Buyer's Guide: Mid-Range System - August 2004
by Evan Lieb on August 23, 2004 12:05 AM EST- Posted in
- Guides
Sound Card
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 MSI K8N Neo Platinum 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.Speakers
Recommendation: Logitech Z640 5.1 speakersPrice: $56 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: $157 shipped
The Z-5300 is, more or less, the more powerful version of Logitech's 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 $101 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, 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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Zebo - Saturday, August 28, 2004 - link
Alright, lets just settle in on your orginal statement about different users and uses.:) Overall great guide and I even kept 80% of your recs but some need this Horse power is gaming so mine reflects that.PQI memory is all the rage right now. Check ou this thread:
http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=322406
JarredWalton - Wednesday, August 25, 2004 - link
Overall, it's a good guide. We still need a "gamer" system for the mid-range and high-end markets, as that seems to be what most people are having problems with. "Get a 6800 vanilla!" Well, if you game, go for it, but at $300, that's a waste for a lot of people. Personally, I couldn't see building a system without 1 GB of RAM, but 512MB in one stick is the only possible alternative. Even on P4, start with a 512 MB DIMM (at reduced performance) and go to 2x512 in the future. 256 MB DIMMs are just *so* 2002. :)My one complaint (sort of) is the Antec 2650-BQE case. I suppose some might differ on this, but I believe that case only has a 120 mm fan in the rear and an 80 mm in the front. The drive cage is also "old-style" Antec. For anyone that hasn't used the "sideways" drive setup in the Sonata and 3700-BQE Antec cases, I think they're head and shoulders above the 2650 design. Shipped, they cost $89 at Newegg, so I think it's worth the extra $10. Still, maybe some people like the old style HDD cage? I don't, but to each his own....
jensend - Wednesday, August 25, 2004 - link
For a mid-range system, I was surprised to see the A64 3000 and the P4 3.0C being recommended. The Paris core Sempron and P4 2.8C offer practically equivalent performance for roughly $30 less in either case (and the 2.8C uses up to 13W less juice than the 3.0C as well). 64-bit capability is not really much of an advantage in the midrange, where the amount of memory addressed will never force a 32-bit processor into PAE mode.Evan Lieb - Wednesday, August 25, 2004 - link
Zebo, look up the differences between the Chaintech and MSI boards. You aren't paying $50 more for just GbE, you're paying $50 more for GbE, 3 FireWire 400 ports, twice the SATA connectors, two extra USB 2.0 ports, 7.1 sound instead of 5.1, and additional RAID functionality (0 + 1). Yeah, kind of important stuff, wouldn’t you say?And no, I’d say there isn’t that much difference between the 955DF and Diamondtron (I’ve owned both). Also, if you’re going to use PQI memory you might as well buy a PC Chips board powered by a Codegen PSU.
Oh, forgot to mention, the lowest price I was able to find on an NEC FE991SB-BK was $279 shipped, not the $249 you listed. Where’d you find your price?
Zebo - Wednesday, August 25, 2004 - link
I already said the chaintech was inferior, question is gigabit which no one has in my house worth $50? Nope. The chaintech, overclocking and stabiliy wise was every bit as good as MSI in the 754 mobo roundup done here at anandtech and it's fiddy bucks less. You forgot the additional cost of the diamondtron which is just way better than any shadow mask samsung, use both side by side, you'll never suggest a samsung monitor again. Nothing wrong with PQI and it's half the price.Yup getting double video performance and being able to play all high res games on that beautiful NEC is pretty importatnt to me..Who were you targeting?
8NP4iN - Tuesday, August 24, 2004 - link
i want to see how an overclocked sempron performs...Evan Lieb - Tuesday, August 24, 2004 - link
thebluesgnr, thanks, I fixed that.zebo, you system comes out to $996, not $923. You're also using a clearly inferior motherboard and the cheapest of cheap RAM, and all just to upgrade your video card, which some users may not want to do if they don't game heavily. Again, think about it, different users have different needs.
Milkman95, we’re thinking of upgrading the memory, but are still trying to figure out how many users in this category really need a gig of memory. That said, with newer games coming out and heavy multitasking becoming more common in this segment, I’d say 1GB will be necessary in the near future. Only mid-range users who are on the cusp of high-end would need a gigabyte of memory.
Evan Lieb - Tuesday, August 24, 2004 - link
thebluesgnr, thanks, I fixed that.zebo, you system comes out to $996, not $923. You're also using a clearly inferior motherboard and the cheapest of cheap RAM, and all just to upgrade your video card, which some users may not want to do if they don't game heavily. Again, think about it, different users have different needs.
Milkman95, we’re thinking of upgrading the memory, but are still trying to figure out how many users in this category really need a gig of memory. That said, with newer games coming out and heavy multitasking becoming more common in this segment, I’d say 1GB will be necessary in the near future. Only mid-range users who are on the cusp of high-end would need a gigabyte of memory.
Milkman95 - Tuesday, August 24, 2004 - link
Good guide as always. My only comment is that i think its time to move the mid-range ram to 1 gig. 512 is nice, but gamers will notice performance limitations on newer games such as UT2k4, D3, HL2. I would say currently the ram is the limiting factor on this PC not the video card.mino - Tuesday, August 24, 2004 - link
#12: 4.) that was the reason a wrote IMHO there ...You made a point there.