AMD PC Advice - too buy or not to?

mp7125

Hi

I'm hoping to buy a PC and have been sent the following details from a local company. Can't afford to spend more than £400 and not been very technical need to know the pros and cons of the two deals set out below. Can I get better elsewhere?

AMD ATHLON 64 2800+
ASUS K8V-X Mainboard
350w ATX Case (LCD Display)
512Mb DDR 400
Maxtor 120Gb 7200rpm Hard Disk
Nvidia GeForce FX 5500 256Mb VGA
1.44Mb Floppy Drive
Logitech Cordless Keyboard/Mouse
Genius SP-J10 Speakers

£355.00

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AMD SEMPRON 2800+
ASROCK K7VT4A PRO Mainboard
350w ATX Case (LCD Display)
512Mb DDR 400
Maxtor 120Gb 7200rpm Hard Disk
Nvidia GeForce FX 5500 256Mb VGA
1.44Mb Floppy Drive
Logitech Cordless Keyboard/Mouse
Genius SP-J10 Speakers

£295

Ta

stuartw101

not bad for the price i suppose but im not sure about the motherboard so maybe someone can help you, i have just bought an AMD Athlon 64 3200+ 160gb, 512DDR, DVDRW, X300SE Graphics card, these are the main specs of it and the total price was £530.

the ASUS K8V-X Mainboard for the first specs you listed is worth about £50 and the ASROCK K7VT4A PRO Mainboard is worth about £30.

Not sure if the motherboard prices are that cheap actually but though i would let you know so you know how much it will cost them to make it.

NellyLock

remember - from what youve quoted there ther is no operating system, this is what will bump the price up significantly (that is if u want a microsoft o/s)

neil

Joe_Bloggs

Scan have the K8V-X for 47.86 and the k7VT4A Pro for 20.74.
The Athlon 64 2800 for 68.28 and the sempron 2800 for 51.28.
Thats £44 more in components. The sempron is not rated for 400 FSB but only 333 FSB.( It will probably do 400 but that would be an overclock).
The athlon 64 is a socket 754 component that will be able to run Windows 64 when it comes out.
You don't have a DVD/CD burner (Approx £32) or an operating system (XP SP2 OEM £48) or a screen.

Total cost in components including XP and DVD is £357 for the A64 and £269 for the Sempron.
Go for the A64.

All prices from scan (you can often find cheaper if you shop around), all without VAT.
J_B.

T4i

AMD ATHLON 64 2800+
ASUS K8V-X Mainboard
350w ATX Case (LCD Display)
512Mb DDR 400
Maxtor 120Gb 7200rpm Hard Disk
Nvidia GeForce FX 5500 256Mb VGA
1.44Mb Floppy Drive
Logitech Cordless Keyboard/Mouse
Genius SP-J10 Speakers

Looks a nice build. Asus are a big name so support will not be a problem. The 64bit CPU means future-proof. 512MB DDR 400 is fine, can be ugraded to 1GB if needs be. HDD is a 7200rpm so again not the slowest, graphics card will struggle to run the latest games on high detail but will run less juicy games no problems.....

The 350W PSU is alittle suss, if it's a good make it will be fine. But if its a budget one this may cause problems later down the line.

NellyLock

T4i wrote:

AMD ATHLON 64 2800+
ASUS K8V-X Mainboard
350w ATX Case (LCD Display)
512Mb DDR 400
Maxtor 120Gb 7200rpm Hard Disk
Nvidia GeForce FX 5500 256Mb VGA
1.44Mb Floppy Drive
Logitech Cordless Keyboard/Mouse
Genius SP-J10 Speakers

Looks a nice build. Asus are a big name so support will not be a problem. The 64bit CPU means future-proof. 512MB DDR 400 is fine, can be ugraded to 1GB if needs be. HDD is a 7200rpm so again not the slowest, graphics card will struggle to run the latest games on high detail but will run less juicy games no problems.....

The 350W PSU is alittle suss, if it's a good make it will be fine. But if its a budget one this may cause problems later down the line.

the psu bothered me to i think it should be slightly higher but as u say if it a good make *should* be ok.

T4i

I can't believe people are selling 64 bit DDR systems with a 350W PSU. Especially with all the light-mods and extra fans nowadays. If its an Enermax 350W then w00h00, but I really cant see it somehow. I've seen those 420W 'unkown name' PSU's with coloured fans..and they are so.......nasty. A PSU like that will work, but for how long.......I usualy give them 6-8months on a high-end p.c before the rails start struggling. I think a 10% deviation from the rails is regarded as 'safe' anything more/less than 10% is bad news. Thats when a p.c can start crashing during games, restarting for no reason etc....

Most motherboards give you free software for monitoring CPU temps which sometimes includes voltage monitoring.

Monitor voltages during CPU idles and during high CPU/Memory loads. A good PSU will give stable readings during idle/loads.

Prime95 is good for putting a p.c under stress!! This sorts out the stable from the not-so-stable p.c's.

blinky

AMD64 boards can be power hungry

DFI recommend at least a 480W PSU with a 24-Pin ATX connector plus connecting in a floppy power lead and a Molex connector in addition to the 2 ATX power connectors on their NForce 4 boards.

Running in Cool and Quiet mode does drop the power consumption though.

Toxteth_OGrady

Never skimp on a psu.

At least 400W and go for Antec, Enermax, Tagan. Or if you can get one in the US, PC Power & Cooling.

Or if you can afford it go for one of these babies.

:cool:

TOG

Joe_Bloggs

It is a pity that there are no socket 754 90nm (winchester) Athlon 64 2800. The max power consumption of the 2800 at rated speed of the 130nm (Newcastle) version is 60W. At idle 18W.
You could have saved 2/3 power with the non-existant 90nm efforts for the same speed. Socket 939 is the way to go.

DFI boards are in the overclockers niche market. The PSU in an overclocked system is often stressed upto and beyond the limit. Motherboards also have a duty in transforming voltages and currents to match the requirements of processor, memory etc. These voltages are variable often by 0.025 of a volt In the bios .

Using a bigger power supply than you think you will need is not a mistake. It does not consume the rated power at all times but can deliver it when needed. A bigger rated power supply that is under utilised can get by with less cooling and hence fan noise.
J_B.

wolfman

Yeah try and go for socket 939 if possible. You'll be fine with a 380W power supply. You only need 480W if you have a top of the range graphics card, and a number of other devices (hard drives, dvd roms, usb devices etc...). I'd recommend going for the Antec Sonata, you can find it for around £70, a silent case that includes a 380W psu.

I currently have a Tagan 380W (which to be honest I'd like to upgrade) with an AMD3500, 2x hard drives, 2x dvdrom drives, an ATI 9800 Pro, and a few usb devices and a few case fans and it's running very consistantly from monitoring the voltages. It's still a little way off the lower recommended voltages so I'm sure the system you proposed would be fine with a 380W psu.