if you built your own pc for recording...

N

nisthana

New member
can you please tell me what motherboards, processor, RAM, HDD, powersupply, case, CPU fan, sound card etc you have ? Please tell me the model number so I can search that up on the net.

I am convinced that building a PC myself is not rocket science, but I dont know what components to use, specifically for sound purposes, and where to buy them.

This site has been really helpful to me. I thank thee for all the help
 
As far as what components to use, there are many many options. For Audio Stuff, I've found that motherboards with an Nforce chipset seem to be pretty well accepted. I've been using ASUS motherboards for a few years now and have been very pleased with their performance. I personally like AMD's desktop processors, and you will want DDR Ram (probably DDR400) I would probably look into getting Serial ATA (SATA) Hard drives, and most motherboards nowadays have SATA connections on them. As far as an audio interface (soundcard), I use an RME Fireface 800, and have also used the PreSonus Firepod and the Tascam FW-1804, all of which are Firewire devices. You would probably have to buy a firewire card for your motherboard, but those are cheap, and firewire devices will be more "future" compatible than a PCI audio interface.

Oh, and a fantastic place to buy computer equipment is www.newegg.com. Great prices, an overwhelming selection, and fast as hell shipping. Good luck to you.
 
Try this for size:

----------------

CPU:
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 3800+ (Socket 939)

Motherboard:
Abit AN8

CPU cooler:
Zalman CNPS7700-CU Ultra-Quiet CPU Cooler

Case:
Lian-Li PC-7 PLUS Silver Aluminium

RAM:
OCZ 2GB (2 x 1GB) PC3200 Dual Channel Platinum Series EL-DDR CAS2

Power Supply (PSU):
Antec Phantom 500W Hybrid Fan Silent ATX2.0 PSU

DVD/CD writer:
Plextor PX-716AL Dual Layer Slot Loading 16x4x DVD±RW ReWriter - Retail

Two Seagate hard drives:
2 X Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 NCQ 250GB ST3250823AS SATA 8MB Cache

----------------

The sound card / audio interface, really depends on what you're doing.
I have a Delta66 with Omni I/O.
 
Picture of my setup thus far:
http://www.hiphopgateway.com/PDR_0210.jpg

I built my computer... and I if I could have just gotten a good dell, gateway, or HP...I would have rather done that... it was a lot more difficult then i anticipated...

Biggest THING! Make sure you get a quiet case and research CPU fans etc. My fans arent that loud but the case i have seems to vibrate everything and its loud as hell!


Mine has blue neons on it and all that stuff you think is cool when you start building... my advice is dont do the whole neon thing... maybe like a light dimmed neon thing is cool... mine is the brightest thing and just not really worth it in my opinion. i think it just sucks up energy plus makes hooking up more difficult...

Now onto your questions...

I like Athlon processors... they seem to be rated pretty good everywhere... I ended up with a 3.02 ghz Celeron (not that good of a brand but hey 3.02 for like $70) .. I got a motherboard CPU combo kit for like $150 offa tiger direct and for that price i couldnt pass up a 3ghz processor, my budget was limited... my system also has 2gigs of 133 ddr ram ... 133 isnt the best frequency ram out... actually one of the lower models of ddr ram but anyway... with 2 gigabytes of ddr ram... my system preforms very nice... got two gigs for about $200 offa newegg.com

If I could I would use a motherboard that supports SATA hard drives and of course you'll need to purchase a hard drive that is SATA powered too... Mine is 250 gig Maxtor(good hard drive brand) 7200RPM 7mb cache (i think) that i bought from tigerdirect.com for like $100 (great price!)

newegg.com and tigerdirect.com are gonna be your best friends...

But look around and be sure... i wasted so much time and money throughout building this thing...

Your most key features are keeping your system cool, noise, and of course having good specs... My shit was running at like 85-95 degrees until i upgraded the cpu fan... and that wasnt good for my processor, actually that might have been the reason my athlon processor went (that i originally had)... theres just a lot to look into... and be very careful with everything.... ESPECIALLY installing the CPU that you dont break it... my CPU heatsink & fan have to be screwed on and you could screw it on too tight and crack the CPU... just careful careful with everything... PLUS! DONT SLIP WITH A SCREWDRIVER AND HIT THE MOTHERBOARD... i did that with one motherboard and ruined it... and it was just a slight little slip... that must have cut one fo the lines on the board...

Well thats all the advice i have...

Whats your budget?
 
good plans codmate...

I actually got that Zalman CNPS7700-CU Ultra-Quiet CPU Cooler and it works well...

Thgat antec power supply is expensive... ;)

But its worth it... powersupplys can be loud...
 
This works well for me:

XPHomeSP2
Asus AV8 Deluxe
Flatron ez T910B
Presonus Firebox AudioCard
Asus GeForce 6800gt
1gig KingMax
AMD Athalon64 3200+
160g sata
80g sata
 
ThaArtist said:
Maxtor(good hard drive brand)
Click to expand...

No offence - but I have to disagree about that.
I've had several Maxtor HDDs that wrote bad sectors and failed before their time over the years. These days I stay far far away from them.

WD hard drives are reliable, but noisy.
I tend to stick with Seagate.

This is a good site for HDD info:
http://www.storagereview.com/

This is a good site for silencing info:
http://www.quietpc.com/
 
How is ASUS A8N-E ? This supports AMD Athlon dual core and has 1 PCI-Express and 3 PCI slots. Doesnt have any AGP though. How is PCI-E different from AGP ? The guy in local comp store told me PCI-e will replace AGP ?
Also, it doesnt have a fire-wire, which I think I can install later (PCI I guess), but that would take one PCI slot. Other PCI would be taken by sound card, that leaves me with one extra PCI. Do you guys think thats cutting too thin ? What else would I need PCI for ?
If the above MoBo isnt good, any recommendations for good AMD/Intel MoBos ?
I am not constraint on the budget too much, I guess I am ready for $1500 with monitor and it tightens after that :-))
 
My planned upgrade, from a Athlon XP 2500+ 512MB ram 80gig hard drive, is to a nice shinny new Dual core Athlon X2.

