Page 1 of Just bought a Dell 20" 2007WFP - Now I need to get myself a PC!

Ok, I`ve kind of gone about this the wrong way but the monitor was getting such good reviews over at thedvdforums I just bought one on impulse! :/ Have to say though I`m over the moon with it and I`ve only had it linked up to my laptop so far!

To do it justice I`m going to look into getting myself a decent base unit bought/built. I`ve read some good posts in here recently from guys who obviously know what they are talking about so thought I`d get some custom advice about what I should be looking for...

As far as games go I`m not into the ones that require top end graphics cards but I would still like it to be able to cope with most modern games as this machine will be lasting me a long time. DVI and S-Video out is a must. The PC will probably be used more as a multimedia machine in that I`ll be watching a lot of TV Series/Films on it. Multi tasking is something I do quite a bit as I nearly always have 3-5 IE, 2xWord, Outlook, Win Explorer, Nero, MSN and AIM sessions running. TV-Tuner would be good too.

Looking to spend about £700 but could spend more and would like to spend less… :) I might be able to get one of the contractors at work to build it for me but if not, what do you think of this site: www.epcbuyer.com

AMD or Intel? I`m sure the choice of CPU`s was never this big last time I looked into this!

Cheers
Ross

I have a decent motherboard & CPU for sale :D
(Asus P5WD2-E Premium & Intel D 940) (You`ve probably seen the other thread!)

Anyway...

I would choose the Intel route, purely because of the way they`re going with the dual core chips (the new Core 2 Duo`s are amazingly fast - based on all the reviews).

Digital TV Tuner`s can be picked up very cheaply (there`s a load of USB ones out there for around £30-£35 at the mo).

As for graphics cards, there`s load of PCI-E cards now which will cope quite happily with some of the latest games, although if you`re going to run them on a 20" LCD, they might not run at full resolution with a decent FPS rate. DVI output is standard on most cards now. S-Video should be an option for most of them as well, but just check it.

If you want good quality components, its always better to build yourself (Since you know what you`re getting). The cost can sometimes be cheaper, sometimes more expensive - depends on where you source the stuff. (Different sellers will offer bargains on different bits).

I recently built a machine with the following spec: (approx current prices listed)
Asus P5WD2-E Premium motherboard (7.1 sound on board) (£150)
Intel D 940 (2x3.2Ghz processor) (£130)
ATI X1800XT PCI-E graphics card (£145)
WD 250GB SATA Hard drive (£55)
DVD burner (already had - approx £25)
Case (already had - mine was originally £70)

I think that`s about it...can`t actually remember what else would be needed!

EDIT - just remembered (:D) the memory/RAM
I added 1GB (2x512MB) PC6400 (800Mhz) RAM (£90). This was overkill, since 667Mhz RAM should be OK, but I thought I`d go for the max

HTH
Miles

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This item was edited on Wednesday, 2nd August 2006, 13:28

like it to be able to cope with most modern games as this machine will be lasting me a long time. DVI and S-Video out is a must. The PC will probably be used more as a multimedia machine in that I`ll be watching a lot of TV Series/Films on it. Multi tasking is something I do quite a bit as I nearly always have 3-5 IE, 2xWord, Outlook, Win Explorer, Nero, MSN and AIM sessions running. TV-Tuner would be good too.

which basicaly means you do want a powerfull machine ;)

if i where you i`d build one yourself, & the things i would consider are.

1. making it as silent as possible, mainly because of your multimedia reqiurments, very annoying to watch a dvd only to hear the pc attemting take off in the same room ;)
2. most decent GFX cards have svideo out built in, But will you realy need it ? after all your using a tv/monitor that can (probably) handle vga/dvi connectors ? that way you can download hi-def tv shows etc & watch in the proper resolution & format they where intended for.
3. storage, if your thinking of using the pcfor media streaming you`ll need a good amount of storage, i have 2x 200gig drives + 1 x 250gig + 1 x 300gig & i`m down to my last 50gig :o but i have gone a bit ott ;)
4. the case, do you want a small media pc type case of a more traditional desktop ? if it`s gonna be in your front room maybe something like this ? http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=274609

sata hard disc @ 300gig (around £60)
gfx, something around an ati X800gt @ £75 ish
dvd re-writer £35 ish
1gig ddr400 £45 ish

as an example.

the above case = £70
motherboard = £40 http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=385522
cpu = £60 (amd 64, xp3000) http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=92390

However, you might wanna go for an intel chip as some of there range are about to drop in price & they tend to run cooler....

