Need Computer Advice

[Veldor]

ORIGINAL: Gary Childress

OK. This is what I have on hand to put toward a new computer. I figure it might save me a little cost:

1. OS: Windows XP disk (NON OEM)
2. 500gb 7200rpm SATA HD
3. External DVD/CD burner
4. Wireless network adapter (I think. It may not be any good.)
5. Plenty of internal CD-ROM drives.
6. 19" Flatscreen Monitor

Things I know I will need:

1. Mother Board
2. CPU, fan, etc.
3. Graphics Card
4. Power Supply
5. Case
6. Sound Card
7. DOH! Amost forgot RAM

I would like the overall project not to exceed $800. EDIT: Well...better make that $700.

Any thoughts, comments, suggestions? [8D]


EDIT: Almost forgot sound card.

Don't listen to anyone telling you to build your own PC. In todays world there are just too many things you can mess up that way. Something as simple as installing a fan backwards can cause components to overheat and get permanantely damaged. Don't buy your primary PC or its components on Ebay Either.

^This from someone who builds his own PC's and from someone with 10's of thousands of Ebay transactions^

Do something similar to what I did when I purchased a machine for my nephew. I went through Costco for a custom built HP rig. You can pick whatever you need from the website and you'll be certain everything is on the level. You even get a no questions legit copy of Vista and fancy additions you'll never have with your own built PC like fully functional remote controls and TV Cards. Free support and an actual warranty to! I paid $800 exactly for his setup about 6 months back and what pissed me off was how well it played the sames games I had on my $3000 custom built 8800 GTS blah blah Nvidia Machine. Perhaps not at all the super maxed out settings but games like Age of Empires 3 played fine with the 256MB Nvidia card the HP setup comes with.

Check here (And not to sound like a Costco sales person but they do have the best return policy). Not sure about outside the U.S.

http://www.costco.com/CTO/HPLanding.aspx?Prodid=10029569&whse=BC&Ne=4000000&eCat=BC|84|56671&N=4017758&Mo=0&No=0&Nr=P_CatalogName:BC&cat=28162&Ns=P_Price|1||P_SignDesc1&lang=en-US&Sp=C&topnav=

I think HP offers something similar on their own website. At what price I don't know.

[Gem35]

ORIGINAL: Veldor

ORIGINAL: Gary Childress

OK. This is what I have on hand to put toward a new computer. I figure it might save me a little cost:

1. OS: Windows XP disk (NON OEM)
2. 500gb 7200rpm SATA HD
3. External DVD/CD burner
4. Wireless network adapter (I think. It may not be any good.)
5. Plenty of internal CD-ROM drives.
6. 19" Flatscreen Monitor

Things I know I will need:

1. Mother Board
2. CPU, fan, etc.
3. Graphics Card
4. Power Supply
5. Case
6. Sound Card
7. DOH! Amost forgot RAM

I would like the overall project not to exceed $800. EDIT: Well...better make that $700.

Any thoughts, comments, suggestions? [8D]


EDIT: Almost forgot sound card.

Don't listen to anyone telling you to build your own PC. In todays world there are just too many things you can mess up that way. Something as simple as installing a fan backwards can cause components to overheat and get permanantely damaged. Don't buy your primary PC or its components on Ebay Either.

^This from someone who builds his own PC's and from someone with 10's of thousands of Ebay transactions^

Do something similar to what I did when I purchased a machine for my nephew. I went through Costco for a custom built HP rig. You can pick whatever you need from the website and you'll be certain everything is on the level. You even get a no questions legit copy of Vista and fancy additions you'll never have with your own built PC like fully functional remote controls and TV Cards. Free support and an actual warranty to! I paid $800 exactly for his setup about 6 months back and what pissed me off was how well it played the sames games I had on my $3000 custom built 8800 GTS blah blah Nvidia Machine. Perhaps not at all the super maxed out settings but games like Age of Empires 3 played fine with the 256MB Nvidia card the HP setup comes with.

