First build, advice please.

[PineappleChunk]

Hey guys. I've decided to build my own computer, and I need some advice (and quite a bit of help) on the build I've chosen.

CPU- Intel Core 2 Duo E4400 (129.99)
MB- ASUS P5K-VM LGA 775 Intel G33 uATX Intel Motherboard (119.99)
HDD- Seagate SV35 7200.2 ST3320620SV 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM (84.99)
RAM - CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model TWIN2X2048-6400C4 (100.00)

PSU- FSP Group (Fortron Source) AX500-PN ATX2.2 500W Power Supply (59.99)
Case- Rosewill R5604-TBK 0.8mm SECC Screw-less Dual 120mm Fans ATX Mid Tower Computer Case (49.99)

OS- Microsoft Windows XP Home With SP2B 1 Pack - OEM (89.99)

DVD Drive - LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner with LightScribe Black SATA Model LH-20A1L-06 (37.99)
Sub-total = 672.93
Grand Total - 698.78

I have a CD Drive I can use, but I still need a DVD Drive. Speakers, Mouse, Keyboard,and Monitor, I all have. I'm going to be using this computer mostly for gaming. I'd really like to be able to get this down to the $600-650 dollar line, but I don't want to sacrifice too much in the way of performance. One thing I don't get is why this Windows XP is cheaper than the others.http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16832116056
Will I be able to use it?

Another thing: I have a nvidia 6600 that seemed to run things pretty well. I was able to play Oblivion at a decent FPS. Well, at least it was bearable. It recently stopped working for some reason though. There's no video display when you connect the monitor to it. I tried cleaning it, as it was quite dirty, but that didn't help. Any suggestions on how to get that working as well would be nice.

Help would be awesome. Any problems you could point out would be really great. I'm planning to buy the parts around early/mid-October. Thanks in advanced!

**EDIT* Alright! I'm down to $698. It'll be $653.78 with mail-in rebates. I've had too many bad experiences with those though, so I'm not counting on them.

[Alaron]

Welcome to PCMech.

Looks like a solid list. I have just a few things to mention.

Switch that harddrive to a SATA unit.

We recommend LiteOn optical drives. Get a DVD Burner that comes with Nero software.

That is the XP Home CD that we recommend.

Don't forget RAM. Go with 2GB of Corsair DDR2-667.

If you go over budget, you can get the P5K-VM motherboard and use the onboard video for awhile. Then add the video card later.

[PineappleChunk]

Thanks for the warm welcome. I thought I added RAM, but I guess I forgot. I looked at the P5K-VM motherboard you suggested. Seems like alot of people have alot of small problems with it. I'd prefer to have as little conflict with the actual parts as I can, cause It's going to be quite the task for me to put it together. I also found a LiteOn DVD drive:http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16827106049

Does that work? If you think I won't have any easy to fix problems with the P5K-VM motherboard, I'll get it. Not having to buy the video card right away would instantly make this affordable for me. Thanks for the help.

**EDIT**
Oh, and the RAM does have a $40 mail-in rebate, if you can trust those to ever work.

[Alaron]

Swap for this DVD Burner, it will come with software and its SATA: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16827106072

Asus motherboards are very high quality, I think the P5K-VM would work just fine. But let your budget decide.

[blue60007]

Out of curiosity, what kind of problems are mentioned? I take Newegg reviews with a grain of salt - half the time the problems are due to not reading the manual or something else that could have been prevented/fixed by paying attention.

[PineappleChunk]

So I switched the DVD burners, and I'm thinking of switching the motherboard.

Blue, people list things like the motherboard not turning on, something about a network hanging. Now that I look at it again, It looks like it'd be fine to get. One thing though; I know the onboard video will be temporary, but how good will it be? The computer I'm using right now uses Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 900 for it's onboard video. Will it be stronger than this?

[perkster]

you still have 800mhz ram, i would switch it for corsair value select 667mhz as it will run just as good unless you plan to overclock and will save you some money toward bringing down price to your target.

