDE& SATA drives as well as the
RAID controller. You will find that speed of rotation is not necesarily
effective transfer speed. Very few IDES and motherboards actually
transfer at the higher speed.

Now, let's suppose somebody doubles the speed of the SATA drives so
each one can do 3G. The mobo will still only do 3Gb/second. You'll have
expensive bragging rights to show for it.

Just for the record, my first disk driven system was a Kaypro II
transportable running Digital Research's CP/M.
2MHz Z-80 with 64K dram and a pair of 5" floppies rated at 192k each.
Total real and virtual memory without swapping disks totaled less than
512K. It had an A: prompt. To get a C: prompt in those days cost
several thousand dollars.
DOS 3.3 was just hitting it's stride. Need I say more?

Upgrading to ME did not speed things up. This is a dual boot with
Knoppix 3.7 available by default.

 

[John Doe]

Read the specs very carefully on the IDE& SATA drives as well as
the RAID controller. You will find that speed of rotation is not
necesarily effective transfer speed. Very few IDES and
motherboards actually transfer at the higher speed.

That is vague. Your blanket statement "Disk speed isn't anywhere
near as important as it's interface speed" is an oversimplification.
If it were true, we would still be buying 5400 rpm hard drives.

A 10,000 rpm hard drive is faster than a 7200 rpm hard drive. It's
not going to double your gaming frame rates, but it can help
significantly with the general operation of your computer all day
long.

Upgrading to ME did not speed things up. This is a dual boot with
Knoppix 3.7 available by default.

I used Windows Millennium and it is not much of an upgrade. All
Windows 9x versions are the pits. But you were talking about startup
times, so I figured you were concerned about having to restart
Windows. In which case, try upgrading to Windows XP.

 

[TheBitBopper]

Sorry I wasn't making a complex subject clear, John. I thought the same
thing when I bought my $40 120GB Seagate last summer on the spur of the
moment in Best Buy.
A few months later I checked the specs and found out that the disk
drive's control board actually determined the drive's transfer speed,
not the speed of the bits past the heads.

I'm running a P2 @450Mhz. My wife's rig runs XP on a 2.8G Sempron.
I'd rather use a sledgehammer like the P4-630 to make Knoppix or Ubuntu
run snappy and put a wireless keyboard and mouse on my coffee table.
Ubuntu's version of outlook totally outclasses ms orifice for about
$200 less (os + app).

BTW, I have an Intel Reseller account. My site is at
http:/matthew-wood.com.

Sign up for my newsletter and there's some freebies on the
download page.I'll be adding a bunch more over the summer. Most of it
is aimed at the site's content, which is (internet) marketing basics,
but I'd really love to continue this discussion as a Q&A part of a
newsletter on how to get the very most computer for the very least
price.
When I get enough interest I can get a volume discount and save
everybody at least $10 over any P4 dealer on pricewatch. More presells
means better pricing for everybody. And I do not share Subscribers'
info with anybody. Period.

 

[John Doe]

Sorry I wasn't making a complex subject clear, John. I thought the
same thing when I bought my $40 120GB Seagate last summer on the
spur of the moment in Best Buy.
A few months later I checked the specs and found out that the disk
drive's control board actually determined the drive's transfer
speed, not the speed of the bits past the heads.

Apparently something is getting lost in the translation.

 

[TheBitBopper]

Glad you're here.
It seems simple enough- We'll double the bitrate by doubling the
rotation speed. That would work fine if the mobo physically addressed
Cylinder, Head, and Sector. Or Logical Block, depending which system
you prefer.

IDE means Internal Drive Electronics. Think of it as a traffic cop in a
school zone. Clear as mud?

 

[John Doe]

A babbling troll