[Peppermint Duck]

I'm looking into building a new computer, primarly for listening to music, but also for a bit of gaming.

At the moment the components I'm looking at are:

MSI K8N Neo4 Diamond nForce4 SLi (Socket 939) PCI-Express Motherboard
AMD Athlon 64 3500+ Winchester 90nm (Socket 939)
Zalman CNPS7700-ALCU Ultra-Quiet CPU Cooler
Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 200GB SATA 8MB Cache (x2?)
MSI NX6600GT-TD128E GeForce PCX6600 GT 128MB DDR3 TV-Out/DVI (PCI-Express)
Corsair 1GB DDR XMS3200XL Pro TwinX (2x512MB) CAS2
E-MU 0404

+ a quiet case/psu combo someone could recommend?

Then I'm thinking I'll want an amplifier and speakers, but again I'm not sure which to get there either.

I live in the UK and only really have £900 to spend. Is this plausable? All the components listed above total around £900, but I could half the price of the CPU to £100 by dropping to a 3000+ and the Corsair RAM will cost £200, so I could chose some other RAM instead.

Thanks for any help!

 

[C38368]

Antec Sonatas are moving like crazy around here. They utilise a single 120mm exhaust fan for cooling and come with an Antec-branded 380W PSU.
I don't personally care how loud my tower gets (as my music just gets louder), so I'm not bothered by a couple extra decibels emanating from the PSU. However, I understand that Enermax (who are generally regarded as a quality manufacturer) has a line of PSUs out specificially designed to be quiet.
Even if a Sonata isn't what you're looking for, using a single 120mm exhaust fan and making use of negative case pressure to circulate air is probably going to be the best combination of quiet and effective.

Don't have anything to offer on amplifiers, though =\

 

[DrewWinters]

The Seasonic Super Silencer and Super Tornado (despite it's name, it is slightly quieter than the "silencer" model, according the reviews) are very quiet and high-quality.

The Lian-Li PC-6070 and PC-73SL have an excellent reputation for noise-control and build quality. However, neither are very cheap.

If I were you, unless you intend on utilizing SLI soon, would wait a LITTLE bit longer for the cheaper non-SLI nForce4 motherboards to arrive. They should not be far away (in fact, they may well become availble before the SLI board).

I would look into OCZ RAM (but certainly stick to CAS2 ram - also, make sure it is 1T. Better yet, 2-2-2 1T. tRas is irrelevant: i.e. 2-2-2-5 vs. 2-2-2-6) OCZ is very high quality, I can personally vouch for their customer service, and is usaully a bit cheaper than Corsair.

Newegg seems to be in the process of opening a UK store - that may cut your costs some. At the very least, us US folk love Newegg - and for good reason to.

EDIT: You may consider using one of the similar, but older, Zalman CPU coolers - they can be had much cheaper and do an excellent job still of cooling. Otherwise, your part selections are excellent. the 6600GT is the best price/performance bargain out there right now; the A64 is, of course, the best gaming and general use CPU available (the 3000+ or 3200+ may give you better price/performance but I would stick with the 3500+ 90nm if I were you). And Seagate harddrives w/ native SATA and NCQ are the way to go right now. Make sure your 200 gB model has NCQ - it will come in handy in the future. Be warned, though: the 7200.8's are on the horizon.

 

[SDA]

Personally, I'd drop to the 3000+ 90nm if I were you (or a 3200+, if you really feel like it) You won't notice the difference between the 3000+/3200+ and 3500+ in games with a 6600GT, and unless you do a lot of CPU-intensive work it would just be a lot of money spent for no real gain.

Also, unless you're planning to overclock, I'd drop down to cheaper memory. I DEFINITELY don't recommend going with cheap generic stuff, but there's no harm in dropping to regular-grade Crucial or something if you're not planning to overclock. Latency isn't terribly important if you're not overclocking, either; the effect on performance is small even in memory tests, and is not going to be perceivable in something like a game. If you're doing something very system-intensive other than gaming and listening to music, things may change, but otherwise the biggest performance you'll see between ultra-low-latency and ultra-high-latency memory in games will be around 5-6%-- not enough to justify the extra cost, IMO. (This coming from someone who runs his memory at 2-2-2, too!)

For case cooling, I'd look at an Antec SLK3700AMB with a 120mm Panaflo L1A. If an L1A isn't quiet enough for you (whoa), you could get a 120mm M1_ and run it at 7V (pretty easy to do, you can just buy an adapter if you're lazy).

 

[uzziah]

i'm in the same market. consider a zalman heatpipe for you vid card, and an enermax case (the one reviewed on silentpcreview.com)

otherwise, good selection, but i agree with the rest on dropping your processor down to save money with that vid card

but if you have it to spend, ok!

seems like you've got the funds for a great system

what are you considering for audio source?

