Before buying PC please ask our advice first!

Be careful about OCZ RAM and the Asus M2N-E motherboard, check compatability. I recently brought the same motherboard and ordered kingston RAM which claims to be commpatable but i have heard that the M2N-E does have issues with some RAM, mainly due to a low voltage (Max is at 1.9V i think). I will post once i have built my system and tell you how it goes. This is the Asus compatability list http://uk.asus.com/products4.aspx?l1=3&l2=101&l3=308&model=1181&modelmenu=1 click the OVL link.

Also the 7300gs will not be good for gaming, for the same sort of price you could find a OC 7300gt but i would not bother if you are not into gaming. http://www.savastore.com/productinfo/product.aspx?catalog_name=Savastore&product_id=10289642&pid=44&rstrat=0
I was thinking about this card but when for a 7600gt because they where £100 on ebuyer which is very cheap as they are normally £130 upwards.

As far as cases go i would recommend the Antec Sonata II which costs arround £70 and comes with a good 450W PSU which is fine for the set-up you are currently planning.

What is your budget? And what sort of prices are you paying for the components.

Reply 983

Nope, it was an "I-Cute"!

Updated above

Reply 984

Looks like I'll have to go with 533mhz RAM instead of 667mhz RAM :frown:

Reply 985

sr4470

15

samba

Looks like I'll have to go with 533mhz RAM instead of 667mhz RAM :frown:

Whats wrong with Corsair 667mhz?

Reply 986

iknowmole

Be careful about OCZ RAM and the Asus M2N-E motherboard, check compatability. I recently brought the same motherboard and ordered kingston RAM which claims to be commpatable but i have heard that the M2N-E does have issues with some RAM, mainly due to a low voltage (Max is at 1.9V i think). I will post once i have built my system and tell you how it goes. This is the Asus compatability list http://uk.asus.com/products4.aspx?l1=3&l2=101&l3=308&model=1181&modelmenu=1 click the OVL link.

Also the 7300gs will not be good for gaming, for the same sort of price you could find a OC 7300gt but i would not bother if you are not into gaming. http://www.savastore.com/productinfo/product.aspx?catalog_name=Savastore&product_id=10289642&pid=44&rstrat=0
I was thinking about this card but when for a 7600gt because they where £100 on ebuyer which is very cheap as they are normally £130 upwards.

As far as cases go i would recommend the Antec Sonata II which costs arround £70 and comes with a good 450W PSU which is fine for the set-up you are currently planning.

What is your budget? And what sort of prices are you paying for the components.

I'm currently creeping up to £850 at the moment :frown:

No "hard" budget, but I'd certainly like to keep it below £900

sr4470: seems like those corsair modules aren't supported either :frown:

I'll post up a new spec in a second. I've changed it round a little :biggrin:

(and my seagate ran out of stock!)

Reply 987

The RAM i got was 667Mhz CL5, was made by kingston (kingston value ram) and claimed to be compatable. It was on ebuyer for £60, however i think it is out of stock at the moment. I will post to let you know if it worked OK tomorrow or the day after when i have built my set-up.

Reply 988

Also be careful who you buy you processer for, dual core AM2 prices where cut recently in response to the new core 2 CPUs from intel. Because of this prices will vary HUGELY. For example on ebuyer the 3800X2 is £200 and the 4600X2 is £160. Savastore.com are also selling 4400X2 CPUs for £320 which is far to much.

Reply 989

Edit: Iknowmole, the CPU is about £160 (ebuyer)

Here we go:

MSI K9N Platinum nForce 570 socket AM2 retail
OCZ (OCZ26671024V) 1Gb DDR2-667 PC2-5400 Value Series (lifetime warranty)
Athlon 64 4600 Dual Core 2.4GHz 512kb L2 cache AM2 940 pin
Coolermaster IGreen 430W PSU - 85% Efficiency ATX12V v2.2 120mm Fan
V7 V7S20PD 20.1" 1400x1050 600:1 8ms Silver & Black MultiMedia TFT Monitor 3 Years Warranty
Microsoft OEM Windows XP Pro SP2B (Release 2) x32bit
Arctic Cooling (AC-FRZ-64P) Socket 754 939 940 CPU Cooler with Heat pipe cooling Pro
DVB-T USB 2.0 freeview digital TV stick including software and aerial
Speeze Thermal Pads Cpu/cooler Pack Of 5 Pads Amd Approved
Casecom KL-199 ATX Midi Tower Case with 350 PSU
BFG 7300GS OC 256mb DDR2 PCI-E
Seagate ST3250824AS 250GB 7200RPM SATA300 8MB Cache
Sony DWQ120AB2 16x DVDRW Dual Layer black bulk

Reply 990

sr4470

15

Enermax Liberty 400W ATX2.2 Modular PSU

Replace the casecom psu with this.

Reply 991

Lecter

12

Speeze Thermal Pads Cpu/cooler Pack Of 5 Pads Amd Approved

Maybe you migth want to change that to artic silver 5? Unless the other guys ok it.
As mentioned, the 7300GS isn't going to be a gaming card and if your motherboard isn't SLI you might want to go for ATI 1800 range ( i think this GPU) that have signifcantly reduced in price a deliver bang for buck.

Reply 992

sr4470

Enermax Liberty 400W ATX2.2 Modular PSU

Replace the casecom psu with this.

Is This one (currently selected) not ok?

Thanks lecter, looking into that now :biggrin:

(I know its not a gaming one, but considering my GF4-5200 is doing ok I don't need much more of an upgrade to sli etc mes thinks. Not really an FPS man)

Reply 993

roweski

1

browser

Overclock the hell out of that. Even on air cooling you can hit 3.4GHz

Yeah bby!! My thoughts exactly :tongue:

Can i do this through the bios on the asus mobo?

Reply 994

PieMaster

11

5200? eeeew, a 7300 is a huge upgrade on that pile of rubbish.

Using artic silver takes 1 or 2 degrees at mosto ff the CPU temperature on air cooling, you'll probably get some cheap paste with the heatsink anyway.

Reply 995

browser

2

roweski

Yeah bby!! My thoughts exactly :tongue:

Can i do this through the bios on the asus mobo?

You can do it on the BIOS on any board....but a lot of asus boards have extra tools for overclocking.

But basically, yeah, go to the BIOS and have fun with that (10x ?) multiplier.

Make sure you are careful though, and don't overheat your system.

Oh, and post your benchmarks when your done :biggrin:

Reply 996

browser

Overclock the hell out of that. Even on air cooling you can hit 3.4GHz

Check this link http://tomshardware.co.uk/2006/05/10/dual_41_ghz_cores_uk/

Reply 997

matt12987

Hi Guys,

I'm going to be getting a new desktop to go to university with, I was wondering what you all think of this one, £862.43 from dell.co.uk:

Intel® Viiv™ technology - Intel® Pentium® D 945 DualCore(3.40GHz,800MHz,2x2MBcache)
2048MB Dual Channel DDR2 533MHz [4x512MB] Memory
Monitor Dell™ 19" UltraSharp™ Digital/Analogue Flat Panel (1907FP)
Video Card 128MB ATI Radeon® X600 SE graphics card
Hard Drive 320GB (7200rpm) Serial ATA/100 Hard Drive with 16MB
DataBurst™ cache
Floppy Drives Internal 13-in-1 Media Card Reader
Sound Cards Integrated Sound Blaster® Audigy™ ADVANCED HD software
Speakers Dell™ 5650 5.1 Surround Speaker System

I'm not going to be using it for gaming really, just music, DVD, downloads, uni work etc. I'm a bit of a tard when it comes to computers so any advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks a lot in advance

Reply 998