Storage components

Memory

1GB Corsair ValueSelect DDR400 - $89.75 Newegg:
While a lot of people tend to skimp on RAM, we feel that getting good memory is still imperative, falling just behind the motherboard in terms of importance. A lot of the “motherboard problems” that users run into are caused by the memory subsystem. In some cases the memory just isn’t built for the clock speed it’s running at, or perhaps the timings are too aggressive for it and need to be raised to higher levels. Either one of these problems can lead to instability, or cause your system not to boot up at all.

Also don’t forget to run your memory at the proper voltage, often times memory modules are only rated to run at certain speeds and timings at a particular voltage, which is higher than default levels

We stick with brand name memory in the FiringSquad labs and it’s a practice I’ve stuck too as well. Having lived in a college dorm previously I’ve run into plenty of gamers on a budget with systems with generic no-name memory installed causing problems. These generic brands tend to have compatibility problems with some chipsets and motherboards as well. I’m not saying that all obscure brands are bad, in fact, quite a few of them aren’t, but I’ve been burned too many times in the past and would rather spend the $10 or $15 (at most) and just get a name I trust.

On a $1,000 system, you obviously can’t afford to spend it all on the highest-end memory out there, but at the same time many of the major brands have lower-end memory lines, just like all manufacturers do. OCZ and Corsair are the two memory brands I trust the most, and both have value memory lines to select from.

For the rig I chose Corsair’s ValueSelect DDR400 1GB kit from Newegg.com, which is selling for $89.75 right now. The memory’s listed as CAS 2.5 RAM, so it isn’t the fastest RAM on the market, but for $90, it’s a good deal. I was really, really tempted to splurge and go with the OCZ 1GB kit selling for $147.75, as it offers CAS 2 latency and I’ve had great results with OCZ memory, but I just couldn’t justify spending another $58; after all I’m trying my best to stick with the $1,000 budget.

If you do have the money though, I’d highly recommend the OCZ, and based on user reviews on Newegg, it looks like OCZ has scored lots of points with end users for their speedy, excellent customer service.

Hard disk drive

Maxtor DiamondMax 10 6L300S0 - $129.99 Newegg:
No system is complete without a hard disk drive, which is why it ranks right up there with memory in significance. Of course, your average consumer (and perhaps many of you) would probably rank the hard disk drive (HDD) ahead of memory, and again this is where your personal needs are going to take precedence. Obviously a faster HDD means faster load times, which is important, especially for multiplayer games, as you can load up levels faster than your competitors, allowing you to get on the map faster and thus obtain the initial advantage. At the same time though, bad memory can affect your system stability more so than the HDD, which is why in my book, memory comes slightly ahead of the HDD.

If you’ve got a huge library of movies, MP3s, etc, and don’t push your memory’s timings or speeds like an overclocker or performance junkie would, obviously the HDD is going to rank ahead of memory, but for my use, I need good memory.

With all that being said however, fortunately I didn’t have to skimp all that much on the HDD, as I noticed that Newegg was running a Labor Day sale on the Maxtor DiamondMax 10 -- these drives are similar to the ones that we’ve been using on our testbed systems for about a year now.

Newegg’s special is on Maxtor’s DiamondMax 10 6L300S0. This is a 300GB Serial ATA HDD with a 7200RPM rotational speed and most importantly, a 16MB cache. The DiamondMax 10 is a good drive, with support for native command queuing, and boasts a sub-9ms access time. The drive is also quiet.

The real icing on the cake though is Newegg’s current pricing for the the Maxtor DiamondMax 10 6L300S0: $129.99! This was just too good a deal to pass up. IDE users will be glad to know that the IDE version currently sells for $128.