The one below is $655. It has Win XP HE and 3 year warranty 1 year onsite. It has a mouse, keyboard, and speakers. It will ship out the same day as you order it and shipping is included in $655.
It only has 256 mb of ram, but you can easily and cheaply pick up more memory at Best Buy. The warranty makes this system better as a gift than build it yourself systems. If one you builds breaks, guess who is customer service?
I have bought several systems from this place and they are all still running great.
www.cyberpowerinc.com
AMD SPECIAL EXPRESS EDITION - NO MONITOR
# 2ND_USB: Build-in USB 2.0 Ports
# CAS: TURBO X-INFINITY Case 420W W/ WINDOW & LCD Temperature Display (BLACK COLOR)
# CASUPGRADE: NONE
# CPU: AMD Sempron 2800+ Processor [+655]
# CDRW: (Special Price) Samsung TS-H522B 16X DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW DRIVE DUAL LAYER
# FAN: INTEL CERTIFIED CPU FAN & HEATSINK
# FLOPPY: (BLACK) 1.44 MB FLOPPY DRIVE
# HDD: 80GB 7200 RPM ATA 100 HARD DRIVE
# KEYBOARD: PS2 MULTIMEDIA INTERNET CONTROL KEYBOARD (BLACK COLOR)
# MOUSE: PS2 INTERNET MOUSE W/ WHEEL (BLACK COLOR)
# MODEM: PCI 56K V.92 FAX MODEM W/ VOICE
# MSGAME1: NONE
# MSGAME2: NONE
# MSGAME3: NONE
# MONITOR: NONE
# MOTHERBOARD: Abit NF7 nForce2 ULTRA Chipset 400 FSB AGP 8X w/ LAN, USB2.0, & Audio
# MEMORY: 256MB PC3200 DDR400 MEMORY
# NETWORK: ONBOARD 10/100 NETWORK CARD
# OS: Microsoft® Windows® XP Home Edition w/ Service Pack 2
# PRINTER: None
# RUSH: *SAME DAY SHIP OUT GUARANTEE*
# SCANNER: NONE
# SERVICE: STANDARD WARRANTY PLUS ONE-YEAR ONSITE SERVICE
# SOUND: 3D WAVE ON-BOARD 5.1 SOUND CARD
# SPEAKERS: 600WATT PMPO SUBWOOFER STEREO SPEAKERS
# UPS: None
# VIDEO: ATI RADEON 9250 8X AGP 128MB DDR W/ CRT & TV-OUT
# _PRICE: (+655)
I have a copy of XP that I'm not using, so she can use that. The high end video and audio don't matter, but at some point this system will probably get handed off to one of my sisters going off to school.
Anyhow, the system AHF built will work pretty kick ass. I have a few old 40x cd roms lying around that I can throw in there, and I'm not paying for an OS that I already have.
It'll be good to actually build a computer either way, I havne't done it in years.
Yeah Aggie built came up with a nice system there, I'd only do it differently if she wanted a new monitor, or if you needed to get XP.
And the reason I mentioned that is that they have 15 in LCD monitors on sale at Fry's for 179$.
Whottt,
I believe you are confusing dual layer DVDs with dual side DVDs. Almost all movie DVDs are dual layered while few dual side still exist. Whenever you copy a DVD to a single layer DVD you do increase the compression by so much that you'll see all sorts of artifacts in the picture (specially on a large TV). Dual layer DVD allow you to clone a movie DVD and lose nothing of the quality - the main problem at this point is that the dual layer media is still quite expensive.
No Fry's in SA? That sucks. They really do get some insanely good deals sometimes...especially on hard drives and MB chipset combos.
Dual Layer is like D9 right?
Yeah I am talking mainly about the double sided DVD's...and IMO they are becoming more popular, at least here....I get a lot of them when I rent movies now..and I think they suck. I always get at least 1 error on one side of a double sided DVD when I am ripping it..then I have to clean it etc...sucks.
Infinitely superior? In what way? The AMD 64 is waxing the P4 on any and all applications. About the only thing you got going for that system is a PCI-Express vid card, and like I said, unless you're playing Doom 3, Far Cry, or Half Life 2, it's not necessary, and the benefit doesn't come close to matching the cost.Total costs would be about $450 for the video card, MB, and chip delivered. Throw in a $55 512mb PC 2700, a used $20 soundblaster, a $25 52xCD rewriter, a $30 case w/ power supply, a $15 fan w/heatsink, and a $75 WD 8mg, SATA 120GB HD. A bit pricer, but infinitely superior.
