Buyer's Guide - Mid-Range, January 2005
by Jarred Walton on January 21, 2005 11:09 AM EST- Posted in
- Guides
Display Recommendations
For a mid-range computer, there are two standard recommendations for the display. The first is to go with a 19" CRT, which will offer a good sized screen at a reasonable cost. LCDs remain a more expensive alternative, with 17" models being the preferred mid-range size. Cheaper 19" LCDs only cost a bit more than the quality 17" LCDs, but we would steer clear of most inexpensive LCDs, as they are often two- or three-year-old screens that are being sold at clearance prices. If you're in the market for a display, we continue to recommend checking out local stores, as shipping costs often negate the price advantage of buying online, not to mention that you can check to see if your monitor is free of defects before leaving the store. That last point is especially important for LCD purchases, as many online sites will not accept returns unless there are a large number of defective pixels (eight or more is the common requirement).
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CRT Recommendation:
Samsung 997DF 19"Price: $211 Shipped (Retail)
NEC/Mitsubishi FE991SB-BK 19"
Price: $259 Shipped (Retail)
Technologies for CRTs have not changed much in a long time, and there are not too many tube manufacturers remaining. Arguably, the best 19" CRT remains the NEC FE991SB. It has a maximum resolution of 1792x1344@68 Hz and a more practical resolution of 1600x1200@75 Hz - those of you who lack perfect vision may prefer 1280x1024@85 Hz. All told, the FE991 is a flexible monitor that's great for just about any use. The screen is perfectly flat, colors are vivid, and text is crisp and clear. Even the "Super Bright" feature is useful for games and movies that may be a bit too dark by default.
We prefer aperture grille tubes over older, invar shadow mask tubes; although, some will still prefer the lower priced Samsung 997DF due to the lack of the two horizontal stabilizing lines. The Samsung also has a higher maximum resolution, yet it still only runs at 75 Hz at 1600x1200, so there's not much practical difference. Samsung calls the 997DF a "perfectly visually flat" tube. What they really mean is that the surface of the glass is perfectly flat, but the inside of the glass is very slightly curved. Most people will never notice it, but we feel that in the interest of full disclosure, it should be mentioned. In the end, it's still basically a tie between the two monitors due to the $50 price difference. The only real drawback with either of these is size, but that's true of all CRTs. If you want something smaller and more transportable, LCDs are the way to go.
Click to enlarge.
LCD Recommendation:
ViewEra V172D Silver 17" LCDPrice: $264 Shipped (Retail)
ViewEra is not a well known name, but a couple of things strike us as being very worthwhile. First and foremost is a manufacturer guarantee that all LCDs will be free of dead pixels. That's not an uncommon guarantee from most of the major brands, but combine that with the extremely low price - it's as cheap as our 19" CRT recommendation - and it's hard to find fault with the display. Available in silver or black, the C172D features a 16ms average response time and a native resolution of 1280x1024, using a DVI or VGA connection. There are a couple of minor problems, however. First, we would just as soon not have the integrated speakers - they detract from the look of the display, and the quality of such speakers is typically very poor. The other issue is not quite so minor, and it is the use of a 6-bit display that resorts to dithering in order to reproduce 8-bit color - 16-bit and 24-bit color spaces, respectively. The overall look is nice, though, and we're willing to overlook the dithering in consideration of the price and dead pixel guarantee.
If you're looking for an alternative LCD that doesn't use dithering while still offering a 16 ms response time and DVI input, be prepared to pay more. Sony offers the SDM-X73 - also in silver or black - with an 8-bit display for $380. Most of the other "inexpensive" 17" LCDs also use 6-bit TN panels, like the Viewsonic offerings. For $380, you could also opt for a 19" LCD, but then you'll probably drop back to a 6-bit panel with a 25 ms response time. If gaming and movie watching are not a primary concern, such a display is actually a viable alternative. For more information on LCD's, check out the "How to choose an LCD" section of our last LCD Roundup.
