Building a new system, looking for advice please

[mackstar]

I've just purchased a cool new Enermax case with a 350WT power supply, and I'm itching to buy some parts to fill it out. My current system is a AMD T-bird 900mhz, which I have been extremely satisfied with and has given me few problems. I also have an older 400mhz PII which has also been an excellent system and I've had no complaints with. But I'd like to upgrade to play some of the newer games with more speed, and just because building computers is a fun hobby.

I've been reading some of the articles here and it looks like Intel is the best, and the Intel P4 478 2.26 533 FSB caught my eye. However it's $185, not counting the motherboard and appropriate type of RAM. It would make a really sweet system if you had all the appropriate parts, I think. I'm also not sure if my 350WT power supply would be sufficient for this CPU.

The same vendor I got the $185 quote from also has the Athlon XP 2400+ at $199, but that's only a 266 mhz bus, correct? Again I haven't looked into the power requirements for this either.

So basically I was just wondering if anyone could give me some advice on a good CPU/mobo combo that would work with the 350WT power supply and cost around $300. I'm open to either AMD or Intel as I've had great sucess with both chipsets, but leaning towards Intel a bit more at this point based on the articles I've read here.

Also I'd be interested in a motherboard with built in sound and LAN support, I think that's a cool idea and less things to fiddle with. I'm also planning on getting a GeForce 4 128MB card, and a 120GB HD and that's probably it for expansions. Not sure on what type of RAM yet but at least 512MB. I'd like to keep the system simple and clean, so again would the 350WT power supply be able to meet my needs?

Thanks for any advice/replies.

 

[MeTaLrOcKeR]

My Recomendation to you......

Epox 8K5A+ Motherboard and AMD Athlon XP 2400+ if you cna get it from your vendor.....

Get 512MB PC-2700 DDR Ram....ur set....and YES ur PSU is enough for AMD or Intel.....

<A HREF="http://www.anandtech.com/mysystemrig.html?id=13597" target="_new">-MeTaL RoCkEr</A>

 

[mackstar]

Thanks for the replies. Another question: does RDRAM give an advantage over DDR?

 

[coolcat]

It depends: PC 1066 has an advantage on P4 sytems (I think it can't be used with AMD at all can it?); but PC800 doesn't really hold up much against DDR 400

Are you talkin' to me?
That means you know martian

 

[MeTaLrOcKeR]

Yep...ONLY of P4 systems.....but its also quite expensive....in comparison to DDR Anyways....

<A HREF="http://www.anandtech.com/mysystemrig.html?id=13597" target="_new">-MeTaL RoCkEr</A>

 

[spud]

Ya i paided near 200 bucks a stick 256mb for my samsung 1066 32bit stuff at that.

-Jeremy

<font color=blue>Just some advice from your friendly neighborhood blue man </font color=blue> <P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by spud on 10/19/02 05:01 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[spud]

<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by spud on 10/19/02 05:01 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[Crashman]

The P4 2.4 is about the same price (actually a little cheaper for the lowest prices) than an XP2400+. DDR board prices are about the same for both, etc. Performance is nearly identicle. And SiS makes good chipsets for both, while Intel makes good chipsets for the P4


<font color=blue>You're posting in a forum with class. It may be third class, but it's still class!</font color=blue>

 

[mackstar]

Cool thanks a lot for all the replies. I looked around at a bunch of different options but think I've settled on the Athlon XP 2200+, an Asus A7V8X KT400 (has build in LAN and sound, and support for PC3200 memory), and finally a 512 stick of Samsung PC3200. That should be pretty good all for around $350. =)

 

[Crashman]

I'd go with the MSI 745 Ultra if I were building an AMD system right now.

<font color=blue>You're posting in a forum with class. It may be third class, but it's still class!</font color=blue>