Hey there,

Went to newegg today and picked out my new system. I havent built a computer in like 5 years but I am gunna give it a shot. I am not a hardware expert, but from my own experiences, this seemed like a good system. Please let me know what you think, and if you have heard of compatibility issues between these components. I will be doing video editing, video encoding, dvd burning, web type graphix work and misc day to day operations. Some games, but nothing spectacular. The p4 640 is a new processor, i got this one becuase of the extra cache, but I have yet to hear about performance increases becuase it is so new.

ASUS "P5GD2 Deluxe" 915P Chipset Motherboard For Intel LGA 775 CPU -RETAIL

Intel LGA 775 Pentium 4 640 3.2GHz 800MHz FSB, 2MB L2 Cache Processor w/ Hyper Threading Technology - Retail

Aspire X-Dreamer II(Black) ATX Mid-Tower Case with 350W Power Supply, With Window, Model "ATXB4KLW-BK/350"

NEC 16X Double Layer DVD±RW Drive, Black, Model ND-3520A BK, OEM

Thermaltake Silent 775 CPU Cooler With Heatpipe Coling Tech for Intel LGA775 Prescott, Model "CL-P0092" -RETAIL

Western Digital Raptor 74GB 10,000RPM SATA Hard Drive, Model WD740GD, OEM Drive Only

Maxtor 200GB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive, Model 6B200M0, OEM Drive Only

CORSAIR VALUESELECT Kit 240-Pin 1GB(2 x 512MB) DDR2 PC2-4200, Model VS1GBKIT533D2 - Retail

ABIT ATI RADEON X600 XT Video Card, 128MB DDR, 128-Bit, DVI/TV-Out, PCI Express, Model "RX600 XT-PCIE" - Retail

ACER AL1912b 19" Black LCD Monitor - Retail

the total cost after shipping was unter $1600
Heavy sound is not needed, and this mobo has integrated wifi. Am I missing anything else?


thanks a lot for your opinions!

Only two comments (I think)-

1) Ditch the Raptor drive. Go with a mobo that supports NCQ SATA (native command queueing) and a drive to match. Or two fo them. Maxtor has the least expensive SATA-II drives, but you might want to spend the extra money to get Seagate drives with the 5 year warranty. The Raptor drive is about the same speed as a SATA-II drive, but for the same money, you get 3+ times as much room (as in a 250 GB drive).

2) I might go for a slightly faster memory. Nothing wrong with the brand chosen, but you're planning a very quick processor and then throw in slower RAM. It makes no sense, to me.

I might also go for some kind of PCI sound card. I don't know how good the sound is on that mobo.

<font color=green>****</font color=green> Never Assume <font color=red>ANYTHING</font color=red> <font color=green>****</font color=green>

Do you have an example of a SATA drive that is faster than a raptor? I havent seen anything with a seek time that low until you get to SCSI. Overall latency on a raptor should be extremely fast, at least thats what every single person I talk to tells me.

I am not sure what you meant by the RAM, it runs at 533MHZ which is what I was told to get. I beleive that I read in a few places that going over PC4200 ram on the 915/925 chipsets does not even increase performance.

The Raptor is the fastest SATA drive. But the Maxtor MaxLine III 16mb cache drives are faster in some benchmarks and slower in others, but overall system speed differences are minimal, and cost per megabyte definately puts the Maxtors in the lead by a long shot.

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Read reviews of the current SATA II drives here on Tom's. They found that they were 'as fast as' SCSI drives. That should change for the better in the future, if reports are correct, but for now, we can be happy with virtual equality.

As for the RAM, I was referring to the RAM latency, rest times, etc. Some RAM is faster than others even at the same clock speed. Of course if you want the very fastest RAM (at this time), then go for a motherboard supporting DDR2.

<font color=green>****</font color=green> Never Assume <font color=red>ANYTHING</font color=red> <font color=green>****</font color=green>

i'd stick to the raptor!
plus the raptor doesnt loose value like any otehr ghardrive does
i bought mine for 150 and its like 180 now and that was like ummm 9 months ago
mua hahahahah




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