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Rocket321 - Saturday, January 22, 2005 - link
Could someone explain what has changed between the NEC 3520A and 3500A. I checked the Anandtech Fall 16x roundup and it has the 3500A listed as DVD-R 16x.Dranzerk - Saturday, January 22, 2005 - link
Mmm, i bought my 930sb from Newegg about 6 months ago, guess they ran out fast. Oh well. :(N3cr0 - Saturday, January 22, 2005 - link
Well, I think I may go with the system described with the ASUS board but a 3000+ processor to save some cash. As it stands right now, anything is an upgrade from my Celeron 1.2 system. The XFX 6600GT is also available for dramatically less then the Leadtek (40-50$ less) 6600GT, so I'm going to be going with that also.Zebo - Saturday, January 22, 2005 - link
"The Diamond Pro 930sb Mitsubishi monitor is also a excellent CRT choice for 19inch."Too bad no one sells it:(
Zebo - Saturday, January 22, 2005 - link
KILLER CHOICES!!!'Another good mobo is epox 9NDA3J... it's $45 less than MSI..same clocks many say better with new bios. I post at 330 HTT now vs 315 before.. My mem OCs much more too..
JarredWalton - Friday, January 21, 2005 - link
20 - NEC and Mitsubishi "merged" on the monitor segment. The NEC FE991SB is almost the same monitor as the Diamond Pro 930SB. The 930SB did have a few advantages, like a 110 KHz hoizontal scan rate and a slightly higher max resolution, and perhaps a few cosmetic differences.Unfortunately, the 930SB is no longer available online as far as I can tell (and it did cost a bit more). That's why it's no longer in the Guide. If you can find one, it's still a great monitor, although I wouldn't pay much more than $285 for it.
Dranzerk - Friday, January 21, 2005 - link
The Diamond Pro 930sb Mitsubishi monitor is also a excellent CRT choice for 19inch. Very nice monitor, gets great reviews, and cheap to boot.I beleive it used to be Anandtech buyers guide..maybe another type? check it out
JarredWalton - Friday, January 21, 2005 - link
#17 - certainly something to think about, although there are so many possible causes that a lot of people don't tend to list in forums. For example, are they overclocking? What sort of PSU are they running (as a 300GB three platter hard drive inherently uses more power than an 80GB one platter drive)?Most of the posts seem to be related to having RAID issues. I won't even get into the subject of RAID, but having two of those drives running is going to further increase the power demands. What sort of GPU do they have, CPU, etc.? People looking at running two or even three $200 drives are probably putting in other high-end hardware as well, and a 480W PSU - even a quality Antec, Enermax, etc. - may not be able to handle the power demands.
Anyway, the Maxtor is merely listed as an alternative. Plenty of people are using them without any problems, but they're also not using two of them in most instances.
PrinceGaz - Friday, January 21, 2005 - link
Those are a truly excellent set of recommendations for systems in that price-range, Jarred. Compared with your first few guides which I considered to have quite a few poor choices; I read through this guide from start to finish, and without exception either agreed with your choices or would have went with something so close it made no real difference.I'm very close to building an nForce4/A64 box and regularly looking at my options (the only thing I'm waiting for now is the E0 A64 revision), and at some points what you wrote was so close to my own thoughts that I almost felt as if I was reading something I'd written myself!
The only bone I'd pick is with SLI. I'll probably get an SLI board, but not for the SLI capability but because they tend to have more PCIe sockets generally if you run in non-SLI mode and treat the second x16 as a x1. I'll never buy another legacy PCI card, so the two PCI cards I already have are all I'd ever want to put in a new PCIe system, therefore the more PCIe sockets it has the better. The MSI Neo4 SLI board fails miserably in that respect as it has no PCIe slots at all apart from the two x16 slots, so at most you can put a single PCIe x1 card in. I hope MSI gets suitably slated in the forthcoming review because of that.
mad nebraskan - Friday, January 21, 2005 - link
With all due respect, the recommendation of the Maxtor 250GB drive in combination with the MSI Neo2 MB might not be a good one. I helped a friend who had serious issues trying to get a RAID 0+1 to work using this board. We finally gave up and bought Raptors. A quick search of the net found this forum:http://forum.msi.com.tw/thread.php?threadid=63105&...
Now, the problem might be fixed with the latest BIOS, but I don't think it it.
http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?t=368404
Just some thoughts from a guy who banged his head against this particular problem too many times.