Building a PC

[garweber]

I want to build a PC but I have never done this before. Im not sure what components to get for it. Can someone recommend parts to suit my specifications please?

My specifications are:

Not really for gaming, more for storage. I want as big a hard drive as poss to store my collection of anime/music etc.
2no dvd RW drives

small spec i know... lol


Would a dual core processor be sufficient?

[Tetras]

Maybe I am asking a silly question but if all you need is storage, why not just buy a hard drive? (could be external if you don't want to mess with the PCs innards)

Just for storage and playing anime/music you don't even need a dual core, a single would be ok. The bottleneck when transferring data will undoubtedly be the hard drive(s) but realistically you will only do this once, will you not?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I agree with what the previous poster said as external hard disks are reasonably cheap nowadays.
However if you still need a new system I would recommend using a motherboard with decent integrated graphics like the AMD 780G. This will be fine for video playback even of HD movies but not for much gaming. I would also make sure that you install the OS and all the programmes on one disc and use another disc for storage only too.

You can get this from Ebuyer using their free Supersaver postage:

Kingston 2GB KIT (2X1GB) DDR2 667MHz/PC2-5300 CL5 Non Ecc 1.8V 091124 132 in stock £26.99

PowerColor RS780G Socket AM2+ onboard VGA 5.1 channel audio mATX Motherboard £44.95

AMD Athlon 64 X2 4850e 2.5GHz Socket AM2 Energy Efficient 1MB L2 Cache Retail Boxed Processor £49.57

Coolermaster Elite 330 Black Case With CM eXtreme Power 460W PSU *SPECIAL OFFER* £52.99

Samsung HD753LJ 750GB Hard Drive SATAII 7200rpm *32MB Cache* - OEM 139739 740 in stock £59.99

Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium -SP1- Licence and media - 1 PC - OEM - DVD - 32-bit - English £58.90

Optiarc AD-7200S 20X DVD±RW/DL/RAM Internal SATA Bare Black Drive - OEM £14.99

Western Digital WD800AAJS 80GB Hard Drive SATAII 7200rpm 8MB Cache - OEM £26.07

Total:£334.45

[joz12345]

Do you just want to store files? if so, get a hdd, like tetras said. If you want to play those files in your living room for example, then you will want to build a basic home theatre pc without a tv card. You can search the many htpc threads available on hexus for recommendations, for now. We will also need a budget so we know what parts you can afford, so we can recommend all the parts you will need, although a htpc doesnt need to be expensive to work perfectly, a £400 one will work excellently.
edit: beaten to it, what he/she said, althugh a budget would allow us to tailor it more efficiently

[garweber]

well the pc i have currently is a store bought piece of crap and i hate using external hard drives as when im watching anime i get addicted and the exhdd gets overheated. this is why i want to build a pc. one that will last longer. funny that when new and better components are made all the time!!

thanks for the input tho guys

[richieuk]

Whats your budget mate?

[TheReaFireblade]

... i hate using external hard drives as when im watching anime i get addicted and the exhdd gets overheated.

It wouldn't overheat - if you opted for a standard hard drive of your choosing, and put it in a fan-cooled or mesh-sided external enclosure

That option would be a darned sight cheaper, than buying all the components required to build a new PC - when your main reason for wanting to build a new PC, is just so you can watch animé, without having to worry about the HDD overheating

[Zhaoman]

If you insist on a new PC...

AMD 4850e - £50
780G mobo - £60
2Gb 800Mhz RAM - £30
450W Dark Power - £50
640Gb - £60 each

As for cases, pick one you like the look of, I don't know your budget so I don't know whether to suggest a huge 12 drive monster or a little smart looking budget case. If you had more money maybe you should go with an Intel system based on an E7200. Get back to us with a budget dudis!

[garweber]

thanks for the specs guys. yeah i do want to build a new pc. sounds long but it will be more reliable than what i have currently. i basically will use it for most things, not really for gaming tho but i want to have the option for gaming eventually. so the graphics card doesnt have to be top spec for now. this means that i wud need suitable components for a better graphics card later on???

my budget is between £400-600 i wud say. unless it can be knocked down but still keep quality.
as for the tower, would 2 fans be more than enough?

[staffsMike]

Zhaomen's PC is pretty much what I would build although his prices are a bit inflated.

The CPU is £46 on scan today only. The Abit 780G is £45 and the hard drive is £55. All good recommendations though. The onboard graphics is more than enough for HD media and stuff like that it can even game at low resolutions so if you don't need a graphics card yet you won't need to bother at all

I'd probably get a coolermaster CM-690 case with a PSU like the be quiet or the corsair 450VX which should be about £100-110 together, but you could get the antec 300 which is £35 or an Antec combo case like the NSK3480 which comes with a decent 380W PSU, they are just £55

[Will404]

If your data is important, then you could use RAID, 1 (mirror, where all the data is on both disks, so if one is lost then all of it is on another), or RAID 5 (where the data is spread out between 3 or more disks, and if one dies, it is ment to be able to recover all your lost data.

