Building a New Computer: I have some questions!
 

Ok, I need to upgrade what I have:

P4 2.0, 512 RDRAM, 64 Geforce 420MX.
19" Analog LCD

I'd like to be able to play the Elder Scrolls Oblivion, but I mostly use my computer for burning DVDs, CDs, standard web surfing, data management (SAS, SPSS, Access), and word processing tasks. I have around 700-750 to spend, and I am pretty satisfied with my monitor.

I have a couple of questions:
Should I get a single core? or a dual core?
Specifically, should I go for a Pentium D 820 Dual Core? or a Athlon 64 3700?

I have priced out two systems. I can get this one for around 600 shipped:

Dell Dimension E510 Series
Pentium® D Processor 820 with Dual Core Technology (2.80GHz, 800FSB)
Genuine Windows® XP Media Center 2005 Edition
1GB Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 533MHz (2x512M)
Dell USB Keyboard
19 inch E196FP Analog Flat Panel
128MB PCI Express™ x16 (DVI/VGA/TV-out) ATI Radeon X300 SE (I'd upgrade this)
160GB Serial ATA Hard Drive (7200RPM) w/DataBurst Cache™
13 in 1 Media Card Reader
Dell® 2-button USB mouse
Integrated Intel® PRO 10/100 Ethernet
56K PCI Data Fax Modem
Single Drive: 16X CD/DVD burner (DVD+/-RW) w/double layer write capability
Integrated 7.1 Channel Audio

I would sell the extra monitor for 150 to a friend, but I would need to upgrade the videocard for sure (100-150 bucks). After everything is said and done, this would cost me around 700, after I buy the extra videocard.
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If I were to build my own Athlon system, here is what I could get:

APEX PC-115 Beige Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 350W Power Supply

NEC 16X DVD±R DVD Burner Black IDE/ATAPI Model ND-3550A - OEM

Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 ST3160021A 160GB 7200 RPM IDE Ultra ATA100

CORSAIR ValueSelect 1GB (2 x 512MB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) Unbuffered Dual Channel Kit System Memory Model VS1GBKIT400 -

Thermaltake TR2 W0070 ATX 430W Power Supply - Retail

AMD Athlon 64 3700+ San Diego 1GHz HT Socket 939 Processor Model

XFX PVT42EUDE3 Geforce 6800 XTreme 256MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16

$630 shipped, and I'd need a good logic board (I assumed this is around 100 bucks) = 730 shipped

From what I see, I can get a pretty nice and fast Pentium D 2.8 system for a pretty sweet price, or should I just build my own?
Basically, am I getting good bang for my buck?

My input:

Don't get Windows Media Center Edition. It blows, and probably will cause issues with just about every game you have -- including Oblivion.

You've got two power supplies -- find a case that doesn't provide a PS, because 350 is way too small for your system.

You've got the LCD, the dell box comes with a shitty video card.. and you'd end up putting $300 in.. making it $900.. far more than what you built yourself.

Double triple quadruple check your parts and I'd build it yourself.

Build it yourself, and go with AMD.

I agree.

Or if you are not comfortable with putting it together yourself, get a computer shop to do it for you.

Build it yourself, but go with a different hard drive, Seagate is a good brand, but go with a 7200.8 or 7200.9. And get a SATA drive as well. The speed difference is noticeable and will certainly help you with load times for the games. The page is not in English, but tech talk is universal, check out the differences between the speeds of the 7200.7 and 7200.9 is evident:
http://www.sumanet.cz/modules.php?na...article&sid=71

As for mother board, ASUS is a great brand, Gigabyte and MSI as well. Personally I love ASUS, but I have knowledgably friends who swear by there MSI boards. I just built 2 systems based off of the ASUS A8N-VM board. It’s a good board with enough options. 1 PCI Express x16, 2 SATA, 10/100 LAN (not gigabit), on board video and audio, I would recommend disabling the on board video since you will have a real nice video card in it. Check it out it’s a good price.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131571

Thanks for the advice! I appreciate it.
Does anyone have an opinions as to whether I should go dual core? or single core? It seems like dual core is good for multitasking, while single core is better for gaming. Am I correct?
Is the Geforce 6800 a good enough videocard to do what I want to?
I'd like to be able to watch satellite signal through my monitor, I know there are TV tuners out there, but I've heard mixed reviews of their performance. Any suggestions?

Thank you in advance!

Thanks!

