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Grand Rapids, MI | Lance,
I probably can't really help you with MB's and processors. Built one 6 mos ago, but the way things change probably wouldn't be much help now. I will just throw out a few things I learned.
I used a 805 dual processor from Intel. It was the "entry level" for $99, but used the 775 socket like the latest and greatest, so I just figure wait 3-6 mos and the now latest and greatest will be 25% of the price. Bottom line is that you can change a processor in an hour or less, so don't get too crazy with cutting edge for $$$ that will be low end and $ in 3-6 mos. Of course, if you don't know already, tomshardware.com does about the best job of anyone reviewing and benchmarking CPU's
I have posted on here a couple times extoling the virtues of a RAID array. I would highly reccommend you look into this. You can either "mirror" where the same info is written to two HDD's at once. That way if one goes bad, run off the other til you replace it, click a couple buttons and you are back in business with 2 again. As cheap as HDD's are these days, if you rely on your computer like I do, it just doesn't pay to have to have to start over from scratch when you HDD fails. You can also "stripe" two disks, it basically splits up the data flow onto two disks, theoretically twice as fast, in reality not quite, but still improved. Don't use "striping" alone though for critical data, you risk of HDD failure goes way up, since either disk causes data loss. I personally used 4 disks with both "mirroring" and "striping" for the best of both worlds on my server, just make sure you have a decent power supply.
Dual video--Way to go, I love mine!
If you use DDR2 RAM watch your latency, it can vary a lot, the slower stuff will perform worse than DDR, do your research. | |
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