[ceez]

crahak, thanks for that detailed post. who would of thought that trying to install a br player would end up being so freaking expensive. I think i at least should be fine with my 512 pci card....again, cant tell until it's tested, but again, that card is supposed to do HD. and what wattage psu? 500-600-700?

in regards to assu, funny, my coworker told me last week that his board had crapped out on him, today when i asked him about asus he's like no way, that's the board i was using. it also lasted him about 3 years.

[CoffeeFiend]

With a new CPU, just about any old vid card will do (yours will definitely work).

PSU? You don't need anything near that. Even a 350W unit (of decent quality) would be plenty. But DON'T buy a generic/no-name PSU. You don't have to spend like $100 either (on some kind of fancy brand name and modular design and everything). I just bought a pair of Seasonic SS-350ET PSUs for very similar rigs actually, 350W, 80Plus (about 82% avg), Active PFC and all, plenty of power where it matters (324W for both 12V rails combined, etc), good set of cables, etc. For $30 each (edit: was on black friday; it's currently $50 at newegg though, but still... doesn't have to be expensive not to suck)

This post has been edited by crahak: 17 December 2008 - 12:03 AM

[ceez]

crahak whats your input on any of these mobo combos from newegg:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductCombo...e=10&page=1

thanks for the help

ceez

[CoffeeFiend]

You're only saving like $15 or so looking at that list. I'd sooner pick the exact motherboard and CPU I want instead. And it just might end up being cheaper (or cost a little more but be a lot better).

You should be able to get a good P45-based motherboard, a Intel E5200 CPU, 4GB of quality fast DDR2 and a good PSU for under $300.

[cluberti]

spacesurfer, on Dec 16 2008, 07:45 PM, said:

Quote

Q9550 Core2Quad

That's a nice processor. A bit more than cheapest Core i7 but a system with Core i7 will cost you more than with this quad core.

True, and the 920 i7 benches about the same as the 9550, which is a bonus .

[nitroshift]

crahak, on Dec 17 2008, 01:20 AM, said:

Lots of people love Asus boards but I'm more of a Gigabyte guy myself.

I've been using Gigabyte boards for the past 3 years or so, and none has crapped on me yet. Had 2 Asus boards last year, out of which one is sitting somewhere in the shed, waiting for the spring clean-up to get recycled... You do the math.

[James_A]

cluberti, on Dec 17 2008, 12:15 AM, said:

G.Skill 8GB Kit (4GB x 2) - $110:
[url="http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231151"]http://www.newegg.com/Product

Never mind the P4, in the UK that's being cruel. 8Gb kits are almost unobtainable. The nearest possible is 4 x 2Gb for the equivalent of $200 plus shipping

spacesurfer, on Dec 17 2008, 12:45 AM, said:

Real world experience tells me to avoid ASUS.... they are probably good boards but just because mine died after 3 years, I am partial to ASUS now. I had heating problems in that one.

My new Gigabyte runs very cool. I'd vote for Gigabyte.

So that would be something like a GA-EP45-DS3R. That's if you can decide between -45- -45C- or -45T-, then -DS -3 -3R -3L or- 3P. Then repeat all those numbers for a GA-EP45-UD3R etc etc etc.

Why so many variations? Comparing them all is an exercise in futility, at the Gigabyte website. Assumig that I, too, go with Gigabyte, what's the criteria to use to decide between them?

.

This post has been edited by James_A: 19 December 2008 - 05:08 AM

[puntoMX]

James_A, on Dec 19 2008, 05:07 AM, said:

Why so many variations? Comparing them all is an exercise in futility, at the Gigabyte website. Assumig that I, too, go with Gigabyte, what's the criteria to use to decide between them?

Well, you can split it up easily, just take the DDR2 and DDR3 boards and put them in their proper group. Anything lower than an i7 based mobo has no need for DDR3 so you can leave that part out.

The Ultra Durable 3 boards from Gigabyte is where I would look at, so the GA-EP45-UD3P, GA-EP45-UD3R and GA-EP45-UD3 .

[spacesurfer]

I'd go with GA-EP45-UD3P. Check out the review here: http://www.extremete...,2335930,00.asp.

