Build Vs. Recycle

Pride Goest Before the Fall...

We've looked at the popular question as to whether we should build or buy a desktop computer (and generated a fair amount of debate). While buying is the more popular choice as I'm sure that Dell and HP sell more boxes than NewEgg and Tigerdirect ship processors and motherboards, among enthusiasts, our bent is to build. This is the only way to screw together a creation that we'll be proud to call our computer, customizing it to our needs all the way.

However, when our desktop is having major issues, the question becomes as to whether to try and rebuild it better, or simply start again with all new parts. In my view this is an even more difficult issue, and can be dictated by emotions as we try to revive a faithful desktop back to full duty.

On one end of the equation are our needs. Being honest with oneself, and realistically assessing what we want to do with it is key here. While we all may druel for an Extreme Edition C2D Quad Core, most of us can't really use that much power (of course Bill might think it's just fast enough for his triple TV tuner home theater rig, but enough digression). In my case, I need a desktop for word processing, internet, frequent image manipulation, occasional audio editing, and even rarer video manipulation. I haven't played any games in the last few years.

Also, we need to take into account the parts in the current computer. That old AGP card won't work in the latest PCIe motherboard. There may not be enough IDE connectors for the older hard drives as we shift to SATA. RAM has more flavors than anyone can keep track of, but that new motherboard probably won't support those old sticks, no matter how high performance they were at the time. The older power supplies may simply not have enough juice, or the right connections, like SATA to power the drives without additional adapters.

The old rule of thumb was if more than two components needed upgrading, then we should forget it, and buy a new machine. However, the decision is rarely that cut and dry.

Unfortunately, my current desktop is dead, as in the motherboard won't boot past the bios screen no matter what I try. My "drawing board" has been busy as I come up with plans to get a desktop back up and running. Seriously, computing on a 12 inch notebook just isn't too satisfying, and these folks who only use a notebook don't know what they're missing.

Plan A was to wait for the end of April to take advantage of the price cuts from Intel. While an E6600 will go for $222 supposedly, and I could put it in a $300 Shuttle, I'm not enthusiastic about buying a 9 month old processor, with 45 nm chips on the horizon (and the great unknown of what AMD's barcelona Core2Duo fighter will be). Also, I'd have to wait for over 10 weeks, and even if the cuts happened on April 22nd, by the time I collect parts, and build, I'm not together again till early May. Let's just say I'm getting impatient. Also, I'd like to reuse some of my current parts.

At the other extreme, I was looking into a bargain deal. Actually, it's more of a bargain basement deal, as in we've hit rockbottom. For $80, I can get a Celeron 356 chip, and a new mATX motherboard. After getting past the realization that I'd be the owner of a Celery processor, and could never put that in my signature in any forum without being laughed at, I got more objective. The chip in the end isn't terrible as at least it's manufactured at 65 nm, but the motherboard is simply dismal. It's made by ECS and looking around it seems like it's often more trouble than it's worth. I've concluded that my time and aggravation are worth something, and turning down this "challenge" is a wise move. Also, in this special bundled deal, there's no heatsink or fan included. Aside from making me curious where these chips came from, or if they're even new, when we start adding these required parts in, the bargain loses its attractiveness anyway. This may fit under the idea that cheap is just not a bargain.

After researching processors for last week's article, it became clear that at the low end, the Athlon X2 is still the one to beat. However, in my case (pun intended!) the problem comes down to one of memory. Most of these AM2 boards need the faster DDR-6400 memory, and don't support the older DDR-3200 standard. Some support DDR- 5400, but there's little difference in the price compared to 6400. I have (3) 512 mb sticks of DDR-3200 RAM around, and I'd really like to use it. For me, if I have to get new RAM, I'd forget the AM2, and go back to the C2D, but that doesn't work either as I explained above.

All of this research and thinking is enough to make me start surfing the Dell site. Well, almost, so don't get too scared. It turns out, I'm looking to go with an unlikely choice. While the Pentium D's are no screamers, and ran too warm, they may offer a solution to my current problem. For $56, I can get a Gigabyte motherboard which is well rated. Another $97 gets me the Pentium D 915 in the retail package with the heatsink and fan. The RAM and AGP video card gets recycled from my current box. The Pentium D 915 had double the cache of the 8xx series, which translates into only a mild boost in performance, but more cache is usually better. More significantly, it uses the 65 nm process that should run a little cooler than the 8xx gear that are 90 nm chips. Going through benchmarks, overall, it looks like it's roughly equivalent to my now defunct Athlon 64 3800+ processor. Quite frankly, the processor was fast enough, except when multitasking, so the Pentium D should be an improvement in that area.

Ok, so there you have it. For around $150 I can get a new dual core processor and motherboard. Feel free to offer advice in the comments section... And, yes I do know how much better a C2D chip would be for another $200, (or even a little less), and do still wish to pursue this route.

--Jonas