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Hi all,

Following is the configuration, I have decided so far; please post your suggestions regarding the same.

My requirements are word processing, surfing, watching a lot of DVD movies, casual gaming and serious AutoCAD

My budget is around Rs. 50,000. What will be the approx cost for the below rig. If I am adding something which is not required, please let me know.


• Boxed Intel® Pentium® 4 processor 3.0C/E GHz, 800MHz FSB, 90nm
• Boxed Intel® Desktop Board D865GBFL with 10/100 LAN
• 1 GB (512 x 2) DDR @ 400 MHz Transcend / Kingston RAM
• Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 160GB SATA HDD
• Lite-On SOHW-1633S DVD-Writer
• Lite-On LTD165H DVD ROM
• 17” LG Flatron E700s Monitor
• PowerSafe 400 W SMPS with headphones & 4 USB ports in front
• PCI Firewire port card
• Logitech® Wheel Mouse Optical / Logitech® MX™310 Optical Mouse
• Logitech™ NewTouch™ Keyboard / Logitech Easy Keyboard Deluxe Black
• D-Link 56 Kbps Internal Modem / DLink External Modem 56 Kbps DFM-560ES
• A 1.44 MB FDD from Sony
• TV-TUNER CARD: Pinnacle PCTV-Plus Stereo
• Creative Sound Blaster Live 5.1 soundcard
• Creative Inspire 5.1 5200 Speakers
• Sony Standard MV- USM128MB / Transcend 128 / 256 MB Pen Drive
• GeForce FX 5200 (128-bit) 256 MB / GF4 Ti4200 128 MB
• Logitech® RumblePad™ / Logitech® Precision™ USB
• HP Scanjet 3770 digital flatbed scanner / HP Scanjet 4070 Photosmart scanner
• HP Photosmart 145 compact photo printer / HP Photosmart 148 compact photo printer / HP Deskjet 3744 Colour Inkjet Printer / HP Deskjet 3745 Colour Inkjet Printer
• QuickCam™ Pro 4000 / QuickCam™ Zoom / QuickCam™ Messenger / QuickCam™ Express

The things that I am confused are the ones with more than 1 option; some will be decided based on their prices, warranty and availability in the Mumbai region.

I have taken an estimate from many different reputed dealers (took the names from the Intel Website) and the total price is coming to 55K. But most of them are too far from my residence. I stay at Kandivali. Only 2 or 3 are near Malad and Borivali. How is this shop, Bitzy which is opposite Indraprasth? Is it good? If you know some good reputed dealer, providing good after sales service, please let me know. The reason I want it close to my residence is so that the engineer can come within the same day of the problem.

I would require a proof of warranty on all the parts. The assembly needs to take place in my presence on site i.e. my residence. Would like the assembler to break open the sealed boxes of all parts in front of me. Would also require him to show originality certificates of all parts. Would like the assembler to buy all parts with bills bearing my name and ask him to fix the stickers on all parts with the date and their signature. The bills should have the serial numbers mentioned for all the items. Bitzy has agreed for all this.

Is there any way of checking after the computer has been assembled, as to which parts have been assembled?

Is there anything I need to confirm / clarify with the dealer before making the deal?

Thank you so much for reading, would request you to please post the reply

Thanks in advance,
Shyam

A couple things.. I know there isn't as much support for AMD processor's and boards (at least in B'lore) but they are still a bit cheaper.. I'd recommend to you our guy, but I don't think he does anything in Mumbai You could prolly save a bit of cash on the Firewire, unless you need extra ports, since most Motherboards come with integrated Firewire..

55k is a pretty good price for that system... one thing though are you getting a maintenance contract from your dealer? In my experience, we've had slightly better support and components on boxes that we've gotten from our dealer that have a maintenance contracts, since they don't like coming out every two weeks to replace something...

Oh.. and if anything goes wrong, make sure you have a complete system and data backup since the first thing they like to do is format your machine....

-Cent

PS: Rs. 50000 is roughly 1000USD

It seems that the only thing you need serious processing power for is the AutoCAD, but I haven't seen any benchmarks on that, so I don't know whether Intel or AMD is faster at it. At any rate, if you want a P4, I'd get an LGA775 version, as there's little to no point to get the inferior processor and skip out on PCI-E at the same time, which is one of its only advantages at this point (unless AutoCAD turns out to be one of the few benchmarks where it's faster, but even then there's the lack of enabled x86-64 support).
For the video card, stay away from the FX series; in that range I'd get a Radeon 9550 or X300, depending on whether you need AGP or PCI-E (and make sure it's *not* an SE version). The GeForce 6200 would also be a good idea if it ever reaches retail, but they're PCI-E only. A step up you can get a GeForce 6600 which is already available and also nice, just pricier.

Oh yeah.. didn't notice the vid card.. definitely the GF4 4200, the only real reason not to go with PCIe right now is that it will be hideously expensive for you... (at least from I remember)... Also when do you plan on upgrading again?

thank you guys for ur replies

intel D865GBFL does not have integrated firewire port hence going for one

i was thinking of going with LGA775 socket earlier, the cost diff is only 2K but from the reviews i gathered, it is not worth going for it plus the PCIe cards r expensive, but i am still open to it.

what do u think r the pros n cons of the 2 sockets?

i am not planning to upgrade till another 2 years

even i am for GF Ti 4200 cos it is cheap and serves my purpose, i think and as u suggested, shall stay away from the FX series

Which version of AutoCAD will you be using?

Will you be doing alot of 3D rendering or mostly 2D? If 2D, then the games you want to play will determine which video card is best for you. I know that CAD loves to suck system memory and any other available resources (like virtual memory space).

I also know that CAD really likes AMD's. I did time comparisons on AMD and Intel machines with the same memory size/ disk space/ graphics cards at my last job and the AMD systems usually loaded and redrew the files faster. I was using 50meg files to do my testing. (I still have files about 170megs in size at home).

Hope that helps.

i am not sure abt the version, but i think one version lower than the latest available in the pirated market

my sis is into interior designing and will be using autocad for the same.

I don't htink you would want to mention pirated too much on this site.

Anyways. . . . .If you are going to watch alot of DVD's then you should go for the Audigy cards instead of the SB-Live.

Have you considered Logitech speakers instead of the Creative's?

How about a Floppy drive with media card readers built in so you won't take up extra space in your computer or on your desk?

Make sure whichever pen drive you get, you don'thaveto install no proprietary software to use it.

Internal modems will suit your needs just fine. Is the internal modem software or hadware based?

Has your sister considered a program like 3D Home Design or similars for her interior design needs??

Hope all goes well with your decisions.