The Goal:
A gaming rig primarily. Everquest 2, other MMORPGs, FEAR, Doom 3, etc... all maxed out, max eye candy. Also i do alot of web surfing and research so its internet connectivity is important (i have cable broadband). I have no overclocking experiance, so i do not want to count on it, but i may o/c after i become familiar with it and do more research. Cost is a factor, but not at the expense of performance. I will be buying 2 or 3 components at a time, until all is compiled.
The Rough Draft:
CPU - AMD Athlon 64 X2 4600+ Manchester 1GHz 2x512KB L2 Cache Sckt 939 - $546.00
MOBO - Asus A8N-SLI Premium Sckt 939 NVIDIA nforce4 SLI ATX AMD - $164.99
GPU - eVGA 256-P2-N563-AX Geforce 7900GT CO 256MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 - $309.00
Memory - Mushkin eXtreme Performance 2GB (2x1GB) 184-pin DDR SDRAM Unbuffered DDR500 (PC4000) dual channel kit - $209.50
Hard drive - ???
PSU - ???
Heatsink/Fan - ???
Case - Aspire X-Cruise - $69.00
Optical - Lite-On DVD+-R Burner - $42.99
Optical - Asus DVD/CD-ROM - $22.99
Floppy - Sony floppy - $9.99
Sound card - Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeMusic 7.1 channel 24-bit 96KHz PCI interface - $121.99
Monitor - Rosewill R912E Black 19" 8ms LCD Monitor 270 cd/m2 500:1 0.294mm Pixel Pitch - $259.99
Keyboard - Logitech G15 2-tone 104 normal keys USB wired standard - $69.95
Mouse - Logitech G5 Laser 931376-0403 2-tone 6 buttons 1x wheel USB laser - $46.89
Speakers - Creative Inspire P7800 90 Watts 7.1 speakers - $86.00
The Questions:
1. I would liek to use two hard drives. A 10,000 rpm smaller one (for operating system and game installations) and a 7800 rpm large one (250-300GB) for everything else. I dont know much about Hard drives, can you recommend them to me?
2. How powerful of a PSU do i need for this rig?
3. Do i need to purchase a heatsink/fan, if so, any recomendations?
4. Im still rather unclear about my memory. Im certain that i want 2GB. But my motherboards standard ram is PC3200. The memory i chose is PC4000. Is that going to hinder performance or just not matter?
5. The monitor i chose is a brand im unfamiliar with, but the price was appealing. Does my setup call for a better monitor than this, or will this suffice?
6. I am worried about compatability issues, do all these components get along?
The Conclusion:
I am ordering a couple of the cheaper items in a couple days. Most likely the case and an optical drive or two. This way i have time to discuss the rest with you and make any necessary changes before i order the important components.
I am a little skeptical about the high priced cpu. So much more expensive than everything else. But if its worth the extra cash then so be it.
I appreciate any and all advice, and help with this. Dont know what id do without you guys, thanks again.