Buyer's Guide: High End System - July 2004
by Wesley Fink on June 30, 2004 12:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Guides
High End System Summary
| Hardware | Component | Price |
| CPU & Cooling | AMD Athlon 64 FX53 Socket 939 Retail | $829 |
| Motherboard | MSI K8N Neo2 (nForce3 Ultra) Socket 939 | $170 |
| Memory | 1GB (2 X 512MB) OCZ PC3700 EB | $340 |
| Video Card | 256MB NVidia 6800 Ultra | $539 |
| Monitor | NEC/Mitsubishi FP2141SB 22" Diamondtron CRT | $669 |
| Computer Case | Coolermaster Praetorian (PAC-T01-E1) Silver plus 480W Antec True Power PSU |
$195 |
| Sound Card | Creative Labs Audigy 2 ZS 7.1 Retail | $83 |
| Speakers | Klipsch Pro Media Ultra 5.1 | $349 |
| Networking | Onboard 10/100/1000 Ethernet | $0 |
| Hard Drive | 2 x 74GB Western Digital 74GB Raptor 10,000RPM SATA RAID (148MB Total) |
$376 |
| DVD/CD-RW | NuTech DDW-081 8X DVD+/-R/RW | $65 |
| Bottom Line | $3615 | |
$3615 is the final price of our high end system this week, not including any money that you'll spend on software (Windows XP Professional or Home, Office, Photoshop, etc.) or a keyboard and mouse. While this is about $600 more than our last High End Buyer's Guide, we have significantly upgraded our monitor with a 22" NEC/Mitsubishi, video card with a 6800 Ultra, power supply to 480W, and speakers to Klipsch Pro Media. Many of you have suggested that we choose the best in these areas and we are happy to accommodate you. We have also made the transition to Socket 939 Athlon 64 and the top Socket 939 processor in the FX53.
$3600 is not pocket change, but we do believe that you will get a heck of a high end system for this $3600!! We've strained a bit to include the latest High End video from nVidia and ATI and Socket 939 instead of Socket 940, so you will likely see some price decreases in both these areas as these components become more readily available. There are also flat-panel options at near the same price as the 22" CRT for those short on space, in addition to the $1200 21.3" flat-panel. You can spend a bit more at every price point, but we really don't believe that you will gain much, if anything, in performance.
Our alternatives also allow you to customize the High End System to your needs. You can reach $4000 with a 21.3" flat-panel and Home-Studio Audio if those options excite you. You can also lower the total price by selecting our alternates and other suggested components. For example, the cost can be reduced to about $2000 with a recommended cheaper processor, a $300 6800 instead of a $539 6800 Ultra, a cheaper 21" monitor, a 200GB Hard Drive instead of the SATA RAID, and on-board Audio with cheaper speakers. That gives a pretty broad range for a High End Buyer's Guide of $2000 to $4000, but we would consider any of the systems using our recommended components in this guide to be high end. The lower end just leans more to value while the highest $4000 leans more to the best that you can buy for some specific needs.
With the next generation 6800 Ultra, the fastest FX53 Socket 939 on the outstanding MSI K8N Neo2 motherboard, and the fastest 10,000RPM Raid Array, our High End System is the fastest desktop system that you can buy today, period. You can save a lot of money by choosing slightly slower processors or components just below the High End, but if you want the best-performing desktop system that you can buy, you will be hard-pressed to do better than our recommendations in this High End Buyer's Guide. Nest month, we will have a better feel of where the new Intel system (based on LGA 775) will fit in our High End Buyer's Guides. We know that the FX53 is still the fastest processor, but we still do not have a good feel for the price/performance and value that we will really see with the new 925X systems. There are many features on the Intel platforms that could make them attractive in a High End system.
Take a close look at the High End Socket 939 FX53 system, sharpen your pencil, and build the system. Please let us know what you think in the comments section.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
49 Comments
View All Comments
Wesley Fink - Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - link
#6 - We will likely upgrade the DVD burner in our next guide to one of the new 12X (or 16X?) versions. Since I am still having a hard time finding 8X media or a 12X drive it seemed a little too soon to take the plunge in the guide.While I personally think the Audiophile 24/96 is an incredible sound card, and a great card for a home studio, I think it is most useful to a buyer who wants to do some recording on his computer system. It is clearly superior to my ears than either the Creative or lower-priced Revolution as a card for recording. The pro-grade converters made a real difference there.
My concern was whether most high-end buyers were really first concerned about recording quality, so I decided picking it would be too large a leap of assumption. The Audiophile is also 5.1 which is not a problem in my book, but might be for some. Frankly the Audiophile 24/96 coupled with the Klipsch Pro Media Ultra is an incredible computer listening experience - but you already know that.
mcveigh - Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - link
audigy resamples everything, some people say they notice a difference. some say they don't.both cards are great and have ther own pluses and minuses.
9/10.....how bout a 12x dvd burner....and maybe a better sound card (i'm just playing devils advocate)
m-audio Audiophile 2496 perhaps?????
starmonkey - Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - link
Enjoyed the article. Good choices. The only one that surprised me was the case; I was expecting you guys to recommend the Lian Li PC-V1000 that everyone seems to be so crazy about these days.RyanVM - Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - link
The Audigy2 ZS' SnR is just as good (if not a bit better) than the M-Audio Revolution (108dB). It also supports 24/192. Where are the quality advantages of the Revolution?Wesley Fink - Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - link
#2 - It WAS changed in the last guide after posting, and slipped through again this time. We apologize. The 0 is changed to the correct 1.ir0nw0lf - Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - link
Nice changes to the guide this time, although suggesting a video card that is harder than hell to currently aquire might be considered by some a bit questionable, but is still a good candidate for this level of system to be sure. But not to be too overly rude, do you guys actually proof read your articles? Yet again (was this way last high end buyers guide as well), you have on page 9, "Those concerned more about data security than ultimate speed can configure the drives as RAID 0, or mirroring." Can you puh-lease change that to RAID 1? It's killing me!GokieKS - Wednesday, June 30, 2004 - link
Much improved choices over previous weeks. Good job. =)That said, still need to nitpick... though the only thing that I would change and isn't a matter of personal taste (as things like choice for a case are) is the DVD burner. Sony's DL drive and Plextor's 12x models are already both available, and though neither are as good a value, but this is the high-end system, and you're still a far ways off from your $5000 limit. It would also be useful to have a seperate DVD-ROM, for on-the-fly copying of discs. (And a good CD-RW for DAE purposes? 3 optical drives may be a bit overboard though. =P)
Once again, good improvement over previous editions.
~KS
SameOldJames - Friday, April 2, 2021 - link
Can't wait to buy this so I can play Half Life 2 at max settings! I already have my 6800 GT on me and now all I need is this! So excited.SameOldJames - Friday, April 2, 2021 - link
I'm just having a hard time finding some at MSRP....