To Buy or Not

unpurposed

Recently I was offered the following computer for $1000:

AMD X2 4800+ (dual core AMD architecture; I think I have both cores overclocked to 2.7 Ghz right now)
ASUS A8N-SLI Premium (has 2 PCx16 lanes)
2 GB Corsair Memory (4 x 512MB)
ATI X1900XTX
DVD-RW drive (Plextor)
CD-RW drive (Samsung)
Creative X-Fi Fatality Sound Card (with front I/O port)
Antec TruePower 2.0 450W Power Supply (I think; might be 500W)
160GB 7200RPM Seagate HD
Koolance PC3-725SL (Lian-Li water cooled case)
Koolance X1900 GPU water block
Koolance x1900 mosfet water block
Koolance CPU water block
Innovatek mosfet water blocks (for motherboard voltage regulators)
Koolance northbridge water block (I think it’s cooling the northbridge; might be south, but I doubt it)

Should I buy it or not?

Are there similar rigs that I could build myself with a better cpu (maybe a Core 2 Duo and an 8800 GTX) for a similar price? I doubt it but it'd be nice if so. Also, if I wanted to exchange the x1900xtx for an 8800 GTX later, would I have to buy new water blocks and mosfets for the new card? Presumably this is possible but I'm relatively new to the whole computer building thing. Also, I would most likely buy 4 x 1 GB ram for it but I don't know which kind or what. Thanks for the help guys, I really appreciate it.

EDIT: Also, how often does one have to drain the coolant and how much does the coolant cost?

Uncle Long

....This seems like a ridiculous set up...
That being said; liquid cooling systems are kind of, well, expensive. Why is this being sold? Not to be a jerk but do you really want to take on a liquid coolant system?

Oh, and for the RAM, you could always pair 2 x 2GB sticks if you wanted to leave those other two bays open for future upgrades.

I just don't know about this; it seems like it was really built to squeeze as much out of the hardware as it could, but unless you really need to squeak out that last little bit of power then it seems like more of a hassle than it's worth. Also, worth looking into, was the coolant system in response to a known heat issue? Has this system been running overclocked for an extended period of time?

Blake T

Upgrading a watercooled whatever is often a pain as really if you replace a part you should really strip out the computer and do a test run for a day or so to make sure it doesn't leak.

unpurposed

Uncle Long wrote: »

....This seems like a ridiculous set up...
That being said; liquid cooling systems are kind of, well, expensive. Why is this being sold? Not to be a jerk but do you really want to take on a liquid coolant system?

Oh, and for the RAM, you could always pair 2 x 2GB sticks if you wanted to leave those other two bays open for future upgrades.

I just don't know about this; it seems like it was really built to squeeze as much out of the hardware as it could, but unless you really need to squeak out that last little bit of power then it seems like more of a hassle than it's worth. Also, worth looking into, was the coolant system in response to a known heat issue? Has this system been running overclocked for an extended period of time?

I don't know if I made this clear in my post, but the system is already built. The guy who built it is somewhat of an enthusiast and is selling it because he's building a new rig. The coolant system wasn't installed in response to any known heat issues, it was his preferred method of cooling. The new rig he's building is also water-cooled. I do think it's been running over-clocked for a while, but to be completely honest, I really don't know much about over-clocking so I don't know how it would affect it in the long run.

When you say that the system is expensive, do you mean actually buying the parts and installing them or their upkeep? The only expenses I'm looking at, I believe, are the upkeep of the coolant system and anything I wish to upgrade since it's already built.

Also, keep in mind that it was built by a Course 6 (Electrical Engineering and Computer Science) major here at MIT. From what I've seen of liquid coolant systems, they're rather difficult to drain and replace the fluid but the way that I saw the computer set up (I had it for a couple of days), draining and replacing the coolant was really simple and took 20 minutes max.

Thanks for the help, you have no idea how much I appreciate input!

khain

If you bought the parts new sans water cooling it would be roughly 1k, probably a little less. You do get the advantage of water cooling, though I believe you could achieve that overclock setting with air cooling anyway. If you change anything though your basically throwing out old parts and adding more cost in making it less worthwhile.

Comahawk

Warning about the A8n-SLI board: The small chipset fan is infamous for failing, and unlike other boards you need to special order the part from asus due to its size.

Or you can glue on a larger heat sink and drill a small fan into the heat sink.... That was our work around for it

unpurposed

Comahawk wrote: »

Warning about the A8n-SLI board: The small chipset fan is infamous for failing, and unlike other boards you need to special order the part from asus due to its size.

Or you can glue on a larger heat sink and drill a small fan into the heat sink.... That was our work around for it

Does that still apply if it's watercooled? Sorry, I've never come across this coolant system before since every computer I've owned used fans.

