1st actual build.. semi gaming/work computer

[Sousuke]

I haven't actually built a whole system before, but have dabbled in upgrading in just about every part except motherboards & cpus..

This is a new computer that I'm building for some gaming and the usual stuff, not exactly into the latest FPS games but would like the system to last a while (like a couple of years). Will be getting the parts in a couple of weeks' time, so would like to just check over before the time comes and I start panicking. Current parts that I'll be reusing are my 19" LCD and the DVD-RW drive, the rest of the system will be put aside as a sort of file server & misc uses with an old 17" crt.

Now.. on to the components:

PSU: 550W Antec True Power

MB: Asus A8N-E

CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800

RAM: 2x1GB matched pair CORSAIR ValueSelect 184-Pin DDR SDRAM Unbuffered DDR 400

GPU: MSI 7600GT 256MB Dual DVI + TV-Out

HDD: Stuck between the two, namely:
WESTERN DIGITAL Caviar SE16 WD3200KS 320GB 16MB SATA-II
or
SEAGATE Barracuda 7200.9 -300GB- (ST3250622AS/16MB) Serial ATA-II
of which I'll get a pair..

Maybe plus other peripherals.

I plan to get another 19" lcd to run a dual monitor setup (which i'm already running with the 17" crt), and also hook it up to my TV. What is ViVo, and what can one do with it? Is the 7600GT an overkill, as is the PSU?

Since the A8N-E comes with on-board sound, I'm wondering if I should reuse the SBLive! Value card from my old computer.

Is it possible to go up to 4GB of ram?

Is it advisable for me to get the 64-bit version of XP, or will I be better off with just XP PRO or MCE?

Comments, thoughts, suggestions please.

[Staren]

That looks like a pretty good set-up. I don't think I need to question any parts, so I'll just try to help with your questions. Thanks for making it so easy

A 7600GT should be just fine. That is the current middle of the road gaming card most people gp with if they don't want to or can't go with a X1900 or 7900GT.

On-board sound is usually fine for most people. It might actually might sound a little better to you then an older Live! Value card. Give it a shot before you try something else.

It is possible to go up to 4GB, but not needed, but without getting into the real detail and numbers, having all 4 RAM slots full can lower gaming performance by dropping the speed of the RAM. Unless you are doing photo or video editing 2GB should be about perfect.

64-bit Windows isn't worth the trouble. There is still some driver support problems, and I've read some games can have weird issues with it since they where written to work in a 32 bit OS.

[Sousuke]

Thanks for answering. I guess lurking in these forums help a lot

For the RAM, is it important for me to get the matched pair? Is the dropping the speed of the RAM due to having 4 slots full because the RAM cannot be matched in 4's?

Between the 2 hard disks listed, are there any concerns in quality in either one? If not, then I'll go for the price/capacity ratio..

With 64-bit out of the way, what benefits are there to getting XP MCE over XP Pro?

[Staren]

MCE is worthless as far as I'm conserned. It's XP Pro with the media interface loaded on top of it for a premium price. I have a home built DVR myself, and a standard copy of XP Home and a free meda center program called GB-PVR does just as good of a job without the sticker shock or the copy protection that you have to deal with in MCE. Unless you have some reason to need Pro, XP Home will work just fine for most everyone.

[blue60007]

You would definitely want to have matched pairs - this enables Dual channel. Theoretically, this would double memory bandwidth...however I'm not sure of any real-life values, but it does help a bit.

I'm not sure if it's having all 4 slots filled or if it's just because the motherboard might struggle to address all 4 gigs. I have 4 512MB sticks in my system, and it's definitely faster just because there's twice as much RAM versus having 2 512 sticks. I'm not sure how it compares to a system with 2 1 gig sticks.

Both of those are quality drives - go with what's cheaper (looks like the price per gig is cheaper on the WD drive).

[Sousuke]

Somewhere in this forum I read that Windows would not address more than 2+ GB of RAM, is that true? It seems almost strange that hardware development has outstripped software.. If you want to enable dual channel for 4 sticks of ram, can we simply get 2 matched pairs?

I guess MCE's out too, then. I've been using Pro for a while now, so I'll probably stick to that. Maybe experiment dual boot with ubuntu as well, since now I'd have enough HDD space to do it..

I've been seeing video cards with ViVo ports around. What purpose do they serve? Presumeably one can hook it up to a TV, but I've no idea how the "video-in" part works or does..

[glc]

Most cards these days have video out to feed a TV. Vivo is "video in video out" so you can also capture video from an external source such as an analog camcorder or a VCR.

By the way, MCE 2005 is not a reworked XP Pro, it's a reworked XP Home. If you need the enhanced networking capabilities of XP Pro, you won't get that with MCE any more.

32 bit XP can address somewhere between 2.75 and 3.25 gb of ram, depending on how many and what hardware devices you have. It addresses 4gb minus the address spaces of the devices. For now, I'd just get a pair of 1gb modules and worry about upgrading later.

That power supply is not overkill. Having a high quality power supply is very important, and that one is definitely that.

[Sousuke]

So can I actually record shows off the TV, or would that need additional equipment other than Vivo?

I was just thinking that since I'm not about to run SLI anytime soon, I could get a lower wattage Antec power supply.. or should I keep the 550W?

[glc]

Sure, you can get a lower wattage PSU, but make sure it's a quality brand with at LEAST the minimum power required for any video card you are planning on using.

It's a lot easier recording TV shows with a TV tuner card that has PVR capability. Look at Hauppauge cards.

[Staren]

VIVO isn't a single part really. It's more of a term for a set of parts that have been tested together, the way Centreno is used for a spacific laptop design. You don't need to worry about it.

