Your Next Rig

[headbrace]

Next system will be an Epia based machine, prob m10000, 512mb ram, and a 200GB+ hd, for films and tv straight from HD.

After that, im interested in a 64 bit system, tho where the money will come from i dont know

[chrisf6969]

I want an EPIA system too. Like one in a HUSH case, that I can stick in my stereo cabinet (next to TV) to play MP3's and surf with a wireless mouse, etc on my TV.

[Trickle]

The problem with the epia systems is that they arnt powerful enough to play divX/Xvid

My next system will likely be a shuttle for doing just that (using an old spare cpu) + a 9800 class card and DVD writer in the next month.

I dont anticipate a cpu purchase for 9+ months. 2.2Ghz tbredB is fine.

[Austin]

Yep Epia is good because it runs very cool and with very little power but it is VERY underpowered, like inferior to a PIII (or its Celeron) type of underpowered. The C3 1ghz is barely fast enough for basic video decoding so you may want to think about a low speed Tbred AthlonXP instead (esp with undervolting and underclocking). The 1ghz+ should use the superior non-Ezra core which is good as the Ezra 933mhz was way inferior to a Celeron 850mhz, often slower than a Celeron 600mhz. Lets take a quick look at the C3 CPUs ...

http://www.pcpowerzone.co.uk/reviews.php?id=42&page=1

http://www.cluboverclocker.com/reviews/cpu/via/c3_933/

http://www.hexus.co.uk/review.php?review=373

[Galant]

Something just occurred to me.

The case I was looking at for my next/first set-up is an Antec SX630II, the power supply is 300W. Will that be enough when the rest of it will look like this?

Athlon XP 2500+
Abit NF7-S/MSI K7N2 Delta-ILSR
Volcano 9/11
Radeon 9600Pro
2x256 Corsair PC3200
WD 80GB 7200rpm 8MB
Floppy
CD-Rom
etc.

[Austin]

Certianly shoudl be okay as it should be an Antec PSU with an Antec case and Antec are one of the very top PSU manus. A 350W Antec would be nicer of course but I shouldn't think it would be essential. You may want to check over cases again just to see if you can get an Antec 350W perhaps. With most cases you may get a 350W+ but generally it's unbranded and almost certainly inferior to a 300W Antec.

[Bindibadgi]

Originally posted by Trickle
The problem with the epia systems is that they arnt powerful enough to play divX/Xvid

My M10K plays divx or xvid just fine.

[Russ]

Originally posted by Bindibadgi
My M10K plays divx or xvid just fine.

YES, but he can not find taht on google

[unrealrocks]

Shuttle SS85G2 (The A64 one)
3200 A64
1Gb TwinMOS

Rest from my current system - prob sometime around March next year! I'm leaving big boxes behind and gonna have a Shuttle as my main!

[Trickle]

Hmm, I am indeed now struggling to find directly applicable benches to support my statement that indeed must be wrong. Which is a good thing as they are pretty cheap.

Yet, higher bit rate [2CD style film Xvids etc] can tax even standard 700mhz cpu's, so I figured Epia's would struggle somewhat.

Perhaps I'm guilty of applying its appalling encoding rates to playback - which dont necessarily follow.

Edit:
Hmm, Xbit labs have a review of the M1000 via system, and whilst they didnt have and graphs, they did have this to say:

Multimedia. Playing MP3 files is no longer a resource hungry task, as the today’s CPUs are really fast. However, playing MPEG4 sometimes causes some problems. Namely, the predecessors of our today’s platform had these problems. That is why I decided to check how good is our VIA EPIA M10000. For this purpose we used Fraps utility (if you are not familiar with it, this utility shows the fps rate for all tasks where it can be measured at all). So, when we played the movies we had at hand in DiVX format, the frame rate was just excellent. In other words, in the movies with 24fps we received 24fps, in the movies with 30fps – 30fps: no losses. During the movie playback the CPU was loaded by about 65-80%, so there was some reserve left.

So, video playback deserves an excellent mark: A.

The game performace, however, was obviously given a very poor rating as could be expected from its onboard gfx and as I'ed like to be able to play halo on my front room TV I'm still ruling the epia out

[Austin]

Gaming perf is dire and rem there are numerous ways to encode MPEG4/DivX so some may be less demanding than others. In all seriousness a Duron 700mhz or Celeron 700mhz are much better performers ... perhaps getting a new 0.13mu Duron or underclocking / undervolting a Duron/Tbred or Celeron would be a much better PC in ALL areas. Check the links?

http://www.hexus.co.uk/review.php?review=373

http://www.cluboverclocker.com/reviews/cpu/via/c3_933/

http://www.pcpowerzone.co.uk/reviews.php?id=42&page=1

[Nox]

prolly about a year before i start thinking about upgrading again - would imagine it'll be along the lines of a socket 939 athlon or intel equivalent - depends which has the best cost/performance ratio with oc in mind.

though i may take a look at a prometeia between now and then

Nox