But I'm sure the UD3R and UD3 are just as good with some features missing that are in UD3P, that's all.

[ceez]

I actually ended up going with this barebones kits from tigerdirect. I think you cant beat the price

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/Se...52&CatId=31

[CoffeeFiend]

On price alone maybe... But the choice of parts though :/

Shiny fast quad core, but real low on memory -- that'll way more than offset whatever speed gains the quad may bring, and DDR3 is expensive stuff too
Slow HD (19ms seek times on a HDTune bench, making it dead last in the whole bench!)
Cheap case...
Cheap PSU too Single 12v rail with 30A total (a lower wattage Corsair gets a solid 10A more -- hell, my 350W Seasonics can do 90% of that, assuming the Ultra actually manages to live up to its label which is actually quite unlikely); not 80 plus (never actually hits 80%, more like 75%), looks like an old design (more amps on the 5v rail than the 12v one?), etc. Can't say I've been impressed much by previous Ultra PSU reviews (not in a good way anyhow) -- and that's one of their "fancy" modular ones... Just a quick excerpt from that review:

Quote

Make a note to stay as far away from this flaming hunk of crap as you possibly can. If not, we highly suggest you make sure and have a fire extinguisher handy.

I'll stop here.

Within $50 you could get way better IMO, e.g. a plain old Q9600 or even a Duo, along with 4x2GB of fast DDR2, better motherboard, WD AAKS drive and quality parts overall (good PSU, case with good airflow).

This post has been edited by crahak: 20 December 2008 - 05:03 PM

[cluberti]

Well, that machine will run fine for you. However, I'd make sure to bump up the memory and get rid of that god-awful hard drive they put in there with something faster (as crahak mentioned - it's really, REALLY slow).

[ceez]

wow i am amazed of how much you guys know about specs, i dont know how you guys memorize all this stuff but I am impressed and I thank you all for your input.

I am not a gamer so i think i'll be fine with that 500gigger (maybe my 350gigger is faster, i'll post what I have later ). the 2gigs or ram should be fine for now but I know that I will soon upgrade that puppy. As long as I can finally play by br discs and browse the net i'll be fine!

thanks guys

[puntoMX]

cluberti, on Dec 20 2008, 03:12 PM, said:

... get rid of that god-awful hard drive they put in there with something faster (as crahak mentioned - it's really, REALLY slow).

Well, those drives aren´t that bad, they might not be the fastest but they are not much behind on the WD 640GB drives either, plus they are reliable.

EDIT: Access time shows high indeed, 18.7ms, burst 124.8MB/s, and AVG 78.5MB/s... this is on HD Tune but there should be better programs, any tips?

[FrankE9999]

cluberti, on Dec 16 2008, 07:15 PM, said:

Speaking of real-world, I'm running Vista Ultimate SP1 x64 on a Q9550 Core2Quad on an Asus P5Q Deluxe with 8GB RAM, an ATI Radeon 3650 (silent HIS), and some 320GB HDDs as an HTPC and MCE box and it chews through everything I throw at it. And, to boot, it's just as fast in about every benchmark as an i7 920 (except for memory-bound apps, where the i7 will perform far better due to the on-die controller).

Drop the following into a nice case with a decent PSU and a BR drive, and it should run very well under XP or Vista:

Asus P5Q Deluxe - $190:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16813131297

Intel Core2Quad Q9550 - $320:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16819115041

G.Skill 8GB Kit (4GB x 2) - $110:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16820231151

HIS ATI Radeon 3650 512MB DDR3 (silent) - $110:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16814161220

WD Caviar WD3200AAKS 320GB HDD - $55 (x4 = $220):
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16822136074

Total, $950USD

This seems like overkill for a HTPC. The MSI Media Live DIVA 5.1 AM2+/AM2 AMD 780M HDMI Micro ATX AMD Motherboard - Retail is about $170 after rebate. A AMD Phenom 9350e Agena 2.0GHz 4 x 512KB L2 Cache 2MB L3 Cache Socket AM2+ 65W Quad-Core Processor - Retail is also about $170. With this morherboard and processor you don't need a video or sound card.

http://thedigitallifestyle.com/cs/blogs/st...htpc-video.aspx