All you really need is a TV Tuner, some kind of recording program, and an Mpeg 2 encoder that will come with any retail DVD drive in the form of PowerDVD or something silmilar, and you will be able to record.

[Sousuke]

Hmm.. I guess if the card came with it, it'd be a bonus rather than a neccessity then..

Now that AM2 boards are in the process of being launched, should I wait just that little longer and get one of those, or should I stick to my current choice of the A8N-E? I don't think I can afford anything more than a 3800+ X2 for now, though.

Concerning the RAM (sorry, this is the most confusing part for me), the ram listed is DDR, not DDR2, am I right?

[glc]

Correct. AM2 will be the first AMD platform to support DDR2.

[Sousuke]

Would I be able to, say, stick in the X2 3800+ into an AM2 board?

[jayb1234]

Nope. The AM2 boards will have a different cpu socket than the current 939 pin boards.

[Sousuke]

Ah... heck. I guess I'll be sticking to DDR Ram then.

Considering a switch to the Opteron 165 now.. (these things like to screw with our heads, eh? one moment you're decided and the next something looks better..)

[Staren]

That's why you just have to get it out of your head to keep up with the joneses. If it works, you don't need to fix it. I don't upgrade until I have a real tangable reason to.

[blue60007]

Originally Posted by Sousuke Ah... heck. I guess I'll be sticking to DDR Ram then.

The same CPU on the AM2 platform (and DDR2 RAM) really won't perform any better than it's equivalent on the Skt 939 platform. I think they'll be releasing some upped versions of their flagship models, but we're talking big bucks there anyways.

[Sousuke]

I've read a bit about AM2 yesterday, and it seems that they're going to release upped versions of the lower-end (3800+, 4000+, etc) models too. It looks like it's going to be expensive, and apparently AMD says that they'll continue development for the 939 platform anyway, so I guess I'll still have an upgrade path in the future.

Thanks for that reminder, Staren, I'll keep that in mind.

[blue60007]

Here's some numbers:
http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/05/...lf/page28.html

Performance looks the same on identical setups, but DDR vs DDR2. Actually, it appears performance is worse if you don't use DDR2-800.

[Sousuke]

All right.. finally got all the parts. Took a couple of hours to figure out how to put the motherboard into the case and plug in all the little things. Booted up just fine, and attempted an ubuntu install first.. XP will come along later.

[Sousuke]

Well.. XP's up and running, but the USB ports seem to be unable to be installed... or something. In any case, I can't use USB for now. What might be the problem?

[glc]

Check the bios for USB enable/disable, and install the chipset drivers from the motherboard CD. SP1 or SP2 for XP must be installed for USB 2.0 to work.

[Sousuke]

Okie... Updated windows somehow and all went fine...

The weird thing now is, the video card doesn't detect my TV display. There doesn't seem to be any output, despite "forced TV detection" and stuff like that.. BTW the I had changed to an ASUS EN7600GT because the MSI one was out of stock.

[Sousuke]

Here's what happened so far:

Downloaded & installed newest nVidia drivers, 84.21.

Followed instructions at GUIDE: Connecting Your PC To Your TV/Audio System

Followed directions on nVidia website.

Now, I can detect the TV in windows (connected by S-Video), but no matter how I set the output settings I don't get any output on the TV. Should I bring back the card for an exchange, or is it some other problem?

[glc]

Could it be a PAL/NTSC/SECAM issue?

[Staren]

By detect the TV, you mean the second monitor option comes up in display settings right, or are you talking about something else? When I plug my laptop into a TV via S-Video and then switch the TV to the right input, the signal just comes up after acivateing the second monitor. It looks pretty bad until I get the settings cleaned up, but it just works.

When you plug a TV in, you need to right click on your desktop, goto properties, settings tab, and activate the second monitor. I'm just mentioning that because I haven't seen it in the thread.

[Sousuke]

glc: I've tried all the different signal formats, the TV is on auto mode so it shouldn't be the issue.. should it?

Staren: That's exactly what I meant, and by activating the second monitor you mean checking the "extend my windows desktop to this monitor" setting right?

[Staren]

Exactly. When you tell it to extend the desktop, both screens should go black for a second and then it will come back up as if you had changed resolution. It sounds to me like whatever isn't working right is in the TV and not your computer.

Has there ever been a game console connected to the input you're using? Just trying to figure out if yes the input does work. I guess it could be the cable. You've run down the usual suspects I'd be looking at.

[Sousuke]

I was using the TV with my old computer without any problems, with a S-video to composite cable. Right now I've tried the other connections as well, using a single S-video cable, component, and the composite cables. All seem to let the tv be detected, but none produce any output whenever I try to extend the desktop using either the nVidia config or windows display config.

[Sousuke]

Here's the continuation of the TV issue (it's a long and ardous journey, and it's not even ended) :

1 week after sending my technical support request to ASUS (had to get the ASUS 7600GT because the other one was out of stock), I had yet to receive any reply, and calling the customer service hotline led me to a voicemail serivce. That's all well and all (they offered to call back if I left my personal details), but the catch was that the voice mailbox was full. So much for customer service..

Yesterday I brought my system to the retailer where I bought my parts (they do some troubleshooting as well). The TV was too large for me to lug along as well, so we did some the testing on an old LCD tv they had around.

The techician couldn't figure out why the output was black and white either. We swapped a few identical cards from ASUS, but the results were the same. Finally we swapped in a XFX 7600GT, and it worked on the LCD TV.

Thinking the problem solved, I happily went home and plugged in the TV... and was greeted with yet another black & white screen.

I'm starting to think that Nvidia cards have something against me. The ATI alternative (X1800XT abeit more expensive) is looking more and more attractive...