New build - would you go mechanical?

[himynameisbunny]

Just configured a new build for a friend of mine. Aim is to be affordable, fast yet provide a vastly superior user experience than normal prebuilts.

Here's the specs:

AMD Athlon x4 640
ASUS M4A87TD-USB3
Corsair DDR3 4GB
Gainward GTS 450 1GB
Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB
Antec One Hundred
Antec Neo Eco 520w
LG CH10LS20 BDROM Combo
Dell Ultrasharp U2311H
Noppoo Choc Pro
Logitech G9x

Comes to 1179AUD, including $47 shipping from PC Case Gear, and $100 for assembly, installation of software and Linpack/Furmarking.

The person buying it isn't very technologically inclined, however I think that anybody would be able to feel the benefits of a great screen, keyboard and mouse, and that having these with a stellar all-rounder computer are more important than having a blistering fast, bleeding edge machine.

All of my mates that have used my mechanicals have fallen in love. So, why wouldn't this person?

Would you think it's worth throwing those screen, keyboard and mouse in, or would you cheap out on it?

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[keyb_gr]

The person buying it isn't very technologically inclined, however I think that anybody would be able to feel the benefits of a great screen, keyboard and mouse, and that having these with a stellar all-rounder computer are more important than having a blistering fast, bleeding edge machine.

You're absolutely right there.

The next most important things after the above would be memory (which this one has plenty of), storage performance and noise level. Someone who's more into music than gaming would benefit more from a fanless graphics card and a decent soundcard, for example. Now the harddrive, well, a single 7200rpm job will never mean more than standard performance. I guess the budget wouldn't really allow a decent SSD, but maybe you can find one of yesteryear's Velociraptors on the used market and use that as a system drive.

[Lanx]

i'd be cautious, unless he has specified he wants a mech board and he's the kind to be satisfied with a basic $20 dell 104, then no.

[Lpb45]

I love looking at some of the setup pics over at [H]ardforum and OCN and seeing someone with a brand new top of the line everything computer, 3 x 30" IPS monitors, G9x mouse and then a hair/dorito and grime covered 7 year old Dell rubber dome keyboard.

I just put a new system togethor and I have to say my Filco Linear - R really ties the build togethor

[ironman31]

Anyone who wants a budget computer and would like to game, I would not give them a mechanical. Especially if they have never tried one.

[himynameisbunny]

Update: she just used my blackwidow for 10 minutes or so and she loved it.

She preferred the click of the blues - I did say that the noppoo was quieter and lighter but she declined.

Love that she asked after using it "why the hell aren't normal keyboards like this?" Just goes to prove how much people have been brainwashed into buying membrane boards (I'm looking at you, logitech...)

Also really liked the G9, said that it was a lot comfortable than her existing mouse.

My theory proved itself, but to be honest I think it all comes down to being able to try before you buy. On paper it looks ridiculous to somebody that doesn't know what they're looking at. But one use sells itself I suppose.

Also, ripster - the noppoo lettering really isn't that bad. Have you used one?

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[alaricljs]

Now the harddrive, well, a single 7200rpm job will never mean more than standard performance. I guess the budget wouldn't really allow a decent SSD, but maybe you can find one of yesteryear's Velociraptors on the used market and use that as a system drive.

Interestingly that Samsung F3 benches better than the VelociRaptors.  see?

[himynameisbunny]

Having an ssd would always be nice but save for getting a second hand Intel X25 on eBay it's not really possible at a $60 price point.

Even then, they've unfortunately been brainwashed by the "more memory the better" advertising and were originally looking at computers with 8GB RAM etc. so pushing them a hard drive any smaller than 1TB would be a pipe dream.

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[keyb_gr]

Interestingly that Samsung F3 benches better than the VelociRaptors.  see?

I can't say I'm particularly fond of benchmarks pulling numbers out of thin air. They state:

These overall scores are calculated from three different tests measuring the read speed, write speed and seek time of hard disk drives.

So this is purely synthetic: measure transfer rates and access time, do some weighting that gives halfway realistic-looking results, spit out number. StorageReview.com was lightyears ahead of that 10 years ago, even h2benchw should be better.

Most any harddrive will be fast when it's new and near-empty. After a few years of use (with a gazillion Windows updates alone) things will look quite different. You'll also notice the difference when you ask the drive to do multiple things at a time - the higher-RPM unit will simply handle this with more authority. That assumes they're reasonably close in terms of technology, of course. A current 7k2 unit may very well be faster than a 10k that's 2 generations older.

My 2TB WD Black just tears through data.   Puts my 2TB Samsung Spinpoint to shame.

It should. The Caviar Black has pretty powerful electronics, with dual processors and a good amount of cache. If I had upgraded my HDD lately, I would have used one of these. (Shouldn't be all that much more expensive than the F3 of same capacity either.) The Samsung should be more equivalent to a Caviar Blue.

But is it just me or has the conventional HDD market slowed down quite a bit? I hadn't looked at it for a while, and it appears the common models still are pretty much the same as they were a year or two back.
EDIT: OK, so it does seem like there's a Spinpoint F4 out, and 3 TB drives from all the major manufacturers.

Having an ssd would always be nice but save for getting a second hand Intel X25 on eBay it's not really possible at a $60 price point.

Understood. I'd go for a Caviar Black then. WDs have always been good in terms of real-life performance, even if they had their share of problems like anyone else.

EDIT^2: Holy Carp(R), it seems the number of independent HDD makers has been going down from 4 to 2 lately.

[Backward_Pawn]

I would wait a few days.  Bulldozer is going to be coming out very soon and the price of those Athlons will drop once it does.

[himynameisbunny]

It won't be for a little while yet, maybe 3 weeks max? They are still deciding on the purchase.

[slueth]

looks like they improved the lettering on the PRO version .  If you want to save some money, wait till they do those "open box" for the g9x.  That is how i got mines for cheapo.