3 640GB WD6400AAKS Caviar Blue's, in RAID 5 would give you...errrr...alot of space for all your stuff. 1920GB, almost 2TB!!!!! each £52ish from scan today only

After that pretty much what CAT-THE-FIFTH said, just make sure the mobo is RAID5 compat, or get a RAID card.

[garweber]

If your data is important, then you could use RAID, 1 (mirror, where all the data is on both disks, so if one is lost then all of it is on another), or RAID 5 (where the data is spread out between 3 or more disks, and if one dies, it is ment to be able to recover all your lost data.

could u explain that RAID stuff a bit more for me onegai as im a noob when it comes to these things!!

[Will404]

could u explain that RAID stuff a bit more for me onegai as im a noob when it comes to these things!!

Basically, in RAID 1, you have two identical hard disks, each with all the data on it (they are both exact copies of each other, so if one fails then you still have all your data on the other hard disk. Windows see's the two hard disks as one, and the data is duplicated between the two of them, giving you a lot of redundancy. However you do only get half the space (if you had two WD 640GB disks, you would get 640GB of space, with everything stored twice.

In RAID 5, (sorry i made a small mistake in my last post:STUPID you need at least 3 disks, and (this is where my mistake was:OMGyou get [Number of drives - 1 * size of drive] space. So for 3 * WD640GB drives you would get 1280GB, or 1.28TB of space, and for 4*WD640GB drives you would get 1920GB or 1.92TB or space. Mybad!!.

The data is striped across two(or if you have more...) of the drives (split up, and a bit of it sent to each drive), with a parity on the third(or forth...depending on how many drives you have). The parity is what is on the other drives summed up. This leaves the drives (and excuse my bad paint) looking a bit like this:



Therefore if one drive fails, the RAID controller can use what is in the working half of the data, and the Parity of the data to work out what was in the failed drive, and copies it into a new (replacement) drive. For example if drive two were to break, for block A, the first half would be compaired to the parity, to rebuild the data on the second half of block A, and copy it onto the new drive, meaning that all your data is safe.

It has the advantage of being faster, as it gets half the data from each drive, so you do not have to wait so long for the drives to read and transfur the data, and it is more practical than RAID one, in that you get more of the space, only losing the size of one drive, compaired to RAID 1, where you loose half the space.

Hope it is OK and helps.

[TheReaFireblade]

I honestly wouldn't concern yourself with RAID - especially since you're new to building PC's. If you need a backup medium, just buy an external hard drive

[garweber]

Basically, in RAID 1, you have two identical hard disks, each with all the data on it (they are both exact copies of each other, so if one fails then you still have all your data on the other hard disk. Windows see's the two hard disks as one, and the data is duplicated between the two of them, giving you a lot of redundancy. However you do only get half the space (if you had two WD 640GB disks, you would get 640GB of space, with everything stored twice.

In RAID 5, (sorry i made a small mistake in my last post:STUPID you need at least 3 disks, and (this is where my mistake was:OMGyou get [Number of drives - 1 * size of drive] space. So for 3 * WD640GB drives you would get 1280GB, or 1.28TB of space, and for 4*WD640GB drives you would get 1920GB or 1.92TB or space. Mybad!!.

The data is striped across two(or if you have more...) of the drives (split up, and a bit of it sent to each drive), with a parity on the third(or forth...depending on how many drives you have). The parity is what is on the other drives summed up. This leaves the drives (and excuse my bad paint) looking a bit like this:



Therefore if one drive fails, the RAID controller can use what is in the working half of the data, and the Parity of the data to work out what was in the failed drive, and copies it into a new (replacement) drive. For example if drive two were to break, for block A, the first half would be compaired to the parity, to rebuild the data on the second half of block A, and copy it onto the new drive, meaning that all your data is safe.

It has the advantage of being faster, as it gets half the data from each drive, so you do not have to wait so long for the drives to read and transfur the data, and it is more practical than RAID one, in that you get more of the space, only losing the size of one drive, compaired to RAID 1, where you loose half the space.

Hope it is OK and helps.

that does help a little bit. thanks for going into the detail. but as TheReaFireblade says, perhaps it would be better me just using an external hard drive to back up my files for the time being. as i aquire more knowledge of these things i can do more!!

[Will404]

that does help a little bit. thanks for going into the detail. but as TheReaFireblade says, perhaps it would be better me just using an external hard drive to back up my files for the time being. as i aquire more knowledge of these things i can do more!!

Cool, I agree what he means about it being complex.

You could always upgrade to RAID in the future, so for now it is probs best that you set up a single drive system