And further, I mentioned the only two worth while quality PCi-Express cards, which both are running ballpark $400.
Onboard audio is fine, 99% of all users are just listening to music (if they are at all) in stereo.
Manny asked for the best system for $500, you're already at $500 just on the mobo, processor, and "quality" vid card in your PCI-Expressway to Obsolete.
And for my money, there is not a better power supply out there than Antec, and there's no way in you're getting a quality power supply for $30.
And finally, you are rambling on about ATI making all their cards PCI-Express 3-4 years out. The system you've built doesn't even have the capability to go 64 bit with the new Windows OS. But I guess you can say you've got a POS first generation PCI-Express card from 2005 three years down the road to throw into the new system you'd be building to even be capable of going 64 bit (not to mention another $500).
Manny if you've got the old CD-ROM drive laying around, throw that in there and be good, let me know if you got any more Qs.
They should be more resistant to damage than single sided. The reason being is the label side of a cd or dvd is the side that contains the data. The slear side is just the plastic medium. The clear side can be "polished" or cleaned repeatedly with special chemicals. If the label side is scratched it's all over. That's why on writable media it always says to use soft tip markers to write on them.
I use Shrink, and at times have compressed movies up to 50%, and don't see the artifiacting. The other thing you can do with something like Shrink is take out all the extras, other languages, menus, etc. and it significantly decreases the compression of your movies.Whenever you copy a DVD to a single layer DVD you do increase the compression by so much that you'll see all sorts of artifacts in the picture (specially on a large TV)
Yes dual layer=D9
Funny about the dual side DVD, they are almost non existent over here. What's on the different sides? Is it like you have the 4:3 version of the film on one side and the 16:9 version on the other or is it like half the movie on one side and the other half on the other?
What do you use for cleaning? I have SkipDoctor (SkipDR) which repairs pretty damaged discs.
The funny thing with MPEG artefact is that the larger the screen the more evident they are. Compression artefacts are actually present on original DVDs and when you increase the compression rate you're just adding some more. The way that MPEG works is that it "throws away" details in the picture where you are less likely to notice them (this is a very simplified explanation). So as the screen size increase the artefacts become more and more noticeable. Try it you'll see. On a 50" screen you can't miss them.
A German PPV satellite company went bust because they tested their transmissions on high quality 20" broadcast monitors. But people were asking for their money back because on normal size TVs (29" and bigger) the picture was pretty bad. When they realized their mistake there was no more transponders available on the satelites for them to provide the promissed channels at a good quality - so they went belly up....
Actually menus and sub les are responsible for less than 4% of the data on a DVD. Audio is about 10% (so throwing away different languages does help a lot).
Disagree, they are more likely to be damaged, a scratch on either side of the DVD will screw up the reflective capabilities of one side of it, and the label protects the data side...a lot of times you can scratch the top of the DVD just by not putting it in the drive correctly.
IMO they are infinitely more prone to being scratched, every one of them I have rented has been scratched on one side or the other.
Well they were almost non-existent over here as well...they were actually one of the early formats for DVD that kind of got outdated, but IMO, they seem to have made a big come back lately, about half the DVD's I rent or buy these days seem to be the dual sided, and they have come up with DVD drives, I believe that can burn or play both sides without turning the disk over...
I haven't seen any dual sided with the movie split on both sides...what I usually see is the 4:3 on one side and the 16:9 on the other...or else just special features on one side and the movie on the other....What's on the different sides? Is it like you have the 4:3 version of the film on one side and the 16:9 version on the other or is it like half the movie on one side and the other half on the other?
These might actually be D18's though since they usually have two versions of the movie as well as special features...that might be why the D10's seem like they are making a come back...
Anyway, my problems with the dual sided DVD's will probably be short lived since they now have sleeves that you can keep on the DVD while you play it...TDK also has a new polymer that is supposed to make DVD's indestructible, and I think I read something about a company making a breakthrough to where you can now put print on both sides of a DVD...
