Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - I'm upgrading my computer and I would like some opinions...

KnifeMissile · 10-17-2004, 04:22 PM

I, too, am upgrading my system... by buying an entirely new one! I have no real budget, since I have a full time job, but I have very particular needs (actually, I'm just picky). I'm buying all my parts from Canada Computers since they seem to have good prices and a store is just down the street from me. So, this is what I plan to get:

Asus P5AD2 Deluxe motherboard, for Intel 925X chipset (socket LGA775) - $311.00
Coarsair 512MB RAM, 533MHz DDR2 240pins - 2x $188.00
Sapphire Radeon X300SE graphics card - $89.00
Intel P4-HT 3.0GHz CPU, 1MB L2 cache, 800Mhz FSB (socket LGA775) - $247.00
WD CaviarSE HD, 200GB S-ATA - $144.00
Pioneer DVR 108, 16x DVD+/- RW Dual - $113.00
Antec P160 aluminum enclosure - $155.00
Thermaltake Silent PurePower PSU, 480W - $99.00
Creative Labs I-Trigue 2.1 speaker system - $99.00

Which comes to a grand total of $1633 CAD, not including tax. Dell can put something similar together for less money except that they will force me to buy a load of crappy software that I don't want.

I'm not really comfortable spending that much on a case and power supply but I can't find anything that's both nice and inexpensive. In particular, it would be nice if I could find a case like the Antec P160 without it having to be aluminum, a feature that doesn't much concern me. What concerns me is that my enclosure is more expensive than my video card!
I also wanted one of those fancy PSUs that display exactly how much power is being used but my store doesn't seem to sell one. Also, I have this fear that it will pretty much read the same amount of power regardless of what my computer is doing--which would be good to know but kind of embarrassing. Perhaps there's a generic device I can get to do this? It would be nice to include my monitor's power usage too!

Anyway, any advice? All comments are welcome!
Thanks...

10-17-2004, 04:22 PM	#1 (permalink)
KnifeMissile Location: Waterloo, Ontario	I'm upgrading my computer and I would like some opinions... I, too, am upgrading my system... by buying an entirely new one! I have no real budget, since I have a full time job, but I have very particular needs (actually, I'm just picky). I'm buying all my parts from Canada Computers since they seem to have good prices and a store is just down the street from me. So, this is what I plan to get: Asus P5AD2 Deluxe motherboard, for Intel 925X chipset (socket LGA775) - $311.00 Coarsair 512MB RAM, 533MHz DDR2 240pins - 2x $188.00 Sapphire Radeon X300SE graphics card - $89.00 Intel P4-HT 3.0GHz CPU, 1MB L2 cache, 800Mhz FSB (socket LGA775) - $247.00 WD CaviarSE HD, 200GB S-ATA - $144.00 Pioneer DVR 108, 16x DVD+/- RW Dual - $113.00 Antec P160 aluminum enclosure - $155.00 Thermaltake Silent PurePower PSU, 480W - $99.00 Creative Labs I-Trigue 2.1 speaker system - $99.00 Which comes to a grand total of $1633 CAD, not including tax. Dell can put something similar together for less money except that they will force me to buy a load of crappy software that I don't want. I'm not really comfortable spending that much on a case and power supply but I can't find anything that's both nice and inexpensive. In particular, it would be nice if I could find a case like the Antec P160 without it having to be aluminum, a feature that doesn't much concern me. What concerns me is that my enclosure is more expensive than my video card! I also wanted one of those fancy PSUs that display exactly how much power is being used but my store doesn't seem to sell one. Also, I have this fear that it will pretty much read the same amount of power regardless of what my computer is doing--which would be good to know but kind of embarrassing. Perhaps there's a generic device I can get to do this? It would be nice to include my monitor's power usage too! Anyway, any advice? All comments are welcome! Thanks... Last edited by KnifeMissile; 10-17-2004 at 08:28 PM..