hi im building a pc for university, want it 64 bit as fast as possible without paying a lot of money for it.
firstly can i check that an athlon 64 3800+ venice core is compaible with a Foxconn 6100K8MA-RS motherboard, i think it is.

my other question is, this mobo says it is an mATX (i assume this is micro atx) so does that mean i have to buy an micro atx case, or can i buy any normal desktop sized tower. i dont really care what case it is as long as its got front usbs, but when i was looking some were called matx cases some called midi cases and some didnt say. do i have to buy a matx case or will any do (i understand a matx case must be fitted with a matx mobo but not sure about the other way round!) thanks a lot

A micro ATX will usually fit in anything bigger standard than itself, i cant say i can reccomend any foxconn board they arent known for fantastic quality boards, msi and gigabyte make good cheap boards i would direct you towards one of those.

What kind of budget are you looking at.

well thing is i want a 17" tft aswell and ive priced the system from aria with the tft for less than £350 which is really all i can afford (students eh!) thats the above cpu+mobo with 1gb ram a dual layer dvd writer and an 80gig sata hdd (basically just chose cheapest ones out of the brands id heard of!)

i did think that about the foxconn but the spec doesnt look too bad as it has onboard graphics (not really looking to play games so thats ok) it has pci express incase the graphics arent good enough for any uni work i might have to do and it can take up to 4gb of ram so pretty futureproof for the moment.
is the board likely to fail for any reason, im doing applied computer technology at uni so wont just be used to typing etc but wont be anything too challenging, especially for these specs

just had a quick look on aria, theres the Gigabyte K8N51GMF-9 and the Asrock 939 NF4G-SATA2 for a few quid more, which would you recommend? would lean towards the asrock as it takes sata2 but would the gigabyte be the better board overall apart from that?

Just from what i think i remember is the gigabyte model it has SATAII support as well, the gigabyte would be my choice is the better board in terms of the manufacturers track record. Looks an ok price for what you are getting i suppose the parts arent going to be great(keep an eye on the PSU particularly replace it if you upgrade) but seems allright make sure you arent being ripped of with a really bad monitor dont get one with 1024x768 res or less and get a response time of 16ms maximum otherswise you would be better off with a cheap crt.

I know what you mean about the price though im uttery skint at the moment as well, if you are in the UK or europe check out Aldi or lidl not always the shops you want to be seen in but one has a good spec laptop for £500 i think(tv tuner and everything nice size as well and a good DVD drive and HDD) and the other has PCs just the base unit but they sell cheap monitors as well sometimes.

will go for the gigabyte then cheers the monitor is 1280x1024 with 12ms theres another with 8ms for £20 extra though looks a bit more fancy too so will maybe stretch to that
the PSUs on all the cheapy cases ive been looking at are generally 350w if it goes bang will it damage anything else or can i just plug a new one in?

will have a look in aldi (make sure nobody sees me go in!) before i buy a monitor then cheers

sorry about all the questions but last one i promise! the 3700 san diego core and the 3800 venice core are the same price i believe the san diego has a bigger cache than the venice and thats the only difference? is it better to go for the san diego and get a bigger cache, or go for the higher clock speed, or would theey both just perform the same?
cheers for all your help

Performance as they are will be about the same but because the san diego has the larger cache it gets its speed from that so its clocked lowre meaning that its more overclock friendly and outputs less heat, i would go with san diego if there is no price difference but the 3800+ is often cheaper now.

Unfortunatley with cheap PSUs the chances of them blowing are higher than normal and they have a larger chance of taking some of system with it as well because it lacks the safety features and quality you get in normal PSUs that protect the system from the psu. It might be fine but i wouldnt over tax it in the slightest the rated output will also be given as the peak it says 350W bt in reality you can deduct 50-100 W from that for what its actually up to producing.

ok cheers well i wont be overclocking it or anything think its going to be fast enough as it is the psu should be ok i think as im just going to build it and leave it alone
will get the san diego if it runs cooler then that may put a little less strain on the psu may only be a little less but if the 2 chips perform the same then may aswell go for the cooler one its still going to be a fast system