EDIT= miles beat me to it ;) i started writing this ages ago, but the door went :)

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It`s like Stephen Hawkins Vs the Speaking clock.....

You are superior to us in only one way.........You You are Better at Dying....

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This item was edited on Wednesday, 2nd August 2006, 13:40

Quote:
miles beat me to it

Sorry mate, bored at work! :D

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Guy at work just knocked together this for me but I`m thinking I might spend a bit more just to make sure I`m not disapointed!

I`m thinking the graphics card should be the first thing I replace on it! Are these Dual Core processers really that good? What about getting a raid setup, will I be looking at much of a performance increase? 200Gb storage isn;t much so if I got 2x 200Gb I was thinking Raid would be the next step... He`s talking about getting 4x HDD and setting up some Raid 5 stuff - I switched off at this point! :B

Intel Core 2 DUO E6300 "LGA775 Alendalle" 1.86GHz (1066FSB) - OEM £125.07
Asus P5B Deluxe WiFi (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £141.57
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 200GB ST3200820AS SATA-II 8MB Cache - OEM £ 56.34
Corsair 1GB DDR2 Value Select PC4200 Dual Channel Kit (2x512MB) £ 68.09
Sapphire ATI Radeon X1300 Hyper Memory 512MB DDR2 AVIVO TV-Out/DVI £ 39.89
Pioneer DVR-111DBK 16x16 DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter - (Black) OEM £ 25.79
Antec SLK2650BQE Black Quiet Mini Tower Case - 350W SmartPower PSU £ 38.72

Total ~£500


"Life is like oral sex, one slip of the tongue and you`re in the s***!" - Roy Chubby Brown

This item was edited on Wednesday, 2nd August 2006, 15:21

Ross

You `should` be OK with that power supply, but I would consider a bigger one if you can.
I would also suggest PC5300 or PC6400 memory (just that bit faster).

That graphics card probably won`t cope with full anti-aliasing etc on full resolution on your nice new monitor...but should be OK on `normal` settings. Will be more than enough for movies etc.

2x200GB in a RAID setup would make it faster (essentially 1x400GB drive in Windows).
Using RAID5 (a pain in the arse to setup) would give you quite a bit or redundancy (if one drive fails, just replacing it `should` mean you don`t lose anything.

HTH
Miles

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also, if your thinking of using more thsn one hard drive (especialy in raid configuration) then don`t get a very small case, as they will create quite a lot of heat (my 4 hard drives together create more of a problem with heat than my cpu does) i`d consider the Antec Solo, it`s baffled agains noise & looks cool, whilst retaing a reasonable size for air convection, & it`s got a cool rubberised rail system for mounting upto 6 hard drives so they don`t vibrate, this also greatly dampens the internal noise of the drives as they are working :)

but most off all, have fun & do it the way you want it :)

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It`s like Stephen Hawkins Vs the Speaking clock.....

You are superior to us in only one way.........You You are Better at Dying....

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What do you guys think of this GFX card instead:

Sapphire Technology Radeon X1600 PRO 256Mb DDR2 AGP DVI TVO Retail ~£80

In all honesty I still haven`t had a chance to read up on `what`s hot and what`s not` so this is picked purely on the fact that I like the graphic outputs the card has and as it`s twice the price then that means it has to be twice as good! ;)

[EDIT] - Also think I`m going to get the 5300 memory, it`s only a couple of quid more!

"Life is like oral sex, one slip of the tongue and you`re in the s***!" - Roy Chubby Brown

This item was edited on Thursday, 3rd August 2006, 08:08

Sapphire Technology Radeon X1600 PRO 256Mb DDR2 AGP DVI TVO Retail ~£80

you deffinately want to stay away from agp, as it`s been replaced by pci express :)

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It`s like Stephen Hawkins Vs the Speaking clock.....

You are superior to us in only one way.........You You are Better at Dying....

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You might want to have a look at the PC ALDI are selling for just £399.99.

uk.aldi.com/special_buys/product_311.html


Regards,
Critters.:D


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