Building a New Computer...

.exz0r · Post by **.exz0r** » Thu Dec 23, 2004 5:28 am

woops! I forgot to login, thats me up there

I'll quote it just in case you went straight to the 4th page.

.exz0r wrote:Hey... It's me again lol Sorry I never came back to update you guys on my new computer, but guess what? I didn't get it yet!!! Plus I forgot my password to these forums, and when I tried doing the "I forgot my password" thing it gave me an error.. I know I could've just emailed the admin, but oh well. I just don't want you people to think I'm some jerk, who asked for your higher intelligence, and ran away. Thank you very much for helping me out when I first posted this thread, what seems like so long ago. Some of you will be happy to know I decided to go with the socket 939, AMD 64bit 3500+. Here's is the new list of goodies I plan on getting. And once again feel free to speak your mind on what I've picked out, I know you guys know what you're talking about more than I. I do not plan on using RAID. Also, don't bother telling me to get the Nvidia 6800 gt or ultra, I had a time deciding between the x800 and 6800gt, I decided to go with ATI. The reason for this is the only game I will be playing, will most likely be Counter-Strike Source... and all the reviews I've read say that ATI does a better job handling the source engine. Thanks again.

AMD Athlon 64 3500+, 512K, L2 Cache, Socket 939 64-bit Processor
MSI "K8N Neo2 Platinum" NVIDIA nForce3 ULTRA Chipset Motherboard
CORSAIR XMS, 184-Pin 1GB(512MBx2) DDR PC-3200
Western Digital Raptor 74GB 10,000RPM SATA Hard Drive
Western Digital 80GB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive
ATI RADEON X800 PRO Video Card, 256MB GDDR3
NEC 16X Double Layer Black DVDÂ±RW
Samsung Black 1.44MB 3.5inch Floppy Disk Drive
Antec 480W Power Supply
Lian-Li 12-Bay Silver Aluminum Case

Also, wow it really snowed here in Ohio last evening and all through the whole night, theres like a foot of snow $\:D/$

LVCapo · Post by **LVCapo** » Thu Dec 23, 2004 7:24 am

All in all not a bad system. here are some modifications I think you should consider.
1. Instead of the Raptor and a second drive. i'd recommend the Diamond Max 10, it has a 16MB buffer, supports NCQ, is 300GB, SATA, and would probably be about the same, if not cheaper than the two drives you are looking at. so you'd get all those benfits, plus twice the space. Break it up into a few partitions and you are good to go.
2. I really recommend the PowerColor X800 Pro w/ VIVO, these can be flashed to an XT without issue. I added an Arctic Cooler to mine and it won't break 60C while playing Doom 3. Newegg has these at a very good price.
3. although all 939 boards perform about the same in most tests, I'm not a big MSI fan. Abit's board has gotten very good reviews, is a good O/C, and is fairly cheap. ASUS's 939 board is awesome in my opinion, I have not had a single issue with it. Don't discount the VIA boards, they are very good performers.
4 I'd recommend some PQI memory, and if you can afford it, go with some PC 3500-4000. even the AMDs can be O/Ced pretty decent, and by limiting yourself to 3200, you won't get the most out of your system. I'd also consider the 3200+ Winchester, very good CPU, but you can't go wrong with the 3500+.
To recap:
3200+ or 3500+ Winchester (The winchester part is important, these are very good 90nm processors that run very cool and O/C very well)

Maxtor DM 10 w/ 16MB cache, price to performance a much better selection than a Raptor and cheap backup.

ASUS or ABIT 939 mobo

PQI or Corsair XMS memory. Most of it will run 2-2-2-5 at 3200 (with AMD you'll probably see better results at 2-2-2-10), so why not get something with more headroom. If you get the 3200, its only rated at 3200 and anything else is a bonus, while the good stuff will support tight timings and also give you a very good O/C.

Xerxes · Post by **Xerxes** » Thu Dec 23, 2004 10:06 pm

as long as thats 3200xl it should be fine, the new ones use the brainpower pcb and have been doing very well. I haven to agree with capper though on the hard drives it would probably be the better choice.