Check here (And not to sound like a Costco sales person but they do have the best return policy). Not sure about outside the U.S.

http://www.costco.com/CTO/HPLanding.aspx?Prodid=10029569&whse=BC&Ne=4000000&eCat=BC|84|56671&N=4017758&Mo=0&No=0&Nr=P_CatalogName:BC&cat=28162&Ns=P_Price|1||P_SignDesc1&lang=en-US&Sp=C&topnav=

I think HP offers something similar on their own website. At what price I don't know.

Besides being the worst advice I have ever heard, telling the guy to buy an HP tops even that.
HP has the worst approval rating among shelf-bought PCs.

[Veldor]

ORIGINAL: Gem35
Besides being the worst advice I have ever heard, telling the guy to buy an HP tops even that.
HP has the worst approval rating among shelf-bought PCs.

Advising an unqualified person to build their own machine in anyway will generate a machine with far far worse approval ratings than any shelf-bought PC.

Approval ratings are like anything else, you have to factor in whats most important. For starters Dell for instance gets better ratings on support. HP not so good in comparison. But we are comparing to a self built which gets a flat out 0, zilch, the worst support you'll ever get because you get none at all.

So in truth all thats been given by many is narrow-minded self-justifying advice.

Just because you and I build our own machines doesn't mean everyone should. And factoring in the price range is a big component of that. Again the answer would be different if we were talking about a $2000 machine.

There is no one answer fits all.

You loose all credibility at replying with "Besides being the worst advice I've ever heard". Starting by sensationalizing and then not following up with anything substantial just comes across as desperate and completely unprofessional.

[Gem35]

ORIGINAL: Veldor

ORIGINAL: Gem35
Besides being the worst advice I have ever heard, telling the guy to buy an HP tops even that.
HP has the worst approval rating among shelf-bought PCs.

Advising an unqualified person to build their own machine in anyway will generate a machine with far far worse approval ratings than any shelf-bought PC.

Approval ratings are like anything else, you have to factor in whats most important. For starters Dell for instance gets better ratings on support. HP not so good in comparison. But we are comparing to a self built which gets a flat out 0, zilch, the worst support you'll ever get because you get none at all.

So in truth all thats been given by many is narrow-minded self-justifying advice.

Just because you and I build our own machines doesn't mean everyone should. And factoring in the price range is a big component of that. Again the answer would be different if we were talking about a $2000 machine.

There is no one answer fits all.

You loose all credibility at replying with "Besides being the worst advice I've ever heard". Starting by sensationalizing and then not following up with anything substantial just comes across as desperate and completely unprofessional.

Good grief.[8|]

[Gem35]

Gary, you have my narrow-minded advice.
Sorry to have your thread de-railed by some negative posts.
Good luck in whatever you decide to do, sir.[:)]

[GaryChildress]

To clarify, I don't think I'm entirely "unqualified" to build a machine from the ground up. I took a course on Network Engineering at a trade school a few years back and did very well at it (although I didn't go into computers afterward-stupidly enough) and I have "built" a couple bare bones systems before. The biggest stumbling block for me will certainly be the motherboard, CPU and power supply. Everything else is pretty easy to add.

One of the reasons I would like to build my own machine is that I think it would be a good educational opportunity.

As far as support, it's true that I wouldn't get support on the overall machine, but often the individual vendors for the components will offer some support for their components. I've had two machines in the past, both bare bones systems that I didn't get support on. Fortunately I never had a great deal of mechanical trouble with the machines until recently one of them, a 7 or 8 year old machine, finally blew out the motherboard.

[Veldor]

ORIGINAL: Gary Childress

The 700 watt power supply looks pretty good. Someone over in Civfanatics pointed me to a 250 watt to start with and it costs almost as much. I figure I don't want to come up short when it comes to the power supply. Are there any disadvantages or dangers in power supply overkill?

Gary the above is exactly why you can't trust advice found in a forum. Why would you want to trust the component-level advice of me or anyone else on the net if you can't yourself distinguish between good and bad technical advice (No way should you put a 250watt in a modern machine, maybe and i stress maybe a 350watt as a minimum)?

There is no shame in buying a pre-built machine put together by professionals (at least more experienced than yourself) and by a professional organization. My link was to further demonstrate that even such a solution can still be highly customized to your needs.