Thanks for everyone's help so far. I'm still wondering whether or not I should buy it though. Deciding comments?

vonPoonBurGer

unpurposed wrote: »

Comahawk wrote: »

Warning about the A8n-SLI board: The small chipset fan is infamous for failing, and unlike other boards you need to special order the part from asus due to its size.

Or you can glue on a larger heat sink and drill a small fan into the heat sink.... That was our work around for it

Does that still apply if it's watercooled? Sorry, I've never come across this coolant system before since every computer I've owned used fans.

It depends on whether or not he's replaced the stock chipset heatsink and fan with a water block. Since the part list in your original post includes a "Koolance northbridge water block," the chipset fan isn't going to be an issue with this system, because it sounds to me like it's been replaced with a water block.

unpurposed

So what's the final verdict?

To be honest, I really want to buy it but the amd chipset and the ati card are the things stopping me. I can always (and plan on) replacing the card but I don't know about the chipset. How long will this computer last and will it be able to run all of the newest games?

Are there any glaring things that you guys notice about it that are turnoffs?

robaal

Here's the last wishlist posted in the computer thread, and after subtracting Vista and one of the 320GB HDDs you can see what can be had for $1100 (you could shave off the extra $100 off the case and PSU, eg. by getting a Sonata III instead).
A C2D@2,66GHz should be comparable to an X2 at 2,8-3,0GHz, and you could probably overclock it to 3,5GHz+ with a good HSF.

I think you'd be paying mainly for the WC setup/case, and I do not believe it is worth it unless you want a system as near silent as possible (assuming it is actually quiet).
And yes - you'd most likely need to replace the video card water blocks, though the stock 8800-series cooling tends to be quiet.

unpurposed

robaal wrote: »

Here's the last wishlist posted in the computer thread, and after subtracting Vista and one of the 320GB HDDs you can see what can be had for $1100 (you could shave off the extra $100 off the case and PSU, eg. by getting a Sonata III instead).
A C2D@2,66GHz should be comparable to an X2 at 2,8-3,0GHz, and you could probably overclock it to 3,5GHz+ with a good HSF.

I think you'd be paying mainly for the WC setup/case, and I do not believe it is worth it unless you want a system as near silent as possible (assuming it is actually quiet).
And yes - you'd most likely need to replace the video card water blocks, though the stock 8800-series cooling tends to be quiet.

I do like having a quiet system. How does the 8800GTS in the wishlist compare to the X1900XTX? Also, I don't see any extra fans on the wishlist.

EDIT: I've never used that brand of RAM. Is it reliable?

Sorry for all the questions, I just want to make sure before I actually break out the money.

robaal

unpurposed wrote: »

robaal wrote: »

Here's the last wishlist posted in the computer thread, and after subtracting Vista and one of the 320GB HDDs you can see what can be had for $1100 (you could shave off the extra $100 off the case and PSU, eg. by getting a Sonata III instead).
A C2D@2,66GHz should be comparable to an X2 at 2,8-3,0GHz, and you could probably overclock it to 3,5GHz+ with a good HSF.

I think you'd be paying mainly for the WC setup/case, and I do not believe it is worth it unless you want a system as near silent as possible (assuming it is actually quiet).
And yes - you'd most likely need to replace the video card water blocks, though the stock 8800-series cooling tends to be quiet.

I do like having a quiet system.

Air-cooling can be very quiet at low system load, and decently quiet under full load (video cards being usually the loudest then).

How does the 8800GTS in the wishlist compare to the X1900XTX?

Well, it's generally faster than an X1950XTX...
to get some concrete numbers you'd have to check benchmarks comparing the older X1900XTX to its successor, and then subtract the difference in X1950XTX/8800GTS comparisons; drivers might have also improved performance of the nVidia card since the early benchmarks :?

some benchmarks:
anandtech
xbitlabs
BioShock@bit-tech

Also, I don't see any extra fans on the wishlist.

The case comes with 3 120mm fans, which is enough to provide good airflow, and SPCR says the Antec TriCools aren't awful at the "low" setting.

EDIT: I've never used that brand of RAM. Is it reliable?

I'm under the impression that Mushkin is one of the bigger RAM brands, and wiki says they are as old as Corsair.
You might want something better for overclocking, but they should do fine for stock settings (technically, they should be fine for overclocking the E6750 up to 3,2GHz)

Sorry for all the questions, I just want to make sure before I actually break out the money.

This is just an example, some worthwhile changes I suggested to the wishlist author were Western Digital SE16 HDDs in place of the louder Barracudas and the newer P182 case, for the motherboard-tray holes (makes routing the motherboard power cables easier/neater); also, as I previously implied, the Tuniq Tower should be better than the Zalman 9500.