Totally new.. and likely totally naive

[resoluteK]

Hey, I'm a college student without a computer (not a good thing), and so I've been looking into taking a shot and building my own for the first time. I've read many of the articles on this site and found them very useful and informative, in partucular Chris McQuistion's "Building a Quiet PC From The Ground Up."

Anyway, here's my question. Although I've been able to pick out most of the elements I think would make a good system, I fear that I do not know enough to determine if I had selected a 'bad combination', something that just wouldn't work right, overheat, and result in a very expensive puddle. I plan on learning more about overclocking and perhaps attempting it later, but first my goal is to get a functional computer up and running. My tentative list is:

Case: EvercaseE4252 (w/ the mods described in Chris McQuistion's article)
Case Fans: 2 PC Power & Cooling Silencers
CPU: P4 3.2ghz (should perhaps wait for the 3.4 or Prescott variations to become available?)
Motherboard: (Here, I'm relatively clueless. Any suggestions on where to start looking? Any suggestions in particular?)
Power Supply: Forton FSP350
Heatsink: Thermalright SLK-8000
Heatsink Fan: PanaflowL1A
Memory: 2 x Corsair XMS 512mb
Vid. Card: Raedon 9800 XT 256mb

My main concern is perhaps not having adequate cooling or something along those lines. Any help/suggestions are greatly appreciated! Thank you! :D

[stompah]

Welcome to the forums and good luck!

Sorry I am not an Intel guy so I cannot tell you what the best motherboard is for you. For the heatsink you can get a 947u for just a few dollars more. Or even better since you want a quiet PC you can go the Zalman route. In case you havent heard yet Zalman is known for making quiet products.

May I suggest a cheaper CPU to start with? $400 is a lot of money for your first time building a PC. I can build an entire PC minus monitor(maybe if I use rebates) for less than $400. You can get a near 3GHz Celeron for a few dollars north of $100. That should be easily overclocked to mid to high 3GHz but I could be wrong.

Check out the Intel CPU forum and the Intel motherboard forums and go crazy.

What are you going to use for a hard drive? Operating system?

Your power supply may not be able to handle what you are throwing at it. Fortron in a good brand but your choosing a light duty PSU for a heavy duty system. Dont go cheap on your PSU.

BTW go to www.newegg.com www.multiwave.com www.svc.com and a bunch more that I cannot remember at this moment.


Oh I forgot... welcome to the addiction!

EDIT: I just noticed I have the same case. It weighs a ton. Unfortunately it doesnt cover the noise of my whiney hard drive. Dont worry its a bad drive, without it my system is nearly silent.

[shiyan]

WELCOME TO THE FORUMS!

I'd agree with not getting the 3.2, but then if you have an unlimited budget, then all the more power to you! Same thing goes for the 9800XT.

Stay away from the Celerons though! They are terrible for gaming, a 3Ghz Celeron is around the speed of a 1.7Ghz P4 in games!
http://www.xbitlabs.com/images/cpu/3gems-oc/3dmark.gif
http://www.xbitlabs.com/images/cpu/3gems-oc/rtcw.gif
http://www.xbitlabs.com/images/cpu/3gems-oc/ut.gif
http://www.xbitlabs.com/images/cpu/3gems-oc/doom3.gif
(KT333 and 845 motherboards used)

The advice I'll now give is assuming a "best bang for the buck", rather than "unlimited budget" system:

Rather than the 3.2, get the 2.6 or 2.8. They cost a lot less and overclock to very similar speeds as the 3.2. Very soon the M0 stepping will be out, so you should be looking out for SL6Z4 (M0 stepping 2.6C) and SL6Z5 (M0 stepping 2.8C).

Motherboard: Asus P4P800 or P4C800 depending on budget. (not much difference speed wise)

RAM: the memory guys seem to prefer OCZ PC3500 Platinum and Mushkin BL2 PC3500, so maybe those would be the better choice.