The web is full of people who all think they are smarter than the rest.

"I can here the difference between 320kbps compression and 192kps compression in any audio song"
"I can see the difference between MiniDV HD Tape & AVCHD Digital HD Camcorders"
"My custom-built PC generates more frames on COD4 than your POS PS3 could ever dream of"

And so on when in reality the average person should not care one bit about any of those things but they get caught up in the techno-babble by self proclaimed know-it-alls that want to sound like experts and get worried that they are somehow buying the wrong thing.

A certain person here didn't even understand what OEM was yet hands out advice. [:D] That is entry level knowledge that, while not negating the accuracy of any advice rendered in and of itself, certainly calls into question for me the true background and experience obtained by said individual. Of course I might actually agree with everything he said (were you to be looking to build your own machine), but that isn't the point I've been trying to make...

Now I could list an extremely long and impressive list of why Im more qualified (Starting with how much I get paid as a professional for advice) but I'd actually prefer you think of what I just said as BS because it actually makes my point much better. In reality I'm 8 years old and my dad built my PC...

TRUST YOURSELF and not those on the internet. Do your own very thorough research and make decisions based on that. And if you don't have the interest or the time, then trust a company to do it for you (Be it Dell, HP, or whomever).

IF you do have the interest and understand that most home-built machines are a constant work in progress than, in my own equally worthless opinion, you need to start by focusing on the basics. I've seen more machines messed up because of improper power and cooling than for any other reason. This was simply not an issue a couple years back. Don't skimp on the case, the power supply, or the fans. Since you are newer to this I would suggest over-buying on all. Its going to be safer than potentially not having enough power or enough cooling. Pay attention to the direction of the fans you install. Spend extra on those components and you will have ample and clean power and probably a much much quieter system as a bonus. However, I find such a suggestion hard to accomplish within your budget, therefore again my original suggestion as a method of guaranteeing no issues.

Then again all of the above might be awful advice for all you know and so again makes my original point. [:D]

Peace and Love to All!

[panzers]

ORIGINAL: Veldor

ORIGINAL: Gary Childress

The 700 watt power supply looks pretty good. Someone over in Civfanatics pointed me to a 250 watt to start with and it costs almost as much. I figure I don't want to come up short when it comes to the power supply. Are there any disadvantages or dangers in power supply overkill?

Gary the above is exactly why you can't trust advice found in a forum. Why would you want to trust the component-level advice of me or anyone else on the net if you can't yourself distinguish between good and bad technical advice (No way should you put a 250watt in a modern machine, maybe and i stress maybe a 350watt as a minimum)?

There is no shame in buying a pre-built machine put together by professionals (at least more experienced than yourself) and by a professional organization. My link was to further demonstrate that even such a solution can still be highly customized to your needs.

The web is full of people who all think they are smarter than the rest.

"I can here the difference between 320kbps compression and 192kps compression in any audio song"
"I can see the difference between MiniDV HD Tape & AVCHD Digital HD Camcorders"
"My custom-built PC generates more frames on COD4 than your POS PS3 could ever dream of"

And so on when in reality the average person should not care one bit about any of those things but they get caught up in the techno-babble by self proclaimed know-it-alls that want to sound like experts and get worried that they are somehow buying the wrong thing.

A certain person here didn't even understand what OEM was yet hands out advice. [:D] That is entry level knowledge that, while not negating the accuracy of any advice rendered in and of itself, certainly calls into question for me the true background and experience obtained by said individual. Of course I might actually agree with everything he said (were you to be looking to build your own machine), but that isn't the point I've been trying to make...

Now I could list an extremely long and impressive list of why Im more qualified (Starting with how much I get paid as a professional for advice) but I'd actually prefer you think of what I just said as BS because it actually makes my point much better. In reality I'm 8 years old and my dad built my PC...

TRUST YOURSELF and not those on the internet. Do your own very thorough research and make decisions based on that. And if you don't have the interest or the time, then trust a company to do it for you (Be it Dell, HP, or whomever).

