The joys of making a new computer

.1.47 Ghz Athlon XP fine

.geForce3 ti200 pure 64 mb DDR I'd stick with a vanilla Geforce 3

.512 MB DDR Kingston fine

.120 GB 7200rpm UltraDMA133 do you really need that much memory???? 20,30 , or 40 should suffice

.52x Creative Labs IR CDROM no burner or dvd rom??

.Sound Blaster Audigy fine

.4 80mm case fans fine

.350watt mid-tower case (4 usb, yadda yadda) fine

.Mouse+Keyboard+Nice Headphones fine

.Cooling Kit (stupid OEM) fine

.Soyo Dran..something DDR Socket A mobo fine

If i were you id get a 20 GB 7200 RPM HD and spend the rest of my money upgrading the VC and optical drives.

Hint: NEVER buy oem products for AMD... The Stock heatsink works better than the monster heat sink you can buy seperately, and there is a 3 year user warranty, instead of the lame 30 day warranty with the seller. Beyond the 30 days, you have to pay a re-stocking fee, and some other dumb fee, usually adding up to some $30.00. Also the retail processors are MUCH more reliable against the "Endless loop of death" (the processor freezes up, and sends the same info over and over again in the same location by itself, causing overheat and eventual destruction of circuitry).

Also, the case should be atleast 400w, maybe 450w, coz the GF3 is a HUGE resource hog, and if you plan to get a higher gfx card (GF5 maybe ) later on, you ill need the power for it. Also consider buying the GF3 ti500, as it will be close to $130 in June/July. WAY better GFX card.

PS... How many threads about new computers are in this forum??

Well, if you live anywhere near CA, then go to computer warehouse... They are the best retail store available. Dont go to their website though, a couple years behind . The best way to find prices is to find a chain of stores that doesn't spent tons of money on advertising, like CompUSA and Bestbuy, and see if they "Meet or beat any price". However, never ever buy from people like Fry's electronics. If $40 for a 30 GB HD seems too good to be true, then it is. You can also try Pricewatch, or as RL will rant, newegg.com. Good luck

www.ibuypower.com offers a 128mb GeForce 3 Ti-200. How do you think that will perform compared to a Ti-500?

HD size depends on your requirements.

I currently have 46Gig (40gig Maxtor, + my old 6gig drive) and I still run out of space.

I basically use it to store music/movies/games etc. and thats

with burning a lot of them on to CD to free up HD space.

www.ibuypower.com offers a 128mb GeForce 3 Ti-200. How do you think that will perform compared to a Ti-500?

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It will suck. The extra RAM doesn't help at all. Check out http://www.tomshardware.com/graphic/02q1/020205/index.html for a review of the 128mb ti-200.

Quote from the conclusion:

These results speak very clearly. 128MB are practically useless in current games. It's safe to say that getting a 128MB Ti200 is not worth the extra money. Any advantages these cards have are purely theoretical. While I concede that 4x FSAA is possible up to 1600x1200 on a 128MB card, the expected framerates of roughly 25fps make this setting practically worthless. I rest my case.

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get the processer from here. They have OEM, and Retail boxes for normal price. Good company too.


http://www.monarchcomputer.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=M&Category_Code=P