Waiting vs Playing

[pickxx]

I know this has probably been talked about somewhere but since i only have 24hours in a day and can only read so many websites and such a day i am curious as to the pricing of some of the new products comming out?
The next Gen Video cards are right around the corner and will kill the benchmarks set by previous cards but are they going to be like 600bucks?
I know the 939 based mobos will have features that are worth waiting for but are they going to be insane with the priceing?
With all this next gen hardware comming out so close together i dont want to wait for it and end up having to pay $3500 for all the new hardware. Why wait for 3-6months for all of this to come out and then end up spending all that money for it? i know some people with deep pockets can blow that much money and not think about it. but i am a college student and i use my computer all the time and i have very limied extra income. I can save it and buy something in the 1300-1800 if i have to but i would hate to wait just to realize its going to be out of my pricerange anyway. I may found foolish or stupid i guess but i am not a pateint person.
i dont want to end up with a situation like me waiting for the 2005 Dodge Vipers to come out only to realize i can't even afford it. I hope this makes sense

and also as a side note, i know that building a computer will give you the most bang for you're buck because you're not paying for things you dont want and the things most important get the most money, but how much money can i expect to save with this because i know enough about computers to know that if something went wrong with the instal i would be screwed. I feel i could construct it but i dont know what i would do if something didn't go well. Is it worth it for me just to pay a dealer to instal and config everything for me? or is it as simple as plug and play and the chances of things going wrong are minimal?
Thanks

 

[endyen]

Buy when you can, wait when you have to.
Build it yourself. Most everything is plug and play. Before your final purchase, ask here if anyone sees any conflicts.
If you do have problems, there is always someone here to aid.
All problems are tasks to be overcome. A chalenge, learning experience, and a great source of pride and self esteem.

 

[pickxx]

Thats good to know that its pretty easy to build it. I would like a A64 2800-3200, what board should i get for it? and how much ram? Dont most A64 boards come with only spots for 3 dimms? so 768 or 1.5GB or what?
I do graphic desgin casually, occational gaming and all that so the RAM would be nice to move things along but not a dire need. What do they take DDR400?
Thanx a lot

 

[endyen]

DDR 400 is good, though the premium stuff is not needed. A 1 gig stick is a good start.
The new nforce3 250 boards are starting to show up. Any board from the better makers is fine. I like Asus and Abit, but others here are big on epox and MSI. The gigabyte boards are generally good as well. Pick one that fits your budget.

 

[PukePile]

If you want 1 gig of ram i would go with 2 512 sticks as opposed to 1 1gig stick.

Aquamark score of 34,306 Goal 38,000
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[ChipDeath]

2 sticks is pointless unless you're getting a dual channel system.

1 stick gives more options in the future. I would stick with a single stick.

---
Epox 8RDA+ rev1.1 w/ Custom NB HS
XP1700+ @205x11 (~2.26Ghz), 1.575Vcore
2x256Mb Corsair PC3200LL 2-2-2-4
Sapphire 9800Pro 420/744

 

[pickxx]

So get one stick of 1GB? is that much more then two sticks of 512? And what type or RAM? the high end Corsair or Kingston? or would something else be just as good but half the cost? Is the latency the same on a 1GB dimm as two 512? or does that even matter?
oh and btw, how can i double check that i get a Nforce3 250 boards? is there something i can notice from the name or an abriviation so i dont have to look at the specs for them all?
thanx a lot

 

[markgun]

2 sticks is pointless unless you're getting a dual channel system.

1 stick gives more options in the future. I would stick with a single stick.

This does offer more upgradeability, but it's also tagged with a hefty price premium. The extra $30 to $90(US) for a 1GB module might not worth it to a lot of people. I could be wrong on the price differences, but that's what I've seen for the most part.

<b>Qui habet aures audiendi audiat</b>

 

[ChipDeath]

Having looked about, not only are you right on the extra cost, but it also seems you're <i>much</i> more limited on choice - no-one seems to want to sell single 1Gb sticks on their own, plus the selection of various speeds and latency gradings is much larger if you look at the 2x512 kits instead, so I'll have to say that on balance it makes more sense to buy 2x512 sticks, as you say, unless you realistically see yourself needing 3Gb of RAM in the fairly near future (inside 3 years), which is fairly unlikely really.

As for which speeds to get, if you don't fancy overclocking, then just get some decent brand PC3200, or PC3500 if there's a very small price difference. Having no personal experience with A64 platforms I would hesitate to recommend specific RAM that would work with them as I have heard they can be a little picky, so hopefully someone else can pitch in here?

---
Epox 8RDA+ rev1.1 w/ Custom NB HS
XP1700+ @205x11 (~2.26Ghz), 1.575Vcore
2x256Mb Corsair PC3200LL 2-2-2-4
Sapphire 9800Pro 420/744

 

[markgun]

I'm sure that the 1GB modules will become mainstream soon enough, though. I think the whole dual channel craze is hindering their demand. I just wish that the memory prices in general would drop, as they've skyrocketed over the past month or so.

<b>Qui habet aures audiendi audiat</b>

 

[ChipDeath]

Would be nice - I want to grab another 512Mb myself.

I do have the potential problem of getting a single 512Mb stick in one channel, and my two existing 256Mb sticks in the other one - I'm unsure if I'll get it to work , but with only the 3 slots and 2 existing sticks I can't see any other economical option really.

Sadly, even if they do play nicely, I'll almost certainly have to relax my lovely low timings, but such is the price of progress. :frown:

---
Epox 8RDA+ rev1.1 w/ Custom NB HS
XP1700+ @205x11 (~2.26Ghz), 1.575Vcore
2x256Mb Corsair PC3200LL 2-2-2-4
Sapphire 9800Pro 420/744

 

[pickxx]

So i should opt for the 512Mb sticks and get PC3500? but if i do what brands/latency timings should i be looking for? i am not looking to overclock to get max power out of it, so do timings matter that much when i am not pushing my computer to the max everyday.
Isn't the 1GB stick a bit overkill? what programs or type of programs would benifit from having 3GB of RAM insted of 1.5GB? wouldn't that be a waste of like 150-200bucks? Maybe not i am not too familiar with the details of all of this.
Thanx

 

[endyen]

With the A64 boards, the fewer sticks, the better. You dont need matched pairs, nor will you benefit from low latency ram. Get 1 stick of 1 gig, only if it's about the same price as 2 sticks of 512 each. The boards available (other than nforce3 250?) do not like having 3 dimm slots filled, so use a max of 2.
The samsung pc3200/DDR400 should be fine for your needs.