 

[uzziah]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Peppermint Duck I'm looking into building a new computer, primarly for listening to music, but also for a bit of gaming. At the moment the components I'm looking at are: MSI K8N Neo4 Diamond nForce4 SLi (Socket 939) PCI-Express Motherboard AMD Athlon 64 3500+ Winchester 90nm (Socket 939) Zalman CNPS7700-ALCU Ultra-Quiet CPU Cooler Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 200GB SATA 8MB Cache (x2?) MSI NX6600GT-TD128E GeForce PCX6600 GT 128MB DDR3 TV-Out/DVI (PCI-Express) Corsair 1GB DDR XMS3200XL Pro TwinX (2x512MB) CAS2 E-MU 0404 + a quiet case/psu combo someone could recommend? Then I'm thinking I'll want an amplifier and speakers, but again I'm not sure which to get there either. I live in the UK and only really have £900 to spend. Is this plausable? All the components listed above total around £900, but I could half the price of the CPU to £100 by dropping to a 3000+ and the Corsair RAM will cost £200, so I could chose some other RAM instead. Thanks for any help!

emu 0404 is good choice. post a wtb (want to buy) add here at headfi

really, define what you mean by a "bit" of gaming? if you really don't want to play the newest games much etc. you can save a lot of money on components by dropping the performance down. you could then take that money and buy some nice speakers/ or an external dac

just make sure you need all that performance. if you're more interested in music, i'd say drop er down to a mobile athlon etc. with 512mb ram etc. etc. and get some good speakers and amp

what music components do you have? do you need the whole shebang?

most likely, you don't mean you want to do a "little" gaming. probably just putting it that way since your on headfi

but if you're not big into gaming, i'd say spend the money on the audio gear instead.

for the money you'd save getting a lower performance pc, you could get some nice audio components

axiom and paradigm speakers are worth looking into

a sonic impact t-amp ($30) would serve reasonably well as a starter, especially with your budget being tight

do you have headphone gear?

let us know what you have, and the entire system you want to build. figure out where you want to spend the money: pc performance or audio, or a little of both. then we can help you plan out the big picture within your price range. if you want audio components in your price limit, your going to have to drop er down

for reference, i've "built" two theoretical pc's to calculate cost:

1. basic pc: this would be an net surfing, audio pc only. some very basic games as well. based around amd duron or mobile athlon processor
$700 without monitor shipped from newegg.com

2. gaming pc: 6600gt card; amd 2800 cpu, 1 gig corsair ram; you get the idea
$1300 shipped from newegg without monitor


all i'm saying, is if you're willing to live without video games, you could prepare yourself to get ready to live with hi-fi

you might be able to squeeze in an external dac (with chaintech av-710) <though the emu might be nearly as good>, speakers, amp, wiring, monitor; heck maybe an extra set of headphones

just figure what's more important to you: gaming or audio. then spend proportianatly (and i'm a gamer myself, so i can tell you that's important to me - i'm not trying to convince you otherwise). if you like them evenly: spend evenly. if you can rule out hi-end gaming, get ready for some serious audio gear

 

[uzziah]

from your list your basically saying gaming is more important to you; wher you said you want to primarily listen to music.

my advice; if that's the case, work backwords

what do i mean? start with your audio components (look for used stuff please), and figure that out first within reason (leave at least $600 for the pc). then build your pc with what you have left

sorry if i'm being a pain, but as i said i'm in the same boat. really, i'm lecturing to myself

 

[S_Dedalus]

You can halve the ram and still get good performance. Maybe one stick of Corsair value ram.

 

[DrewWinters]

With an A64, in games - latency is more like 10%, minimum - sometimes more like 20%. The difference between the common value ram settings of 3-3-3 2T and 2-2-2-1T is dramatic. I do not consider this a "tweak" type setting - this is important. Now, many "value" RAM's CAN run at 2-2-2 1T even if they are SPD set at higher latencies - but you never know... most RAM sold at higher latencies in singles will NOT run lower latencies in pairs. So, if you buy a single stick of RAM now and one later - you are likely to end up with a pair that won't run lower latencies.
512 mb is acceptable now, it will not be in the future - in fact, Doom3 and Half-Life2 both make the extra RAM felt. I would still recommend 1 gb - preferably a 512x2 pair (otherwise you could get stuck with higher latencies).