I've never heard "dual core is good for multitasking, while single core is better for gaming" - AFAIK there are exceptionally few instances where dual core would flat out underperform in respect to single core.

IDK what the price difference is. ATM I doubt there is much that takes full advantage of dual-core, but if the price difference is not much then go dual core and just hope solid software comes out in the future.

I would go with a different model of GeForce 6800, like the 6800 Ultra.

Aye. What is true is that the same money buys a better (clock speed, cache) single-core processor. Games don't generally benefit from the second core so the money may be better spent on the faster single-core.

Otherwise, I'm leaving you in good hands while I go enjoy some beverages. :thumbsup:

single core would do you the best for gaming, games (with few exceptions) only run on one core, this does leave the other core open for the OS and everything else, but the single core, even with out the rest of the overhead will not outperform a similarly priced single core. Dual core is useful when you need (or want to) run several, intensive applications at the same time, such as a game, and encoding a movie. If you plan to just play a game, and not do anything else, a single core would be best.

As for the video card, you probably want to go with something a bit more powerful, I have not shopped for a video card in a while, hopefully some one who has done some research lately can help you out. Other wise I’ll take a look for you in the next few days.

As for the video cards I have bought and there makers

LeadTek geforce 3 ti200, good performance, crappy design, the heat sink does not actually touch the chip, they slop 3 mm of thermal grease to bridge the gap. I hope they have learned from there mistakes and make better products by now.

Sapphire Radeon 9800 pro, great card, well made, slight issue with one of the heat sinks on the memory, but it was a manufacturing defect, not anyone’s fault, great card.

eVGA 6800 ultra, good design, great performance, but the cooling was very noisy, I replaced the heat sinks and it’s virtually silent now.

I am very happy with my eVGA card, they make solid products, if anyone else can recommend brands that they have used and had great results please do.

Also if you have the money, go with 2 gigs of RAM, at 2 gigs, you have enough to rid your self of the page file, which will increase your speeds for just about everything.

Well no one else wrote back about a video card, so here is my advice:

I’d go with a 7800 GT, 6800 GS or Ultra, if you really have the money there are more expensive and better cards out there, but these will run you about 200, the one you have listed is the low end of the 6800’s, it only has 8 pixel pipelines, which will hamper you when playing games at high resolutions.

Ditch Intel, AMD all the way. For that matter, ditch Dell, build one yourself, as suggested by others. The hardest part is probably seating the heatsink on the CPU, after you (don't over) apply thermal paste that is.

i would say build your own with the AMD. i have been playing oblivion all week and i have a amd 3700+ 2gig of cheap corsair ram and a 7800gt and the game runs flawlessly with all the highest settings. I do suggest you get at least 1gig of ram the cheapest stuff you can get your paws on thats still a reliable brand unless you want to overclock you really dont need fancy ram. you wont need dual core most stuff isnt set up to take advantage of dual core cpus yet so i would wait a year or so before being worried about that. you will need at least a 400 watt power source. Depending on how tight your budget is i would suggest a asus motherboard they are right around $90 for a decent one or gigabyte for about $60. get a SATA hard drive and a motherboard that can handle it too its a nice speed boost over the ata. i have a ATA and a SATA in my computer ata being a old hard drive from my last computer and i can tell the diffrence real easy between the two.

If you do end up building your own i suggest checking out newegg.com great site to buy stuff from. good parts cheap and very fast shipping. tons of choices of what to get as well. Alot of people swear by tigerdirect but i was just recently screwed over by them so i wouldnt suggest it to anyone. Horrable customer service there.

Thanks for everyone's help. Here is what I ended up getting:

AMD 3500+ (165 Shipped)
2 gig Corsair Value Select RAM (132 shipped)
ASUS A8n5x Motherboard (80 shipped)
Antec Sonata II Case with 450 watt power supply (75 shipped)
ATI x850xt Video card (160 shipped)
NEC 3550 DVD Burner (38 shipped)

I have a hard drive that I'll use for the time being, but I'll eventually upgrade to a SATA drive. I'll wait for the day after thanksgiving sales.

Now, to put this thing together................

Alright, its all together and running! Oblivion plays great. This is definitely the way to go. I got a lot more satisfaction by building this myself rather than buying one prebuilt. Thanks for everyone's help.

your welcome, have fun with oblivion, i love it.

always more fun to build your own =) and oblivion is pretty nifty

And that NEC dvd burner is kickass and very easy to make region free if you ever have a need for that. http://liggydee.cdfreaks.com/page/ for info about that.