Well, after my matest mishap http://www.lfsforum.net/showthread.php?p=706657#post706657 im in need of a new pc. tight budget, talking about £300-£400 max. want something fast and good value for money.

Already have the CPU i want in mind, AMD Athlon 5000 Black edition....has unlocked multiplyers, can be boosted to 3.0Ghz quite happily. Anyone reccomend a good Motherboard that will utilize the unlocked multiplyers (So multiplyer adjustment is a MUST) and of course DDR2 and PCI-e and SATA please. will be the AM2 socket (940??)

Anyone recommend a nice cooler also. and a good SATA HDD around 200GB (prefer it to be a maxtor drive, seems to be the only make that hasnt broken on me or anyone i know) And everything else is up to you, as long as the grpahics card is Nvidia

So i need recomendations for:
CASE
Graphics card
RAM
Motherboard
PSU
maybe a sound card if theres budget left. and anything else ive left out cause i usualy do that

Thanks in advance!

Quote from robt :

(prefer it to be a maxtor drive, seems to be the only make that hasnt broken on me or anyone i know)

Cant really help on the rest, but Maxtor? Had three, all have died on me with no indication they were failing.
Never again will i buy Maxtor.

For RAM, I will time and again recommend the Corsair DDR2-800 2x1Gb pack at 4-4-4-12 timings. Great RAM, great price.

As for the HDDs. Maxtor may have been the only drive to not fail on you, but they're the only drive to have managed to fail with everyone else, lol. Seagate Barracuda Perpendicular-Recording drives are the way to go - any size you want!

As for the cooler, I'm using this on my AM2 FX-62 - and it works like a charm!

okey doke, somewhere i can buy from the UK would be nice next time but i know the cooler.
ahh yes, heard about the barrcuda, isnt there another model too? cant remember what its called now. similar though. also is it worth having two HDD's and making an image/bakcup copy just incase?
also, just for you, budget is about $600-700

Lol - don't worry. I can do simple conversions

Don't know too much about what site you could use to buy from in the UK...

Any Seagate drives I would recommend. I just know the Barracudas are what most people get (I have four!)
If you want to have a backup, there's certainly no harm in getting two of them and creating a Raid 1 setup. I've got four drives setup like this:

|Drive 1 - 320 Gb| + |Drive 2 - 320 Gb| => |Drive 1 - 640 Gb|
|Drive 3 - 320 Gb| + |Drive 4 - 320 Gb| => |Drive 2 - 640 Gb|

Drives 1 and 2 are linked to show up as 1 large drive, and same for 3 and 4. That way I see 1 640 Gb drive, and everything on that is mirrored onto another 2 drives in the same format. Gets you faster read/write times and redundancy in case a HDD ever fails, which is especially useful if you have Maxtor drives

so how does raid work? ive known it mentioned before, but ive only been given very VERY basic explanations.
and id be looking at buying off www.ebuyer.co.uk most probably. though if u find anything on www.autdirect.co.uk for the same price ill get it from there as its round the corner so i wont need to pay postage

RAID is a way to setting up your drives in different configurations.

Here's the Wiki article explaining it, but here's the basics:

RAID 0: Takes multiple hard drives and "links" them together to create one big drive. So, say you have three 320Gb drives. If you don't use RAID, then in Windows, you will see Drive C (which will be where Windows is installed), Drive D and Drive E. If you apply RAID 0, they will show up as one giant Drive C with 960 Gb. It's convenient (for some people) but it's also good because it affords faster read/write times, since the computer is reading the data from all three drives at the same time, meaning it can access data three times as fast. However, you're three times more likely to have a drive failure - which will mean you lose all your data (on ALL drives since it's spread across them.)

RAID 1: For this you need an even number of drives, and all it does is mirror the data from one drive onto another. This means that you always have two copies of each drive (or each set of drives, if you have RAID 0) so that if one fails, not only do you not lose any data, but you can keep using your computer normally. All you have to do is replace the dead drive and it will "rebuild" the setup to how it was previously. Main issue with this setup is that you only get to use half the storage you have free, since half is devoted to a second copy. Great if you're a data-loss freak though!

