Weekly Buyer's Guide: Entry Level System - March 2004
by Evan Lieb on March 17, 2004 11:22 PM EST- Posted in
- Guides
CPU and Motherboard Recommendations
CPU: AMD Athlon XP 2000+ OEM (no heatsink)Motherboard: ASUS A7N8X-X (nForce2 400)
Price: CPU - $49 shipped (OEM). Motherboard - $69 shipped
UPDATED March 18th, 2004. After a month, the Athlon XP 2000+ has come down in price so much that it is now selling for exactly as much as the 1800+ we recommended 4 weeks ago. The 2000+ is identical to the 1800+ in every aspect save for its clock speed; 1.67GHz instead of 1.53GHz. As we mentioned before, this CPU offers excellent performance in today's business applications and games while being very light on the wallet. $49 is a steal and will satisfy even the cheapest of cheap systems. There aren't many 2000+ processors available in retail, but any old CPU cooler will do. We suggest the Cooler Master DP5-5G11A, which is just $10 shipped from several online vendors, if you like a cheap, but effective, cooling solution. If you're looking for something more quiet, we suggest mounting a Panaflo L1A fan to reduce noise.
For more information on exactly how your 2000+ might perform, you can check out AnandTech's very own Budget CPU Shootout from last December. Keep in mind that the 2000+ isn't listed in our benchmark charts there, but you can still get a very good idea of how it performs by looking at how its close brothers perform in comparison to the competition.
The A7N8X-X was our recommendation 4 weeks ago and continues to be our recommendation today. Not much has changed in the last month, so this is a predictable pick. Still, we'd like to reiterate a few things that we talked about before, namely the reliability, features and excellent price that this motherboard offers. The performance that the nForce2 400 chipset brings is an especially nice bonus considering the price tag, as this is basically the exact same chipset that you'll find in high end Socket A motherboards save for dual channel DDR support. We've had lots of personal experience with this particular ASUS model and simply put, we love this motherboard to death. You can't go wrong with an entry level motherboard like this one.
Listed below is part of our RealTime pricing engine, which lists the lowest prices available on the AMD CPUs and motherboards from many different reputable vendors:
If you cannot find the lowest prices on the products that we've recommended on this page, it's because we don't list some of them in our RealTime pricing engine. Until we do, we suggest that you do an independent search online at the various vendors' web sites. Just pick and choose where you want to buy your products by looking for a vendor located under the "Vendor" heading.
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Baldurga - Thursday, March 18, 2004 - link
About second option for GPU, I think a 9600SE 128Mb 128bit for 67 is a great deal. You can find it here:http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?desc...
Ok, is not Tier 1 brand, but with 128bit and 9600 core it is a very good price/perf optio on budget.
Octoberblue - Thursday, March 18, 2004 - link
"Western Digital continues to make well priced budget drives that aren't noticeably slower than the 5400RPM variety"- Don't understand this comment. Did you mean not noticeably slower than... something else. This is a 7200rmp drive...?
ehanneken - Thursday, March 18, 2004 - link
"Motherboard: ASUS A7N8X-X (nForce2 Ultra 400)"Minor correction: The A7N8X-X uses the single-channel nForce2 400 chipset, not the dual-channel nForce2 Ultra 400 chipset.
Pumpkinierre - Thursday, March 18, 2004 - link
Newegg have got the Duron 1.8 at $43 conspicuously missing from your roundup. I'd sooner have MHx than cache anyday and the nearest A-XP is the 2200+ at $62 so youd save a few bucks which could go towards a full dx9 card- cut down 9600 or 5750. As dx9 takes a lot of the computation onto the gpu, a full dx9 card favors a weaker system so that's where the money should be spent.The Duron also runs at 1.5v, 0.1v below the A-XP and combined with smaller L2 cache makes it cooler and if desired more overclockable.
Evan Lieb - Thursday, March 18, 2004 - link
PrinceGaz,Bah, changed and properly updated. :)
PrinceGaz - Thursday, March 18, 2004 - link
According to the real-time price engine, the XP2000+ is the same price as the recommended XP1800+ ($49) and that the price hasn't changed in the last week. So the XP2000+ would probably have been a better recommendation (I assume the article is under a week old).Evan Lieb - Thursday, March 18, 2004 - link
Agreed guys, I'll change PC2100 to PC2700 next time. Even though it means squat for entry level users, you're right, might as well go with the faster memory if the price is identical.Originally though, Crucial PC2100 was $35 (Newegg if I remember right), so you would save $5 versus PC2700 and $10 versus PC3200. But Newegg upped their prices after the guide went online. You guys should be wary of those types of things in the future, because vendors will do that on occasion.
Zebo,
Were you using the LCD to compare the 9800 Pro to the Shuttle board's nForce IGP graphics? You're definitely a rare case if there's no noticeable difference between the two in terms of text sharpness.
Zebo - Thursday, March 18, 2004 - link
I have the MN31N and notice zero blurred text on the benQ LCD it runs on.. I also have saphire 9800 ultimate edition and BFG 5900NU so I think I would have noticed by now.Here's my rec for overclockers and silent budget system.... Plus you get DVD drive, MCP-T, and better case too.
CPU & Cooling AMD Athlon XP 1800+ (OEM) - $49
Cooler Master HSF - $10 $59
Motherboard Shuttle "MN31N" for $85
Memory 256MB Buffalo PC3200 - $44
Video Card Onboard - $0
Monitor Samsung SyncMaster 763MB $146
Computer Case Antec SLK1600 - $46
Sound Card Onboard sound $0
Speakers Creative Labs SBS270 2.0 $20
Networking Onboard 10/100 Ethernet $0
Hard Drive - Seagate 7200rpm 40gig- $59
CD-RW Samsung CDR-W/DVD Combo Drive,- $47
Bottom Line - $506
Then crank it up:)
gherald - Thursday, March 18, 2004 - link
Text sharpness is definately a concern, good call AT on the R9200.But I also think PC3200 should be used instead of 2100. The price difference is small, and it will give you much greater flexibility when it comes time to upgrade, cuz 3200 can actually be used by most modern processors like the P4, A64, and Bartons
You can even run the 3200 @ 333mhz if you want it synced with a non-OCed 2500.
I'm kicking myself for having bough a couple PC3000 sticks last year, instead of PC3200. Now I can't use those sticks on new systems...
Zebo - Thursday, March 18, 2004 - link
Ya medfly I agree..Imean what the point of buying a 3200 capable chipetted board and crippling it with 2100. Ch-5 buffalo PC3200 is only $44 at newegg.I also would have gone on-board graphics.. Probablly the smoking Shuttle "MN31N" for $85!! Has the MCP-T/soundstorm for great sound has GF4 MX for video and plenty of overclockers features.
Oh well can't please everyone. Other than that I loved it.:)