New build, looking for good but cheap components.

I wouldn't say get the most out of them, although the Core 2 overclock easily, you will void your warranty on day 1....


Liam

I have always had AMD, whats better, AMD or Intel? Intel is always more expensive....

Also, with the monitor issue, what is the REAL difference between a monitor like Acer and a monitor like Samsung? Same size, same everything apart from the name, but Samsung and other well known names are £40-50 more expensive.

Not everything apart from the name is the same on the surface, different panel, refresh rate, response time, contrast ratio.

What size were you looking at? Widescreen?

Intel at the moment rule the roost, and aren't more expensive in most cases when you place them side-by-side.


Liam

I don't know what it is but AMD make me feel as if i would be against the norm, a rogue and abit of a freedom fighter. Where-as having intel would make me feel like a conformist, why is that! haha, i bet i sound insane.

I was thinking of 22 inch monitor, but then when i measured my old crt monitor, it measured up as 14'' of viewable screen(19 inch from corner to corner) I think they measure lcd screens as the viewable screen, so i am imagining 22 inch of viewable screen compared to 14'' and that is massive!

So maybe 19-20'' screen is good enough! And yeah widescreen :P

I guess it depends on whether you're a fanboy towards graphics manufacturers, ATI+AMD are the same company now, Intel Core 2's and Quads outperform AMD chips pound for pound in gaming and video encoding, so if you want to do either, couple it with 2gb of DDR2 800, and an Nvidia 8600GT, on an Asus board, in a Thermaltake Case, with a Thermaltake PSU and you're good to go.


Liam

Looking at power supplies there is a vast difference in price. I'm just thinking, what is the massive difference? All they are are power for the real stuff to work surely?

Here is where most folks go cheap and later have major problems.
I.E. burn out mobos, cpu and other components.

Depending what all you place into your computer, you may want to start with a 600 watt psu and a good name brand. Some of those new video cards draw 300 - 350 watts by themselves.
Tagan, Xion, OCZ, Enermax, Thermaltake are good brands to use.
DO NOT short yourself on the ps.

I was looking at ddr3 memory, i know that it uses less resourses etc but would that be worth getting, or is it too expensive etc?


So suprised by the fact that i can buy 2gb of memory for £50 now, that's insanely cheap!


There is so much choice it's hard to choose. I am looking on komplett, because that's where i bought my hard drive, they seem to have very good prices. They only sell grpahics cards from companies that i have never heard of, Why no nvidia or radeon?

What companies?

DDR3 is a little bit young, and expensive, 4gb kit = £700.


Liam

I was looking at the corsair on komplett.

The GPUs on komplett they are selling are companies like xfx and point of view? who the hell are they? lol

Also with cases, i need as many fans as possible, i want it black and sleek in design, finding it hard to find one.

2 of the 120mm fans in the case will move lots of air.
One in front blowing in and the other in the rear by the ps blowing out.


No need for the computer to be really noisey.

One can always mod [modify] the case and put a fan in the side cover or a blow hole in the top. But you have to experiment with the side to find out if blowing in or out is the best way to have it.

Yes, what about the GPU, are those ones on komplett worth going for? Or is it best to stick with Nvidia or Radeon.

Those are the card manufacturers, Nvidia and ATI do the chipset and set the core and memory clock, and the manufacturers (Asus/XFX/BFG/POV/EVGA/Leadtek) add their own touch, and selected partners OC the cards too.


Liam

So which are better?

All of those are good, you want to steer clear of Biostar/PC Chips, and if you go for one of the better ones, compare numbers side by side, as if they are based on the same chipset then the only differences are likely to be factory overclocks.

I'd probably put them in the order of Asus/Leadtek/BFG in the top group, and POV/EVGA/XFX intermediate group, although EVGA and XFX tend to do bundles, and cool looking PCB/Fans, etc.


Liam