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I'm going to be building myself a gaming computer but to be honest, it will be my first build. Could anyone tell me if the parts I picked are alright/compatiable. I want to make sure it'll run when I get/build it. I also think its going to need more cooling but I don't know much about cooling so could someone help me there. My buget is about $1500 - $1600. I want to stick to Pentium.

Case (ASYS 8676BW Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 450W Power Supply)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811195002

Motherboard (MSI P4N SLI-FI Socket T (LGA 775) ATX Intel Motherboard)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813130362

Processor (Intel Pentium D 830 Smithfield 800MHz FSB 2 x 1MB L2 Cache LGA 775 Dual Core, EM64T Processor)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819116212

Memory (the $286 one. 2nd down) (DDR2 PC2-5300 • CL=5 • UNBUFFERED • NON-ECC • DDR2-667 • 1.8V • 128Meg x 64 )
http://www.crucial.com/store/ListPar...4N+SLI%2DFI%29

Graphics Card (eVGA 256-P2-N538-AX With Battlefield 2 Bundle Geforce 7800GTX 256MB 256-bit GDDR3 VIVO PCI Express x16 Video Card)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130235

Hard Drive (Western Digital Raptor WD740GD 74GB 10,000 RPM 8MB Cache Serial ATA150 Hard Drive)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822144160

DVD Drive (NEC Black IDE DVD-Burner)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16827152047

Could anyone let me know if this will work. Of course OS would be Windows. And again I don't think theres enough cooling there so... any help there? Okay. I put in the product names.

I'd recommend actually listing your parts (as well as providing the links) so that we can see what you are buying without having to click on all those links.

Yikes. I just clicked on your first link there for the case.

Danger. Danger. Red lights.

Highly recommend getting a better power supply. PSUs that come with cases are 99.9% garbage and cause headaches (unless the case is Antec for example).

32 bucks for a case and fan is an amazing price. But it is amazing for a good reason. I highly recommend you re-think that option, even if it means going cheaper on some of your other parts.

If I like the case. You recomend I get the case and buy another PSU? Just remove the one that comes with the case. What do you suggest for wattage?

If you really like that case, then yes, that's what I'd do.

Take out the PSU that comes with it, and pop in a quality PSU. It is not so much a question of wattage (that 450 should be plenty for your system) but a question of how many amps it is putting out on each rail. To put it into plain English, basically PSUs have to make different types of power for different parts of your computer. Cheap PSUs generally suck at doing this. So even if it is a 550W power supply, it still may be completely insufficient at creating the right type of power for certain parts of your system.

Take a look at this thread here. Some excellent info on what companies are good and which are not: http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=792566

I bought the case I liked and replaced the power supply without a second thought. I happened to get a 550W Antec psu but there are other good brands as Don's link explains.

Thanks for recommendations. I will now probably buy a PSU too. Could anyone please check my parts and tell me if they look compatable? I think they are but if I buy them and they're not... X-x Any ideas on more fans? Case only comes with one.

I don't know anything about building intel systems so can't help you there.

As for your case, I think you are going to need much better cooling. It has room for 2 more 8" fans on the front, and two 8" fans on the back. You'll need at least one of each I'd say. One for the front, and one for the back. I'd probably get two in the back right away since you have a killer video card in there, and from what I have heard Pentiums run pretty hot.

Also, when looking for your new PSU, don't go cheap. You'll be running a dual core pentium and a 7800 video card. That system is going to need some really good power or you'll have some major headaches.

Take a look at antec, enermax, or fortron PSUs.

Im on newegg now. Im not a computer genius but I know in my case its cheeper to build this than buy it. Uh. I hope this isnt too dumb but on newegg for PSU Type theres more than one kind. Theres ATX (which I know is my case type) but theres others like ATX12V and such. What one do I look into. I don't know much about PSUs.

ATX12V is the one you want. Ideally it should have dual 12v rails as well.

As far as compatability..it seems to check out

Your CPU and Chipset checkout

And as long as your PSU is strong enough, id say its a fairly nice build.

Got one question though. WHy the RAM? Yea its got a big number infront of it, and the bandwith is nice and big...but the CAS (latency) is 5!

Would it be better to go with a lower ammount of RAM for a lower CAS and upgrade it accordingly?

It is not the size of your RAM (GB) but rather the speed. that high speed has a nice bandwith, but has a huge latency. Try to find some with 3 or 4 (which is still high, but for ddr2 is the best you will find.) maybe some in the PC4600 range

Can anyone tell me if this memory is compatable with my MB? Ive already purchased it but its not too late to cancel. I think it is but I want to make sure. The reason I ask this is because I just noticed. Everything seems to check out BUT. The memory is 2.0V and the MB site says it takes 1.8V. I don't know how much of a difference that makes. Also, I went to the MSI website. Does the memory I choose have to be one their list of memory brands? I chose pqi and thats not on their list of like 6 brands. Scratch that. Now its too late. Now my question is send it back or not when I get it.

MSI P4N SLI-FI Socket T (LGA 775) ATX Intel Motherboard


pqi 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM Unbuffered DDR2 533 (PC2 4200) Dual Channel Kit System Memory

Thanks for any help.