All that is neither here nor there at this point though...my issue is dual sided DVD's that I currently rent that are always scratched on one side or the other, making it impossible for me to steal them properly.
Since the ones I get that are scratched are usually rentals..I use a soft cloth to clean them and if they are deeply scratched I just blow off trying to rip it.
You missed my point. The shiny side can be fixed or cleaned multiple times without real damage. If you scratch the label side, there is no fix, since you essentially scratch off the data.
Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC) is a set of wrapper classes around the Win32 API to give an object-oriented interface to Windows. It basically allows you to program Windows apps in a style similar to how one writes programs in Java. It takes care of a lot of low-level things and keeps you from having to explicitly make function calls with like 12 parameters at a time and such like you would do in the Win32 API. Also, if you don't like using pointers you'll hate the Win32 API because everything is done through pointers and pointers to pointers.
Basically, Win32API is a C interface to Windows while MFC is a C++ interface. You hae more control with the Win32API, but your programs are better structured and development time is usually shorter if you have a good knowledge of MFC.
The MFC headers and libraries come standard with the Visual C++ compiler. You can actually download the compiler for free from Microsoft's website, but you'll have to pay the $1,000+ for the package if you want the text editor, debugger, and the ability to compile and link with the touch of a button instead of using makefiles and command-line processing.
I can't say much about MFC, because I always use the C-based API whenever I develop software for Windows (too lazy to learn MFC and I'm scared it will negatively affect performance, since all I like to write in Windows is games... always have to #define WIN32_LEAN_AND_MEAN ).
Apparently I'm going to have to do some programming with one of these 2 and I'm not familiar with either one. The C++ compiler I used in the past was from Borland and UTSA apparently doesn't support it. I was reading somewhere that these 2 are associated with .Net so I was hoping to get a relatively inexpensive software package so that I could do my programming from home instead of spending all my time in the school labs.Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC) is a set of wrapper classes around the Win32 API to give an object-oriented interface to Windows. It basically allows you to program Windows apps in a style similar to how one writes programs in Java. It takes care of a lot of low-level things and keeps you from having to explicitly make function calls with like 12 parameters at a time and such like you would do in the Win32 API. Also, if you don't like using pointers you'll hate the Win32 API because everything is done through pointers and pointers to pointers.
Basically, Win32API is a C interface to Windows while MFC is a C++ interface. You hae more control with the Win32API, but your programs are better structured and development time is usually shorter if you have a good knowledge of MFC.
The MFC headers and libraries come standard with the Visual C++ compiler. You can actually download the compiler for free from Microsoft's website, but you'll have to pay the $1,000+ for the package if you want the text editor, debugger, and the ability to compile and link with the touch of a button instead of using makefiles and command-line processing.
I can't say much about MFC, because I always use the C-based API whenever I develop software for Windows (too lazy to learn MFC and I'm scared it will negatively affect performance, since all I like to write in Windows is games... always have to #define WIN32_LEAN_AND_MEAN ).
By the way, thanks for the info!
I take perverse pleasure in just buying components on sale at Fry's piece by piece over a few months until I have enough to build a system, then tell everyone how cheap I got it.
You can download Visual C++ off KazaaLite and it should come with MFC. I thought maybe it was something for work, so stolen software would put the company at risk. I think I have an MFC textbook somewhere in either PDF or Windows help-style precompiled HTML format somewhere if you want a copy of it.
I disagree. You pay out the ass for warranty from an OEM vendor when you basically get it for free on every part you buy that's not OEM when you build your own system. The last system I built has a 3-year warranty on every singe major part (CPU/ MB / GPU / RAM / HD / CDRW / SOUND / ETC).
For tech support I've found nothing better than the forum at amdmb.com. No waiting on hold or any crap like that, and the community is really commited to helping AMD users fix their problems and do it quickly.
Damn we have a bunch of computer geeks on this forum.
Just kidding.
Sincerely,
The lady who has four computers within three feet from her.
Literally.
^^^
busted!!!
and please don't insult me I'm not a computer geek, I'm a video geek :p
I don't know if I qualify as a computer geek.. I don't build them, I only have 2 systems and I don't do programming for fun... although I did sign up for this Graphics class thinking it sounded like fun, so maybe I'm headed down that road..
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