Power supply: That's a great power supply already, but as you are spending quite a lot on the other components already, maybe you should be going even a bit higher on the power supply, such as an Antec Truepower 430w. Other very good ones are the Fortron 530w, Antec Truepower 480w, 550w, PC Power & Cooling power supplies. A good power supply is quite important for a successful overclock.

Heatsink: go for the best, the Thermalright SP94. you won't regret it. If you are going for a very quiet setup, then the Zalman CNPS7000 series like stompah suggested is very good.

Graphics card: The 9800 Pro is not much slower than the XT, and will overclock to not much slower speed than what the XT overclocks to, but if you have the money, then I guess you could justify getting the XT. (good thing that you are staying away from nVidia!)

[resoluteK]

Thanks for the replies!! Big orange letters.. I'm touched.

In general, I'd like to get one of the best systems I can.. but I would of course like to stay reasonalbe in cost.

I'll definitely look into the Raedon 9800 Pro and the cheaper cpu ideas. Aren't there different versions of the 2.8ghz P4 like 2.8b or c? Which of these is the best?

For an operating system, I'll go with Windows XP.. and for hard drives, I'm looking at two 80gb Western Digital "Special Edition" JB drives.

As far as the power supply, thanks for pointing out that a 350w may not be up to snuff.. I'll look the suggestions you gave, as well as the ones in reference to the motherboard and heatsink.

Again, thank you! Yall (Texas word) are too kind!

[shiyan]

you're welcome!

The C means 200fsb (or 800fsb as it's quad pumped), B means 133fsb (or 533fsb...). You want the C version, as it provides a lot more bandwidth.

Windows XP is the way to go. As for whether you choose Home or Pro, have a look here: http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_home_pro.asp and http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/howtobuy/choosing2.asp

Hard drive: the WD800JB is a great drive, but it is not the latest and fastest. That would be the Hitachi/IBM 7K250 series. That would be around 7~10MB/s faster in transfer rates, and has a faster seek time. Here's a head to head comparison between the flagship 250GB versions of those 2 hard drive families: http://www.storagereview.com/php/benchmark/compare_rtg_2001.php?typeID=10&testbedID=3&osID=4&raidconfigID=1&numDrives=1&devID_0=250&devID_1=245&devCnt=2 here's a mini review of the 7K250 by larva: http://forum.oc-forums.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=237664

the Fortron 350w is a very good power supply, but the system you're putting together will require a lot of power, and a better power supply will give you even better results.

[resoluteK]

In regard to the motherboard, which is the better option?

P4C800 Deluxe
P4C800 Deluxe w/ AI features

Thanks again for all the help!

[shiyan]

What you see at Newegg as "P4C800-E DELUXE Retail" basically has everything that the "P4C800 DELUXE Retail w/ ASUS AI Features" has, plus Intel Gigabit LAN, and Serial ATA RAID on the ICH5R. All the AI feature stuff it has as well.

Whether those 2 additional features are worth your money is up to you.

[resoluteK]

Gotcha. I'll shell out for the best one I can get.

Does that mean I don't need to buy a gigabit network interface card?

[shiyan]

that's right.

[resoluteK]

Hey, alright.. one less thing.

Shiyan, thank you so much for all your help!!

[resoluteK]

Hey again, I'm about to order some parts but I've stumbled on a couple areas I'm unsure about..

In relation to the Zalman CNPS7000 heatsink, should I opt for the aluminum/copper or the pure copper variety?

Also, I see that the P4C800-E Deluxe motherboard has an integrated sound card. Does that mean I can't install a separate sound card?

People on this board are so nice.. thanks again!

[RadiationMan]

Originally posted by resoluteK
In relation to the Zalman CNPS7000 heatsink, should I opt for the aluminum/copper or the pure copper variety?
Go for the pure copper. It is more efficient at heat transfer than aluminum.

Also, I see that the P4C800-E Deluxe motherboard has an integrated sound card. Does that mean I can't install a separate sound card?
You can install a separate sound card. You will just need to disable the integrated one when you do.

People on this board are so nice.. thanks again!
Everyone here was noob at one time, and we all try to help each other out. This is a good place to be.

[resoluteK]

Thanks!