Your motherboard is solid one and future proof the P5k has many recommendations here, but if you want to save money your processor and other parts will work fine with the cheaper Asus P5b Board, which is cheaper but very solid and reliable board also highliy recommended.

EDIT: dont go for onboard video if you plan to game, wont be up to it. but as yorue sticking to XP you wont need a DX10 card like the 8600, so maybe a cheaper 7 series NVIDIA card may save you money and be a good performer in your system.

[PineappleChunk]

Well, I did as you suggested Perkster. I added a Geforce 7600GT 256MB for $90. What's the difference between the ASUS P5K LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX Intel Motherboard and the P5K-VM one, other than the onboard video? I didn't see any 667mhz RAM though. I might decide to do a bit of overclocking once I get everything up and running.

It's now around $800 dollars though...maybe $740 with rebates. It looks like that's as cheap as it's gonna get. If I really have to I'll get rid of the video card. I think I'll be able to get enough money for it though. So how does it look?

CPU - Intel Core 2 Duo E4400 Allendale 2.0GHz LGA 775 Processor Model BX80557E4400 (125.99)
MB - ASUS P5K-VM LGA 775 Intel G33 uATX Intel Motherboard (119.99)
PSU - FSP Group (Fortron Source) AX500-PN ATX2.2 500W Power Supply (59.99)
HDD - Seagate SV35 7200.2 ST3320620SV 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive (84.99)
DVD - LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner with LightScribe Black SATA Model LH-20A1L-06 (37.99)
OS - Microsoft Windows XP Home With SP2B 1 Pack (89.99)
RAM - CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model TWIN2X2048-6400C4
(100.00)
Video Card - EVGA 256-P2-N615-TX GeForce 7600GT 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 SLI Supported Video Card (89.99)
Case - Rosewill R5604-TBK 0.8mm SECC Screw-less Dual 120mm Fans ATX Mid Tower Computer Case (49.99)

Subtotal- $758.92
Grand Total- $787.18
$727 with mail-in rebates
This is everything I need, right? I can put this all together and have a working whole? Thanks alot for all the help so far.

[Katreat]

As Perkster points out if you are planning on gaming you will need to get a dedicated video card as soon as possible. The on-board video will likely get you up and running and allow you to play games but since it will be sharing the resorces on the MB it will slow you down. It might be a good temporary fix if budget is tight, and that is a good board which offers future expansion, but you will want a dedicated video card as soon as you can afford it. You can get a decent gaming card for as low as $100 so should not take too long to save up for one. What is really nice about that board is it has lots of upgrade potential and you can build up the system over time.

Kat

[PineappleChunk]

Yeah, I know what it's like to use the on-board video. I'm using an old Vaio with no vid card to play games right now. The 512mb RAM and bad video make playing anything beyond sub-par graphics an ordeal.

I'm pretty sure I can get the extra $90 to pay for the vid card, but if I can't, it's not as if I can't take it off the list.

Oh, and not that I plan on getting it now, but would 4GB of RAM make a much more noticeable difference than 2GB? I multitask quite a bit, but not so much that I think I'd need 4GB. Maybe 4=6 web pages open at once with a game and something else on is the most I'll have open at once.

[Alaron]

For that kind of use, 4GB is unnecessary. 2GB will be plenty. You would have to switch to a 64bit OS also.

Your list is solid.

[Katreat]

Originally Posted by PineappleChunk Yeah, I know what it's like to use the on-board video. I'm using an old Vaio with no vid card to play games right now. The 512mb RAM and bad video make playing anything beyond sub-par graphics an ordeal.

With 2 g of ram and a C2D this will definately be an improvment

[PineappleChunk]

Thanks so much for the help guys. Without it, I would've spent weeks finding out what parts to get, and wondering if they'd work together. Then I'd probably get something that wouldn't work with everything else. This is so much easier now.

[das1988]

I recently heard a rumor that NVIDIA is releasing some new video cards around November. I have not looked into this, does anyone know if there is any truth there?
New video cards = price drop for older cards

[scythe_god]

I did hear something about that das. I heard thy were bringing out their 9200 range. I'm not positive its true thouhg

[syxguns]

PineappleChunk-
As Alaron indicated going to a SATA unit is a good idea because of their speed and the fact that they are cheap. He then suggested XP Home edition, which I don't simply because it does not come with all of the networking essentials that XP Pro has. However, if you are not networking or just setting up peer to peer then Home edition would be fine.

