Building A Computer

[Fyvve]

So i have been poking around newegg and i am going to order some stuff to build myself a new computer. My question is about the differences in all the chip types like celeron, pentium, duron etc. I just need to know the pros and cons of each. If anyone can help that would be great. especially if you know of a website taht will help me out. I dont need anything very powerful because i am only wanting to play games like the sims (that's about the most taxing thing i will be doing with it i think) I am also confused about the 64 vs 32 bit stuff. Like i said any help is appreciated.

 

[PinkSpider]

The pentium is where the good stuff is from Intel. From AMD its the ATHLON.

 

[moz]

what are you planning on using the computer for?

latest 3D gaming?
word/office processing
video editing?
3D rendering?

do you have an OS in mind?

 

[PinkSpider]

Id go for something between 1 and 2 ghz myself. I have a 1500mhz amd ATHLON and that ran sims well.

 

[Goity Z]

my Athlon 2200+ is great

 

[spray]

no offence intended, but if you're looking at building your own pc you're going to want to be a bit more clued up

buy a mag like micro mart, full of parts and also helpful user stuff, and a few others and give them a read!

 

[yaustar]

Here is a brief overview

Intel:
Celeron: Dont. Even. Bother.
Pentium 4 (HT): Great chip for Overclocking, heavy multitasking (eg encoding two avis at the same time) and any other CPU intensive tasks
Pentium 4 (non-HT): Same as above minus the heavy multitasking
Pentium M: Low power and heat meaning less noise for cooling and a 1.6gig is on par with a P4 2.8gig

Be prepared to pay more for other parts such as the power supply and ram though as P4s need a lot of power and fast ram to really perform their best

AMD:
XP Bartons: Great chips and very low prices mainly because they are close to extinct on the tech line
XP - M: High in demand because they are GREAT overclockers with unlocked mulitplers
Sempron: Mixed bag here. the Socket 754 3100 is a great overclocker but in general, this line is considered budget
S939 A64: This socket core is going to get dual cores soon and the Winchester chips run great in terms of heat and power compsention. Good Overclockers as well especially the 3000. (dont bother with the Newcastle chips). The chips are great for image editing and gaming.
S754 A64: Same as above but no future dual core chips and the Socket line will be terminated.

If you are in the UK, grab the latest copy of CustomPC.

 

[markusdragon]

Theres also a lot of websites that'll give you a step by step guide to getting the parts for and putting together a new computer. Just google for them.

I'd offer help and advice on how to build your comp, but I'm somewhat rusty. Last time I built a computer, 256mb of memory was excessive

 

[thecheat]

people. look at his prof. he's from the US.
i reccomend Maximum PC, there are lots of articles about building. plus, their website has how tos and all sorts of good stuff (reviews, comparisons).
as for the proc, since this is your first PC i'd go with an Athlon XP. they're cheap and fairly fast, so you can't really go wrong (unless you REALLY want top of the line stuff.)

 

[Fyvve]

no offence intended, but if you're looking at building your own pc you're going to want to be a bit more clued up

​

None taken but why do you think i posted this question? I am trying to get more "clued up."

Right, i am from the US. The OS i would like to have is XP but i have heard that microsoft will be comiong out with a new one called longhorn. I dont know when that is but i *might* want to run that when it comes out if its anytime remotly soon (i just dont want to get stuck with XP becausei was too cheap to go for something that would run the new OS). I am not interested in latest 3d gaming, just games like the sims which runs pretty good on my 600mhz laptop. No 3d rendering and the only video editing i am interested in is reencoding clips and ripping DVDs for my GP. I will check out Maximum PC and see how that does me.

Thanks for all the replies. Keep the suggestions coming if you have them

 

[thecheat]

then you'll want an Athlon XP. go for a 2500+, it should be fine for longhorn (and if not, they aren't all that expensive, you can get a faster one).
one thing you need to make sure of is when buying an AMD proc, make sure you buy the best mobo you can afford. intel has the upper hand with mobos because they know their own technology the best, but go for something like an abit and you'll be fine. since you're not doing anything very intesive, an SiS chipset should be fine.
and about the 64bit vs 32bit... i DOUBT that longhorn will be 64bit native, so you should be fine with a 32bit proc. (Meaning no Athlon 64, go for the XP)

 

[yaustar]

hmm..

Not sure about using the Socket A line as it isnt very future proof but I think it be fine for what you want to do with it. I am inclined to say go Socket 754 as it allows you to get a A64 if you want one later... Get at least 512 mb of ram as 256 will slow down your system... I would advise getting a budget GFX card as it be better then the mother card at least.. probably a geforce fx5200 or if you still can get them a geforce 4 MX440.

