Computer Building

I recently have bought some stuff to build computers.
I would like some reccomendations on some cheap but decent motherboards/cpu to buy. I dont want to spend too much money on my first computer i build, because if i mess it up somehow, i dont want too much money to be lost.
Any sugguestions?
Thanks

I would go for a 3700+ SanDiego core. As for the mobo: I would go for an ASUS. The best one out is the A8N32-SLI Deluxe. If you want something less I would go for a 3500+ or a 3000+.

That board is very good but I wouldn't say it was the best. Personally I feel its a close call between the A8N32 and the A8N-SLi Premium.

The A8N32 has two PCI-E x16 slots that run at x16 when both in use but, with two cards inserted, there is not alot of room for much else as two PCI slots are positioned between the PCI-E slots.

The Premium on the other hand has two PCI-E x16 slots aswel but they only work at x8 when two cards are installed. This still leaves three PCI slots free for use.

Summing the above up, there is a trade off, graphic performance or useability.


As for a CPU, the AMD 3700+ San Diego CPU is a brilliant gaming CPU with 1MB L2 Cache. For around the same price and usable in the same socket 939 motherboard, the Opteron 165 is a nice CPU. It has a slightly slower stock clock speed [ 1.8GHz ] but the 165 is a great overclocker on air. The Opteron 165 is also a Dual Core CPU with 1MB of L2 Cache per core.

Only problem is, if your not wanting to overclock that is not really a viable option.

Always buy fast hard drive, even RAID. CPU power being where it is today, the main bottleneck is usually the HD.

I would recommend an SATA Raptor by Western Digital.

HDD's are only a bottleneck if/when being used [ such as read/write functions ].

The most common bottleneck on a computer is the RAM as alot of people overlook things such as latencey timings. People spend plenty of time researching the newest graphics cards and CPU's because the technology changes so quickly, as for RAM, this is not the case and many people overlook this simple but critical component.

Who wouldn't

Especially now it is out in 150GB with that viewing panel ! Looks very nice.

about how much does that cost?

I want to run dual harddrives one probably about 150 and another one smaller that would be my main HD, where the OS will be and stuff, the 150 would be where i have all my data and stuff.

Well you can get the 150GB WD Raptor in two models, with and without the viewing panel. Personaly I would get it with, obviously you pay more for that model, but it does look amazing.

USA - Newegg
UK - Scan