Weekly Buyer's Guide: High End System - April 2004
by Evan Lieb on April 30, 2004 12:05 AM EST- Posted in
- Guides
Monitor
Recommendation: Samsung 1100DF 21" (20" viewable) DynaFlat CRTPrice: $470 shipped
Not only does Samsung make a great mid-range monitor with their 955DF series, they make a great high-end monitor with their 1100DF series too. The 1100DF is capable of refresh rates of 75Hz at 2048x1536 and 85Hz at 1280x1024 and has a dot pitch of 0.20mm. Text clarity is very impressive, glare is non-existent, and gaming performance is top-of-the-line.
Alternative: ViewSonic P225F 22" PerfectFlat CRT
Price: $610 shipped
ViewSonic's 22-inch P225F CRT is a stellar choice for gamers. The aperture grille is what makes this monitor particularly special. Going by its word for word definition, the aperture grille "is a series of vertical wires stretched vertically down the inside of a CRT to mask the beams from the electron guns at the back of the tube". What the P225F's flat aperture grille essentially does is help to minimize the geometric distortion that users will see on increasingly larger screens, like this 22" monitor. With this feature, the P225F is basically able to display a more precise and accurate picture with sharp overall text clarity compared to monitors without flat aperture grille technology. Because of this feature, the P225F is truly one of the best 22" monitors on the market that doesn't force you to take out a second mortgage on the house. Philip's 22" 202P45, the one we picked as the alternative monitor for our high end guide a month ago, is another excellent choice for less than $600.
Computer Case
Recommendation: Kingwin K11 Aluminum ATX casePrice: $70 shipped
Kingwin makes a great aluminum computer case, dubbed their K11 series. Even with all your components installed, the case is still relatively light, even light enough to carry to a LAN party or bring it over to your friend's or family's house. It comes with four 5.25" bays, two external 3.5" bays and five internal 3.5" bays, four USB 2.0 ports, and one Audio, Mic, FireWire port. There are two front fans, one rear fan, and one top fan included as well. As we just suggested, a 360W Enlight power supply is recommended for a system that draws as much power as this one.
For a power supply, we suggest Antec's 400W PSU (SL400) for $50 shipped. It provides stable voltages, a good warranty, fairly quiet operation, low operating temperature, and in general, is reliable and trusted among enthusiasts. Truth be told, a quality 350W or even 300W power supply may do the job just as well, but since the price difference is minimal at best and because this system draws a large amount of power anyway (3400+, 9800 Pro, etc.), you might as well not leave anything to chance.
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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Murst - Thursday, May 6, 2004 - link
I am looking to build a new system, and I have used this article for a lot of guidance. However, some points I disagreed with. Here is what I have come up with. The case I'm not too sure about yet, as there are also many great choices from other top manufacturers. This does not include a monitor, and I will be looking for an LCD with a fast response time (something good for gaming). Sorry if I left out anything. The prices include shipping.Processor
AMD Athlon 64 3400+
404
newegg.com
Motherboard
MSI|VIA K8T800 K8T NEO-FIS2R
126
newegg.com
Heatsink
Thermalright SLK-948U
43
newegg.com
CPU Fan
Vantec Tornado
15
newegg.com
Power Supply
Antec TruePower 550W
106
newegg.com
Case
Cooler Master Wave Master
153
newegg.com
1 GB RAM
OCZ Gold Revision 2 (2x512)
284
computerhq.com
Sound Card
Sound Blaster Audigy 2
76
newegg.com
Graphics Card
ATI X800XT
500
not out yet
Speakers
Logitech Z-5300 5.1 THX
153
newegg.com
Hard Drive 1
WD Raptor 10k RPM 74GB
215
newegg.com
Hard Drive 2
Seagate SATA 160 GB 7200 RPM
122
newegg.com
DVD RW
NEC 8x DVD RW #2500a
87
newegg.com
Total:
$2284
cK-Gunslinger - Tuesday, May 4, 2004 - link
D'oh! Looks like I missed the boat on this one. Where have I been the past 3-4 days?Anyway, this is a pretty good guide, but I agree with quite a few of the other posts here. I keep up with my own system guides just for kicks, and they have always pretty much mirrored Anand's. The biggest differences seem to be in Storage and Monitors.
With harddrives so cheap today, why do we still recommend only a single drive? You can get quite a bit of performance increase as well as flexibility by simply exploring multi-drive options. Yes, you may increase the total cost of the system by $100-200 dollars, but you'd probably be better off than you would by jumping up to those $250 speakers you recommend.
Also, I know these systems are primarily used for gaming, so CRTs are rather entrenched, but good LCDs such as the Dell 2001FP work beautifully for games as well as general desktop usage. Again, this adds to the total cost, but if you are going to be staring at your monitor for hours per day, a 1600x1200 LCD with 16ms response will be easy on the eyes.
Again, I know these guides are highly subjective, but you've done a pretty good job keeping things in order. I just wish you'd be a little more willing to experiment and explore other options. Keep up the good work!
cbcphotog - Monday, May 3, 2004 - link
1) You made several changes in your latest guide but didn't give any explanation. I'd be interested in knowing why...... The motherboard for the AMD 64 changed from the ASUS K8V Deluxe to the MSI K8T Neo-FIS2R?
... The alternate monitor from the Phillips 202P45 to the ViewSonic P225F?
