On buying a system

[jormar23]

Here's the deal, I want to buy a computer kit from pricewatch, and I want to put my own video and sound card in the computer, however I noticed all of them have on board sound and video cards, is there any way I can disable them so I can use whatever video and sound card that I want. Will this affect what kind of cards I can buy. I really don't want to deal with alot of conflicts between cards. thanks for the help Chris

[Spanky]

I think you will find alot of that on pricewatch, alot of the cheap motherboards come with onboard sound and vid because they are ment for budget systems. Its sounds like thats not what you want, so you should get a good motherboard that doesn't have either, specially if your never going to use them.

Rather then buying the lowest priced item on pricewatch find one or 2 companies that you here good things about but still has nice prices and work with them.

Pricewatch is more of a place to look for the cheapest prices on a certain item, not really building a computer, as far as i'm concerned.

[eagle1]

I agree with dave there.!! With $500 you should get a pretty decent motherboard with 256RAM and a good thunderbird cpu.! And you would still have some money to buy a Sound Blaster Live (value.!/!) and a good video card (be it geforce, Radeon or the new Kyro.,!!).!

Reccommeded sites:

http://www.mwave.com
http://www.newegg.com

[daveleau]

You can disable both, but typically when a system has all of the stuff onboard, there is less expansion. I would agree that you might be happier with a little more of a motherboard.

Please be sure to use resellerratings.com to check on the pricewatch vendors.

Dave

[jormar23]

I really don't want to spend that much, I paid way to much for the one I have now. I am looking to put about $500.00 in a system. I want a amd t-bird. I will buy video card and sound card later. what's a good motherboard, there are so many to chose from I really don't know to much about it. I really don't want to spend days and days trying to figure out what a good one would be. I will not be overclocking it. any ideas? thanks Chris

[daveleau]

The Epox boards are great little inexpensive boards. I would look into them. In buying a system, the LAST thing you want to skimp on is the motherboard. I cannot refer you to a cheap one because regardless of brand, a super cheap one will not make you happy as it will be unstable (non-overclocked). I would stick with the major players and the major chipsets and skimp elsewhere or save your money til you have a little more. Buy a little slower processor, or get a smaller hard drive...anything but skimping on a mobo.

[jormar23]

okay I have another question for you, when buying a motherboard, is it better to go with the 200 or the 266 bus, I want a motherboard that will last for a while saying a new cpu comes out I would like just to pop that one in. are there any out there that has the future in mind? whats the difference, and also when buying a video card what does ddr, vivo stand for and also what is the difference between a geforce 256 and geforce 2. sorry about all the questions guys, I really do appreciate it. thanks Chris