Build spec check

[Barry]

All parts sourced from same place because its just easyer for me



Can anyone recommend better hardware/better deals for the same price?

[staffsMike]

Intel E5200. £60

Same RAM £2 cheaper scan today only

640GB Western digital AAKS £48 or samsung spinpoint £43. Much faster and bigger.

[Barry]

Harddrive size is not really a issue, the parts are going in a 1U games server, you sure the drives are faster because the WD1600AAJS is single platter?

[staffsMike]

The 640GB is 2x 320GB platters so almost certainly.

[Barry]

is there anything smaller at the same speed? (planning 1 main drive and 1 spare drive if main ever goes down)

[staffsMike]

Yep samsung 320GB's should* be single platters (on scan) and the same sort of speed

*check the model number.

[Barry]

Thanks for the info Mike

I have this now


(LN19894) Arctic Cooling MX-2 High Performance Thermal Compound £3.98
(LN19302) 4GB (2x2GB) Corsair TwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC2-6400 (800), 240 Pins, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 5-5-5-18 £38.35
(LN23991) Intel Pentium Dual-Core, E5200, Socket 775, Wolfdale Core, 2x2.5 GHz, 2MB Cache, Retail £64.74
(LN24161) Gigabyte GA-EP31-DS3L, iP31 Express, S 775, PCI-E (x16), DDR2 1066/667/800, SATA II, SATA RAID, ATX £49.55
(LN24220) 320 GB Samsung HD322HJ Spinpoint F1, SATA 300, 7200 rpm, 16MB Cache, 8.9 ms £37.56
(LN17261) Akasa AK-395-2 All Copper Skive Fin Passive cooler 1U for LGA 775 Processors £21.14


partitioning the drive to 80/120/120 wont slow the drive down will it? and all these parts should work fine together?

and a bigger question does anyone know for sure that the passive heatsink will fit on the Gigabyte GA-EP31?

[staffsMike]

Thanks for the info Mike

I have this now


(LN19894) Arctic Cooling MX-2 High Performance Thermal Compound £3.98
(LN19302) 4GB (2x2GB) Corsair TwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC2-6400 (800), 240 Pins, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 5-5-5-18 £38.35
(LN23991) Intel Pentium Dual-Core, E5200, Socket 775, Wolfdale Core, 2x2.5 GHz, 2MB Cache, Retail £64.74
(LN24161) Gigabyte GA-EP31-DS3L, iP31 Express, S 775, PCI-E (x16), DDR2 1066/667/800, SATA II, SATA RAID, ATX £49.55
(LN24220) 320 GB Samsung HD322HJ Spinpoint F1, SATA 300, 7200 rpm, 16MB Cache, 8.9 ms £37.56
(LN17261) Akasa AK-395-2 All Copper Skive Fin Passive cooler 1U for LGA 775 Processors £21.14

Looks good


partitioning the drive to 80/120/120 wont slow the drive down will it? and all these parts should work fine together?

Shouldn't do, have a read of Zak's partition theory thread

and a bigger question does anyone know for sure that the passive heatsink will fit on the Gigabyte GA-EP31?
Can't see why not, it looks like a straight forward fitting and it isn't a cluttered board

My thoughts in bold

[Barry]

1 thing confuses me with the chip

dual core/ dual core 2?, which is it

[staffsMike]

1 thing confuses me with the chip

dual core/ dual core 2?, which is it

Well it's a pentium dual core, but in the core 2 family.

The pentium dual cores were originally the cheapest core 2's going, then Intel decided that they had the pentium name lying around which, to the feeble minded PC world buyer probably means it's good, so they grouped the cheap, low cache CPU's together and call them pentium dual cores

They're realistically just as good as the E7*** (and e8***) in high res gaming and clock very well too.

[Pob255]

The "pentium dual core" is just intels name for there cut down core2duo chips
and the only difference I know of is less cache memory although the e5x00 has 2mb cache which was the same as the old e4x00 low end c2d cpu's

The e5200 is a great little cpu and overclocks well.

[Barry]

Won't be overclocking it on a 1U server