IF you do have the interest and understand that most home-built machines are a constant work in progress than, in my own equally worthless opinion, you need to start by focusing on the basics. I've seen more machines messed up because of improper power and cooling than for any other reason. This was simply not an issue a couple years back. Don't skimp on the case, the power supply, or the fans. Since you are newer to this I would suggest over-buying on all. Its going to be safer than potentially not having enough power or enough cooling. Pay attention to the direction of the fans you install. Spend extra on those components and you will have ample and clean power and probably a much much quieter system as a bonus. However, I find such a suggestion hard to accomplish within your budget, therefore again my original suggestion as a method of guaranteeing no issues.

Then again all of the above might be awful advice for all you know and so again makes my original point. [:D]

Peace and Love to All!

Huh?
The poor guy justs wants advise. I don't think people should be going around dissing everyone's advice.
He clearly appreciates all the input including yours, however, none of us appreciates when someone starts to critisize people like they don't know what they are talking about. I am getting sick and tired of people criticizing other people. No one asks for it, so please keep comments on other comments crime to a minimum. I am speaking for everyone. Way too many forums get locked because of this kind of behavior, and who does it harm? the guy who only wants some advice. I'm not trying to sound like a moderator or anything, but we are all grown men here. Let's please act it.

[GaryChildress]

Hi Veldor, I appreciate your caution and I would definitely agree with you if this were Usenet or maybe Ebay. Places like that can be a real zoo and you can leave those places not knowing which way is up and which is down. I may be wrong but I hold Matrix and a few other moderated forums I visit in a little higher esteem. But I will certainly keep your words of caution in the back of my mind before I run out and go on a spending spree.

Thanks again to everyone for your input. I'm still in the process of figuring out exactly what I want to get but I do consider everyone's input valuable. I know there are different opinions on what is the best route to go and granted I may disagree with some ideas based upon what little I know of computers.

Thanks again.

[Veldor]

ORIGINAL: panzers

Huh?
The poor guy justs wants advise. I don't think people should be going around dissing everyone's advice.
He clearly appreciates all the input including yours, however, none of us appreciates when someone starts to critisize people like they don't know what they are talking about. I am getting sick and tired of people criticizing other people. No one asks for it, so please keep comments on other comments crime to a minimum. I am speaking for everyone. Way too many forums get locked because of this kind of behavior, and who does it harm? the guy who only wants some advice. I'm not trying to sound like a moderator or anything, but we are all grown men here. Let's please act it.

Just to be clear I wasn't the first to directly criticize an individual. It was said I gave the worst advice ever given. So it would be proper to complain in response to that post instead or just let it go entirely.

To be clear further though, my lengthy post was not meant to entirely be directed towards that person, even if a paragraph was. It was actually trying to make a larger point, to which I guess everyone will be blinded from trying to understand vs simply getting angry which is so far from the intent. Even that paragraph, if you read it for meaning, wasn't meant as a direct attack vs an illustration of a point which I then included myself in multiple times. Im not even aware of threads on this board that ever even discussed the 3 other example points I gave.

My views are neutral, which should be overwhelmingly apparant to anyone whose actually read for content my postings. I don't care for extremisms in most any opinion including ones that say all pre-built PCs are crap, overpriced, or whatever. Different things suit different situations. My main reason for posting at all was to show that there is another side/school of thought/etc. to which the author of the thread has already acknowledged some validity in even if a preference in one direction vs the other has been given.. To which I will gladly adapt any further advice I give in the thread and had already in my above post.

No way this thread will be locked right now. My posts have plenty of on-topic and positive content. Worst case it might have hijacked the thread into a separate but concurrent discussion around my philosophical statements around internet postings (Which is not against any forum rules most anywhere including here). The fastest way to a locked thread is actually more posts like yours which don't contribute at all but rather sparks replies like this one which also don't contribute and so on. So lets all act like grown men and not fuel a fire that was already burnt out with only a few ashes left IMHO anyway.

So................

What does anyone think about my case, power, cooling suggestions? On the money or over-paranoid? Even more critical component to a home built PC.... Thumbscrews... or else your gonna get so darn sick of putting the screws in and out that you'll end up just leaving the case sides off most of the time which can go right back to the cooling problems.