While yall are absolutly right that you get better performance to price with the 3000+ or 3200+, look at it this way: A64's scale fairly linearly with clock speed: the 3500+ costs $100 more than the 3000+, but is 20% faster - $100 is less than 10% of the projected cost of the system. Same with the RAM, higher quality RAM cost less than 10% more (total system cost more, that is), but will give you as much as 10% performance increase. Doesn't that sound like a great deal now? (I'm really good at this whole justifying what you want thing.)

Anyway, if you are in a tight bind with money, then cheaper RAM and a slower CPU aren't terrible ideas - but if I were you (and I am, incidently, in a matter of speaking) I would wait until I had the money to get what I wanted rather than settle for something less. I tend to regret purchases much less when I do it that way. YMMV

EDIT: btw, if you are willing to forego gaming, uzziah's advice is good. Always get your priorities in order BEFORE buying things. But assuming you already have (got them straight) then don't settle - save up.

 

[DrewWinters]

I got so exciting writing my little justification that I forgot the real reason I was recommending the extra cash for the 3500 over the 3000/3200. Graphics cards tend to advance quicker than CPU's. That is, you can by with an older CPU and newer graphics better than you can than with a new CPU and an older card. Wait! Does that contridict my recommendation? Not at all. If, in the future, you decide to upgrade to get better performace - the first choice will be to upgrade the video card, not the CPU. If you bought a mid-line CPU to begin with, then your CPU is still going to be good enough while the cheaper CPU may be struggling to keep up. Upgrading both CPU and GPU at the same time is certainly preferable from a performance standpoint but not feasible (for most people) from a financial standpoint. Furthermore, if Peppermint Duck does intend to upgrade to an SLI setup in the future - the CPU will definently become the bottleneck. Games like Half-life2 are becoming more and more CPU-limited, so investing in a better CPU at the outset is, IMO, good future-proofing. Besides all that, you get better performance for everything that does not require the graphics card in the process - which, dare I say, most computers get used for more than gaming anyway.

That's just my take. It could be easily argued that for the $100 saved now you could replace the CPU later on with a faster one. <shrug> Good luck! I hope we haven't confused you.

EDIT: incidently, you should stick to the 90nm Winchestor-core CPU's. they run a little faster, a little cooler, and cost only a tiny fraction more.

 

[SDA]

Quote:

With an A64, in games - latency is more like 10%, minimum - sometimes more like 20%. The difference between the common value ram settings of 3-3-3 2T and 2-2-2-1T is dramatic. I do not consider this a "tweak" type setting - this is important.

Where did you get that idea? Honestly, people think latency is a LOT more important than it really is... the idea started to go out of fashion for a little while, but it seems to be coming back again. Feh. Anyway, here, let me give you some benches to back up what I'm saying: http://www.gamepc.com/labs/view_cont...ookie%5Ftest=1

Notice that the absolute largest performance difference between 2-2-2 and 3-4-4 memory in games is about 5.5%, not 20%. Notice also that the only tests that show a big difference are not gaming-related, and are in fact specific latency tests (i.e. non-real-world). I'll say it again: it's not worth paying big bucks for lower latency unless you're doing very memory-intensive stuff (gaming does not qualify) or overclocking.


Quote:

While yall are absolutly right that you get better performance to price with the 3000+ or 3200+, look at it this way: A64's scale fairly linearly with clock speed: the 3500+ costs $100 more than the 3000+, but is 20% faster - $100 is less than 10% of the projected cost of the system. Same with the RAM, higher quality RAM cost less than 10% more (total system cost more, that is), but will give you as much as 10% performance increase. Doesn't that sound like a great deal now? (I'm really good at this whole justifying what you want thing.)

Only if you don't factor in that you won't actually get a significant performance increase in games

In many cases, a gaming system is only as strong as its weakest link, and while the 6600GT is a good card it will probably be the weak link in a 64 3000+ system. There's no good reason to spend that much money on a faster processor instead of a better video card for games alone. (Again, this applies to gaming only-- system recommendations change a lot from application to application.)

As for RAM, as I said, that's not true. (see above.)


Quote:

I got so exciting writing my little justification that I forgot the real reason I was recommending the extra cash for the 3500 over the 3000/3200. Graphics cards tend to advance quicker than CPU's. That is, you can by with an older CPU and newer graphics better than you can than with a new CPU and an older card. Wait! Does that contridict my recommendation? Not at all. If, in the future, you decide to upgrade to get better performace - the first choice will be to upgrade the video card, not the CPU. If you bought a mid-line CPU to begin with, then your CPU is still going to be good enough while the cheaper CPU may be struggling to keep up. Upgrading both CPU and GPU at the same time is certainly preferable from a performance standpoint but not feasible (for most people) from a financial standpoint. Furthermore, if Peppermint Duck does intend to upgrade to an SLI setup in the future - the CPU will definently become the bottleneck. Games like Half-life2 are becoming more and more CPU-limited, so investing in a better CPU at the outset is, IMO, good future-proofing. Besides all that, you get better performance for everything that does not require the graphics card in the process - which, dare I say, most computers get used for more than gaming anyway. That's just my take. It could be easily argued that for the $100 saved now you could replace the CPU later on with a faster one. <shrug> Good luck! I hope we haven't confused you.

