New opteron rig advice

[gazdude]

Decided to upgrade from my aging 2.26 P4 Shuttle to a regular sized system which will be easier to update in the future. Only thing I'm keeping are screen, HD and DVD writer.

I've come up with this so far as a pretty low cost but hopefully decent performing setup (for usual office/uni tasks and also gaming! and possibly some photo/vid editing)

Opteron 146 (bought off Ocuk forums CABNE0545) - £125

Asrock 939 DUAL-SATA2 (939) ULIM1695 - ~£50

PowerColor ATI Radeon X850 XT 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/DVI - £146

Antec Sonata II Piano Black Quiet Case - 450W Smart Power PSU - £76

Hoping to keep the total under £550!

now I'm just wondering what ram to get? and what cooler for CPU?

I'm after 2Gb and was considering Gskill, Geil Value and also Corsair.

Hopefully I can do a bit of overclocking as well and get the CPU up to 2.6-2.8Ghz, might be a challenge though as I haven't done any overclocking since Duron 650@850!

cheers !

 

[FarFarAway]

I reckon a nice set of OCZ Gold VX or maybe GSkill Light blue (excellent RAM)

Maybe even a gig of Crucial Ballisticx

As for the cooler I'd get an XP-90c or an SI-120

 

[FragTek]

You have a great base system there! I do see that you're trying to save some money too. One thing you can do right off the bat is ditch the X850XT for an X800GTO2 which can be overclocked and flashed to a true X850XT for a fraction of the cost.

As far as RAM goes there are a lot of great options out there right now. G.Skill, OCZ, Crucial, Mushkin, PQI, all have some sweet RAM at a great price. I was talking with Bourne and I think the best RAM for the money right now is probably the PQI Turbo 2 x 1gb kit w/ 2-3-2-5 timings. U can get it here in the states for about $170. There again I got my new Crucial for $175 after the $75 rebate and I'd take it over the PQI. See what you can find in your area and then report back with it so we can tell you what the best buy and best RAM available is.

Cooling solution. There are a lot of mixed opinions for heatsinks. Right now the best ones out are: Thermalright XP-120, XP-90C, Highrise or the Thermaltake Big Typhoon.

Ur other parts look good though! Good processor, great mobo for the money, and a nice case with a quality PSU.

:beerchug:

 

[gazdude]

thanks for the help guys !

I was considering the X800GT, but this X850XT is on a special at ocuk which works out pretty cheap and can ocuk it further than the X800

as for ram im still undecided I'm after some value ram for now (until i get the oc'ing bug), so will have a look at the suggestions you guys have put forward.

read a lot of reviews and definately its between XP120 and Big Typhoon at the momment, although will I need that sort of cooling straight away? Will stock hs and fan do for a while?

Yeah I'm trying to do this one on a budget as I'm still at university and haven't got the cash for an uber pc at the moment

cheers again

 

[WC Annihilus]

Stock will be fine fine at stock speeds and a mediocre OC, obviously depending on the ambient temperature of your house. It's definately very sensitive the house temperature, going up 1:1.

 

[FarFarAway]

Yeah stock speed the stock HSF will do fine till the student loan gets into the bank

Then pimp the XP-120 + nice fan and get an pwning OC

 

[WC Annihilus]

I'm gonna be putting in my new BT soon (once my friend gets the blasted lapping kits) so you could always wait for my review

 

[gazdude]

Yeah stock speed the stock HSF will do fine till the student loan gets into the bank

Then pimp the XP-120 + nice fan and get an pwning OC

roger that one

student loan is always handy

 

[Ham]

Nice Motherboard lol, I got one. If your looking for cheapness, Ive had two unmatched sticks of kingston value 512 running stock 400 in dual channel in mine. They were more stable than a singe 512 stick. So 4 Sticks of kingston value ram? or you could get two matched kits. Only problem being these are CL3, whereas most other suggestions have been 2 (I think).

 

[FarFarAway]

NOOOOO

don't get Kingston - especially not with DFI

DFI = pwnage

Kingston = sUck4ge

DFI + Kingstone = Dead RAM, or board or both or just no POST.......

Ever

 

[FragTek]

He doesn't have a DFI mate, he's running the ASRock mobo.

 

[Ham]

Me and llwyds Kingston is fine, other than llwyds didn't run at ddr400 on his skt A board. It had to be clocked down to 333, but then that may be because is was on a dual channel controller (according to the guy in our local PC shop dual channel only runs at 333 enless u falk out for a DFI, which IMO is bollocks). As i said it runs fine dc @ 400 in my mb.

From what i've read it seams to be luck of the draw with its value ram. But my ASRock seams to go very well with it.

 

[FarFarAway]

Yeah thats basically bollocks

BUT DFI boards are very picky when it comes to RAM so be warned

 

[macgamesrule]

According to the ppl at DFI street, the best brands of RAM for a DFI mobo are OCZ, GSkill, Geil, Mushkin, and certain Crucial models. Corsair is iffy, some ppl have them work with no problems, others have no end of trouble with them, so they're rather a gamble. Kingston is not recommended.

 

[mrbeef]

Yeah thats basically bollocks

BUT DFI boards are very picky when it comes to RAM so be warned

My dfi doesnt have a problem running ram i can put anything in it

its happy running on kingmax cheap stuff none matched pairs admittedly it is the next thing to change but its running fine

 

[FarFarAway]

Your lucky then. Most DFI users find that anything other than top grade ram screws it all up

Kingmax is t3h sUx