wedding bell blues

[GRCRAIG]

Hello
I have to wait until I,m married on july 17 1999 to build my own computer.I just purchased a 300a SL2WM MALASIA cpu for $150.
knowing that I can o/c to 450 later.What I need is some quality advice on the other components to put into my home built computer
IE. best video card,best h.d,cd rom /dvd ?
best m.b(abit bh6 ?)best ram(toshiba ?)and
anything else you guys might be able to help
me with.... this will be my first attempt at
building a computer,but with this forum and
my own abilities I know I will end up with a
system that will out preform something I could buy a the local computer store..

ps. currently using a 486 dx33 that I have
torn apart many times becuase of technical
problems.

thank you.

[Bleeding Edge]

Congratulations on your upcoming life.

You'll probably be offered many good suggestions for the hardware. So, I'll only point out a few considerations.

Since there is still time to make these purchases, try to delay it until your actually ready to assemble. This way you will get the best prices and latest offerings because of the constant price drops and new-tech releases.

For the motherboard, you will want it to support the UDMA/66 for the hard-drive; 4X AGP for the videocard; and 133Mhz memory. The other considerations here would be support for Rambus memory, if it's available at the time of purchase.

This of course means; the hard-drive, videocard and the memory module are all as referenced above.

Use this site as one source of reviews for the hardware recommendations that follow.
www.reviewbooth.com/pr_review_search2.htm (http://www.reviewbooth.com/pr_review_search2.htm)



[This message has been edited by Bleeding Edge (edited 04-24-99).]

[Bleeding Edge]

Grcraig,
People here are usually thrilled to give their suggestions on quality components. They're well informed to recent developments and with the products they use themselves. This post may be overlooked due to it's title. Although, I found it catching. Lets see if we can guide some folks over. So hang on.
If not do a copy&paste and repost it under a different title.

This reply will temporarily move this thread up the listings. Most of us who reply are good people, as well as the the site itself.



[This message has been edited by Bleeding Edge (edited 04-26-99).]

[CMonster]

www.sysopt.com (http://www.sysopt.com) You'll not have to go far for some great suggestions on hardware. There are always good ideas here.

My suggestions are much more modest than Bleeding Edge's, in the here and now and for the sake of economy: -

# it's true, life begins at 400+ mhz

# 128MB minimum memory

# RIVA TNT - a great single card solution

# Ensoniq Audio PCI - great sound and good compatibility at a very good price

#DRIVES : *I have about $5500 worth of computer stuff (now worth about $1500), including 5 medium-to-hot PCs, and I have used IDE/Ultra ATA drives exclusively - and if there is one thing I would change that would be it.
If possible get SCSI on the motherboard or a good SCSI adapter- I know the ultra ATA are okay, but if you go SCSI you can have more devices and much better drives/CDROM/ CDR.

** Plextor makes an excelent CDROM and CDR, friends who have these drives give great reviews (If I had paid as much as they did I would love them too) http://www.sysopt.com/forum/smile.gif!



I wonder where it all will end - will graphics get as good as a sunset sky and the human eye? Will the computer get up and dance with me...

I am satisfied for now that what I have is sufficient to the task, but faster disk speed and more memory would be the only things I might upgrade for - anything else would be primarily to satisfy my ego- ha!



[This message has been edited by CMonster (edited 04-25-99).]

[JimmyCW]

Something to look at is the "What you got" thread now current on this board. Print it out, get a highlighter and see what are the most common peice others are using. Look at the prices of the units, and when you have read about these and priced them them come back here and post a note asking people's impressions of your selections. You will be better informed than just asking what is good, and it will give you better answers.

my two cents......a little more work on your part. See what you think.

[augidog]

thank you, JimmyCW, for that un-solicited plug.

GRCRAIG-congrats on your pending nuptials. i have printed out "OK, watcha got?" and it is a goldmine of 'recommendations', including a few different mobo's people are using with your particular CPU.

augidog

[Ed_S]

Congrats. Hopefully you'll have something better to do than computing...

Seriously, there's no way to give good advise this far in advance, three months from now the whole picture may have changed! I'll bet I'm not the only one who bought a part for a future upgrade that never happened because things changed. What's "new & hot" now will be old hat by late July

Best I can advise: wait, keep reading here & elsewhere, ask questions & learn what works & what doesn't. About a week before purchasing, post well-worded topic & you'll get an overload of advise.

On the other hand, on a gift list a video card would beat a toaster hands-down!
Does CompUSA have a wedding registry...

[GRCRAIG]

Thank you gentleman for your reply,s to my
Questions. I think I,ll take the advice of
waiting untill I,m ready to build the machine
before asking these questions.

[cobain1crt]

First, congrats on the wedding, second, I am not going to sugjest a model, company, etc..., but I will say a few things: first, if you do not yet have a case, get a full ATX tower case with 4+ internal 3.5 bays, 3+ external 5.25 bays, and with one or two external 3.5 bays. You want to have room for 3 or 4 case fans without modifications. You also must have a 250 Watt p/s. When you get the parts, I will gladly give you any help you need, I will even put the computer together for the price of shipping. Also, get at least 1 10gb hard drive, but there are now some realy good, and cheap 17.2 gig drives, I have seen them at $300 retail. Last, I sugjest getting Atlas ram, I said I would not do this, but they qare the best, by far. They cost a bit more, but are guaranteed on everything, are fast (6ns and lower on some models).

[cobain1crt]

First, congrats on the wedding, second, I am not going to sugjest a model, company, etc..., but I will say a few things: first, if you do not yet have a case, get a full ATX tower case with 4+ internal 3.5 bays, 3+ external 5.25 bays, and with one or two external 3.5 bays. You want to have room for 3 or 4 case fans without modifications. You also must have a 250 Watt p/s. When you get the parts, I will gladly give you any help you need, I will even put the computer together for the price of shipping. Also, get at least 1 10gb hard drive, but there are now some realy good, and cheap 17.2 gig drives, I have seen them at $300 retail. Last, I sugjest getting Atlas ram, I said I would not do this, but they qare the best, by far. They cost a bit more, but are guaranteed on everything, are fast (6ns and lower on some models). You will find a lot of new stuff now that you are moving up this much! 33 to 450+! Remember in the case that it must be ATX, I learned this the hard way when upgrading from my 486/40 to my p-2.