Building new comp and would like some advise

[Remires]

I am currently running an HP Pavilion 6355 (Celeron 333, 256MB RAM, a 4 Gig, and a 20 gig HDDs, A 3DFX Vodoo 3000 graphics Card, WIN98). After graduating with my Associates Degree in Computer Engineering I wasn't able to get a job (AAS degrees are apparently useless) so after two years of being unemployed I am going back to school for my Bachelors in CS. Since my computer is 7 years old as of this November my family lent me the money to get a new computer. I am building it myself so this way I can upgrade it easily myself (something I wasn't able to do with the HP, at least not easily). I havn't built a PC since 1999 in High School and that was in that stupid extra big, all windowed case so I can see what is going on on the inside.

I ordered all of my components already, just waiting for the motherboard, HDDs and PSU to come in from TigerDirect. Before I begin I was hoping you guys could give me some tips so I don't do something stupid like burn out the processor the first time I boot up the PC or anything.

Here is the list of components:

• CPU: Athlon 64 3700+
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819103539
• Heatsink/Fan: Thermaltake Venus 12
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835100007
• MB: Fatal1ty AN8-SLI
  http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...Tab=0&NoMapp=0
• PSU: Ultra X-Connect 500 Watts (ult31558)
  http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...412&CatId=1079
• GC: SAPPHIRE ATI RADEON X800Pro (100600L-Red)
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814102466
• HDDs: 2x SEAGATE Barracuda 300GB (7200.8 ST3300831AS-RK)
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822148070
• RAM: 2x Rosewill 512 MB
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820223030
• Optical Drive: NEC DVD Burner ND-3540A
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16827152052
• Case: Thermaltake "Tsunami VA3000BWA"
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811133132
• Keyboard: Logitech Elite (967234-0403)
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16823126114
• Mouse: Logitech MMX510
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16826104150
• Monitor: BenQ FP91G+
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16824014090
• Speakers: Creative Inspire P7800
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16836116153
• OS: WinXP Pro (SP2)
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16837116195

Just some things I know which may be issues:

I would like to set up the HDDs in RAID 0 and I know sometimes Windows XP doesn't like that when you install it(any advise for making this go smothly would be greatly appreciated)

Yes I do have a small vial of Arctic Silver 5 to attach the heatsink to the processor

I have an Anti-Static Wrist Strap


Thanks in Advance

Remires
Your local American

[shaithis]

If you really want to run RAID, I would suggest buying a proper raid controller.

I have always found on-board RAID to be well below par. Look at a 3Ware or Adaptec card if the price permits.

[azzkicker_9002]

I'd either go for DFI nf4-Sli Lanparty or Asus Premium, bad experience with Abit in the past. People've said good things about ABIT, though.

so, maybe it's just my luck!

[unreal]

Very nice, but I would suggest a different heatsink/fan; I would look for the Artic Cooler one, or the Akasa Evo series...

Also I personally would try and go for a 6800GT or even 6800 Ultra now that they are cheap, but thats my opinion that other people might not agree upon. Also I would go for the DFI-LANParty or Asus SLI boards rather than the Fatal1ty ones... and it kinda helps to future proof if you have an SLI board and an SLI-compatible graphics card.


As for installing WinXP, I have no idea about RAID but you will help the setup out if you Press F6 at the beginning when it asks you, and supply your SATA Mobo drivers on a floppy disc.

[dbuske]

If you can afford it, go with a new Athlon 64 X2. That is the fastest right now.

[herbert_goon]

Hi

2 things:

1 - Go for a 6800GT, as you can SLI that later (if you don't intend to don't buy an SLI board).
2 - DO you need 600Gb? If this is for your study then RAID1 the 2 drives and enjoy the feeling of security.

HTH

[dangel]

I hate that case. I m8 has one and that door is just annoying and heavy. The built quality isn't anywhere near the coolermaster it rips off

[sawyen]

are u decrypting NASA's space station signals? Why do you need 600GB?... maybe its just me..

X800Pro? WRONG! Go for something with more OOOmpph, X800XL, 6800GT are all great alternatives.. (might want to consider 7800GT as well)

[TiG]

First off let me say welcome to the boards Remires. And congratulate you on a lovely laid out post. It was a pleasure to read.

I'm pretty impressed with your choices, I'm not a big fan of the thermaltake series for fans, but it should be fine.

