Weekly Buyer's Guide: Mid-Range System - May 2004
by Evan Lieb on May 20, 2004 12:05 PM EST- Posted in
- Guides
Sound Card
Recommendation: Onboard soundPrice: $0
For a mid-range system, you most likely aren't going to need a lot of audio processing power unless you're an audiophile. If you are an audiophile, then you probably already have a pretty good idea of what kind of programs you run that would require the power of, say, an Audigy 2 sound card and a Gigaworks surround sound speaker system. But if you're just looking for basic sound that is of good quality (most onboard sound solutions sound identical) that will play music, games, etc., then the onboard sound on either your ABIT AN7/NF7-S Rev.2 motherboard or your ASUS P4P800 Deluxe motherboard will more than suffice. If you're looking for something more potent, we suggest that you peruse our High End Buyer's Guide from a few weeks ago.
One other comment that we'd like to make about your sound is that if you choose ABIT's AN7/NF7-S Rev.2, you should realize that this motherboard has an MCP-T South Bridge, meaning you can bypass its onboard DAC by using the optical out port on the I/O panel of your board. This gives you much better sound quality basically for free (for gaming mostly). However, this requires speakers with the appropriate receiver, which costs more. If better gaming sound quality is worth it to you, then we suggest going this route.
Speakers
Recommendation: Logitech Z640 5.1 speakersPrice: $59 shipped
While totally unnecessary if you're not a gamer or audiophile, the Z640s are nonetheless a very popular and low cost set of high quality speakers. Whether you talk about the 45.5W satellite output/25.7W subwoofer output or the very effective magnetic shielding that protects your speakers from interference from other devices, you can't help but love these speakers. They have a great reputation for reliability and longevity in general, and our extensive personal use of these speakers only backs up that claim. If you want surround sound on the cheap, it's hard to beat the Z640. If you're a big gamer, we suggest the Audigy 2, if you can afford to spend the money. Personally, we find the immersive gaming experience of the Z640s and an Audigy 2 to be truly great, but others may not be so impressed and will opt for the cheaper variant.
Alternative: Logitech Z-5300 THX Certified 5.1 speaker
Price: $147 shipped
The Z-5300 is, more or less, the more powerful version of Logitech's more successful brother, the Z-640. Besides obviously supporting 5.1 channels of sound, the Z-5300 is able to boast such features as a 100W subwoofer and a greater than 85 dB signal to noise ratio. The surround sound gaming and movie experience is tremendous, paired with a good Audigy 2 sound card. These speakers can get impressively loud and best of all, we didn't encounter any sort of crackling or distortion as volume was turned up to excruciating levels. For the price, these speakers are almost as unbeatable as the Z-640's, though not quite the bargain considering the $88 price delta in favor of the Z-640. Still, the Z-5300's are a good "power" upgrade, so to speak.
If, for whatever reason, you're not interested in high-end sound and will be gaming or watching movies mostly with your headphones on, obviously an expensive surround sound system will be pretty useless. If that's the case, you may just want to opt for 2.0 or 2.1 speakers, such as the ones recommended in last week's Entry Level Guide. But if you have to choose between a good sound card and a good speaker system, we suggest that you go with the speaker system.
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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Pollock - Friday, May 21, 2004 - link
Well, if you've never noticed, the buyer's guides get recycled all the time...I do agree that a retail 64 2800+ would be much better than an XP 2800+ for only $67 more. Especially since socket 754 prices should fall a bit more when socket 939 comes out here soon (WHEN!?!).
Actually, TrogdorJW if you were paying attention to the weekly ads last week, you could have gotten 2 512MB sticks of Kingston HyperX 4000 for $200 from Best Buy.
gherald - Thursday, May 20, 2004 - link
#12, yes that is exactly what they are suggesting. Nvidia's FX debacle is well-known, and good luck finding products from any other company that are in the same league as ATI and Nvidia. (though this may change soon, cf. XGI and Creative Wildcats)Now I will admit that the newer 5700, 5950 and 5900 XT are viable cards compared to their god-awful predecessors, but they still do not quite offer the price/performance value ATI has.
It is a pretty well known fact that the ATI drivers still have slightly more compatibility problems than Nvidia's, but for the most part they work great, assuming the rest of your system is compatible. So if you were going to buy 100 cards for 100 random PCs then perhaps you would be safer going with Nvidia. But once an ATI driver and card are proven to work with a given rest-of-hardware combination -- as AT has no doubt verified for the purposes of this guide -- they by and large work perfectly thereafter and deliver somewhat better price/performance compared to Nvidia's offerings.
