But I'd recommend getting 3 drives and use the striping/parity raid option so that you get both incresaed speed and reliability.
I've been trying to find a good article that talks about raid. Let me know if you find some good info on that.
Both Anand and Tom's Hardware have some good info on Heat sinks and fans. If you are not going to overclock you don't have to be concerned about going dual fan. Another consideration is noise. All those fans in the box make a racket, you might want to think about an effective but quiet cooling solution.
What video card depends on what you want to do. Both the above sites have lots of info. Get one that doesn't have a fan if you are concerned about noise.
Finally if you want a rea challenge and are interested in building a quiet box go to http://home.swipnet.se/tr/silence.html. Be prepared to spend some time.
As opposed to what? The main advantage to using RAID is data security, i.e. if one drive in your array goes down you can replace the drive and rebuild the lost data from a mirrored or parity drive.
But the tech_index guys will know how to make it work.
Click the link!!
I currently run a Abit KT7A-Raid with 1200 mhz in Raid-0 configuration.
Raid-0 provides a significant disk speed increase.
What video card should I get?
A Geoforce 2 MX card would give you a good price/performance
ratio. Geoforce 3 better but more expensive.
What type of memory ,I know this board supports pc133 but is it DDR compatible.
Motherboard does not support DDR, pc133 is fine.
For further information on the KT7A-Raid motherboard, go to
http://www.viahardware.com/faq/kt7/kt7faq.htm.
Video card: If you want to play 3D games like Quake3, Unreal Tournament, Tribes, etc.....The best price, performance, stability and gorgous picture - 64MB GeForce2 MX400. Looking at $68 + shipping @ shentech.com If you don't plan on playing demanding 3D games, go with the 32MB GeForce2 MX200 at $54 (@ same place). I've bought and installed both these cards in the last month for different people. You won't be disapointed.
RAID: No, don't do it. Unless you are just wanting to complicate your install....There's no real reason. Just get a 7200RPM/ 100MBs UATA hard disk for the speed. 40GB Seagate (brand) drive like this for $98 right now. I've installed several of these over the last couple of months. Very fast and reliable. No need for RAID on your home PC in my opinion. But, if you want to complicate things and spend more money go for it. ...I do realize it's not THAT complicated. But, it's unnecessary for a home PC in my opinion.
Memory: Just get the PC133. Don't waste your money on the DDR stuff. Price/Performance...It's not worth it. You can get 256MB of PC133 for $29 right now. Three weeks ago it was down to $22. But, the price is always up and down. 256MB should be plenty. But, hey if you want to spend the money 512MB would be sweet. Get two strips of 256MB.
FAN: Humm, this one's tricky as it depends on if your processor is a Slot-A or Socket-A. The bigger the better when it comes to CPU fans. But, I've got a few AMD 1.2GHz Athlon Thunderbirds out there with just $8.99 fans in them playing demanding 3D games and not overheating. On the Slot-A systems I think you get more heat and need a bigger fan. I've used a $15 big fan on a few of those with no overheating playing demanding games.
My kids systems are my best test systems. They give them the severe workout continuously over hours playing 3D games. Well, that's my 2 cents worth. I can at least speak from a lot of system building experience. ...don't mean to sound cocky I swear. Just trying to be helpful to a freeper.
RiVer
I know this board supports pc133 but is it DDR compatible.
No it isn't DDR compatible and DDR isn't even compatible between vendors. The pc133 is dirt cheap now. The manufacturers are selling it at a loss. Eventually, DDR will replace pc133 as low end memory once the bugs are worked out of it. Until that future date, buyer beware of DDR!
Just make sure you have a decent power supply. I use AOpen cases with a 250 w PSU, and it runs the overclocked Athlon, 512 M or RAM, three 20 GB HDDs and a CD-RW just fine. However, cheaper PSUs would choke on that. AMD recommends at least a 300 W PSU for normal operation.