Have decided to build a box instead of buying ready built.

[desi]

One of my sons will be going to school next Fall and is wanting to get into videography. He is also heavily into black and white photography. This will be our first build. We now have an "old" Gateway with a Seagate scuzzy drive which has given us a few good years without any problems. We've shopped around and this is what we have come up with
from newegg and TigerDirect. Help !!! Please. Any input/suggestions etc will be greatly appreciated. Thanking you in advace, desi and Kevin.

CPU AMD 64 |4400+ ATHLON X2 939P RT
Asus A8N32-SLI-DELUXE Socket 939 Motherboard
HD WD 400GB Caviar SE16 7200RPM 16 MB cache
Video cards VGA EVGA N 6800GS 256-P2-N386-AX
MEM 1Gx2|CORSAI TWINX2048-3200C2PRO
DVD BURNER PLXTOR PX-740A/SW-BL
Ultra 600w X-Finity Power Supply w/2 80mm fans
CASE ANTEC|P180 SIL RT Mid Tower 2 120mm fans

P.S. His younger brother will want to be gaming on this box as well.

[democracyindanger]

1. I always recommend

arstechnica's guides. They're update fairly often, and give suggestions on the best parts within defined price ranges.

http://arstechnica.com/guides/buyer/system-guide-200601.ars

[desi]

2. Thanks for the link democracyindanger

..gonna go there and check it out..

[WhollyHeretic]

3. That looks like a hell of a computer. A second DVD/CD drive

is always very helpful when you work on your computer a lot. I've never used a X-Finity power supply but make sure you read some reviews and make sure it's not too loud, with all the fans in that thing it could get loud in a hurry.

[desi]

4. Thanks GreenJ..I would have replied sooner but...

..I've been busy most of the evening putting this box together and at the rate I'm going it will be next week before it's ready to fire up...I did as you suggested and picked up another DVD/CD drive, a reasonably priced (cheap) Sony. I also decided to go with a different power supply. This one says "Low Noise"..its an Ultra X-Connect 550 W. It's a "modular" one which allows you to just use the wires needed to hook everything up. I opened that other one up and all those wires and fans scared the hay out of me. The case would have been a mess and there would be little room for air circulation. Again, I apologize for the late reply and again thank you for your help/suggestions...gonna go catch Countdown now, missed the earlier broadcast..

[bvar22]

5. Built one similiar before Christmas.

I've been delighted with mine. Your 4400+ is going to scream.

480 Watt Antec ATX Power Supply
AMD Athlon64 +3200 Venice 939pin
ASUS A8N-SLI
1gig Ram
PCI Express(x16) Video
GeForce 6800GT Graphics
250G SerialATA HD

Simple to assemble, and lightening fast.
I have had none of the problems discussed on the net.
3D Benchmarks over 13,000 with a single GeForce6800
Chips run cool with the stock fans (under 115F) even under the toughest loads (HalfLife Upgrade and FEAR)
I uninstalled all the overclocking software. No need to overclock.

I may never use the 2nd SLI slot. Initially, I had planned to use two Video Cards in tandem, but the one GeForce6800 (SLI capable) is MORE than enough for even the most resource hungry games today.

On Edit: The ASUS Motherboard has a hardware firewall that is slightly confusing to configure and use.
It take a bad rap on "The Net" about "corrupting downloads", and many recommend disabling" the ASUS firewall.
I spent some time getting mine configured corrrectly, and have had NO (zero) problems with it.
I recommend keeping the ASUS firewall.

Remember to log on to the ASUS site for current BIOS and Drivers (1st thing)

The Mobo comes with several utilities:

Probe...allows desktop monitoring chip temps and fan speeds...cool

There is another one I can't remember what it is called....something like "Boost" or "Turbo"...It allows for desktop overclocking.
I uninstalled it. I have no need to overclock, and it was cheesy looking anyway.

Have fun.

[desi]

6. Thanks for the info bvar22

..finished putting everything together late last night. I'm on it now testing a few things out and I will surely use some of your info..I did have a problem (with that Asus firewall)loading the **free** Virus protection/spyware/popup blocker/removal from Adelphia...Windoze kept promting me to load the Norton "trial" which I refuse to use...oh, this thing smokes for sure...Thanks..desi

[bvar22]

7. IIRC,

I disabled the virus protection, disabled XP Firewall, but kept the ASUS firewall.
I use AVG, and am very satisfied with it. It seems to have no compatibility problems with the ASUS Firewall.

I am a former ZoneAlarm user (and still use it on my other networked systems), and liked ZoneAlarm because it notified me when MY software was attempting to log on to the Net for whatever reason. ASUS does the same thing (with a pop up) but you have to click on the more options button to choose "just this once".
If you click on the "ALLOW" button, it writes a RULE in the configuration that allows the program in question to access the net whenever without telling you.

There is a page in the "configuration" section of the ASUS Firewall
(click on the icon in the tray),
click on "View Current Profile",
...."Firewall"
...."Advanced Configuration"
....Application
...."Purge Table" (button at bottom)
This will allow you to re-review which programs are attempting to access the net. I still use RealPlayer (among other) that I want notification when they are trying to access the net. I usually let them (just this once), but I DO like to know.


IIRC, I had to use "Custom Configuration" to set up a profile that allows commmunication and file sharing with the two ohter computers on my LAN. It took a little while for me to understand the ASUS (Actually Forceware Network Accesss manager).


Don't bother with the XP64 yet.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=242x6166

Cheers