little sys for little sis...opinions please...

[IBM]

Not got a lot to spend on this one. I owe my younger sister about a thousand collective Xmas and bday pressies, and this is what she's going to get. Would really appreciate any opinions you might have, compatability issues, or alternative components...looks alright to me, but I'm tired, so might be missing something obvious.

KME 5260 Midi Tower Case Aluminium Front plus side window 400w PSU £22.99
Sony 48x24x48x16x Ide Drive (combo) - Oem (SILVER) £28.91
Kingston 256MB 400MHz DDR Non-ECC CL3 (3-4-4) DIMM X 2 £53.98
Asus A7N8X-X SKT A Nforce2 AGP X8 Sound USB 2.0 Motherboard Retail Box £41.89
AMD Athlon XP2600 333mhz 512 L2 Cache Barton Retail Boxed Inc Heatsin & fan 3 year warranty £57.46
Coolermaster Aero7 Upto XP3200 Skt A with Speed Adjustment Retail Box £16.99
Western Digital Caviar 80Gb 7200rpm EIDE Hard Drive - OEM £35.83
Sapphire Radeon 9600 AGP X8 256MB DDR DVI TV-Out Retail Box £64.54

Grand Total £385 inc VAT and shipping

Thanks in advance

[mike_w]

I would say 256mb on the Radeon isn't really needed, but I might be wrong. Also, I heard from somewhere that the RAM on the 256mb version is slower than on the 128mb version.

Where are you buying this all from?

Mike

[Kezzer]

yeh the RAM on the 256MB is slower and it's slower than the usual 9600 pro 128MB version. It is a budget system after all and it's a pretty damn good spec for the price!

[directhex]

for a little system, go with a shuttle. she's not gonna play games which are massively demanding, and the infinite cuteness of a shuttle will go down a treat.

say a £150 SN41G2, £50 of RAM, £75 of drives, £50 of CPU. get graphics or don't, gf4mx will be fine unless she's gonna play UT2004.

[IBM]

She's not one for playing games, but I wouldn't deprive her of the latest version of Sims

The 9600 Pro sticks another 30 quid or so on top of the price, and if I'm getting her a copy of XP Home as well, she should thank her lucky stars she's getting the system as it is....mutter...mutter....gates....cheap....money...grubbing....

Any spec changes?

[IBM]

I had a hell of a problem building my new rig (see below) and had to call in a lot of help, and now I want to try something a little easier, and a SFF is cheating

[mike_w]

I wasn't suggesting getting a 9600 Pro, just a normal 9600 128mb.

[IBM]

Sorry Mike, the Pro comment was directed more towards Kezzer than yourself. I saw a couple of 9600 128MB, but they were all either 9600SE or 9600 Lite ... like this one
Sapphire Radeon 9600 APG x8 128MB DDR DVI-I TV-Out Lite Retail for £70.

All the prices are from Ebuyer.

[BUFF]

Why buy an HSF if you are buying a retail cpu (which comes with an hsf)?
or to put it another way - why buy a retail cpu when you are buying an aftermarket hsf?

[blockers]

I was about to say that there isnt a lot of point spending money on a HSF too.....also, she wont need great cooling, as i guess she wont be overclocking...

Why not go for twinMOS RAM? as i coudl work out cheaper than the Kingston...just a thought. Also, you could look at the second stuff?

Maybe just get her a 9600 (not a pro/XT) or whatever, as if she is just running The Sims im sure a 9600 would do

Will

[IBM]

Can I just ask, is that Sapphire 9600 Lite the same as a regular 9600, just with less packaged rubbish? Or is the configuration somehow different?

Buff -- ahah, thank you. Knew I had missed something when I put that package together, and it was that I'd got a retail chip. Shall be rectified shortly.

Blockers -- You're right, she won't be, but since I chose the Athlon 64 for my first build, my overclocking ambitions were cruely crushed, so I'm going to try to kill her system before I send it to her
As far as the RAM goes, I'd heard good things about the Kingston, plus it's listed against the Asustek board for a good match, plus changing to the TwinMOS won't save me much...

Suprised that no-one pulled me up for saying SFF are cheating

[iMc]

The Sapphire Lite versions are the same card just w/o the extra games/programs.

[IBM]

iMc -- cheers early riser. Thought that was the case.

Now I'm back to CPU....OEM....here's the three

AMD ATHLON XP2500+ 333MHZ FSB 512 L2 Cache Barton CPU - OEM - £54

AMD ATHLON XP2600+ 333MHZ FSB 256Cache - Thoroughbred CPU - OEM - £61

AMD Athlon XP2600 333mhz 512 L2 Cache Barton OEM CPU - £64

(And just to ask, if I've got the Manufacturer part number before purchase, can I use it to find out whether the chip is clockable?)

Many thanks

[blockers]

Go for the Barton xp2500+, as no doubt most people will say. People have got it to xp3200 even with the multipler locked, so if you want to give it a good bash before you send it to your sister then thats what you want And its the cheapest , dont get the tbred one as it will be lower that the xp2500 becuase of the extra cache

[IBM]

AMD ATHLON XP2500+ 333MHZ FSB 512 L2 Cache Barton CPU - OEM £46.07
KME 5260 Midi Tower Case Aluminium Front plus side window 400w PSU £22.99
Sony 48x24x48x16x Ide Drive (combo) - Oem (SILVER) £28.91
Kingston 256MB 400MHz DDR Non-ECC CL3 (3-4-4) DIMM X 2 £53.98
Asus A7N8X-X SKT A Nforce2 AGP X8 Sound USB 2.0 Motherboard Retail Box £41.89
Coolermaster Aero7 Upto XP3200 Skt A with Speed Adjustment Retail Box £16.99
Western Digital Caviar 80Gb 7200rpm EIDE Hard Drive - OEM £35.83
Sapphire Radeon 9600 APG x8 128MB DDR DVI-I TV-Out Lite Retail £59.01

[IBM]

Total inc VAT & Shipping £373.89