And panzers I do love you also.

[Arctic Blast]

The only advice I'll give you, Gary, is to accept any help, and then research it for yourself. Figure out your main components, and what you NEED and what you WANT and what you can AFFORD, then figure out what to get. Go to some good hardware forums and read up on what people have to say, maybe check out a site like Tom's Hardware and read some reviews. That's what I did, and I've been thrilled with the system that resulted.

[Veldor]

ORIGINAL: Arctic Blast

The only advice I'll give you, Gary, is to accept any help, and then research it for yourself. Figure out your main components, and what you NEED and what you WANT and what you can AFFORD, then figure out what to get. Go to some good hardware forums and read up on what people have to say, maybe check out a site like Tom's Hardware and read some reviews. That's what I did, and I've been thrilled with the system that resulted.

I also like to double-check that advice against buyer feedback at Amazon.com or similar. While I do not read too much into any one posting, I've often found even a bad post may raise a concern over a feature or aspect I wasn't previously aware of which I can then research further. There are also cases of overwhelmingly negative or positive feedback for a product which on occasion can greatly help confirm a decision to purchase or not to purchase a particular item. More often I'm also finding people posting when they do return a product which one they then chose instead. In a few cases I was not even aware of this "better" product and I subsequently ended up discovering and purchasing it that way.

[GaryChildress]

Would someone be able to recommend a good tutorial on building your own PC? I'd like to find one that is up to date with the latest technology. When I Google I find a few but I'm not sure which one would be the best and most up to date.

Thanks.

[06 Maestro]

Gary

This is a good web site for that stuff. The is online help/forums and they also have a CD and book (updated periodically) which they have been trying to sell me for years-you might want it.

I suppose it is not really that difficult to do. Although I have not built one from scratch, I have successfully changed every component in my puters at least once-and I am far from being a "techy". The one thing that is really important while while handling new components is the avoidance of static electricity-ground everything. It might be comical to the experts, but I use one of those wrist band to box bracelets just to be safe.

Check it out. http://www.pcmech.com/byopc/

Good luck

[Gem35]

I used to belong to DIY(do it yourself)- Street(formerly DFI-Street) who then merged with Overclockers Club.
Alot of great folks there and here is a link to their system build forum.
I learned just about everything I know about PCs from those sites. Plenty of great stuff even if you are not into overclocking.

[panzers]

ORIGINAL: Veldor

ORIGINAL: panzers

Huh?
The poor guy justs wants advise. I don't think people should be going around dissing everyone's advice.
He clearly appreciates all the input including yours, however, none of us appreciates when someone starts to critisize people like they don't know what they are talking about. I am getting sick and tired of people criticizing other people. No one asks for it, so please keep comments on other comments crime to a minimum. I am speaking for everyone. Way too many forums get locked because of this kind of behavior, and who does it harm? the guy who only wants some advice. I'm not trying to sound like a moderator or anything, but we are all grown men here. Let's please act it.

Just to be clear I wasn't the first to directly criticize an individual. It was said I gave the worst advice ever given. So it would be proper to complain in response to that post instead or just let it go entirely.

To be clear further though, my lengthy post was not meant to entirely be directed towards that person, even if a paragraph was. It was actually trying to make a larger point, to which I guess everyone will be blinded from trying to understand vs simply getting angry which is so far from the intent. Even that paragraph, if you read it for meaning, wasn't meant as a direct attack vs an illustration of a point which I then included myself in multiple times. Im not even aware of threads on this board that ever even discussed the 3 other example points I gave.

My views are neutral, which should be overwhelmingly apparant to anyone whose actually read for content my postings. I don't care for extremisms in most any opinion including ones that say all pre-built PCs are crap, overpriced, or whatever. Different things suit different situations. My main reason for posting at all was to show that there is another side/school of thought/etc. to which the author of the thread has already acknowledged some validity in even if a preference in one direction vs the other has been given.. To which I will gladly adapt any further advice I give in the thread and had already in my above post.