This is true, but CPUs above $200-225 tend to depreciate in value quickly. With a Socket 939 motherboard, CPU upgrading shouldn't be a problem... and by the time the 6600GT becomes slow, I promise you the 3500+ will be slow as well. The fact that video technology advances more quickly is cancelled out (actually, outweighed) by that gaming performance is much more dependent on video card.

Consider, for example, the argument for buying a 1.4GHz Athlon instead of a 1.2GHz Athlon. Given the benefit of hindsight, do you really think it would be worth paying, say, $100 extra for that small amount of headroom you get? Would a 1.4GHz Athlon be much less of a bottleneck for modern cards than a 1.2GHz Athlon? Well, guess what: 1.4/1.2 = 3500/3000. Furthermore, that example actually works AGAINST me, since video card wasn't quite as important in those days as it was now.

 

[Peppermint Duck]

Thanks for all the info so far guys, and thanks SDA for the heads up! Your right, the £100 I save by buying cheaper RAM I could put towards...say getting a Geforce 6800GT instead...though I'd be interested to see any benchmark comparisons between it and the 6600GT if anyone has any? Maybe I should SLI 2x6600GT?

I'm looking into 2 different types of cheaper RAM atm...
Corsair 1GB DDR Value Select PC3200 CAS3.0 Kit (2x512MB) £117.44
Corsair 1GB DDR Value Select PC3200 CAS2.5 Kit (2x512MB) £128.02

I take it it's worth paying the extra £10 for the 0.5 lower CAS? (though I'm not entirely sure how that affects the performance?)

I'll also save in the region of £100 by getting a socket939 A64 3000+ (Winchester), which, from a certain site I can get for £90 this week only (£20 lower than normal retail), but I'm not sure I'll be buying my system just yet.

So if I outline my current budget...

EMU 0404 = £70
A64 3000+ = £100
CORSAIR RAM = £130
6800GT or 2x6600GT = £280ish
ASUS NFORCE4 SLI MOBO = £130-190?

Then a case+psu+hard drive+cd drive(s)+tft...

The more I look at this the more I realise how expensive it's going to be! And to think at the beginning I wanted an amplifier and some high end speakers. Dang. I still do want that though...just there's been no feedback on those specific items. Maybe I should just make a high end music system and ignore games...what good games have I played in the past year anyway? Doom3 was a let down...and infact the only game I've played since then (3 months ago) is Half-Life2...which was good, but I completed it in a day. If I get out of this gaming loop I'll probably save myself a bit of money...but then again the money I save will probably end up going towards new high end audio equipment...which I guess you'd all support anyway!

 

[Peppermint Duck]

Sorry, double post.

 

[jpr703]

I know quite a bit about PC components and I can tell you that you've got the specs of a solid system there--congrats!

Check out Antec cases. Almost all their cases are well desinged and well built. Plus they make one of the best power supplies on the market and they usually include one with their cases. You can save yourself some cash this way and get a great case/PSU.

 

[SDA]

Two 6600GTs SLI'd are slower than a single 6800GT, IIRC. Performance may improve as the technology improves, but I'd say not to bother either way; the nice thing about SLI is that if you decide that you would be better off with it then you can just buy a second card (probably for less than you got the first for!).

This may come as a surprise, but I also wouldn't recommend the 6800GT in your case. The 6800GT is definitely a lot faster than the 6600GT, but the 6600GT is still a very fast, capable card, and I think it would offer more than enough power for you. You said you don't game all that often anyway, and high-end video cards have suicidal depreciation.. just doesn't seem like a very good way to spend money in your case. It's up to you, of course, and there is a large, very real performance difference between the two cards-- I just think the 6800GT seems like overkill in your case. Why not just get a 6600GT and use the extra cash for better speakers (or food, heh)?

Memory. It's up to you whether or not to spend the extra cash on CAS2.5 memory.. the performance difference is negligible, but then so is the price difference. Flip a coin.

By the way, are you planning to get a new monitor with this system? (Unless your current monitor is very good, I'd recommend it.. never been a fan of skimping on I/O devices.) If you are, what're you looking for in a monitor? The monitor can be a significant chunk of the final price tag, and it's the part of a desktop PC that you'll always be using regardless of what apps you run on the PC, so it's good to choose it carefully.