Weekly Buyer's Guide: Entry Level System - July 2004
by Evan Lieb on July 7, 2004 12:05 AM EST- Posted in
- Guides
CPU and Motherboard Alternatives
CPU: AMD Athlon XP 2500+ Retail (heatsink and fan)Motherboard: ABIT NF7-S Rev.2 (nForce2 Ultra 400)
Price: CPU - $79 shipped. Motherboard - $86 shipped
For an additional $23, you can purchase an Athlon XP 2500+, which runs at 1.83GHz on a 333MHz DDR FSB and comes with a 512K L2 cache, over the Athlon XP 2000+ that runs at 1.67GHz on a 266MHz DDR FSB and comes with just 256K L2 cache. So, in contrast to the Athlon XP 2000+, the 2500+ runs roughly 167MHz faster, comes with double the L2 cache, and has a FSB that is 67MHz faster. All this adds up to better performance that, depending on what applications are run, you may or may not notice. You will be receiving a better performing processor with the 2500+, but don't be surprised if the extra $23 doesn't net you a compellingly different experience compared to the 2000+. Gamers will probably benefit the most from the additions of clock speed, FSB and L2 cache increases with the 2500+, so keep that in mind.
There are other subtle differences between the Athlon XP 2000+ and the 2500+ that are worth noting here, like the 2500+'s higher Vcore (1.65V instead of 1.60V) and larger die size. The Athlon XP 2500+ is also quite an excellent overclocking CPU, and has been for months now, even though they are shipping multiplier locked these days. You may want to check out AMD's mobile version of the 2500+, details of which you can find here.
Also keep in mind that while Athlon 64 processors and motherboards have been widely available for many, many months now, they are still not priced cheaply enough to merit any type of recommendation in an entry level guide. They deserve plenty of recognition in a mid-range guide, however. Perhaps when enough Socket 939 processors permeate the market, the prices on Socket 754 Athlon 64 processors will fall around (and maybe below) the $100 mark, at which point, it would be appropriate to recommend them in an entry level guide.
In a lot of ways, the ABIT NF7-S Rev.2 (also known as the ABIT AN7) is a beefier version of the ASUS A7N8X-X. This is primarily due to the NF7-S Rev.2's better feature set, which includes SPDIF, an MCP-T South Bridge for superior sound, and a dual channel DDR capable chipset in the nForce2 Ultra 400 (versus just the nForce2 400, non-Ultra, found on the A7N8X-X). Pushing SATA into the low end mainstream is very important for the development of that technology, too. Also, if you're at all interested in overclocking, the NF7-S Rev.2 is certainly the cream of the crop, along with perhaps the DFI NFII LAN Party series.
If you are stil interested in what other motherboard alternatives are out there for entry level users, we suggest that you take a look at nForce2 Ultra 400 boards, which are shipping with features like native GbE, Firewall, and 4-drive RAID. These are the same features found on nForce3 250Gb motherboards. They are just starting to trickle into the market and they may just be in your price range.
Listed below is part of our RealTime pricing engine, which lists the lowest prices available on the Intel 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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Evan Lieb - Wednesday, July 7, 2004 - link
As far as the system you're recommending Tostada....if you really want to go with a bottom of the barrel manufacturer like Biostar, the absolute worst 2D and 3D video performance you can find on the market in the nForce2 IGP, and a 2MB cache 80GB HDD instead of an 8MB cache HDD, then be my guest. ;)Oh, and the Apex case comes with a no name 300W PSU. Another huge no no.
Evan Lieb - Wednesday, July 7, 2004 - link
Degrador, it has been fixed. :)Tostada, no, even at 1024x768 the text quality difference between an nForce2 IGP board and an ATI 9200 board is quite noticeable. It's even fairly noticeable at 800x600. Not sure what IGP boards you have used, but I've used basically all of them. They're OK if you want cheap video with occasional gaming, but 9200 cards are better if you want even better gaming and noticeably better 2D text quality.
As far as the keyboard/mouse, we explained our reasoning quite clearly. A keyboard/mouse is a much more individualized purchase than, per your example, a set of speakers. You're constantly feeling and touching a keyboard/mouse, so our recommendation would be based purely on opinion, on personal preference. That's really not what we want.
WD 8MB cache drives are widely considered a bit faster than comparable Seagate/Samsung/Hitachi 8MB cache drives, are on the whole a bit cheaper, and are generally considered very reliable. They really don't run much hotter than comparable drives, and they are only noticeably louder than Seagate drives. The difference is minute, at best, either way you look at it.
I'm not sure what your definition of crippling is, but 256MB of RAM is hardly crippling for an entry level Windows XP machine. How many times is an entry level user going to notice a boost in performance with more than 256MB of memory? Hardly many times at all, and certainly not enough times that they would actually be compelled to spend $50 or more. And since you mentioned it, exactly where are these "many other places" that you could cut costs in this system?
Tostada - Wednesday, July 7, 2004 - link
If I was going to spend $546 on an entry level system (with monitors and speakers), I think this would be a MUCH better system:$180 NEC 17" SuperBright Diamondtron
$57 Athlon XP 2000+ T-bred Retail
$61 Biostar M7NCG 400 nForce 2 dual-channel IGP
$64 Samsung 80G
$90 2 x 256MB Corsair PC3200 CL2.5 Value Select
$40 Sony 52x32x52x16 combo DVD / CD-RW drive
$32 Apex 300W case
$20 Creative SBS250 speakers
$544 delivered from newegg.
A better monitor, twice the RAM, a dual-channel board, and the ability to play DVD's for $4 less.
I would generally spend the extra $23 to get an Athlon XP 2500+ Barton, though.
Tostada - Wednesday, July 7, 2004 - link
I really must (as always) beg to differ on this system. It makes me wonder if the author of the guide has built many entry level systems for average people.In this price range, buying a video card is a complete waste of money unless you need the DVI output (which the $40 Radeon listed doesn't have). The nForce2 IGP does very well, and text quality is perfect for the average user (who isn't going over 1024x768 anyway).
A computer pretty much needs a keyboard. I find it quite odd that the price of speakers is included, but a keyboard/mouse is not. You can use a computer without speakers.
I also find it odd that the guides are sticking to Western Digital drives, especially the WD800JB. WD's specs for their 80G drives are quite bad -- they reserve the right to give you 40G platters. WD drives (with exception of the Raptor) are generally louder, hotter and slower than most of the competition from Samsung/Hitachi/Seagate.
And honestly, 256MB is pushing the limits of what is acceptable. There are many other places to cut costs before you cripple a machine with 256MB RAM.
Frallan - Wednesday, July 7, 2004 - link
I like this system I find it to be really good value for money since you acctually found good products that are also decent performers.But I would really like to se the Overclockers guide as well :0)
Degrador - Wednesday, July 7, 2004 - link
I think I pointed this out last time too with the cpu alternative: "All this adds up to noticeably better performance that, depending on what applications are run, you may or may not notice". Please, please, please can you fix this? It really bugs me :)Apologiliac - Wednesday, July 7, 2004 - link
*fondApologiliac - Wednesday, July 7, 2004 - link
I'm particularly found of this weeks budget system.