About to start ordering

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Cheers for the advice,
My customer doesnt have a clue about computers, He only knows what the salesman in PCworld etc tell him. He has his mind set on the P4 3.2HT or above and wants 1Gb RAM and a 17" TFT, thats it. The rest is trusted to me, I have a max budget of £1000 and will not make a penny on it.
I am following Phoenixs advice on the motherboard and my spec is:

Asus P4S800D-E deluxe skt 478 with SATA
P4 3.2 (Prescott) 1MB cache with fan
256MB ATI RADEON 9250SE DDR TV-OUT MEDIA MAX
200GB MAXTOR CALYPSO 8MB 7200RPM SATA HDD
512MB PC3200 400DDR DIMM X 2
SONY 52X32X52 CD-RW
SONY DWD22A 16X DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER
XP HOME EDITION & WORKS

Can anyone see anyone obvious mismatch etc, any advice on more suitable components and some advice on the PSU and cooling would be most appreciated.

 

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Only thing I notice - do you really need a CD-RW drive when you are already putting a DVD-R in there. Doesn't the latter do the work of the former ?

Or maybe I'm being dumb again...

 

good job for you guys then, I read on the description it played CD-ROM and CD-RW but nothing about being able to record them, hope so, will knock about £20 off price if your right

 

I'd be well surprised if the DVD-r didn't do all the CD-RW does, but you'd be wise just to make sure anyway - worth it if you can stick £20 in yer pocket

 

DVDRWs do generally burn CDs
but its nice to have two devices
for CD-Cloning and reading/writing at the same time

have you tried LiteOn, they are usually alot cheaper than sonys, and most major players are just rebranded anyway (sonys used to be re branded hitachis, nto sure what they are using at the mo)

and you can get Region Protection remover for LiteOn drives

Also make sure you are getting a 1st generation Prescott thats socket 478, the new ones are socket 775 or something

what LCD are you getting?
i would recommend the BenQ 17" that does 1280x1024@16ms
but it doesnt have DVI out, very cheap though (under 200)

 

IMHO its best to have two of othem especially if copying from one disc to another...but yes DVD writers do also CD-Rs and CD-RWs...I plan on gettin a DVD writer probably in time for Xmas...so its up to you MrNice...if you ask me I would do what the customer wants that way everyone is happy...

 

I would suggest getting a better graphics card.

I presume the 9250se is a slightly upgraded 9200 and as such it won't offer anywhere near the performance of the rest of the system.

An ATI 9800 card can be bought for a reasonable price and even if you could only afford a 128MB version it would still be a much better card than the one you are suggesting. If needed cut back slightly in other areas such as hard drive size and skip the CDRW. If you are really on the limit then drop the speed of the processor down a notch, you'll still end up with a much better balanced system.

 

Yeah I thought that myself but the customer will never be interested in games or stuff that needs a good graphics card, It's basically a websurfer he wants to watch movies and edit pictures on.

 

i agree, no way you need a 9800 if your not playing games

i only have a 9600XT and i can play BF at 1600x1200