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Build your own PC: a buyer’s guide

Manek Dubash ZDNet.co.uk

Published: 23 Jan 2004

Basic platform

At the heart of the machine sit the motherboard and CPU. The first choice was tough: Intel or AMD? The latter offers cheaper computing and has lots of support among the overclocking community. However, that's not primarily what our system is about, so we chose Intel’s hyper-threaded Pentium 4 in order to optimise CPU-intensive tasks such as MP3 compression and video rendering.

One critical criterion for our self-build system is quietness, which is achievable by keeping the interior as cool as possible so as to reduce the need for potentially noisy fans. One of the best ways is to achieve quietness is to ensure that as many features as possible are integrated on the motherboard. The fewer cards you plug in, the better the airflow and the slower fans need to run. Such a system ought to be more stable, too.

So we specified a fully-featured motherboard that included Gigabit Ethernet, which is now cheap enough to be good value and can significantly reduce the time taken to move large files around (especially when you’re backing up). In addition, we wanted Serial ATA RAID to boost the performance of storage -- usually the slowest subsystem.

With that in mind, we plumped for the Gigabyte 8KNXP (£133.61 ex. VAT), whose Intel 875P chipset supports the hyper-threaded Pentium 4 and DDR400 dual-channel RAM. We selected the 2.8GHz Pentium 4 -- the OEM version, since we planned to use a quietened cooling system. This processor isn’t the very fastest available but, in practice, it's not noticeably slower than a 3.2GHz chip and costs considerably less at £155 (ex. VAT). A gigabyte of memory (two 512MB modules costing £91.98 ex. VAT in total) was supplied by Crucial, which is well known for its reliable products and straightforward online memory configurator.

Motherboard and CPU: Gigabyte 8KNXP and 2.8GHz Intel Pentium 4 Processor supporting Hyperthreading Technology.

The final element of the basic platform is the power supply unit (PSU). In line with our ‘quiet PC’ philosophy, we chose the chunky but almost silent Q Technology Ultra-Quiet 350W PSU (£65 ex. VAT), whose slow-spinning 120mm fan creates very little noise.