New PC advice please

[kaistenolee]

New PC advice please

Hi all.

With Uncle Kevs moolah, I am looking to get a new PC (this one wont open MS Word...). Below is what I am looking at. Please give me some advice on whether you think they are alright (and if all the parts would all work together). In both builds the case, keyboard, mouse and speakers are fairly generic.

PC 1. INTEL

MOBO: Intel S775 Gigabyte GA-EP43-UD3L
CHIP: Intel Core 2 Duo E7400 (2.80GHz/45nm/1066FSB/3MB) LGA775
RAM: Desktop DDR2 Ram 2GB Kit (2x1024MB) PC8500 1066MHz Kingston HyperX KHX8500D2K2/2GN 5-5-5-15
VID CARD: PCI-e (nV) 9500GT 1GB Sparkle SF-PX95GT1024U2-HP (550/800MHz)
HDD: 3.5" HDD SATA-300 500GB 16MB Seagate (7200rpm)
DVD: 5.25" SATA DVD Buner/Rw Samsung SH-S223-BL 22x Black (oem)
MONITOR: WideScreen LCD Monitor 19" ASUS VH192D (5ms)
PSU: Power Supply 650W Coolermaster eXtreme Plus RS-650-PCARE3-AU (with SATA Cable)

PC 2. AMD

MOBO: AMD AM2 S940 Gigabyte GA-MA770-DS3P
CHIP: AMD AM2 Athlon 64x2 Dual Core 6000+ (3.0GHz/2MB/89w)
RAM: Desktop DDR2 Ram 2GB Kit (2x1024MB) PC8500 1066MHz Kingston HyperX KHX8500D2K2/2GN 5-5-5-15
VID CARD: PCI-e (nV) 9500GT 1GB Sparkle SF-PX95GT1024U2-HP (550/800MHz)
HDD: 3.5" HDD SATA-300 500GB 16MB Seagate (7200rpm)
DVD: 5.25" SATA DVD Buner/Rw Samsung SH-S223-BL 22x Black (oem)
PSU: Power Supply 650W Coolermaster eXtreme Plus RS-650-PCARE3-AU (with SATA Cable)

MONITOR: WideScreen LCD Monitor 19" ASUS VH192D (5ms)
According to itestate.com.au the prices for the above would be PC 1: $1054 and PC 2: $952

Thanks in advance.

[CWR03]

It would help to know what will be the primary use for this PC.

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Well, for a "performance" encoding machine I'd definitely go with one of the new LGA1156 socket Core i5's or Core i7's (Lynnfield) nowadays!

On the one hand the old Core 2's can not keep up with the Nehalem's performance-wise, on the other hand there usually is no point in getting an expensive LGA1366 socket Core i7 (Bloomfield) now.

And you should get at least 4 GB of RAM noways. RAM modules are really cheap at the moment. No need to limit yourself here...

[smileBhappy]

And you should get at least 4 GB of RAM noways. RAM modules are really cheap at the moment. No need to limit yourself here...

so long as you use a 64bit OS, else you will only be able to use 3.2gig, unless you used a 32bit in PAE mode.

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/server/PAE/PAEdrv.mspx

[burfadel]

PAE mode is rarely successful. Also I'm sure the 3.2gb rule only applies to 512mb video RAM. With 1gb video RAM I think its actually more like 2.8gb useable.

[setarip_old]

@kaistenolee

You might want to (soon) check out some of the pre-built HP desktop quad-core models that are now on sale for what may be less than half of what you've indicated. They typically include more RAM (Gigs or more) and fairly priced videocard upgrades, if needed...

[LoRd_MuldeR]

so long as you use a 64bit OS, else you will only be able to use 3.2gig, unless you used a 32bit in PAE mode.

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/server/PAE/PAEdrv.mspx

I know. But why should I use a 32-Bit OS nowadays? When I get a new 64-Bit capable machine, I would install 64-Bit OS for sure. In fact I did and won't go back ;)

Just for the notes: 32-Bit software runs perfectly fine under 64-Bit OS and driver support for 64-Bit OS is no worse than 32-Bit now, except for archaic/unsupported hardware maybe...

[Shinigami-Sama]

so long as you use a 64bit OS, else you will only be able to use 3.2gig, unless you used a 32bit in PAE mode.

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/server/PAE/PAEdrv.mspx

if its an encoding machine it'd be kinda silly to stay 32bit imo

[detmek]

If you want low-cost PC, go for AMD Athlon II X4 630 CPU with AM3 MOBO. And for graphic card, for the equal price, go for ATI 4650, its faster. Or 4670.
AMD Athlon 6000+ is too old.
For Intel platform, go for Core i5 and ATI 4670.

[smileBhappy]

Apparently, 32bit software is limited by how much ram it can address. each thread can only address 1.5gig ram, even if its running on a 64bit os. So if you only use one (32bit) program at a time all that ram you have is probably going to waste.

there’s something about this on Microsoft’s website but I’ve misplaced the link.

[DonQ]

RAM in 64bit OS is not going to waste - when it is not used by applications, it is very usable as system (disk) cache. Of course if your only application doesn't access disk, then disk cache is not useful - but somehow I feel that applications, used by video processing forum members, do access HDD sometimes...

[Shinigami-Sama]

Apparently, 32bit software is limited by how much ram it can address. each thread can only address 1.5gig ram, even if its running on a 64bit os. So if you only use one (32bit) program at a time all that ram you have is probably going to waste.

there’s something about this on Microsoft’s website but I’ve misplaced the link.

wrong
a 32bit process on 32bit windows(linux is slightly differnt) can address 2gb of ram, 3gb with the 3gb switch, and compile with large address support - also some userenv magic needs to be done as well

a 32bit process on 64bit windows can address the full 4gb range if compiled with the large address support

you can also do all sorts of neat tricks when you have lots of ram(ramdrive etc)

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Not to forget that more than 2GB of RAM can be used easily on a 64-Bit by running several processes in parallel, even if each individual process is 32-Bit and thus limited to 2 GB.

Also being ready to run 64-Bit processes is always a nice thing, even if the majority of your processes are still 32-Bit.

Especially since practically there's no drawback for running 32-Bit processes on a 64-Bit OS, but it is technically impossible to run 64-Bit processes on a 32-Bit OS...

[Blue_MiSfit]

Exactly :)

I'd say either of those machines would be quite underpowered for doing encoding. A quad core is mandatory for encoding, IMO :) Athlon II x4 CPUs are okay, but the Phenom II X4 CPUs aren't much more expensive, and do quite well.

If you can afford it though, a Core i7 riding the new consumer-grade LGA1566 socket and a P55 chipset would be the way to go. Core i5 lacks hyperthreading, which does help a lot for video encoding.

The pro level LGA1366 systems with the x58 chipset etc are probably overkill for most folks, or underpowered for hardcore folks - as this is basically missing an additional CPU socket ;)

I'm not sure if you plan to do any gaming - but if you do, that 9500GT is woefully underpowered. I'd suggest getting a Radeon 5770, as they're quite cheap and perform very well!

That all being said - if you're not encoding (why are you posting here if you're not lol), either of those systems would be fine for desktop usage, though I always do encourage at least 4GB of RAM these days, since it's so cheap - plus Vista and Windows 7 will gobble it all up for cache!

x64 all the way unless you need legacy software (16 bit :devil:) or hardware support. End of story. No other reason to use 32 bit operating systems these days.

~MiSfit