Need expert advice on building an affordable "Dream machine"

[baatar]

Ok, I've decided to build my "Dream machine".
But this is going to be a Dream PC I can really afford (thus I'm going with Athlon.) It'll be mostly intended for heavy 3-D gaming (can't wait for Max Payne to come out) and video-editing.

However my biggest challenge is choosing the ultimate motherboard. Sould I go for still not mature DDR or for old proven KT133-based one?

If DDR then which chipset to choose? AMD-750 or KT266 (i don't even consider ALi Magic 1)?

And the following requirements must apply:
-ISA slot (for modem)
-RAID controller
-ATA100
-Soft Menu (for overclocking)
-Ability to mount one of those biggest greatest coolers.

Basing on the these conditions can you suggest the best suitable motherboard (in your opinion)?
Concrete name/models are preferred.

Thank you.

[Bovon]

Hi baatar

And welcone to the SySopt forum. You will get loads of advice on just which mainboard is the best, cuz everybody has their favorite.

I just ordered and recieved today, an Iwill KK266, non raid. I wanted the raid board for the IDE headers, but so few have really gotten the KT133A boards working good and reliably in that configuration, so I decided on the non raid and a controller card for my setup.

I studied everything I could find on all of the AMD boards for 5 months before I made my final decision. The Abit K7TA also has one ISA slot, as does the Iwill boards...and that was a consideration for me too...as I have a drawer full of USR/3Com Courier V everything 56K V 90 modems...well, not QUITE a drawer full...but the next time lightning gets my modem, I'll have a spare.

The KK266 is very stable, and I recommend that over the DDR boards for now. The DDR boards are having some problems, and simply have not matured enough yet...the board manufacturers are backing off now on making more of these...
http://www.digitimes.com/NewsShow/Article.asp?IR=N&ClassID=100&datePublish=2001/05/23&pages=01&seq=1

So, if it were I..I think I would be sticking with the good old SDRAM for right now, and the Iwill would be hard to beat.

I ordered mine from http://www.newegg.com/ for $114 (now $110 durn it! ordered mine last friday http://www.sysopt.com/forum/biggrin.gif ) and $5 FedEx shipping. The KK266-R is $125 at the moment, with $5 shipping.

It does have the soft menu, with everything except the 100 to 133 fsb, which is a jumper on the board..no problem at all.

It will handle the big heatsinks, and I have on hand the Swiftech MC 462-A board mount heatsink I ordered from CrazyPC for $55.

Have fun with the dream machine, whichever board you get...but, the need for an ISA slot limits the choice to about 3 or 4 boards.

[Yar1182]

For video editing and gaming you might want to consider the All in wonder Radeon. It is capable of very decent 3D gaming, has some decnt features vor vidio editing and capture. I know people are going to say get a Geforce 3 or upper end Geforce 2, but that $$$. Something to consider.

Definately get DDR. It's very near the same price, and why would you buy old technology.

IDE raid is fast, but also consider storage space if your doing video editing. You'll need lots of hard drive space.

[zskillz]

hahah... now, i just wanted to point out how it's sort of an oxymoron to say

affordable dream machine...

hehe...
*sniff, chuckle*

ok,ok, maybe I'm the only one who thought that was funny

-Z

[Brangwen]

Brother Bovon:

Congrats on your purchase of the Iwill KK266 board. I have run two since March and am very impressed.

baatar:

I agree with Bovon obviously. If you go to www.KDComputers.com (http://www.KDComputers.com) and look at the RMA returns under "specials," you can get this board for $91.00! It comes with a 30-day warranty from KDComputers <u>and</u> the same 2-year warranty from Iwill as a new board. Worth checking out!