TrogdorJW - Thursday, May 20, 2004 - link
You know, I've been using WD hard drives in almost all of my systems for the past couple years, and finally, the whine got to me. I got a new Antec BQE3700-SLK case with nice, quiet 120mm fans. The whine of the hard drive is now *extremely* noticeable, and rather irritating if you're watching a movie with a quiet sequence. The drive in question is the WD 800JB suggested in this article.I just picked up some Samsung SATA 160 GB drives and a 120 GB IDE (using RAID on the SATA) in order to reduce noise from my hard drive. So, while performance may have suffered a bit, my ears are happier. I imagine that for the $85 price, the Antec case is also quieter than the CaseEdge and Kingwin cases you suggest. We could use a new configuration called "Quiet System" to add to the current mix? Heheheh.... Seriously, though, I would love to get more input on what parts make a truly silent PC (without watercooling).
Also, it kills me that for about $30 more, I picked up 1 GB of RAM (two Kingston DIMMs) for a friend only two and a half months ago. Ouch! And my 1GB Mushkin 3200 Level One "only" cost me $213 at the end of February as well. I guess with prices climbing this high, it's now hard to recommend 1 GB for mid-range systems. Too bad. Far Cry, Battlefield, and UT2K4 all benefit noticeably from the extra RAM.
lupis42 - Thursday, May 20, 2004 - link
One minor note. Both video and video alternative are ATI cards. Are you suggesting that there is no other manufacturer worth the money for a midrange card? I have had 2 ATI cards, and I have had major system stability issues with their cards and drivers.gherald - Thursday, May 20, 2004 - link
"However, we should note that the Athlon 64 2800+ comes with only 512K L2 cache instead of the standard 1MB L2 cache that come with the vast majority of Athlon 64 processors currently shipping."Er, the 3000 also has 512k. The 3200 and 3400 have 1MB. So in terms of models offered I'd say the 512k/1MB is split 50/50. That of course is ignoring the AthlonFX, though I think that's perfectly fair since we are talking mid-range systems here... but EVEN IF YOU INCLUDE THE FX, 33% have 512k, so saying the "vast majority" have 1MB of L2 is completely inaccurate. In addition, very few FXs are being shipped, so if you make the comparrison based on units sold my point is still valid.
"In addition, the $173 price tag is OEM, meaning that you have to buy your own cooling, which costs an extra $20-$25. So really, the lowest priced Athlon 64 is still going to cost near $200"
No, it is only $14 more for the retail version. Duh!
I see your...
AMD Athlon XP 2800+ (retail) - $120
ABIT AN7 (nForce2 Ultra 400) - $96
2 X 256MB OCZ PC3200 EL (CAS2) - $135
CaseEdge TS1 Mid Tower plus 300W PS - $74
... and I'll raise you a ...
AMD Athlon 64 2800+ (retail) - $187
ABIT KV8 Pro (K8T800 Pro) - $104
1 x 512MB OCZ PC3200 Series EL Platinum Edition (CAS2) - $130
ANTEC SLK1600 with 300W Antec PSU included - $42
... for only $38 more. The way I see things, that is a small price to pay for a better performing 32bit system that will not become obsolete as quickly due to the promise 64bit holds.
To confirm my prices and see item descriptions, go to newegg.com and paste these into the search box:
19-103-452
13-127-178
20-146-889
11-129-121
One final note: there is a $15 shipping charge for the SLK1600 from newegg, but I am confused as to how AT came up with their $74 figure and which PSU they are recommending. But either way, I still think the SLK1600 is a better deal.
hans007 - Thursday, May 20, 2004 - link
i think that rather than get extra expensive ocz memory , a amd 64 2800+ and a single stick of 512mb pc3200 elixer or lower brand name memory (such as stuff on sale at frys) would make this a better system and cost about the same.ZobarStyl - Thursday, May 20, 2004 - link
Great guide, perfect mid-range system...and guys, with mobo sound like that it IS a midrange system...every guide that comes out someone asks for nicer things when frankly the point of the budget/mid guides is to give you the most bang for you buck. I agree with dankim for any system that's isn't ultra high-end media encoding a 64 would be a much better solution, and the 2800 A64 is only 8 bucks more expensive than that P4...it's only a matter of time before the A64 drops under the P4 in price...then what are they going to recommend as an alternative to AMD? =)dankim333 - Thursday, May 20, 2004 - link
Good point XRaider. I just skipped to the end just to see the price comparison between the two, but nada...Oh, and of course, the point could be made that the alternative Intel configuration costs about as much as an AMD64 2800 solution, which is definatively superior in most benchmarks. But, I'm just picking nits...
XRaider - Thursday, May 20, 2004 - link
Opps.. sorry about above..Maybe you should also price out the alternative system (intel) so people could compare prices/performance on all of these guides you publish. Thanks.
XRaider - Thursday, May 20, 2004 - link