MaximumPC 2006 06

CPU: The brains behind the

whole operation is AMD’s

Athlon 64 3700+. It rings in

at 2.2GHz, which we over-

clocked to 2.53GHz (bargain-

bin chips usually overclock

quite well). With 1MB of

L2 cache, it’s certainly not

gimped. We briefly consid-

ered going with a dual-core

X2 3800+ proc, but at $300

it was just too pricey.

Videocard: Pumping the

pixels is nVidia’s new middle-

weight champion—the 7600 GT.

This card impressed the hell out

of us, besting the former budget

champ—nVidia’s 6800 GT—by a

healthy margin. It’s SLI capable,

and doesn’t even require exter-

nal power!

Hard drive: The

WD2500KS is a shoe-in for

a budget box because it’s

blazing-fast at a low, low

price. With 250GB of storage,

a fat 16MB buffer, a SATA 3G

interface, and cool operation,

the only compromise we’re

making here is capacity.

Case/PSU: Both of these components are awesome, despite the
low price. Kingwin’s case has ample cooling and is super easy to work
in. We coupled it with Antec’s SLI-capable 550W TruePower 2.0 PSU.
The TruePower delivers more than enough power for our needs now,
and it will still suffice if we add a second videocard.

JUNE 2006 MA XIMUMPC 49

Motherboard: The

foundation for the whole

shebang is Asus’ excellent

A8N-SLI Deluxe. This for-

merly high-end board can

be found for an eminently

affordable $110. It’s SLI-

capable, rock-stable, and

offers plenty of overclock-

ing options.

CPU:

whole operation is AMD’s

Athlon 64 3700+. It rings in

at 2.2GHz, which we over-

clocked to 2.53GHz (bargain-

bin chips usually overclock

Our optical drive arrived after the photo shoot

(D’oh!); see the spec list for details.

The Specs

CPU: AMD Athlon 3700+

$230, http://www.amd.com

RAM: 1GB Corsair PC3200

$75, http://www.corsair.com

Videocard: nVidia GeForce

7600 GT

$225, http://www.nvidia.com

Hard drive: Western Digital

Caviar SE 16 250GB

$110, http://www.wdc.com

Mobo: Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe

$110, http://www.asus.com

Optical drive: BenQ DW1655

w/LightScribe

$55, http://www.benq.com

PSU: Antec TruePower 2.0

550W

$115, http://www.antec.com

Case: Kingwin SK-523BKW

$55, http://www.kingwin.com

Total: $975

in. We coupled it with Antec’s SLI-capable 550W TruePower 2.0 PSU.
The TruePower delivers morThe TruePower delivers more than enough power for our needs nowe than enough power for our needs now, ,
and it will still suffice if we add a second videocard.