There are other RAID configurations you can read about in the article, but those are the two basic ones. RAID 0+1 for example, takes, say three hard drives - and makes them look like one big drive - and then mirrors those to three more drives acting as one big drive (so, RAID 1 applied to a RAID 0 setup.)

riiiiiight raid 1 sounds a good idea to me lol. one thing i must say though is i usualy partition my hard drives anyway, so if i used RAID 1 for example, would i then have both drives partitioned? and can anyone else see this thread apart from me and stang? haha. seems nobody else wants to help me out

I believe so. RAID 1 means that both drives are exact duplicates of each other. I'm not familiar with the technicalities of it though.

And what? MY ADVICE ISN'T ENOUGH?!??!

Why do you partition your H/D's? If you went with RAID and tried partitioning them you's just makes things complicated, dunno if you can even do that. If £ is tight then I wouldn't bother with things like RAID, granted H/D's are pretty cheap but it's still £50 that could go somewhere else.

EVO wanted some help with an upgrade (around £500 in the end), it's a bit of a read but it covers a lot of things - http://www.atcteam.org/forum/showthread.php?t=278

There are some other threads there about upgrading as well all AMD, except mine, I jumped ship and went Intel. Prices will have dropped a little since as well.

That's a good point. If you really are on a tight budget, you may as well just get one bigger drive.

important things i need at the moment are:
CASE
PSU
MOTHERBOARD WHICH CAN UTILISE UNLOCKED MULTIPLYERS

and what size/pice do the barracuda drives start at?
Thanks for the info gag but thers a lot of links and this old pc cant cope! cant have msn and two internet windows open at once!

-80 Gb - $40
160 Gb - $50
250 Gb - $65
320 Gb - $85
400 Gb - $100
500 Gb - $120
750 Gb - $175
--1 Tb - $250

Sorry for the $'s, lol.

PSU: Will depend on what you put in it - but look into one of the Corsair ones. Though that may not be a good choice as they are a bit expensive. Good quality though.

CASE - http://www.ebuyer.com/product/127584

PSU could be tricky, I know some people (well, Rogue) who have had problems, need a name brand to make sure you get what is says on the tin, so to speak. You'll need to get all your parts sorted then look at a PSU, what power you need will depend of your graphics card and stuff.

As for the motherboard, I'd google overclocking, AMD and budget and try and find some reviews or something to make sure you get what you need. My Gigabyte (for Intel) is totally rockin for overclocking but I dunno if that crosses over to the AMD's.

Good news?
CPU can be overclocked to 3 GHz easy, and will be faster than that 3 GHz AMD,
Good HDD,
Great ATi GFX card,
£397.52 Delivered.

Bad news?
Intel CPU,
Seagate HDD,
No RAID on the mobo.

Coolermaster Elite 330 Black Case With CM eXtreme Power 460W PSU *SPECIAL OFFER* 135101 139 in stock £42.99 £36.58 £42.99 £36.58
OCZ 2GB Kit (2x1GB) DDR2 800MHz/PC2-6400 CL 4-4-4-15 PLATINUM XTC with LIFETIME WARRANTY 116755 465 in stock £29.99 £25.52 £29.99 £25.52
Optiarc AD-7200S 20X DVD±RW/DL/RAM Internal SATA Bare Black Drive - OEM 139414 791 in stock £16.00 £13.61 £16.00 £13.61
Arctic Cooling AC-FRZ-7P Freezer 7 Pro Socket 775 Processor Cooler 105994 357 in stock £15.34 £13.05 £15.34 £13.05
Seagate ST3250410AS 250GB Hard Drive SATAII 7200rpm 16MB Cache - OEM 131301 2151 in stock £45.21 £38.47 £45.21 £38.47
Intel Pentium Dual Core E2200 Socket 775 2.2GHz 800FSB Retail Boxed Processor 139584 92 in stock £55.39 £47.14 £55.39 £47.14
Gigabyte GA-P31-DS3L iP31 Socket 775 8 channel audio ATX Motherboard 140061 40 in stock £52.61 £44.77 £52.61 £44.77
Power Color HD3870 XT PCS 512MB GDDR4 256bit 800/2400Mhz Dual DVI PCI-E Graphics Card 138550 21 in stock £139.99 £119.14 £139.99

Sorry there are no links. I CBA!

