input on expensive system

I am building a computer for one of my dads friends and hes got money to waste, heres what i got:

1.6Ghz Pentium IIII
Intel Corp. MoBo
512 Mb Rambus
Sony 24x10x40
Maxtor 40gb HD
Gainward Geforce 3 Ti450 64Mb DDR TV-out
56k Zoom V.92
Viewsonic 17"
Logitech Optical Scroll Mouse
Microsoft Natural K/B
Nikao Mirror Case
Enermax 350 Watt PSU

It will have passive cooling also, there are going to be lot's of fans in there

I just wanna know what you guys think about this thing, and also, how overclockable are the P4's? Ive never owned or even desired to own an INTEL anything Im a Die Hard AMD fan myself

Intel motherboard ??? not on your life .... money to burn ??? why not Plextor 24x burner ??? Nikao case ... you have to be kidding ... let him waste some money on the good stuff ... go for a Antec Performance Series or better yet get the Lian Li aluminum case ... forget about the "Intel" motherboard ... whew they stink !!! If he is stuck out with a dial up modem get something like US Robotics that is not a "winmodem" ... Hey why dont you be adventurous and get something like the ECS P4S5A that uses the SiS 645 chipset that uses DDR333 memory instead or the "RAM-BUST"... you can be a the first one on the block to critique the SiS based board ... as for all those fans make sure to have it cleared for take off before he "fires" it up !!!! Just Kidding ... I really do feel that the Plextor burner and the Antec or Lian Li pieces would serve someone with money to waste than the Sony burner or that god awful looking case ... you gotta give me the link for their products ... good luck with the system !!!

what a piece of expensive crap!

I like money to waste.


1.6Ghz Pentium IIII ::: why not 2G?

Intel Corp. MoBo ::: ?!

512 Mb Rambus ::: I don't know if the P4 works any better with DDR, but I'd give it a shot.

Sony 24x10x40 :: Not bad.

Maxtor 40gb HD ::: Only 40?

Gainward Geforce 3 Ti450 64Mb DDR TV-out ::: I'm not a gamer, so no idea here.

56k Zoom V.92 ::: USR

Viewsonic 17" ::: Only 17"?

Logitech Optical Scroll Mouse ::: I have it and like it. Wireless would be nice too.

Microsoft Natural K/B ::: How about one of the internet keyboards with all the buttons. I have one... never use those damned button, though.

Nikao Mirror Case ::: ??

Enermax 350 Watt PSU ::: Might want to go a bit higher if you're using a ton of fans. Also consider the PC Power and Cooling line.


I know you probably didn't want it picked apart like that, but you did says money to waste. Why not shoot the moon?

Hey and dont forget to get him a Pioneer DVD106S slot load DVD-CD-ROM to save his expensive Plextor burner ... for 55.00 bones he could get the Digital Doc 5 by macpower so he can have some whistles and bells to go with all that money to waste and control all those fans... while he's at it get him to get the new Sound Blaster Audigy Platinum sound card so he can have IEEE 1354 with more whistles and bells ... might as well throw in a CoolerMaster HD cooler to add to his Cessna turbo prop sound effects ...

Antec SX1240 with the two standard fans with the processor heat sink and fan should be plenty for the cooler running Pentium 4 processor with provisions for plenty more fans just by "snapping" them in

Plextor 24x10x40x burner

Pioneer DVD106S DVD-CD-ROM

Teac 1.44mb floppy drive

Digital Doc 5

Sound Blaster Audigy Platinum

whoa, whoa whoa, Hes not bill gates, All he needs in it i Mhz and a good gpu(and maybe some RAM). i dont think i will end up using the nikao case anyways, as fr the zoom, he only need it for emergency backups and its only like 15 bucks, And the MoBo, well i know it sucks, i wanted a dragon in it but he wants Pentium and i dont know why, im gunna try and talk him into getting an AMD, then ill put a dragon plus or Iwill or something of the like, Any suggestions about the MoBo? If i am able to talk him into AMD then he will most likely get a Dual Proc, now that would be somethin, 3Ghz, wow.

If money is no object then you might want to check out the Tyan Thunder GC-HE - S4520. You can see it here. It's the third one down. For quad operation you'll need the newer Xeons which support 4-way smp and come in much larger cache sizes. Those should be available very soon. Anyway, if you've got lots of money you want to spend the Thunder GC-HE- S4520 might be a nice way to do it. Think of the Geek factor of owning a quad P4 Xeon system.

Anyway, if you don't want to spend quite that much money and don't want to wait for the newer Xeon MPs ( that is the P4 Xeons that support 4-way or higher smp) then you might want to check out the supermicro P4DC6 which you can see here. The P4DC6 is a very nice motherboard. I have one of these myself with a couple of 1.7Ghz Xeons and I'm quite happy with it. The 2.0Ghz Xeons are available now but they weren't when I built my system. If money isn't much of a concern then I'm sure youd want to go for the 2.0Ghz parts. The P4DC6 is a very nice rock solid stable board. The only downside is it supports a maximum of only 2 cpus, whereas the Thunder GC-HE - S4520 will support upto 4.