$1000 USD to spend...HELP!

[Ishtim]

After 5 years I am ready to build another machine and I like to get your opinions on what I shold buy.

I own both Intel & AMD, ATi& nVidia, so I am open for suggestions... some gaming, some photoprocessing, etc...
My P4-2.4 or Athlon XP 3200+ with Ati HD 2600 & GF6800GTX are going to be hand-me-downs for the wife & kid.

I need:
mobo
CPU/heatsink
RAM
Video
Sound (onbaoard is OK)
Storage (<160GB is plenty)

What would you get?

[g0tanks]

Do you need a power supply?

[g0tanks]

Made something quick on Newegg, includes a PSU and souncard:


You can also pick a Newegg.com - Thermalright Ultra-120 CPU Cooling Heatsink - CPU Fans & Heatsinks for the heatsink, I chose for a Z-600 because the TRUE was out of stock.

[Ishtim]

Originally Posted by g0tanks

Do you need a power supply?

I have an 500W antec... Smart power or something like that.
I am hoping to use the Antec ATX case/PSU to save a few bux.

I am looking at your newegg post... Thanks!

[g0tanks]

Oh I think your Antec PSU should be able to do the job. Minimum PSU for an 4870 is 450W but i'm not sure how much amps you need.

[Max_87]

Don't buy that CoolerMaster crap! Get a Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme and pair it with a fan of your choice

As for HDD I highly recommend Caviar SE 16 WD6400AAKS, best value for money. The SpinPoint F1 320GB is not a good choice.
Newegg.com - Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - Internal Hard Drives
Costs $20 more but you get twice the space. WD6400AAKS is faster too.

Other than that, the rest of the list looks ok to me. You can select E8400/E8500 or a 550-650W PSU to save a bit more and keep the cost under $1000. 750W is a bit overkill for this system. Otherwise you can just use back your old Antec PSU, it's still powerful enough.

[g0tanks]

Originally Posted by Max_87

Don't buy that CoolerMaster crap! Get a Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme and pair it with a fan of your choice

As for HDD I highly recommend Caviar SE 16 WD6400AAKS, best value for money. The SpinPoint F1 320GB is not a good choice.
Newegg.com - Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - Internal Hard Drives
Costs $20 more but you get twice the space. WD6400AAKS is faster too.

Other than that, the rest of the list looks ok to me. You can select E8400/E8500 or a 550-650W PSU to save a bit more and keep the cost under $1000. 750W is a bit overkill for this system. Otherwise you can just use back your old Antec PSU, it's still powerful enough.

Agreed with the heatsink, the TRUE was out of stock on Newegg so I just picked the Z-600 for my convenience.

The WD could be a better, haven't had any experience with it. From what I can tell though is that the Spinpoint uses less power.

I went for the 750W because I had some money left, and I didn't know or he had a PSU that could handle the system. Might as well take a bit overkill PSU for future proofing.

[Max_87]

Originally Posted by g0tanks

Agreed with the heatsink, the TRUE was out of stock on Newegg so I just picked the Z-600 for my convenience.

The WD could be a better, haven't had any experience with it. From what I can tell though is that the Spinpoint uses less power.

I went for the 750W because I had some money left, and I didn't know or he had a PSU that could handle the system. Might as well take a bit overkill PSU for future proofing.

That doesn't matter unless you are talking about servers where you have tons of them running. WD6400AAKS is a superior drive in every aspect.

As for PSU, yeah no problem going for a better one if its price fits the budget.

[Ishtim]

Thanks for the advice...

I have many years of luck with WD drives, however, since the NForce2 days I have had 3 of 5 ASUS boards die and haved moved on to others. Do you feel that strongly about ASUS? Or is the intel breed improved? As for the WOLFDALE, is it worth extra $80 for jump from 3.16 to 3.33 GHz?

[g0tanks]

Originally Posted by Ishtim

Thanks for the advice...

I have many years of luck with WD drives, however, since the NForce2 days I have had 3 of 5 ASUS boards die and haved moved on to others. Do you feel that strongly about ASUS? Or is the intel breed improved? As for the WOLFDALE, is it worth extra $80 for jump from 3.16 to 3.33 GHz?

I have a P5Q-E myself and I really like it (had a 650i board before and it died). Good overclocking features, lots of bios options and nice specs overall.

Well if you want to save money (you could use that to go for a nice 750i board if you want) i'd go for the 3.16Ghz. The difference is pretty much nothing at those speeds, and it will be even smaller if you overclock.