I used eBuyer btw - just copy the QuickFind codes and get your items.

the graphics card....GDDR4?! When did that come out. also, im not goin over to DX10/vista yet if that helps me get more DX9 performence for less?

Also thats the case i was looking at but wasnt sure if it was any good. Same DVD-RW too. least i know i was kinda on the right track

Seems everyone mentions gigabyte for motherboards, they "the" make to get then? always seemed to be put off them for some reason. Also, my pc is from back in 2002, so im guessing all mobo's would support unlcoked multiplyers if i ignored jakg and went the AMd route anyway? :P

If you ignored the mighty Jakg you'd be an idiot :P

I love AMD, but Intel are THE CPU maker atm

Gigabyte aren't the best (IMO - Asus are for me at least), but thats easily the best overclocking board for Intel for under £55.

I've owned one Gigabyte board in my life, and it wasn't too shabby - until i shorted it with a screw. Asus FTW though!!! (although slightly more expensive...)

Jakg is right - although I love AMD, and I HAVE an AMD, if I built a computer right now, it'd be an Intel (they're way ahead atm.)

As for the GFX card - you aren't necessarily paying a premium price for DX10 when you buy an 8800 - you're just paying the price for the current great graphics card, which also happens to support it. It's not even that fantastic of a card for DX10. That's the card to get - regardless of whether or not you'll be using Vista.

Buy a system builders version of vista home premium only £70

well im sticking to AMD lol. i dont care :P only had one pentium n the pc was crap (ok it was a 266mhz pentium 2 but shush lol) the "mighty jakg" drives a moped, who of any respect has a moped?! :P nobody can answer my unclocked multiplyers question? and im guessing you get what you pay for with motherboards? and that grphics card is expensive! ah well. ill see, any sub-£100 options?

you just cant help some people oh well buy the amd crap lol

pentium/intel just makes me think of microsoft and pc world :vomit: id rather buy a slower AMD and have a clean conscience :P
Also, the AMD cpu with the multiplyers increased sits at E6xxx range on most benchmarks, id rather just click the multiplyers up then fiddle with fsb's and voltages. seems "safer" and doesnt make a diffrence to heat and voltage use it seems.
so help me with what i would like rather then what you think i should have i mean it in the nicest way possible. just struggling to find a few bits, i havnt kept up with technology since i built my last pc. Thanks for all the help so far guys

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/139890 any good for an AMD mobo? doesnt seem too bad.maybe im missing something.

Quote from robt :

i havnt kept up with technology since i built my last pc.

Meaning that you don't realize the giant leaps Intel has taken.

Quote :

maybe im missing something.

Yes... the whole part where Intel leapfrogs AMD to become the ultimate CPU... by far. You should REALLY reconsider (this from an AMD fan.)

But I respect your decision. Not too sure about your board there. I highly recommend Asus, but I don't know too much about that board. Reviews seem kind of 'eh.

mmm just a 2.6 gig intel is about £90 and the 3,0 amd is £60. oh i dunno just either want a simple overclock (like the multiplyers) which doesnt affect other parts (higher heat, FSB, voltage) or a faster stock CPU. i really dont want to start fiddling with things that arent point and click. cant change my budget either, isnt my money, loaning from my sister. and i think im gonna be spending £30 of the budget on networking stuff so that she will be happy and give me the money.

But that's the thing, the Intel IS faster stock. My 2.0 Ghz Intel Core2Duo in my laptop is a FAIR BIT FASTER than my 2.8 Ghz AMD FX-62 in my desktop. THAT'S how much better Intel is at the moment.