Build MY Computer

[grindspoon]

Hey i have $1200 dollors to buld my own computer with. and $300 to buy a monitor with...i dont know much about what is good and what is not so i figured i would ask you the best..I ask two thing though..if possable i want a flatsceen monitor and everything to be linux compatable(dont forget about a modem) The price is not completely set in stone but i still want the total cost to be around there....So there yah go..Build me the best performing computer i can get with that amount of money...thx in advance..

[grindspoon]

also a few more things..i dont want the hd to be over 20 megs..i wont need any more that that..also i will probly be using the system for mainly 2d+3d graphics and animations..sometimes i may play q3 arena or team fortress but thats it..

[neodave]

Here's my 2 cents:
I'd go with a 1 or 1.2gig AMD Thunderbird, they've become very reasonably priced lately. I have the IWILL KK266 motherboard and love it. ABIT makes a very good motherboard, as does EPOX which you'll find a little cheaper priced. I also love my Soundblaster Live sound card. Can't hardly go wrong with a good Soundblaster card. As for video, you'd be better off getting the advice of a gamer. I went with a cheap AOpen AGP card, as I'm not much into games. In my opinion Enlight 7237 and Antec are the best cases for the money. As for the Hard Drive I prefer IBM. 15 and 20 gigs are priced fairly reasonable.
Happy Shopping!!!!!!
Dave

[This message has been edited by neodave (edited 07-18-2001).]

[kareem]

Well,
for monitor, choose either NEC, Viewsonic, or Sony, flatscreen only, >17" in size more like 20", <.27dpi. my choice would be NEC since they last forever.

I prefer Asus motherboards, you'll probably use an AMD Athlon of at least 750MHz or you should.
Hard drive: at least 20 Gig is fine, it will or should be at least a 7200 rpm but check the seek time. For E-IDE's 8.5 ms is fine.

Sound card, Soundblaster live 5.1 is a great card.
Graphics: oh my, there's a bunch. I'm not sure which would be great for gaming. It should be a GeForce card. I like Elsa's line since I do gaming.

Memory: I've heard that the pc133 sdram has been unstable and experiencing its behavior, I would tend to agree. The new ddr ram is sounding very promising though. Have at least 128MHz, more like 256 or so.

OS: Windows 2000 Professional, I wouldn't go any other way. You will have to pay extra attention to the bottom of a game's box as it will show you whether or not it can be played on that OS.

I think with that money, you're starting with, you have room to increase that processor to maybe 1.2GHz and add more memory.

------------
any of those monitors I suggested will run you around $200 - $300 for 17" still, you can find them at $170, but you'll need to check the computer currents mag.
-----
sorry, I assumed you meant 20 Gig instead of 20 megs. The other post was correct about finding a motherboard that can support such a small hard drive. I'll be surprised if you find one.

[This message has been edited by kareem (edited 07-20-2001).]

[voogru]

i dont want the hd to be over 20 megs

I dont think they have mobos that support 20MB hard drives. you sure you wont need any more than that? windows is 250MB i dont think you could run windows http://www.sysopt.com/forum/frown.gif

Im just messing with ya http://www.sysopt.com/forum/wink.gif

i agree with neodave

-voogru

[grindspoon]

hahaha yeah..20gigs..heh..and as for the graphics card i'm thinking about going with the kyro 2..but i dunno...i heard its eats gforce mxs...imput? also to the guy who suggested the sony flatscreen...you have any prices on it? its sounds great..

[SprFletch]

I generally agree with the data already posted. My additional reccomendation is to go with the AMD 761 chipset (if you want DDR) for stability and performance, though it's overclock features are poor. Everything else has been great advice. About 3D gaming cards, check out an article on www.extremetech.com (http://www.extremetech.com) under "3d graphics and gaming" called "3D chips by the Numbers." It compares 13 different chipsets (not specific cards) on 3 different platforms (Athlon, P4, & PIII). It ranks everything from the Kyro 2 to the GeForce 3 to the Voodoo 5, and even back to the TNT2 for comparison purposes. It also benchmarks them on 3D content creation, and not just gaming. Good Luck!

[Rhino302]

Don't sell yourself short on 20 gigs though. If you had to buy another 20 gigger in the future, you'll save yourself a lot of money now by gettin a 30 or 40. You'll find stuff to put on it. I thought I'd never fill up my 15, so I got a 30, and now I have about 18 gigs on it....And I don't even have all my games installed.

[hallam2003]

you ahve quite a bit of money here to work with, i think you should rememer that yuou can upgrade parts now for next to nothing, but once you buy them, its too late. IE, you can get a 30GB HD for maybe $15-20 more, you can get a better graphics card for only a little more. lost of stuff can be upgraded. I build pretty nice gaming/performance systems. I don't spend much money on them at all, though my focus is on speed, video, and audio, not really on having the highest quality case, NIC, modem, or perifials, though i won't buy the cheap stuff most of the time. I do recommmd the enlight 7237 case, it's about the best case you can get for under $50, it's nice and sturdy, and cheap all at the same time. here is a current system. this one is on budget, so the modem, NIC and some other stuff is kinda crappy, and it has a crappy 3 pcs speaker set, and onboard audio, the buyer plans to upgrade this using birthday money a few months after it's built, anyway:

12xDVD
56K modem
crappy NIC
MSI k7t266 PRO
floppy
30.6 GB HD
Logitech internet keyboard/optical mouse
crappy speakers w/ sub
1.2Ghx, 266Mhjz fsb, OEM proc
crappy case
MSI geforce 2 PRO, 64MB DDR
19 in 1600x1200 75HZ Monitor
crucial 256MB PC2100 RAM
some extra cooling stuff, including ASII

this all comes to just about $1000 even, so...your going to get a nice system i think


Hallam