Need some expertise-ish help here! (Buying a DELL)

[RollerBall]

"I wouldn't touch him with a bargepole, who the heck' has a bargepole"!

congo and I have both got one. congo also uses garlic just in case  :)

[Jimbo]

GARLIC! Garlic-bread...??!

[MWISimmer]

So James... are you still buying a Dell?

[Jimbo]

So James... are you still buying a Dell?

erm No ...... .....I have customized my own system now, and is ready to post, will put it in this post in around 10mins time. Tell me what you think, and again, alterations VERY welcome.

Right here we are, the new assigned spec.



I havent posed a exact motherboard, so i have included two, again, suggestions on this.
Also i have included the RAM (667Mhz), would this work and be compatible with this motherboard? or would i be looking at getting 400Mhz.....

And SLi aswell, is this needed or will a Single 7800 do all my gaming fine? including All FS and Addons?

Thanks for your help again.

[Gary R.]

Last year I traded my old dell, a dimension 800 P3 on a new system from a local PC shop which I specked out.  I got me a AMD 2800, 60 gig hard drive, 1 gig of ram, a 9200 radeon, and moved over my cdrw drive.  Didn't need a monitor because I already had a great 19" trinitron CRT which I still use.  They did data transfer for me and loaded XP which a friend burned for me and the total cost with trade of my old tower still came in at less than $300.  Around $275 if I remember correctly and some of that was in their labor charges of course.  I am a little more educated now and my next PC upgrade will be done entirely by me.  There is nothing proprietary here as you will find on a dell or a gateway.  I will never need another tower.  My power supply is a 400 watt.  I can put any socket A processor in my mobo up to a 3200 or if I really want to go all out, I can buy a 64 bit board and chip, with PCI, and trade my AGP 6600 GT on a 6600 or 6800 PCI card.  I did some price checking and I could perform those upgrades now with trade for my current parts and stay under $300.  I step up to 3200 chip for under $150 and I won't even need a bios flash for it, my curent bios is compatible. Why, I don't even have this system built as good as it could get.  My Gigabyte K7 mobo has 3 ram ports on it and could support up to 3 gig of ram.  I only have 2 512 meg and a 256 meg module installed now. I have the chip clocked up indicating 2.3 ghz and with some cooling improvements I know I could get more, possibly up to 2.6 ghz.  What I have now is nearly infinatley upgradable in as big or as smalll a steps as I choose to take depending on what I can spend.  Deal with a small shop and choose wisely.  Make sure they take trade credit on your old parts and study up on hardware to do as much as  you can yourself. You will save a ton of money and the satisfaction is having only what you want, nothing you don't want, and the pride of using something that YOU built.

[Jimbo]

[quote]Last year I traded my old dell, a dimension 800 P3 on a new system from a local PC shop which I specked out.

[congo]

Really the most difficult thing is getting the case wiring to the mainboard correct, the mainboard manual will clearly show the pinout. With care and patience, it's doubtful you will have any problems. The PC build process is basically like a small Leggo set and not that much more difficult. True, there are pitfalls, but if you have common sense and reasonable dexterity with a screwdriver, success is most likely.

The next most difficult thing will be your BIOS option setup. But the PC should auto configure in BIOS and tweaking can be done later.

Another option is to get your supplier to assemble it for a small fee, many supplier's are happy to do this, then ship the box complete.

I really do have a barge pole, I wasn't going to admit it earlier, but Rollerball gave the game away. It's leaning against a tree in the back yard.  

[Jimbo]

Cheers Congo, im thinking of getting it pre-built for a very small price from the supplier like you mentioned.

And again, everyone thanks.

And the Bargepole, well "peter kay" a comedian made that Joke up, thats where i got the idea from lol.

Many thanks again Congo and everyone else wjp helped.

Just airdusted my PC, the cans arn't cheap are they!?
Although the system is running quicker now, and its looks as though it is a computer, and not a duster, im happy now lol.

Cheers.

James

[congo]

If you aren't confident, getting it assembled is a very wise plan.

If something goes wrong with the new hardware, they have no excuse to blame you for incorrect installation, and they should replace the defective part/s promptly.

I always have more faith in hardware that's 6 months old than new stuff.