Building a PC for under one grand! *AMD fans Argue Your Case*

[ShadowPho]

My friend asked me to build him a PC for under $1000. He also wanted to go Intel. I was not sure if I should convience him to go AMD .
I heard that Intel runs more stable but I was not sure if thats true.
Anyhow, he already has the case, keyboard, mouse, screen, case, cdroms.
Also I was notsure to get a FSP or Rosewill:
Rosewill RV450-2 ATX 2.01 450W Power Supply

OR

FSP Group (Fortron Source) AX450-PN ATX12V 450W Power Supply
All the stuff was bought from newegg

$214 CPU
Intel Pentium 4 640 Prescott 800MHz FSB 2MB L2 Cache LGA 775 EM64T

$60 Motherboard
ASRock 775Dual-880Pro ATX Intel

$130 DDR2 2 Gigs memory
WINTEC AMPO 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM Unbuffered DDR2 533 (PC2 4200) Dual Channel Kit System Memory

$200 Video card
eVGA 256-P2-N386 Geforce 6800GS 256MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 Video Card

$90 HDD Serial ATA150
Maxtor DiamondMax 10 6L200S0 200GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache Serial ATA150 Hard Drive

His maximum cost is $1000, all of the above comes out to be ~$800. So if there any bad things like "That Mobo doesnt support Prescotts!* please tell me. I will appriciate it.

 

[Tyreal]

There is no real proof saying that Intels run more stable.

Intels are generally better at dvd encoding and most of that media stuff. AMD's are generally better at gaming. Though there are of course, intels that beat amds in gaming and amds that beat intels in encoding and such.

Don't get that Rosewill psu. Get a fortron (FSP)

 

[Soichiro]

Prescotts run really hot, which can cause instability. Get a 3000+ or 3200+ Venice, or if he insists on Intel, a different kind of P4. For PSU, get the Fortron. As for memory, don't get the cheap stuff. Buy OCZ, Corsair, Patriot, or Mushkin instead. I didn't even know there WAS a Wintec brand. Lol. The rest of it sounds good.

 

[Xoligy]

yea my amd has always been stable lol also change the memory thats cheap *** memory get some decent stuff!!!

 

[Rattle]

DFI Ultra-d $125
146 opteron $190
Gskill pc3200 2gig $190
eVGA 7800 GT $300
Fortron 500 blue storm $80
Maxtor 16 mb cache 250gig sata $90

Grand total $975

would stomp the crap outa the machine you posted....

 

[jcw122]

Why so much RAM? Save 100 bucks and only get 1GB.

 

[jcw122]

DFI Ultra-d $125
146 opteron $190
Gskill pc3200 2gig $190
eVGA 7800 GT $300
Fortron 500 blue storm $80
Maxtor 16 mb cache 250gig sata $90

Grand total $975

would stomp the crap outa the machine you posted....

And yeah it would.

 

[Rattle]

And yeah it would.

could get a good gig of TCCD ram for $150 but for an extra $40 2gigs is nice or could get the gskill ddr500's for another $40 ofer the 3200's....

some of the gskill 3200 2gig kits are only ocing to 225 though...

 

[Kevin007]

2 GB for gaming of course...and I mean it fits his budget, so it isn't bad..

 

[ShadowPho]

yea...I might try that...he is going to be using his PC mainly for gaming and he wants to be able to run HL2 at all max at 1024*768
DFI Ultra-d $125
146 opteron $190
Gskill pc3200 2gig $190
eVGA 7800 GT $300
Fortron 500 blue storm $80
Maxtor 16 mb cache 250gig sata $90

Grand total $975

*starts newegging*
But that memory isnt DDR2
and this MB is the same for only $85 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813136163


Wow 7800 GT ...I wish I would had a $1000 right now...

 

[Kevin007]

yea...I might try that...he is going to be using his PC mainly for gaming and he wants to be able to run HL2 at all max at 1024*768
DFI Ultra-d $125
146 opteron $190
Gskill pc3200 2gig $190
eVGA 7800 GT $300
Fortron 500 blue storm $80
Maxtor 16 mb cache 250gig sata $90

Grand total $975

*starts newegging*
But that memory isnt DDR2
and this MB is the same for only $85 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813136163


Wow 7800 GT ...I wish I would had a $1000 right now...

I give that two thumbs up

 

[ckj]

AMD doesn't use DDR2 they use DDR, socket M2 which comes out next year will be the first amd platform to utilize ddr2. Don't get DFI, your friend doesn't sound that computer saavy and DFI sometimes requires a lot of tweaking. Instead get an abit or an epox board. The asrock isn't too bad either.

 

[Rattle]

ddr2 means squat right now anyway on either platform, your not losing anything by having ddr1 the architechure is different and the 2000 HT on the A64 more than makes up for intels ddr2 configuration.

the DFI is a great board but he may be better off with a ABIT, or EPOX, as far as I've seen though on ANY MOBO NF3 or NF4 there's is always tweaks involved anyway, like timings and a few other settings that need to be changed from optimized defaults.

I say go all the way and jump in with both feet and go with DFI, there's really not much to do to run stock on that board....

BTW my other rig is a

3000 venice
OCZ 1gb TCC5
eVGA 6600gt
fortron 500watt
2X80gb IDE's
DFI ultra-d

completly stock 1280X1024 with NVCP and game settings max it pulls 70fps in CS S test and gets frames from 40 in the worst spots and up into the 300's in DM and the Single player and it increases hugley when I run it 2.7 with 500HTT so that system will stomp no doubt

 

[bLack0ut]

get the asus if theres no overclocking to be done, and ur friend isnt computer saavy... dfi is a pita to tweak

also not as stable as the asus

 

[Rattle]

get the asus if theres no overclocking to be done, and ur friend isnt computer saavy... dfi is a pita to tweak

also not as stable as the asus

thats a false statement

all I ahve to do to run either of my DFI rigs stock is change first display to PCIX and set my ram voltage to 2.75 and disable cpu thermal throttling, which you will have to do on everyboard you buy lmao and to say its not as stable as a board that doesnt overclock as high is a contradiction in itself when its the highest stable overclockable board how can it be less stable at stock than another ?

 

[Flip-Mode]

Ppl, you are forgetting the 69$ Asrock mobo!
Look up some reviews on it, its Asrock S939Dual and its soposed to be superb and it OC's pretty well AND its only 69$ so you can invest somewhere else.
Besides that I'm all for the Opty and some OCZ memory.

 

[Scott9027]

Don't get OCZ memory, or anything like it that's expensive. Just get Value RAM, since you aren't going to be overclocking. I would get the ASRock or Epox board. And make sure you go with the FSP PSU over the Rosewill.

 

[Soichiro]

The thing is, OCZ makes some of the best and cheapest Value RAM. Either get OCZ or Corsair value RAM since he won't be overclocking.

 

[tom10167]

The only real question is, will this be overclocked?


If the answer is no I'd stuff 2GB of ValueRAM in to the cheapest motherboard I could with the fastest processor and video card.

 

[Soichiro]

I'd stuff 2GB of ValueRAM in to the cheapest motherboard I could with the fastest processor and video card.

The "cheapest motherboard you can find" isn't going to work very well (since most of them are from crappy companies). At least get one that doesn't suck. The ASRock mobo that Flip-Mode mentioned would work pretty well.