Brangwen http://www.sysopt.com/forum/wink.gif

[hallam2003]

I'd like to recommend the MSI motherboards, I've used these a few time, and have friends that have used them numourus times. They are stable and have a good performance in my rating. I haven't used too many other brands, but these are just at good if not better and for a fraction of the cost, might be a though. Most of the MSI boards have someting called LED diagnostic function, it's a serieas of 4 LEDS in the area of the serial ports, visible from the inside only of coarse, these are like a mini on-boar post card, many mobo companies are using these now, on boot-up the LEDS will flash deffernet sequesnces, they provide you with a little sticker that shows what the coades mean, if the computer stops on boot-up, the LEDS will lock at the point where if got messed up, for instance, if the color code was the code the corresponds to the AGP test, then you should re-install your AGP card, or check it or whatever, it's pretty handy, these board are rock-solid, while other board may be a little better, these are much cheaper in most cases. They also have a few differnet options for overclocking, including Fuzzy Logic 3, basically a soft menu type thing, it works too. My board it the "turbo" it mean most of your specs, bt not the RAID, but you can buy the "Turbo-R" which has raid....just make sure you kow it has raid befoer you buy it. you need to look over all the boards at MSI, www.msicomputer.com (http://www.msicomputer.com) , they have a few there, and they also sell a few video cards and cd-roms, but they are a little pricy. anyway, that's my recommendation on that. I know how it is to not be sure about parts, most people here helped me, but i ended up buying parts when i wasn't quite sure if they were what i wanted, don't do this, it makes for a few uneasy nights untill the shipment arrives. I would also recommend that you go for DDR, right now you can pick it up for about the same price, the boards are little more expensive, but why buy last year's technology, you can pick up DDR boards for about 130-150(US), these are retail, and include all the goodies, manuals, printed boxes, warrenties, all the goods, I'd recommend you go with the retail models for stuff that are too expensive for you to replace, unless the price is a lot higher over the OEM versions. I'd actually say that the ISA slot is going to limit you search by quite a bit, only a few boards still have an ISA slot, mine has one, but the new ones don't ussually. I'm guessing you want it for the existing modem, right? if so, I'd recomend you simply replace this with a new PCI version, they can be picked up pretty cheap now. If you can provide an estimated price range, we can all help you a little more, i know for a fact that i did a price quote for a friend only a few days ago, it didn't have DDR, or raid, but it did have some heavy gaming and video stuff, not editing though, and i got the perts for under $650. you didn't ask about it, but I'd like to aslo recommed the elight 7237 case to you, it has 4 5.25 bays, 3 3.5 bays, a 300W PS if you make sure it has one when you order it, good studry constuction, for a very low price. it's pretty widly used, modders use it because they can screw it up, and only lose maybe $60. it's a medium-high quality case, the only low quality thinks are that the top panel is rivited on, and the expasion slots are pop-outs instead on those heavy screw in slots, but hey, you just throw those away anyway, and what do you expect for a $55 case, but this case probably won't do you if your going for a raid set-up. as far as video goes, i do have to recommend the geforce 3, but since that about $370, you won't be able to get it probably, so I'll have to say the higher-end geforce2's they are nice, if you look for long enough, you can find a desent deal on them. i only recommecn this card beecause it's the only type I've had any experience with. I can't speak for the other one's.

a few sites to buy stuff at.
www.crucial.com/webpromo (http://www.crucial.com/webpromo) - 15% off the good stuff, and free 2nd day shipping.
www.mwave.com (http://www.mwave.com) - good prices www.newegg.com (http://www.newegg.com) - good prices, less stock www.axiontech.com (http://www.axiontech.com) - ok place, big stock

e-mail me if you need help or have a question - evanhallam1@hotmail.com - don't worry, i don't have a life, feel free to e-mail me.


Hallam

[desmocat]

Here are the specs on my latest build:
Iwill KA-266R (Raid)
AMD 1.2 Ghz 266 FSB Rev"C"
384 megs Crucial PC2100 DDR ram
4 Seagate 30 gig 7200 ata 100 drives
running raid 0, 2 arrays @55.8 gigs each
1 IBM deskstar 75 30 .7 gig on IDE-0
1 plextor 12/10/32 CD-RW w/burnproof on IDE 1
voodoo 5 5500 video card (AGP)
SMC network card.
A Open full tower case
a bunch 'o fans. http://www.sysopt.com/forum/wink.gif
I just got it going yesterday, haven't had a chance to really play with it, but I didn't encounter any problems with it while getting it going, other than having to download the Win 2000 drivers for the video card.
total price for this rig is about 1500 bucks U.S, but DDR has come down since I bought mine, and the hard drives can be had cheaper too, saw them at Frys for 99 bucks each, I gave 129 for mine a couple of weeks ago.
If you spend wisely, you can build said dream machine and not blow the kids college fund in the process.