Buyer's Guide: Mid-Range System - August 2004
by Evan Lieb on August 23, 2004 12:05 AM EST- Posted in
- Guides
CPU and Motherboard Alternatives
CPU: Intel Pentium 4 3.0C 800MHz FSB (512K L2 cache) NorthwoodMotherboard: ASUS P4P800 Deluxe (865PE chipset)
Price: CPU - $218 shipped (retail heatsink and fan). Motherboard - $112 shipped
Knowing just how much Athlon 64 processors trump current Pentium 4 processors in games, it would only be fair to point out the Pentium 4's advantages in other programs, like encoding or specialized applications, such as Lightwave. Certain 3D rendering apps, like Maya, will go back and forth between the Athlon 64 and Pentium 4, though the P4 does eventually win out in that area. Business applications are no contest, though, and AMD continues to dominate this area of life. This annually "weak" area of performance for Intel and their consistently higher prices are keeping them from mid-range and entry level CPU recommendations. The fact that they're losing their lead in encoding doesn't help either.
But overall, besides the $49 price delta, the 3.0C is able to offer somewhat near Athlon 64 3000+ (512K L2) performance; though as we said before, it will fall very short in certain applications. Certain steppings of the 3.0C are even available online that overclock extraordinarily well, and so that may be a major reason to go with this particular processor. We wouldn't bank on finding the perfect 3.0C stepping of your dreams, though. Search our forums for more information.
This pick continues to be a tough one, since ABIT, Gigabyte, DFI, MSI and other motherboard manufacturers offer excellent mid-range 865PE offerings. In the end, ASUS had just enough features and performance with their P4P800 Deluxe to edge out the other contenders, not to mention the fact that we've personally tested and approved this motherboard for reliability and thoroughly enjoy it. The P4P800 Deluxe is one of the best, currently available Intel motherboards that you can pair with an 800MHz FSB processor, and therefore, a 3.0C processor is perfect. The P4P800-D has an excellent balance of great features (SATA and IDE RAID, Gigabit LAN, IEEE1394 FireWire, etc.), 865PE performance, and a very good "mid-range" price at $112 shipped. Most online vendors sell this board for more like $112-$118, but as you can see, you will be able to find it for less at a few reputable online vendors. If you were so inclined to enter into more experienced user territory, the P4P800 Deluxe is also an excellent motherboard for FSB overclocking. Otherwise, we suggest that you stick to stock, and not overclocked speeds, if you are a beginning builder.
For a more in-depth look at the ASUS P4P800 Deluxe, we suggest you take a look at our Intel motherboard roundup from last year.
Listed below is part of our RealTime pricing engine, which lists the lowest prices available on the Intel CPUs and motherboards from many different reputable vendors:
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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KristopherKubicki - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
The 2510 is junk for dual layer burning. I think quality has gone up a bit in the last 4 months, but when it first came out it burned coaster after coaster.But then again, same for the QSI/Nutech stuff.
Kristopher
ceefka - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
BTW, I like these guides. They have proven to be helpful in understanding what vendors are offering.Most vendors keep their total set price low with crappy mobo's, slow and/or <512MB RAM, el cheapo AGP-cards etc. Very different from what happens here.
I've been reading these guides and comparing them with fixed offerings. I know now I will build my own machine. 2 years ago I knew next to nothing of PC's and I would have bought a Dell blindfolded... Thank you AT!
Booty - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
I was happy to see the Antec case recommended in this article. I think it's a much better case than some of the ones you've been recommending in the low-end and mid-range guides.ceefka - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
So let's say1. I'll replace the DVD-burner with the NEC 2510 2. put in 2x512MB of RAM
3. stick to my old Dell 17" CRT monitor that can easily handle 1248 x 1028
4. stick to the rest of the summary. Would I be happy with a system like this editing my Mini DV tapes?
I especially wonder if someone would recommend another graphics card. I liked the connectivity of the Asus V9520 Home Theater, Geforce FX 5200, 128Mb,TV because it featured S-VHS in. That way I could also commit things from VHS-tapes to DVD. There is also de Studio 9 DV/AV from Pinnacle that you could add on later, but of course that will cost you extra.
Illissius - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
I agree with most picks, but would have put the 9800 Pro as the default video card and perhaps a 6800 non Ultra as the alternative. An A64 3000+ coupled with a lowly 9600 Pro is among the more unbalanced gaming systems I've seen.RobertMcDonald - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
What about the nVidia 5900XT? Its predecessor (the 5900SE) did remarkably well for bang-for-the-buck back on the Q4 2003 graphics roundup. It's a bit more expensive than the 9600 Pro, but I believe the performance difference justifies it. Granted, it can't keep up with the *really* high-end cards, but in the mid-range, its bang-for-the-buck seems hard to beat.CeilingHoles - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
I agree with paxnot. Many people, including myself, have bought the NuTech DVD burner because of your recommendation. So far, all I've had is problems with this drive, and I'm not the only one.. The NEC 2150A is clearly the superior drive for the price range.paxnot - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
I generally believe that AT does a great job at putting forth excellent recommendation, but there is one recommendation in this article that is simply ridiculuos. I am talking about recommendation of the NuTech DDW-082 burner. This burner has been recommended month on month in this guide. But quite honestly, it's a piece of crap. I purchase this drive based mainly on AT's recommendation and I have regretted it ever since. I have tried several different media with this drive and the performance is still awful. If I burn movies faster than 1x, the movies come out with pixelated scenes. Further, the drive has abysmal read speeds. My year old vanilla-flavored dvd consistently outperforms the Nutech drive by a 20-50 margin. I believe that the NEC ND-2510A burner is superior to the NuTEch burner. Not only does it support Dual Layer media, but it has better media support. NuTech is a second rate company. It's website support is awful and limited. Furthermore, AT's recommendation rest on a $6 dollar price differential. 6 bucks!. You lose DL support, (yes, dl media is rare) but for 6 lousy bucks you get a resonable future proof drive from a trusted company. Shame on AT for recommending this inferior burner.thebluesgnr - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
Nice article Evan - well done. I really enjoyed this one.I have one small comment though (of course ;)
"We should also mention that you don't have to get two pairs of 256MB modules if you think you'll be making big memory upgrades in the future. That is, you can opt for a 512MB OCZ PC3200 EL stick in order to save an additional DIMM slot for future memory expansion. "
It should be made clear that this comment is specific to the main mobo/cpu pick (Athlon 64), and if you go with the alternative (Pentium 4) two sticks is highly recommended.
There's also a small typo there - it says "two pairs" instead of one.
Thanks,