I'd say pretty much everything you've chosen is good quality and will work well together. I like the A-Bit series boards and i'm on my 6th one running and recently my dad purchased the one just below the one you have there. It is an absolutely superb board.

I'm not aware of the Ultra X series of power supplies, but it looks pretty good and plenty powerful enough. I'd personally chose a difference graphics card as that one doesn't seem to offer the best value for money at present.

Think you could get a bit bigger bang for your buck so to speak

The case is down to personal choice but have to admit the screen/mouse/keyboard you've chosen all appear to be rather

Impressed you've kept with the same old machine for so long.

Let us know how you get on with the build.

Nice to see more americans on here

TiG

[xrob]

I ordered all of my components already, just waiting for the motherboard, HDDs and PSU to come in from TigerDirect.

why are you all giving hardware advice when he has already ordered it.

Puting a PC together is pretty easy theres not much you can mess up on, as for RAID you should have much of a problem with the onboard controller, it will be fine for what you need, as i havnt actually use that motherboard i cant actually help with the setting up of it, i have the ASUS-A8N-sli premium and i use 2x300 gig hd's stripped and the setup was simple, just enter the raid setup screen and configure the raid you want, then it should just show up in windows, it didnt show the HD's as the correct size when i first booted up but after i played around with the disk managment in windows i managed to sort it out.

GL
rob

[Drago]

Ahm... why do you use the Windows XP SP2 on a 64bit machine? I'd go for Windows XP x64 Edition - just in case.

And to the components now: Don't take an ATI graphics card - unless you get a new R520. Why? Because they doesn't support Pixel Shader 3.0 yet.

Because of gaming performance you could also take a sound card... Onboard sound isn't that fast anymore...

[mike_w]

Ahm... why do you use the Windows XP SP2 on a 64bit machine? I'd go for Windows XP x64 Edition - just in case.

And to the components now: Don't take an ATI graphics card - unless you get a new R520. Why? Because they doesn't support Pixel Shader 3.0 yet.

Because of gaming performance you could also take a sound card... Onboard sound isn't that fast anymore...

I wouldn't go for Windows XP 64bit thingy, since there is a lack of drivers and support - so far as I'm aware, a lot of applications don't work on XP. As for graphics card, if I had the money, I would go for the X800XL, which seems to provide the best bang for your buck at the moment.

[bobo007]

why are you all giving hardware advice when he has already ordered it.
GL
rob

thank you, I was getting really confused there for a min.

As far as installing XP to a raid 0 array, It works just fine.
The basic steps needed are to create the array, make a floppy with the RAID driver on it, and then install XP.
You create the array in the BIOS, the manual for your mother board should provide all the info on the settings.
The raid driver shoud be on the CD for the mother board, or go to thier site and download the latest driver and put it on a floopy.
Then start the XP intall, right at the start you will see at the bottom of the screen,
"press F6 to install third party scsi or raid " Just hit F6 and put the floppy in when it asks for it.
Its simple, and dont worry about messing up, at this point you dont have anything to loose,
so you can always do it over if it doesnt work the way you thought.
have some fun ! You should have a very nice machine when your done.

[unreal]

So why did he ask for the advice when hes already ordered it

Hes just waving his e-penis in our faces

[aidanjt]

If you really want to run RAID, I would suggest buying a proper raid controller.

I have always found on-board RAID to be well below par. Look at a 3Ware or Adaptec card if the price permits.

3ware is major overkill for simple stripped/mirrored RAIDs, and in the case of SATA 3ware cards use SATA->IDE bridges to communicate with the RAID processor, which in turn automatically cuts the peak bandwidth to 133mb/s (theoretical bandwidth at that, this was probibly an electrical hack to rush an SATA product to the market quickly, we'll hopefully see a native SATA RAID processor next year), not to mention the overhead for onboard caching and further onboard processor latency issues.

BIOS RAIDs are more than adaquit for desktop machine use.. If you want to serve thousands of files over a gigabit ethernet connection to hundreds of disk i/o hungry users, go with 3ware RAID5, otherwise onboard RAID is generally sufficent.

As for installing WinXP using the motherboard's onboard array, its easy, when your WinXP setup cd kicks into the text setup portion (blue screen), when your prompted at the bottom to load SCSI/RAID drivers hit F6, stick your floppy disk in, hit enter, select the right driver and your sorted. Never once had a problem with it.

Nice setup btw.

[BUFF]

Dump the X-Connect 500 if you intend to overclock at all.
It looks pretty but it's not a great performer.