2) I'm also wondering why you chose the NEC2500A optical drive for this system instead of the NU Tech DDW-082 that recently received you editors choice award.
Thanks.
NordicNINE - Monday, May 3, 2004 - link
There doesn't seem to be many CRT reviews lately. Esp for larger models. I'm looking to get a 21-22". I do play games a few times a week and every other week or so, I play games all night, so I want something that works very well for games, but mainly I want something with razor sharp text. I know that aperture grill monitors have brighter colors, etc but they have lower quality text than a good invar shadow mask. So, would the 1100df be a good choice? I was thinking of the NEC 22" Diamondtron monitors but again I'm worried about the text quality and it seems that anytime you see monitors setup somewhere they're running some stupid looping demo that doesn't show text AND they run through some crappy splitter so all the monitors look bad.Philotic - Monday, May 3, 2004 - link
I second, third, fifth, eighty-seventh...whatever the hard drive recommendation, but my real question is who only uses one hard drive for storage? I personally store my important data on multiple hard drives based on the type of data. I wouldn't store important information on the same drive as my operating system, that's madness! I would use a WD74Gb Raptor as the OS drive because of speed, but I would only use Seagate drives for storage. I also disagree with the speaker selection; I would recommend the Logitech Z-680s or the Creative Gigaworks 7.1s, perhaps the updated high-end Klipsch Promedia 5.1. Video card? I think everyone agrees that this is a poor time to purchase a video card but the guide must go on!Mackintire - Sunday, May 2, 2004 - link
Evan Lieb,Looks like you saw a couple of my posts. I suggested that Seagates 7200.7 drive would be a better drive. Yes, I frequently visit SR. But as someone who orders near 50+ HD's a month I can tell you my personal experience. With 10 hour a day operating time. I have near 70% of our WD based drives have displayed bearing disfunction, by either failing or grinding within a 6 month period. None of the Seagate 7200.7 series drives we have used have failed so far. We currently have a smaller percentage of Seagate 7200.7 drives in the field. And 3 sets of 30 are over the 6 month point with no apparent problems.
The 7200.7's appear to be slightly faster in general use. I personally own both types of drives and can confirm the Seagate 7200.7 is quieter and runs cooler then the WD 120g JB. This is again my experience.
Thank you for your response.
Mackintire
Mackintire - Sunday, May 2, 2004 - link
AtaStrumf,The drive you are refering to is Seagate's 120gig Barracuda V. The Barracuda V based drives are know to run hot. The Hard drive I am speaking about is from Seagate's 7200.7 series. The 7200.7 series are one of the coolest running drives on the market.
I know about vowing never to buy another XXXX brand drive again. After returning near 40+ drives to WD I was almost ready to count them out.
But I gave them another chance by purchasing a 74gig Raptor, and I couldn t be more pleased with it. For now I will stay away from WD normal drives untill they fix them.
Please be a little more specific next time about what hard drive model you had bad experiances with.
Mackintire
Evan Lieb - Sunday, May 2, 2004 - link
TrogdorJW, good call, we’ll include an Alternative for the case next time around. We really don’t get much responses for cases, as everyone has their own priority. Look is very subjective with a case, something we don’t have to worry about with HDDs, CPUs, etc.Ducsauce, try Newegg.com.
Mackintire, most user’s experiences are different. Take a look at SR.com’s database of user reviews on WD, Seagate, etc. HDDs. You’re exaggerating the tangible differences in performance as well.
TrueWisdom, you, like Mackintire, are vastly overemphasizing the real world difference between a Raptor and a JB drive in single user desktop scenarios. Not everyone is going to notice the difference in performance, and certainly not enough to justify a $125+ price delta.
Nigham, depends what type of RAID array you’re referring to, not to mention the fact that you have to buy a second HDD. And your performance will increase anyway with two HDDs not in RAID, anyway.
n4v3k, a 480W PSU is not mandatory, we’ve tried lower wattage PSUs with a 6800 Ultra.
00aStrOgUy00, we’ve tested both speaker systems plenty, and probably more than you have. ;) Also, the whine does not apply to all WD drives, notice we didn’t say ALL drives have this problem (really, no one besides WD truly knows what percentage of their drives whine). Then again, many users will care less with the case we recommended, since it effectively funnels the noise. The Barracuda’s are quieter, but are not faster (and if they were in select scenarios, it isn’t noticeable in the real world), and there’s no hard data that says Barracudas are more reliable than Caviars either. Our experience says both are about the same reliability-wise.
As for those recommending an FX-53 or dual Raptors in RAID….this isn’t a dream system, this is a high end system. We clearly explained why we didn’t want to recommend A64 FX or P4EE processors, and why we didn’t want to recommend a Raptor. They are not bad choices, just prohibitively expensive for the small benefit in real world. And of course, the accepted definition of “High End” has never been “Fastest hardware on the planet without regard for price or reason”. :)
AtaStrumf - Sunday, May 2, 2004 - link
I tested a Seagate 120 GB SATA drive a long time ago and vouched never to buy one! Why? Because the damn thing got so hot I could fry eggs on it!!! The HSF on an Athlon XP with its fan off is the ONLY thing in a PC that gets hotter than that drive. I really don't see where you get off saying it runs cooler than a 120 GB WD.00aStrOgUy00 - Sunday, May 2, 2004 - link
I also forgot to mention, you said the hard drive has an infamous whine. Why recommend it if you know it has this problem?