 

[PinkSpider]

no offence intended, but if you're looking at building your own pc you're going to want to be a bit more clued up

​

None taken but why do you think i posted this question? I am trying to get more "clued up."

Right, i am from the US. The OS i would like to have is XP but i have heard that microsoft will be comiong out with a new one called longhorn. I dont know when that is but i *might* want to run that when it comes out if its anytime remotly soon (i just dont want to get stuck with XP becausei was too cheap to go for something that would run the new OS). I am not interested in latest 3d gaming, just games like the sims which runs pretty good on my 600mhz laptop. No 3d rendering and the only video editing i am interested in is reencoding clips and ripping DVDs for my GP. I will check out Maximum PC and see how that does me.

Thanks for all the replies. Keep the suggestions coming if you have them

​

You dont need a new OS, Stick with XP or 2k is what Id do.

Building a pc is a bugger guy, for a start forcing a fan in will scare the shit out of you then getting all the IDE cables set up etc. Oh the fun although a quick 20 min demo showed me what to do okay.

 

[moz]

Here is a brief overview

Intel:
Celeron: Dont. Even. Bother.

why in your opinion Dont.Even.Bother?

please enlighten us with your wisdom and proof of why a celeron wont run the applications he needs?

 

[yaustar]

mmm...

I made that post before he stated what he was going to use it for and assumed he wanted it for the latest tech ...

The celeron would be fine to run what he wants the PC for but personally I would spend a little extra and get a Sempron 3100+ which can be overclocked really well or if I had to stick to the same budget, go for the Socket A Athlons.

 

[Octavious]

the celeron sucks BALLS
DONKEY BALLS to be exact
If he wants to game, get a real procesor
you want to DOOM 3 it up ?
Get an Athlon XP 2700+ or higher, up to a 3200+ barton, great socket A AMD chips
however, If you want longhong to run its full potential, get a 64 bit chip, the A64 3000 or 3200 will more than meet your needs
Intels are weak next to AMD's in gaming because gaming is CPU INTENSIVE
its known that AMD's put out a lot more operations than Intels in a clock cycle
thats why a XP3200+ (2.2- 2.4 gig) outdoes a 2.8gig and sometimes a 3 gig P4 with twice the bus-speed in everything but on-the-fly video editing, which average people don't do much ( and Intel barely won by teh way )
so, just keep that in mind

~Octavious

 

[spongebue]

I must say, http://newegg.com has great prices and is very reliable. My dad got a computer with every part from newegg and he couldn't be happier. I got a few parts from there myself and I love it. They even gave me a shirt with my processor and a hat with my processor

 

[Bigjunior]

I must say, http://newegg.com has great prices and is very reliable. My dad got a computer with every part from newegg and he couldn't be happier. I got a few parts from there myself and I love it. They even gave me a shirt with my processor and a hat with my processor

​

I always check out www.techbargains.com
it's a link site and tells ya where the good deals are. Also has some coupons on it. check it out!

 

[generalnmx]

http://www.tomshardware.com
http://www.anandtech.com
http://www.cnet.com

Those sites will help you learn about the technology, what's hot and what's not. I'll try to give you the run-down.

- The Pentium 4 architecture with Hyper-Threading technology is about neck-and-neck with modern AMD processors. The P4 itself isn't really a very good choice for anything but a Windows computer, and even then it usually needs special code in the application to get decent speed.

- The Pentium 3 and Pentium-M give far better performance per GHz and are therefore more "overclockable" (if you're into that sort of thing).

- However, overclocking is not really a good idea.

- The Athlon 64-bit processors actually benchmark higher then Pentium 4 for 32-bit processes, especially the latest AMD models. If you must get Pentium and want 64-bit, wait until Intel releases their newer 64-bit models, which have adaptations from technology bought from AMD. They also run cooler then P4s, too.

- For a gaming, a good equation is: CPU 30% + Graphics 50% + RAM 15% + 5% Other . If you upgrade only one of those to the fullest, one of the others will be a bottleneck. Anything else isn't really that big of an issue, that includes the HDD. Note that online games are a little different.

- Good budget video cards are the Nvidia Geforce FX 5900XT and ATI Radeon 9800XT. Any on-board graphics or audio chipset should be avoided for a good computer.

- If you're buying a brand-name computer, don't worry about the RAM. You can save up to $100 buying it yourself.

- Most of anything else not mentioned is hype and will increase your performance to such a relatively small degree that the extra cost isn't worth it. However, if you want to learn about RAID arrays, those are nice for data security.

Maybe I'll think of more later.

 

[yaustar]

Also choose a good case (one with good airflow) and a stable power supply (one that wont blow up).