Igotmilk
Member
This is a post I made on another forum about my fisrt PC build. It is a little dated. I have always purchased pre-made PC's because the prices seem so cheap, but I feel I got a lot more for my money with this build and I am confident of all the parts and the ability to get drivers for new OS's as they are released.
Here is my parts list:
Motherboard: Abit NF7-S $104.99
CPU: AMD ATHLON XP 2500+ "Barton" 333 FSB PROCESSOR CPU- RETAIL $90.00
RAM: 2 X Mushkin DDR 512MB PC3200 222 - Black Hi Perf Level II $278.30
Video Card: ATI RADEON 9600 PRO 128MB 8X AGP DVI/TV RETAIL $170.00
HDD: MAXTOR 160GB 7200RPM Serial ATA Hard Drive Model 6Y160M0 8MB OEM $131.00
Case: CHIEFTEC Server Chasis (Aluminum Workstation Tower with Plastic Front Cover) $72.00
Power Supply: ENERMAX EG465P-VE(FM). 460W Power supply for AMD K7, K8 & Pentium4 $78.99
Total: $925.28
At first I was considering with going with two sticks of 256MB of RAM and am still not sure I made the right choice. I should not need the 1024MB of RAM, but I decided in case I wish to upgrade a little in the future that I could still hopefully keep this ram and with the $136.30 price difference I took the chance.
OK, I ordered all my system parts from NewEgg on Veterans day (Nov. 11th.) in the afternoon Eastern Standard Time. This was one of the most enjoyable experiences I have had with this PC so far. I immediately started having buyer's remorse about the case. After I ordered I kept reading the forums and two case threads started! There were some good cases posted and I started to second guess myself!
Shoot! Now you know I gotta' open this stuff and check it out! I start opening boxes like a professional box opener at the Mr. Universe of Box opening trials to be held next Boxing day. Everything was there.
The first thing I noticed was how light the case is. I should not have second guessed my case choice. The one I got is GREAT! I love the way it looks and I love the space and the weight of it. Shoot, and unlike other things I have fallen in love with I am sure that this thing will not be packing on 300 pounds and telling me "But you loved me when I was lighter! I am still the same case on the inside!"
Yeah, Like I said this case is great. I grabbed all the documentation and headed out. I did not get home until after 12:00, but when I did I started the assembly. This is the first PC I have built from parts, and I have primarily used Motherboards.org for information. So this was a little slow at first. I stayed up until 3:00 but I had to get up at 8:00 to go out for the day. I was not finished with the assembly yet but I felt I had made good progress. I was happy about all the parts I had ordered and was looking forward to getting this thing rocking. So the next evening when I get home I put a couple of more hours into it but I had to go out and get my drink on. I left home at a little after 11:00 and made it home by 2:00 for a post celebration assembly party. This is where I pretty much finished everything….well for the most part. I was unable to get it to read floppies. I had snagged the Floppy and some old dopy CD R/W drive from my old rig and I could not install Win2K cause' it wanted the SATA drivers from the diskette, WHICH IT COULD NOT READ! I checked all the connections and played with it for a while then hit the sack.
The next morning I played around a little more and still had no success. I tried another floppy from an older system and same deal. This was the most frustrating thing about the whole process. Since it was Sunday I decided I would go to Best Buy and pick up a $9.00 Floppy. No dice! Best Buy has one $9.00 Floppy drive and it is priced at $25.00! Screw them! I'll show the man! So I go to a few other stores and the same story pretty much. I ended up giving up and going home. I did not work on the PC anymore on Sunday. The next day I got hold of a floppy from a friend, very cloak and dagger since we met in a parking garage for "The Exchange".
OK, this one worked so on Tuesday I got the operating system installed. Then came the updates! Over 56K!! (Screw the man I am not paying $40.00 a month for Broadband….unless it includes the broad!) Well this was NOT working out. So I had to download the patches at work and burn them to CD. Now everything is up and next week I can start to over-clock, but this thing rocks! It is not the fastest PC but it seems to be stable, light, quite, and if I can say so myself handsome. One thing I did notice was that MotherBoards.org is mentioned in the front of the manual that comes with my ATI RADEON 9600 PRO.
I appreciate all the help and advice I got from everyone here and wish you all the best in the future!
Lessons I learned:
Here is my parts list:
Motherboard: Abit NF7-S $104.99
CPU: AMD ATHLON XP 2500+ "Barton" 333 FSB PROCESSOR CPU- RETAIL $90.00
RAM: 2 X Mushkin DDR 512MB PC3200 222 - Black Hi Perf Level II $278.30
Video Card: ATI RADEON 9600 PRO 128MB 8X AGP DVI/TV RETAIL $170.00
HDD: MAXTOR 160GB 7200RPM Serial ATA Hard Drive Model 6Y160M0 8MB OEM $131.00
Case: CHIEFTEC Server Chasis (Aluminum Workstation Tower with Plastic Front Cover) $72.00
Power Supply: ENERMAX EG465P-VE(FM). 460W Power supply for AMD K7, K8 & Pentium4 $78.99
Total: $925.28
At first I was considering with going with two sticks of 256MB of RAM and am still not sure I made the right choice. I should not need the 1024MB of RAM, but I decided in case I wish to upgrade a little in the future that I could still hopefully keep this ram and with the $136.30 price difference I took the chance.