Personally I dont really like the A8V, maybe we've just had bad luck but alot of them have come back. We've had considerably less Neo2's come back and we sell more of them.

LVCapo · Post by **LVCapo** » Fri Dec 24, 2004 1:40 am

the problem with the A8Vs was the version 1 boards, they didn't have working AGP/PCI locks. I RMAed mine this last summer, got the ver. 2 and love it. Every MSI board i've worked with has had pretty serious issues, but some people swear by their new boards, they say theres a big improvement. I think the popularity is the fact its an N-Force board, and if you like the NVidia chipsets, there isn't much to choose from in socket 939.
As to the memory, I disagree. the brainpower pcbs are doing very well, the ones we've used for our reviews are great....but, if you buy 3200, its only rated to 3200, and anything higher is a bonus. the corsair XMS 4400 I've been using (with the brainpower PCB) is pretty good stuff. I'll use my system as an example. I put 2 sticks of 3200XL in it, could hit 225-230, with crashes, regardless of the timings. Put the 400 in and run 240 without an issue at 11X........with the 3500+ Winchester, i was hitting 265-270 pretty stable. If you are getting those numbers with 3200XLL, then you are the exception, not the rule.

.exz0r · Post by **.exz0r** » Fri Dec 24, 2004 2:19 am

Why is the 3200 more expensive than the 4000?

Xerxes · Post by **Xerxes** » Fri Dec 24, 2004 11:38 am

capper every board we've sold have been rev2 a8vs and most of the problems have been with nc cores.

and exz0r the 3200 isnt. just make sure youre comparing the same ones for 4400c25 is the corsair your want if you dont want to use the 3200xl as it also uses tccd.

LVCapo · Post by **LVCapo** » Fri Dec 24, 2004 5:26 pm

that is strange but actually not surprising. i don't deal with things on the retail end, only what we get for reviews and what I buy muself. I would think that your experiences would be a better overall gauge as to the quality people can expect.
But looking at two different posts completely, you like the PQI memory and Bio hates it!!! I like the ASUS board and you don't. I wish there was some kind of quality standard that was actually enforcable.....it seems that everything we deal with in some sense is luck of the draw.
My new favorite company iis DFI, their stuff seems to be top notch, and after spending some time ggetting to know them I like their approach in that they don't have to be first, but they have to do it right. I wish everyone thought that way.

infinitevalence · Post by **infinitevalence** » Fri Dec 24, 2004 10:28 pm

the MSI Neo2 is a good board, i just built a system using it. I also agree with capper that you need to dump the raptor and look at the Maxtor DM10. Also save your cash and get the winchester 3200+ i just got the one for my friend up to 2.5 no problem infact the biggest thing holding me back from going higher is the ram. So buy some fast ram that can go 250mhz or higher as you will most likly be running at 10x 250 HT x4. Also make sure that when you connect your SATA drives you use the #3 and #4 connectors above the AGP slot as the #1 and #2 connectors seem to have issues around the fsb/pci lock and quickly runn out of spec, and this severily limits your overclock. <--- found that out the hard way and had to reinstall windows when it corupted my drive

Xerxes · Post by **Xerxes** » Thu Dec 30, 2004 4:21 pm

I know exactly what you mean capper quality control is deffinetely an issue. DFI is my favorite now too their tech support and general customer service have been great (Hopefully their nf4 board/s are out soon). Not worthless like Asus' when i tried to get a simple question answered. ASUS is only good for companies that just need them for parts/rma service (for the tech support area)

dontasciime · Post by **dontasciime** » Mon Jan 31, 2005 2:27 pm

The person that has gotten the diamond max to work on neo2, did you have trouble with the drive being picked up in windows as a removeable drive?

As i have the k8n neo platinum and the maxtor diamond max 10 16 meg cache sata drive and i have tried it on all 4 of the sata connectors and have updated bios to 1.50 and still it does the same.
Lots more people have had this issue as well, and even some people that have the neo2 are reporting the exact same issues.
Do you know if maxtor have revised teh drive and that is one you have or is there something different that you are doing that we are not.

