!~ My new system for $350. Advice needed!~!!

  • Thread starter Thread starter Jotosuds
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Jotosuds

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i've decided to ditch the old junk and just buy a new computer. here's what i've got.

No O/C
No games gonna be played
Windows XP or 2000 Pro gonna be run
gonna be used for multi-track recording, ( so comp needs to be quiet as well)

i already have:

Case
monitor
power supply
floppy

this is wat i'm planning to get:

AMD XP1700 $51
Asus A7n266-VM $71
Crucial DDR 2100 $44
Seagate Barracuda IV 40gb $78
Spire hsf $8
galaxy case fan $6
Arctic Silver III $6
MSI 52x cd-rom $18

i want to get a burner, but newegg is out. buy later i guess.

what do you guys think? can i get any better for less money?

thanks!
 
Jotosuds said:
i've decided to ditch the old junk and just buy a new computer. here's what i've got.

No O/C
No games gonna be played
Windows XP or 2000 Pro gonna be run
gonna be used for multi-track recording, ( so comp needs to be quiet as well)

i already have:

Case
monitor
power supply
floppy

this is wat i'm planning to get:

AMD XP1700 $51
Asus A7n266-VM $71
Crucial DDR 2100 $44
Seagate Barracuda IV 40gb $78
Spire hsf $8
galaxy case fan $6
Arctic Silver III $6
MSI 52x cd-rom $18

i want to get a burner, but newegg is out. buy later i guess.

what do you guys think? can i get any better for less money?

thanks!
Click to expand...

Sound Card?

You don't say how much RAM you are getting either - 512Mb is a workable minmum, especially if you are using XP or 2000. 40Gb is a bit aneimic for a HD especially for DAW work. I would fork over another $20-30 for at least a 80Gb HD.

What kind of power supply do you have? AMD's need at least 350W PSU's.
 
i don't think i'll be needing that much computing power.

vocals, guitar, programmed drums. maybe a max of 16 tracks.

i'm getting 256 ddr. maybe more later.

40 gigs is a lot! if i need space, i'll delete stuff.

advice?
 
256 is going to bog a DAW in 2000 or XP quite a bit-i agree with the 512 minimum. hell, ram is cheap!

i think 40gb is plenty to work with, though i would lean toward getting a dvd-r for backups of large recordings with many tracks.
 
I also agree that 512 is the minimum for 2000 or XP! Better yet get twice the minimum!

Personally I would go with XP but why PRO? Isn't that for just to enhance connectivity between computers like in a business work place?
 
Definetly get 512MB RAM and 80GB HDD. I only have 256MB of RAM in my oresent computer and I'm always just on the limit. As for HDD, for a handful of dollars more, you'll get an 80GB HDD, you'll be happy you did in a couple of months.

Athlons get by on far less than 350W as long as you don't have many HDD, CD, a bunch of PCI cards or a big ass graphics card.

/O
 
Jotosuds said:
i don't think i'll be needing that much computing power.

vocals, guitar, programmed drums. maybe a max of 16 tracks.

i'm getting 256 ddr. maybe more later.

40 gigs is a lot! if i need space, i'll delete stuff.

advice?
Click to expand...

Windows alone can easily eat up 200Mb of RAM with nothing else running - like zerosig said, it will really slow your system down.
 
40 gigs is not a lot.
A project consisting of 16 tracks recorded at 24/88 may easily occupy 2 gigs and more. You may need to record several takes to work with, so double and triple that. Plus operating system, plus application software, plus virtual memory, plus backups ...
80 gigs - is a very good advise.
 
thanks!!!

thanks a lot guys!

80gigs, eh? 512 of ram.. i think i could manage that.

how about the mobo i'm getting? i'm getting it because it has onboard video and because it's n-force. but it's nforce 220 and i guess that's the oldest one. should i get the Sis based Asus board instead? i heard Sis is better for sound than VIA.

thanks again!
 
oh yeah, one more thing.

how should i partition this hard drive, be it 40 or 80? one big sector? how many gigs should i allot for everything? DOS requires how much usually? i'm confused about that whole deal.

thanks!
 
I've been eyeing that mobo myself, any particular reason for choosing a micro-ATX board? The nForce chipsets have gotten som good reviews but I haven't read anything about compatibility issues with certain soundcards, like some old VIAs had. Maybe you should look at an nForce2 based mobo like the Asus A7N8X (if you prefer Asus boards). It's gotten some good reviews. I don't think it has onboard gfx though.

Do a search on partitioning. It's been discussed in great lenght before.

/O
 
I heard the Asus A7N8X is nice too, and I agree with the idea of an nForce2 chipset. I am putting a new system together this week based on an Epox 8RDA+ (also nForce2).

Did you really mean that NewEgg was out of ALL burners ? ;-) That can wait anyhow, until you record something worth burning.
 
yeah, i want a burner just so i can use it as a cd rom too. and burn stuff of course.

i want that board solely because it is nforce and cuz it has onboard video. and it's only 70 bucks! only pci slot i'd use would be sound card, when i get one.

thanks guys
 
hey, i want more RAM now....

Is installation difficult? How much is 512 ????
 
ModalMike said:
hey, i want more RAM now....

Is installation difficult? How much is 512 ????
Click to expand...

Pops in a slot...cant be any easier;)
Price ? Depends on what type of ram your looking for.
 
jotosuds, if it is worth anything to you, i would skimp on the cpu for more ram before i would skimp on ram. just my personal opinion. a gig would be nice, but i really think you can get decent work done with 512-with 16 tracks, you're going to be looking at something on the order of 880mb for a 5 minute song, in total recorded shit, if all tracks are song length. i only do between 2 and 5 mono tracks at a time right now, and though my os is 98se (and hence much less ram-intensive), i still thought that 128 was a bit skimpy. haven't tried recording now that i have 320-i suspect it will be better. as far as hdd size, it varies. just realize that 880 is for the space that you CANNOT get rid of in order to keep the master intact. it's easy to quadruple that while editing. maybe that will help you on perspective there. i typically suck up 200+ megs for a song, with the few tracks i use, during the editing process. i really think you can get away with a 40, but i wouldn't advise it without a dvd-rom. just figured i'd be a little more explicit.
 
Just keep in mind that the A7n266-VM is a micro-ATX board, so you'll be needing a micro-ATX case to house it. Very convenient if you ask me but just something you need to have in mind.
 
I would seriously recommend getting multiple harddrives. 40gig is plenty for me for the audio drive, more would be nice though...

but a big improvement is seen when you get the OS on a completely different harddisk than the audio. I use XP Pro(just over 2gigs) so an old 10gig drive works fine. I also use a seperate program disk; so OS is on one, SONAR on another, and audio on another. Absolutly no harddrive problems...
 
hey guys. i decided to get the 80gb seagate and 2 sticks of 256mb DDR crucial. sounds good?

my mid-tower case has mounting holes for micro-atx. that should work i think for the mobo.

cool... thanks for the advice all!

Gonna Buy TODAY:

AMD XP1700 RETAIL $65
Asus A7n266-VM $71
Crucial DDR 2100 $90
Seagate Barracuda IV 80gb $98
galaxy case fan $6
LITE ON 52x/24x/52x burner $54

grand total: $384 w/o shipping.

thanks again guys!
 
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