XP Home and XP Pro are not set up for support of SATA drives. You will need to install drivers for the SATA unit before XP will install on the HDD. Even though when you go in your BIOS it will recognize the drive you will still have to follow these steps. You will need a floppy drive to do this, but they are very cheap. Here is a link on the steps to take to make the Installation a success. http://cruftbox.com/blog/archives/000867.html

[Alaron]

__Moderator Note__

das1988, please do not hijack someone else's thread. Start your own in the Video forum. Thanks.

[PineappleChunk]

Alright, so I got all my parts, and put it together last night. It was working fine then. Now, every time I try and start it up, I get funky looking lines pop up on the screen. I can log into Vista, but when I get into it, I see the outline of the Control Panel. If I move the mouse around, the windows kind of skew. I did install a couple of things last night, so I'm trying a system restore, seeing if that works.

Will anything odd happen if I try and install Vista again?

Oh, and is 60-70 something degrees Celsius high for a CPU temp?

**EDIT**

I feel like a total idiot. I forgot to install the video drivers for the Geforce 6600 I found lying around. One thing though, is it possible to install the driver in safe mode? Cause I'm finding it nigh impossible to do anything out of safe mode right now.

**EDIT2*

Well...I installed the driver, no change. Think the video card might just be faulty? I mean, I was totally surprised when it worked. It hasn't worked in my other computer for a long time. I think I'll install the ASUS On-board graphics drivers, and switch, see if that works.

**FINAL EDIT**

Alright, it seems to be working for now. I installed some drivers, and it's all working great now. I haven't tried restarting the computer yet though. Hopefully it'll work.

[Katreat]

Glad you got it up and running. Your temperatures are high, or alot higher than mine. Are you sure your reading C not F? I personally have only checked temp right at first build to see if I got the heatsink on correctly, have never checed them sense. But pretty sure my readings where way below yours. At 70 degrees it sounds like you are measuring in F (cant spell it) not C.

If you are using an older video card you will likely need to go on-line and download Vista drivers for it. So the drivers on the disk that came with the card might work, but they are probably optimized for XP.

Anyway, good luck and check back for a computer guru to post what temperatures are normal.

Kat

[PineappleChunk]

Well, last time I checked (I had everything in. Vid Card, 2 HDDs, etc.) It was 36 Celsius for the MB and 60-70 Celsius for the CPU. I've had the comp on for an hour or two now, and my CPU doesn't seem to have melted...I guess that's a good sign?

[Cricket]

60 - 70 degrees C?!? That's too hot. Make sure you installed the LGA775 heatsink correctly. Here's a tutorial.

Cricket

[PineappleChunk]

Alrighty, I'll do that. But my video display problem is happening again. Any ideas on that? >< Thanks

**EDIT**

Wow. I pushed in the rest of the pins on the heatsink after much hard pushing, which I was afraid was going to break the MB. CPU temp is now 23 Celsius. I just hope I didn't damage the CPU at all. >>;

Still having my video problems. I'm gonna try installing some other drivers; hopefully it'll get resolved this way.

[PineappleChunk]

Oh dear..this insn't good. I went from bad to worse.

I figured out that my video card was faulty, so I went into the BIOS and tried to change some Chipset settings without checking things out first. I ended up not being able to see anything, and I was getting 3 beeps when the comp started up. So I took out the CMOS battery to reset the BIOS. Now, when I start up the computer, my HDD isn't recognized. I have no idea what the problem is. I've tried replugging everything in, that didn't work. I could really use some help. ><

Thanks so much.

**EDIT**

I guess I somehow managed to fry my IDE cables, or something of the sort. I took a ribbon cable from my old computer and connected it to this one, and poof, it works! I'm relieved. I thought I might've damaged my HDD. Hopefully my video problems won't come back after restarting.