Hey guys building new computer and need some help!

[chaman5g]

<p>Hey guys, lets just sat the computer market has gotten too complicated to follow . I built my first computer in college nearly 5 years ago it was an AMD 1800Xp and has lasted me til now. Now its just time to upgrade I think the prices of the 64 are in my range. lol

<p> Basically I am going with:

<p>Athlon 64 x2 4200 Dual Core ($355)I have heard the difference between the 4400 and 4200 is neglible and not worth the 100 extra. Is that true

<p>Nforce 4 ultra motherboard ($96) i have no clue about sockets and motherboards but my online reasearch has led me to this.

<p>Memory I have no clue about so please help me out. I know to go corsair

<p>Ati Radeon 9800XT 256mb 8xagp ($170) (is ati better then nvidia?)
( i only play warcraft frozen throne and occasionaly cs I know this is overkill but u never know i may need it in the future)

<p>What kind of power supply will i need? how many watts? last one i bought was an Antec are they still good>?

<p>Now the hard drives i have now are pretty outdated. They are the maxtor daimondbacks I believe? What would u guys recommend.

<p>My budget is from 900-1500 i jsut need another compo that will last me 3 years. The cheaper the better.

<p>another question: are ad-aware and spybot still the best prgorams used against spyware now?

<p>Any help is greatly appreciated. Oh and what cases are good for keeping my system cool. Do u guys think its worht it to invest in cpu fans and hard drvie fans? I am defeintelly looking for quiet machine my last one was way to loud! lol. Well guys i hope u can help me out and thanks again. [/b]

 

[shadowduck]

<p>Hey guys, lets just sat the computer market has gotten too complicated to follow . I built my first computer in college nearly 5 years ago it was an AMD 1800Xp and has lasted me til now. Now its just time to upgrade I think the prices of the 64 are in my range. lol

<p> Basically I am going with:

<p>Athlon 64 x2 4200 Dual Core ($355)I have heard the difference between the 4400 and 4200 is neglible and not worth the 100 extra. Is that true

<p>Nforce 4 ultra motherboard ($96) i have no clue about sockets and motherboards but my online reasearch has led me to this.

<p>Memory I have no clue about so please help me out. I know to go corsair

<p>Ati Radeon 9800XT 256mb 8xagp ($170) (is ati better then nvidia?)
( i only play warcraft frozen throne and occasionaly cs I know this is overkill but u never know i may need it in the future)

<p>What kind of power supply will i need? how many watts? last one i bought was an Antec are they still good>?

<p>Now the hard drives i have now are pretty outdated. They are the maxtor daimondbacks I believe? What would u guys recommend.

<p>My budget is from 900-1500 i jsut need another compo that will last me 3 years. The cheaper the better.

<p>another question: are ad-aware and spybot still the best prgorams used against spyware now?

<p>Any help is greatly appreciated. Oh and what cases are good for keeping my system cool. Do u guys think its worht it to invest in cpu fans and hard drvie fans? I am defeintelly looking for quiet machine my last one was way to loud! lol. Well guys i hope u can help me out and thanks again. [/b]

1) That is true, the 4200+ is fine, but the Opteron 165 is better at $325 with the cache of the 4400. It will easily overclock to 4400 levels.

2) Asus A8N-E for the motherbard ($92 at newegg)

3) 2GB (2x 1GB) DDR-400(3200) Corsair XMS or OCZ Gold DIMMs

4) Depends on the card, at the very high end ATI does have the edge. That card is fine for the games you play now. If you can afford it spring for a 7900GT (~$300)

5) Get the Antec Truepower II 550W- highly recommended.. around $95

6) SATA II (3.0gb/s) 250GB range w/ 16MB cache.. Seagate or WD.. around $100

7) Yes (spyware question)

8) Antec P1800 with this case not really. Stock cooler is fine.

 

[Aids]

Yeah i would defenatly go with the opty as far as that goes. Socket 939 is what you are looking for. The Asus A8N-E is an excellent motherboard choice with SATA 2 which is hella fast. Ati and Nvidia are hard to compare which one is better but i would suggest either an x1800xt for around 289 or a 7900 gt for around 310. The only problem with the 7900 gt is no memory coolers but thats not hard to fix . Antec PSU's are known to be very stable and have excellent rails so go Antec. As far as cpu cooling i would go with a Thermaltake Big typhoon, it really quiet and very very effective for overclocking and keeping things chilly.

Edit: I noticed that you wanted to get an AGP mobo and if you dont take our advice with the other stuff at least save yourself and get a PCI-Express motherboard. Its futureproof unlike the nearly extinct AGP.

 

[mdd1963]

"<p>Nforce 4 ultra motherboard ($96) i have no clue about sockets and motherboards but my online reasearch has led me to this.

<p>Memory I have no clue about so please help me out. I know to go corsair

<p>Ati Radeon 9800XT 256mb 8xagp ($170) (is ati better then nvidia?)
( i only play warcraft frozen throne and occasionaly cs I know this is overkill but u never know i may need it in the future)
"

There are no NF4 boards with AGP slots, so be sure you get a PCI-e video card, vice the AGP model you have indicated...

(If 3d gaming, look hard at at least a 7600GT, and better yet, a 7900GT!)

There are numerous dual channel 184 pin DDR400/PC3200 sets (2 ea. 1gb modules), or if planning on overclocking your cpu and/or memory bus, you can find some PC3700/pc4000 for extra, but Corsair makes decent value RAM sets that are fine up to ~220 MHz FSB before needing to alter mem ratios or timings...

 

[sandmannight]

If your budget is 1500 and you already have a monitor go for the 7900 gt. Great for gaming and you want to run Vista dont you. I am not saying that that other one wont though. Listen to the guy below you. Go for the opty 165 and overclock it to 4200 or even 4400 and 4800 and yes you can get it to FX 60 with good cooling. You can find guides on how to overclock it on the internet. If you get that video card you have now you dont need a big power supply but if you get the 7900 gt I would get a 500 watt PS.