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I need a new workstation computer. I am thinking of just taking a loan and getting one.
At first I thought I wanted a prepackaged Dell or Gateway or some such. After taking a closer look, I realized I wouldn't be able to get exactly what I wanted. (I don't need a monitor, a keyboard, a mouse, a sound card, a floppy drive, an operating system, Internet access, or an office suite.) This means I probably have to build my own AGAIN...
Here's what I think I want: dual-proc (Intel or AMD?), 1 GB of RAM, 160 GB of disk space, and a GeForce 4.
I'll probably just run Windows 2000. Maybe Linux if I am feeling adventurous again.
Any input? Should I go with AMD or Intel dual-proc? Good place to get the components?
I'd like to stay in the $2000 range or so.
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or there is a computer that you could have for free....
I like Intel. Yeah, that's right, fuck you. AMD is cheaper and "faster," but tends to be more unstable, judging on my coworkers' and my experiences. AMD is also very popular and most people tell me I'm a raving moron for prefering Intel, but P4s are better than AMD XPs.
But.....
There are no dual-P4 motherboards. There are dual-Xeon Intel 850 chipset boards, but those absolutely do not fit your budget. So, for dual-processing, go AMD. Now, I ain't sayin' an ASUS A7M266-D with two AMD XP 2800+s wouldn't fly. (It also has 4 DDR-RAM slots, so you'd be able to fit a gig of DDR without paying ridiculous amounts on a 512 MB stick.) Though, if I were you, I'd go with a nice ASUS P4B533 and a single Northwood P4 2.2 GHz with 768 MB DDR PC2700. But that's just me.
Corsair DDR PC2700 memory is your best bet, but it may be too expensive, DDR from Crucial is fine, etc, whatever.
Western Digital 8MB buffer "special edition" models are the best non-SCSI/etc. HDs, but are also expensive (Best Buy used to have them on sale). Two 80GB IBMs are fine, though people have supposedly had trouble with them I've never seen one fail, thoughIcouldbewrong, whatever.
NVIDIA, bleh. Call me a macwhore, but ATI rules. The All-In-Wonder 9700 PRO beats the pants off of the GeForce Ti4600. But they're both fine for a few years; it's all bias. Anything but a Parhelia (tee hee!).
No idea where to get components, most people I know get them from local stores that pricematch OEM hardware.
Also, Windows XP. It doesn't suck anymore (post SP1).
A loan? Haven't you been a rich, classy mother sipping on bourbon and smoking coronas since your Netscape days?
Bleh. Go Macintosh.
And, you know, watercooling.
D'oh, the dual-Xeon boards aren't 850... they're 860, E7500, etc. Not that it matters... it's late.
Thanks for the assistance. I don't think there are any AMD machines at work, so not everyone is obsessed with them. :P
I think I will get 512 MB sticks or 1 GB sticks though... planning ahead or something.
Heh, I think not. Living in California isn't cheap... And school isn't any cheaper. I've gone this far without taking a loan, at least. ;)
I would like a Mac (new toys = new interest in this boring field), but it's just not reasonable for me to do that right now. I do lots of PC stuff for work and I am partially buying this for that purpose.
I wouldn't take yours... you know that.
Yeah, the Mac plug was an obvious joke. I've been obsessed with them since I began editing movies and audio and stuff, but besides that it's all PC.
What do you do nowadays anyway?
School. :/
I'm seriously considering dropping all my difficult classes and going into culinary school (just like jcore!!111111). With my grades and scores and activities and whatever I could easily get into MIT, but I'm just not as interested in technology and engineering as I was a few years ago. It's probably just a phase, though.
yeah...I know that, but I thought I would offer anyway
I appreciate the offer.
You're welcome, honey...but you know what is mine is yours...so honestly, if you would ever want my computer, you could have it.
What's the difference between registered memory and unregistered memory?
This page says the ASUS A7M266-D can only have from Athlon MPs from 1 GHz to 1900+. Does that mean the 2800+ wouldn't work?
Does this motherboard sound okay?
http://www.tyan.com/products/html/tigermpx.html
Um, aren't you poor enough? o_O
Yeah, but I need a new computer, and I figure not taking a load by my senior year is good enough.
Okay... I was tired, slightly drunk, and tired last night, and was misleading about the AMD dual-processing. This goes to show that dual-processing is confusing, expensive, and expensive.
Athlon XPs are not used for dual-processing; rather, Athlon MPs are. The Tyan board is fine (as long as you get the MPX S2466N-4M rather than the S2466N so you don't end up with only three PCI slots), but you can only use two Athlon MPs (preferably 2200+ if you can find them in your price range). On that ASUS, you can (supposedly) use a single Athlon XP and a single Athlon MP (the MP 2200+ would work, but probably not the XP 2800+ [which isn't even released yet so...]). The Tyan is nice because it has four DDR slots; you could get four sticks of Crucial registered 256MB PC2100 DDR memory at a lower cost than a 512+256 for the three slot ASUS boards.
... So if I were you and had to go dually, I'd get the Tyan Tiger MPX S2466N-4M, two Athlon MP (18/20/22)00+s, and four sticks of Crucial. But I'd rather go non-dual Intel. :P
(Registered memory simply means the RAM contains a "buffer" to help with large electrical load [for mainboards with a lot of memory], obviously, unbuffered [unregistered] doesn't have the buffer. Registered memory is common in servers and workstations...)
Scratch that, you can't use an XP and an MP dual. Duh.
Anyway, you can also check out the Gigabyte GA-7DPXDW and the MSI K7D Master in addition to the ASUS A7M266-D and Tyan Tiger MPX (S2466). Good luck.