I have tried everything, and i seem to narrow it down tho the nvidia sata controller 2.6 as when you turn that off and just use windows drivers it works as it should , i dont like the way its listed as dual pci ide either though.

So if anyone else can suggest something i might have overlooked, i have posted onto the msi forum and someone else reports that MSI gave them a file which was a firmware update for the hard drive which according to the user has now fixed what was wrong , yet on maxtors site i cannot find this. so isusepct a bit of bull on someones behalf.

infinitevalence · Post by **infinitevalence** » Mon Jan 31, 2005 6:34 pm

That has nothing to do with the Drive rather its to do with nVidia's drivers, its normal as the nVidia driver supports SATA's native ability to be hot swapable. the only what to get around this as you descovered is to use the windows driver.

.exz0r · Post by **.exz0r** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 11:54 pm

Hello everyone, yes it's me again... sorry for the threadmine, but I've build my computer. I just want to thank you guys for the help, I took all of your words into consideration, and you helped me a lot. Thanks.

::Specs::

Lian Li PC-65 Alluminum Case (Silver)
MSI "K8N Neo2 Platinum"
AMD Socket 939 Athlon 64 3500+, 90nm, 2.2 GHz, 512KB L2 Cache 64-bit Processor
CORSAIR XMS Xtreme Memory Speed Series, Xtra-Low Latency 184-Pin 1GB DDR PC-3200 w/ Platinum Heat Spreader
Western Digital Raptor 74GB 10,000RPM SATA Hard Drive
Western Digital 80GB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive
Antec 480W Power Supply with Blue LED Fan
ATI Radeon x800 Pro
Soundblaster Audigy Gamer
Thermalright Heatsink XP-90
Panaflo Fan 92x92x25mm
Lite-On DVD+/-RW
Samsung 3.5 Floppy Drive
Round IDE Cables (Blue)
SATA Cables (Blue)
Logitech Blue Performance Mouse
Logitech Elite Keyboard
Arctic Silver Thermal Paste
2 Blue Cold Cathodes

::Pictures::

.exz0r · Post by **.exz0r** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 11:57 pm

I now have another question. I scored a 4778 on 3DMark05... Is this good or bad considering my hardware? I'm wondering if I need to be messing with some of my BIOS options. Thanks.

infinitevalence · Post by **infinitevalence** » Fri Mar 11, 2005 1:48 am

WOW! thats a good looking system, top quality products looks like a good buy, nice job. I have not yet benched in 3d05 by i scored 11131 in 3d03 if that helps.

my system specs:

3000+ @ 2.6ghz
1gb BH-5 @ ddr480 2-2-2-8
X800XL 256mb
DFI Ultra-D
Maxtor DM10 250gb 16mb

.exz0r · Post by **.exz0r** » Fri Mar 11, 2005 1:52 am

Everytime I try using 3DMark03 it crashes from corrupted file errors. I think from missing textures.

Post by **Apoptosis** » Fri Mar 11, 2005 11:34 am

dude kick ass rig... those numbers look about right. What driver are you running?

.exz0r · Post by **.exz0r** » Fri Mar 11, 2005 11:39 am

I was having all sorts of problems last night, getting memory errors... having problems with my drivers, so I reformatted... I'm setting everything back up this time a bit more carefull. I'll post my scores later on today.

.exz0r · Post by **.exz0r** » Fri Mar 11, 2005 12:49 pm

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh. I'm starting to get aggravated. I just got 2 errors, both of them I got while trying to install Half-Life 2. Here's a screenshot of the error.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sat Apr 09, 2005 5:04 pm

Are you getting all these errors at stock speeds?
Also, can't seem to load your pics

gvblake22 · Post by **gvblake22** » Sat Apr 09, 2005 5:05 pm

Anonymous wrote:Are you getting all these errors at stock speeds?
Also, can't seem to load your pics

OOOPS, that was me^^^^