OK, I ordered all my system parts from NewEgg on Veterans day (Nov. 11th.) in the afternoon Eastern Standard Time. This was one of the most enjoyable experiences I have had with this PC so far. I immediately started having buyer's remorse about the case. After I ordered I kept reading the forums and two case threads started! There were some good cases posted and I started to second guess myself!
This is what was so fun. My shipment was broken into two parts. The case coming from LA and the rest coming from Trenton, NJ. I live very close to NJ but very far from LA. I tracked my two shipments through FedEx and the biggest question I had was when the parts would arrive. The stated delivery time was prior to 4:30 PM EST on Monday November 17th. I actually figured both shipments would arrive the same day but that the day would either be the Friday (Good) or the Monday (Bad). The worst case scenario for me was to have one shipment arrive on Friday and the other on Monday. That would have just ticked me off. Well as I tracked the packages I could not be sure until I awoke the morning of the 17th and both packages were in the local final destination waiting to be put on a truck and shipped to me. Now I knew I would HAVE to leave home at 2:00 in the afternoon so this was as tense for me as an Alabama boy watching the World Championship Mud-Flap Racing race with a hefty bet on the side. This was the home stretch and it was close. At 12:00 I still had no sign of a FedEx truck and again was beginning to second guess myself. I knew that we have had FedEx deliveries after 6:00 some nights but I was betting that since it was a Friday that FedEx dude was gonna' try to rush his route so he could meet up with his buddies and heckle the UPS boys at whatever watering hole Delivery Professionals gather at to get their drink on. I have to assume that with their knicker-like shorts it is very dimly lit. So the clock tolls one and still no delivery, now I am freaking, wondering what will happen if I am late or if I can make it back before the delivery. But none of this was necessary as the FedEx girl (Yes a girl!) made it at 2:46:53 EST November 14th in the Year of our Lord 2003.Lesson 1: do not read the board after ordering prior to receiving parts. This can make you second guess yourself and as in my case could cause you to roll up in a little ball in the corner crying like a girl
Shoot! Now you know I gotta' open this stuff and check it out! I start opening boxes like a professional box opener at the Mr. Universe of Box opening trials to be held next Boxing day. Everything was there.
The first thing I noticed was how light the case is. I should not have second guessed my case choice. The one I got is GREAT! I love the way it looks and I love the space and the weight of it. Shoot, and unlike other things I have fallen in love with I am sure that this thing will not be packing on 300 pounds and telling me "But you loved me when I was lighter! I am still the same case on the inside!"
Yeah, Like I said this case is great. I grabbed all the documentation and headed out. I did not get home until after 12:00, but when I did I started the assembly. This is the first PC I have built from parts, and I have primarily used Motherboards.org for information. So this was a little slow at first. I stayed up until 3:00 but I had to get up at 8:00 to go out for the day. I was not finished with the assembly yet but I felt I had made good progress. I was happy about all the parts I had ordered and was looking forward to getting this thing rocking. So the next evening when I get home I put a couple of more hours into it but I had to go out and get my drink on. I left home at a little after 11:00 and made it home by 2:00 for a post celebration assembly party. This is where I pretty much finished everything….well for the most part. I was unable to get it to read floppies. I had snagged the Floppy and some old dopy CD R/W drive from my old rig and I could not install Win2K cause' it wanted the SATA drivers from the diskette, WHICH IT COULD NOT READ! I checked all the connections and played with it for a while then hit the sack.
The next morning I played around a little more and still had no success. I tried another floppy from an older system and same deal. This was the most frustrating thing about the whole process. Since it was Sunday I decided I would go to Best Buy and pick up a $9.00 Floppy. No dice! Best Buy has one $9.00 Floppy drive and it is priced at $25.00! Screw them! I'll show the man! So I go to a few other stores and the same story pretty much. I ended up giving up and going home. I did not work on the PC anymore on Sunday. The next day I got hold of a floppy from a friend, very cloak and dagger since we met in a parking garage for "The Exchange".
OK, this one worked so on Tuesday I got the operating system installed. Then came the updates! Over 56K!! (Screw the man I am not paying $40.00 a month for Broadband….unless it includes the broad!) Well this was NOT working out. So I had to download the patches at work and burn them to CD. Now everything is up and next week I can start to over-clock, but this thing rocks! It is not the fastest PC but it seems to be stable, light, quite, and if I can say so myself handsome. One thing I did notice was that MotherBoards.org is mentioned in the front of the manual that comes with my ATI RADEON 9600 PRO.
I appreciate all the help and advice I got from everyone here and wish you all the best in the future!
Lessons I learned:
Don't freak out and second guess until you have at least seen your goods! I know that if you order online that you have to wait, but take up knitting or something.
Next time I will just buy a new floppy drive since it was not worth all the problems I had trying to save $9.00 by keeping the one I had.