No way this thread will be locked right now. My posts have plenty of on-topic and positive content. Worst case it might have hijacked the thread into a separate but concurrent discussion around my philosophical statements around internet postings (Which is not against any forum rules most anywhere including here). The fastest way to a locked thread is actually more posts like yours which don't contribute at all but rather sparks replies like this one which also don't contribute and so on. So lets all act like grown men and not fuel a fire that was already burnt out with only a few ashes left IMHO anyway.

So................

What does anyone think about my case, power, cooling suggestions? On the money or over-paranoid? Even more critical component to a home built PC.... Thumbscrews... or else your gonna get so darn sick of putting the screws in and out that you'll end up just leaving the case sides off most of the time which can go right back to the cooling problems.

And panzers I do love you also.

I will take that as man love.
But, seriously, I look at your number of posts and mine and it is clear who has been around longer. And while I appreciate you and everyone else to keep this a enjoyable experience where gamers like you and I have this great opportunity to talk on roundtable fashion, You must know how many times Erok has been forced to lock up threads because there is always someone the wants to knock down someone's opinion, or throw off the topic to the point where everyone is suddenly in a pissing match. I have been offended on several occasions, some of them down right blatently. I just get sick of all the infighting with certain people. Now I know you as much as anyone in here which is zilch. All I care about is that we all get together, be responsible, and enjoy the fact that there are so few of us out there. I'm sorry if you thought I was singling you out, I guess I just saw another good thread about to go bad, and it always starts out so innocently. I know you have been there. You have 1,302 reasons to prove it. As for my own post, I don't see why that wouls spark contraversy other than risking Erik's wrath for trying to cool off a subject before he does which is his job. I agree with you that I need to rephrase what I originally said to: let's just let it go entirely. No hard feelings. never had them at any point, at least in this thread.

[GaryChildress]

OK. This is my list of components for my new computer. Unless someone screams; "Wait. Gary!! It's a cookbook!!" these are the components I will be getting. I've cut corners on a couple places and gone almost all out on a couple others. I hope I've cut corners and splurged in the right places.

Things I already have for the computer:

1. OS: Windows XP upgrade disk (NON OEM)
2. 500gb 7200rpm SATA HD (Seagate)
3. External USB DVD/CD burner (Pioneer DVR-X152)
4. Wireless network adapter (Netgear WG311v3 PCI adapter)
5. Plenty of internal CD-ROM drives. (though with IDE cables)
6. 19" Flatscreen Monitor
7. 3.5" External Floppy Drive

Things I'm purchasing for the system:

CASE: $30.00
Power Up ATX Mid-Tower Case - Black, Front USB
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... 6&CatId=32


MOTHERBOARD: $10.00 (part of a combo deal with processor)
BIOSTAR A770 A2+ AM2+/AM2 AMD 770 ATX AMD Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813138106


PROCESSOR: $235.00
AMD Phenom 9850 BLACK EDITION 2.5GHz 4 x 512KB L2 Cache 2MB L3 Cache Socket AM2+ 125W Quad-Core Processor
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6819103249

VIDEO CARD: $189.00
EVGA 512-P3-N801-AR GeForce 8800 GT 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130318


POWER SUPPLY: $110.00
CORSAIR CMPSU-650TX 650W ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply 100 - 240 V UL, CE, CB, TUV, FCC, CCC
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6817139005


RAM: $45.00
G.SKILL 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6820231098


TOTAL COST = $619.00

EDIT: forgot to say USB external DVD/CD drive

[Nomad]

Gary, a quick glance tells me you should buy a SATA CD/DVD ROM reader. I believe that most new motherboards do not have IDE adapters.

BTW, I could not get the links to work to check your MB.

[GaryChildress]

Woops, links fixed... [:o]

[Gem35]

ORIGINAL: Nomad

Gary, a quick glance tells me you should buy a SATA CD/DVD ROM reader. I believe that most new motherboards do not have IDE adapters.

BTW, I could not get the links to work to check your MB.

That board has one pata connector so he can use his IDE drives just fine.
The connector can support 2 drives and if wants to use more he can always get an add-on IDE PCI card, his external drive can be used via USB most likely so he fine there as well.
Good list, looks like a solid PC Gary.