Specs
-----------------------
-Athlon X2 4400+
-Asus AN8 SLI Premium
-OCZ 2GB Platinum memory
-160GB Western Digital SATA II Hard drive
-NEC 8x Dual Layer DVD Burner
-OCZ 450 watt Mod Stream power supply
-Kingwin Windowed Case
-----------------------

All this will be coupled to a Digi002 rack and a Dell 20" widescreen monitor.
 
Codmate said:
No offence - but I have to disagree about that.
I've had several Maxtor HDDs that wrote bad sectors and failed before their time over the years. These days I stay far far away from them.
Click to expand...

Well I can't really disaggree from first hand experience because this is the first Maxtor I've owned (just bought not too long ago)... I've had seagates and they eventually messed up somehow... I got two right now that have messed up on me twice now, even after reformating them... Dont really know what their problem is...

Maybe its just every brand has their bad items? I dunno... I was always under the impression that Maxtor was one of the top brands for hard drives...

Straight from their web site... "Maxtor Corporation is one of the world's largest suppliers of hard disk drive storage products and solutions." -- http://www.maxtor.com

Joe
 
Tyan K8WE
2x opteron 244 stock cooler
2GB registered ram
Hitachi 80GB sataII OS disk
Areca raid controller with 4x Hitachi 160GB sataII in rad 5 for data
RME Hammerfall 9652
All in a Coolermaster Stacker with 2 psu's
 
ThaArtist said:
...Straight from their web site... "Maxtor Corporation is one of the world's largest suppliers of hard disk drive storage products and solutions." -- http://www.maxtor.com

Joe
Click to expand...

That's marketing! Every company will say they are the biggest and best at what they do.

I don't think Maxtors are bad drives at all, but I've been very satisfied with my Western Digital drives. I have two 8 meg cache models in my DAW, and they have been rock solid while running all day long, every day.

Regarding CPU - I'm just not sold on the Celeron for DAW work. You could've gotten a lot of bang for the buck with AMD, or just jumped into P4. I just don't think the processing power is there with Celeron, and I'd guess that even an AMD Sempron would've been a better route to go. But hey, if it works for you then that's cool! Start makin' some music. :)
 
my junk

It will depend on what and how you are recording and the hardware/software you use for recording. If software based, you will need more processing horsepower. The more hardware based, the less CPU intensive. I originally built my strongest machine for video, and used the Abit IC-7G mobo, P4 3.1Ghz with 1GB of Geil ram, 2 HDs - one for OS/apps and one for data. One is a 120G WD, and the other a 160G Maxtor. I have had good luck over the years with both brands. I haven't used Seagate but have heard good things about them. I would like to have the WD Raptor 74G for the OS and apps drive. I am running XP Pro SP1 tweaked for audio work exclusively. Fans and PS were quiet types with adjustable speeds. Aluminum case for improved cooling. Sorry I can't remember the brands, its been a couple years. I have a hardware DSP DAW, Paris, so I really don't need all this horsepower. I have a couple Athon computers also to which I intend to move the DAW to a Barton XP2500+ and use the P4 for Soft Synths, VSTi, etc, which will require lots of horsepower, and maybe MIDI on the other 1.33Ghz Athlon.
Hope this is of some general help since the stuff above is a little dated.
 
ThaArtist said:
good plans codmate...

I actually got that Zalman CNPS7700-CU Ultra-Quiet CPU Cooler and it works well...

Thgat antec power supply is expensive... ;)

But its worth it... powersupplys can be loud...
Click to expand...
Hi there, I need some advice on the Zalman Cpu fan you mentioned, I just bought one myself, this thing is bloody huge and will never fit in my case.
I would like to know the size of case your using, mobo specs would also be handy?

I'm looking to purchase the Antec slk3700bqe super midtower and at the moment I'm using a Gigabyte 661FXM-RZ motherboard and a really crappy generic case.
 
windbuks said:
I'm looking to purchase the Antec slk3700bqe super midtower and at the moment I'm using a Gigabyte 661FXM-RZ motherboard and a really crappy generic case.
Click to expand...

Heres the case I'm using:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811144026

(Don't get this case though! I'm purchasing a new one cause its way too loud... )

The case you are thinking of using looks to be fine, just make sure it stays cool. I would utilize that big 120mm fan in the back, plushave a QUIET dual fan powersupply. I think the ones with a fan on the bottom and back work better. (that might not be totally necessary though...) If you want you could e-mail the company for reassurance... It will work though.

Your motherboard I found online and it looks to be an Intel motherboard and cpu socket 478. This fan supports this motherboard as I have an intel board right now with socket 478 and have the same fan hooked up. The fan comes with instructions, just follow the instructions and adapter pieces for "socket 478"... If you don't have the instructions I also found them online.
 
Last edited:
Havoc - that's one heck of machine ... and I should know because it's very close to my set up.

FWIW - I've used, and continue to use all of the big three drive manufacturers - Maxtor/Seagate/Western Digital. In the past, I've had only Seagate give me any failure trouble (in a Compaq machine at the time), but it warned me before it went, so I didn't lose any data. I did have a Maxtor fail too, but it was MY fault ... I accidently shocked it. Other than that, I've found all of them to be equally reliable and wouldn't hesitate to use any of them.

Best,

Kev
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top