Does this sound like a well designed computer? 2nd Revision

[halfpower]

CASE
Antec SLK3000B

PSU
Seasonic 350W ATX12V Super Tornado

CASES FANS
2x 120mm Nexus - One in the rear and one in the front

ATX MOTHERBOARD
Asus A8V Deluxe

SOCKET 939 CPU
AMD Athlon 64 3500

CPU HEAT SINK & FAN
XP-120 w/ 120mm Nexus

MEMORY
Kingston KVR400X64C3AK2/1G - 2x 512MB

AGP VIDEO CARD
DirectX9, OpenGL 1.4 ** I don't know anything about video cards. My plan right now is to go for a $40 GeForce FX5200.

IDE OPTICAL DRIVE
NEC 3520A

SATA HARD DRIVES
2x Samsung spinpoint with Nidec motors ** Maybe similar Seagates

PCI SOUND/RECORDING CARD
Echo Mia MIDI

PCI WIRELESS NETWORK CARD
802.11G 128bit encryption PCI card ** Theses are all the same, right?

PCI ADD IN CARD
STEREO TV/FM tuner ** I am still shopping for this. I have only identified one card that has stereo audio for both TV and radio.

OS
Windows XP Pro



Lingering Concerns:

350 watts might be more than I need. Asus does not discuss this topic at great length in the A8V Deluxe manual. Is the cooling system adequate? Should I actively throttle the front fan? Does this board undervolt/underclock well? Someone suggested I get 1GB of Crucial Ballistix. For just $20 more I could get 2GB of Kingston. What's so special about the Ballistix? The D/A converters on the NEC 5320A DVD/CD are awful. Is there a simple solution?

Questions? Comments? Suggestions?

thanks
halfpower

[NeilBlanchard]

Hello:

It looks very good, overall! The key things to check would include whether or not the XP-120 fits the motherboard, and whether you can use RAM in all the slots. Also, if you have to add a passive video cooler, will that fit in conjunction with the XP-120...

I would stick with the Samsung HD's even if you have to get JVC motors -- the Seagates are most likely noisier that the JVC version, and the Seagates are certainly a lot warmer than any other HD I have used.

Why the NEC optical drive? Do you know that it is quiet? I have had good luck with Asus and Samsung.

I would say that not all wireless NIC's are the same, at all -- or at least I hope so. Some are going to be much easier to set up than others, especially if you want to use encryption. My experience is very limited with wireless, but I was frustrated that my Belkin wireless NIC could not be set up with encryption -- even with my Belkin wireless router! I made several calls to their tech support, and while they are pretty good to deal with, no one was able to help me get it working...

[ilh]

My NEC 3520A is incredibly loud. Fortunately, I think I will only rarely used it. I wish I had paid attention to known quiet optical drives. Can I slow it down to make it quieter?

[StarfishChris]

Tools such as Nero's DriveSpeed should do the trick. Search for it on Google (it is free, isn't it?)

[halfpower]

...if you have to add a passive video cooler, will that fit in conjunction with the XP-120...

I don't know how I'll figure this out. Thanks, I didn't realize it was a potential problem. The XP120 does fit though.

Why the NEC optical drive? Do you know that it is quiet? I have had good luck with Asus and Samsung.

I just heard that the NEC drive was good. I'm sure I could find a more suitable one if I looked, but it takes sooo much effort to find the frequency response, THD, SNR, etc. for an optical drive. I never know where to find it.

[Mr_Smartepants]

AGP VIDEO CARD
DirectX9, OpenGL 1.4 ** I don't know anything about video cards. My plan right now is to go for a $40 GeForce FX5200.

PCI ADD IN CARD
STEREO TV/FM tuner ** I am still shopping for this. I have only identified one card that has stereo audio for both TV and radio.

Why not just combine the above and get a Radeon 9600 All-in-Wonder? They can be made passive quite easily (if not passive from the factory).

IDE OPTICAL DRIVE
NEC 3520A

From what I've read these are VERY noisy at speed. The Samsung is much quieter.

Also, not all 802.11g cards are created equal. Stick with a name brand (ie. Linksys, Netgear, SMC). That will alleviate any configuration/driver problems

[ilh]

Tools such as Nero's DriveSpeed should do the trick. Search for it on Google (it is free, isn't it?)

Thank you! That works great. It is much, much quieter at 16x.

[halfpower]

Why not just combine the above and get a Radeon 9600 All-in-Wonder? They can be made passive quite easily (if not passive from the factory).

This is something I have been considering. I did not realize that the All-In-Wonders could be made passive. It would likely make good use of system resources. On the other hand I don't need high resolution, so I haven't been planning on my TV card soaking up much bandwidth on the PCI bus. It will probably be more expensive, draw more power, and have a better picture. I would definitely have to think more carefully though if my video card is $200 rather than $35. Do I just use a Zalman of Thermaltake VGA cooler? Do passive VGA coolers weigh a lot and mechanically stress the machine?

[halfpower]

Tools such as Nero's DriveSpeed should do the trick. Search for it on Google (it is free, isn't it?)

Thank you! That works great. It is much, much quieter at 16x.

It was actually my impression that anything spinning at 40x is going to make a lot of noise.

[Chris.Day]

Regarding the TV tuner, you will probably be much happier with a Hauppauge PVR150 card and something like GB-PVR. A lot of people are unhappy with ATI's software and with the Hauppauge cards you get a choice of a lot of 3rd party software.