EggXpert

Side note due to the way points are done now, I have just posted points for the people most helpful :)

Thanks for all the little point thingies! :)

Really, though.  Thanks. :)

Hope everything goes well in your build Temptest ^^

Just ask if you need anymore opinions/helps...

 Respectfully,

PROACEX1

Ouch! You got an intel Mobo?

 My experience with those has always been "Great for a workplace / corporate workstation, but I'd never build a gamer rig out of it..."

That's a decent list of premium parts, no doubt, but let me point a few things out with that build:

1) 4GB of RAM? You do realize that Windows XP/Vista 32 bit has a logical memory addressing limit of appx 3GB, right? Yes y'all, I was one of those idiots who bought a power gamer rig two years back and got to learn this lesson first hand. I spent $300 at the time for 4 GB of OC'd Corsair RAM... only to get to sit on 1GB of it, installed and unused (to this day). Oh, but you say 64-bit Windows solves my problems? Sure they do, when my poor gamer box ran stable under XP 64-Bit, I got to play all my 32-bit games in 32-bit virtual machines. And Still got to worry about wether 64-bit SLi drivers would be released or not. Save yourself the hassle, get 3GB of RAM and be happy.

2) Chipset. Intel has a rep for building stable workstation boards, but they've never been the "gamer's choice". While stable, generally hassle-free and compatible with a wide array of processors, Intel boards (due to the northbridge and southbridges used, aka "chipset") generally lack support for premium level features most gamers demand. Examples: While Crossfire-supported, it's a virtual certainty that this board would be outperformed by other boards that have a Crossfire (built for ATI) chipset. Also, g'luck ever trying to overclock on an Intel boards. Those features are pretty much absent in every intel chipset I've used. Intel pretty much lets you detect whatever cpu you've installed and use it as-is, and that's all. You've got yourself a nice stable workstation-class chipset there. Work off it's strengths and don't try to make it do anything outside of its' design envelope.

3)  SLi or Crossfire (even if its an "eventual upgrade path" plan) should be decided upon when you spec out your parts, not as a bolt-on add after you've got your system together. "But what about those extra PCI Express slots?", you ask? If you put a second (or third) PCI-Express video card in those slot(s), you'll end up with sub-adapters that will (theoretically) be able to support more displays (CRT, LCD, or TV even) in a spanned-desktop environment. But you'll be doing your gaming only on your Primary Display Adapter (most likely the card you install in your PCIE x16 slot). You lucked out on the ATI XFire support though, that means you can get one Crossfire edition card now, and a 2nd ATI card later on, and Xfire will work (but both cards gets slowed down to x8 x8 modes). Someone with a part of PCIE x16 cards and a SLi or XFire x32 chipset can still come by and smoke you in framerate though.

 

Summary: You've got the guts of a nice "Budget Crossfire" rig. Stick with Windows XP Home (32 Bit) and get a slammin fast ATI X1950 PCIE x16 card. In a year or so, when you feel the need to upgrade, complement with another ATI X1950 (x16 or x8 PCIE) to boost your framerates up. Maybe even a new CPU and/or faster RAM. You're not gonna have to buy a new rig from scratch until all the really power-hungry DirectX10-ONLY games come out in 2-3 yearss.

The 4GB concern has already been addressed.

Also, I used to think the same of Intel.  But it seems that, recently (read: the last six or so months), Intel has taken a great step ahead of AMD, and I've heard of more and more people using Intel for their gaming rigs.  Maybe their new slogan should be "Intel: Not just for work anymore" (it's about as good as it's other crappy, new slogan). [/sarcasm]

SLi or Crossfire should be decided on.  But it doesn't mean you have to buy both cards at once!  It just means that, when you have the money available later on, you can buy one and plug-it-in.  And there you go.

NinjaStrike:

4 Gigabytes of memory is completely unnecessary. 2 gigabytes, 3 at the maximum will be completely sufficient for today's and tomorrow's (foreseeable) applications. The following is a list I've been updating for some time now, intending to buy it myself soon, so you can be assured I have "done my homework". : D  Adding a second 8800GTX to this rig would be great. Warning, however, shortly after Crysis is released, the 9000 series will be out ^^.The case is naturally your own decision. Check my sig!

Case- XCLIO A380BK Fully Black High Gloss Finish SECC 1.0mm thickness ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811103010
$106.99

Proc- Intel Core 2 Duo E6420 Conroe 2.13GHz 4M shared L2 Cache LGA 775 @3600MHZ (400x9)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115016
$189.00

Mobo-ASUS P5N-E SLI 650i
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813131142
$139.99

Power Supply-OCZ GameXStream 700W
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817341002
$124.99

Memory-  WINTEC AMPX 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820161030
$94.99

Video- EVGA 768-P2-N831-AR GeForce 8800GTX 768MB 384-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 HDCP
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130072
$529.99

Hard Drive-Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3320620AS (Perpendicular Recording Technology) 320GB 7200 RPM 16MB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16822148140
$79.99

Optical Drive-SONY Black 18X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 8X DVD+R DL 1 8X DVD-R 6X DVD-RW 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-R 32X CD-RW 48X CD-ROM 2M Cache E-IDE/ATAPI DVD Burner
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827131038
$29.99

CPU Cooling- COOLER MASTER AQUAGATE VIVA RL-M4A-E7E1-GP Liquid Cooling System
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103017
$59.99

Card Reader- LINKSKEY LKA-CR15B 19-in-1 USB 2.0 Black Card Reader/Writer
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820300901
$12.99

Cold Cathode- LOGISYS Computer CLK12BL 12" Cold Cathode kit - Retail
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16800888026
$3.69+3.69@ $7.38

 $1376.29

**************
OS-Vista Home Premium OEM
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16832116202
$111.99

Monitor- SCEPTRE X22WG-1080p Black 22" 2ms(GTG) DVI Widescreen LCD Monitor 300 cd/m2 2000:1
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824112009
$249.99

 

$1738.27
 

 

 

 

 

I agree with it, 2 gigabytes, 3 at the maximum will be completely sufficient for today's and tomorrow's applications.

Given that my motherboard does not support sli :( I have decided to basically get the best or near the best NVIDIA card that I can afford.  Now I have heard that the Ultra is not much better than the GTX but what preformance benifits doest the Ultra have over the GTX? 

I was also wondering about heat...? I'm sure both of these cards produce large amounts of heat, so assuming this is correct what should I be thinking of to counter act this problem?

 

NinjaStrike and peavelover:

"I agree with it, 2 gigabytes, 3 at the maximum will be completely sufficient for today's and tomorrow's applications."

 

Lols, you are going to be extremely surprised how many games and other apps use 4Gb of system memory alone today, let alone tomarrow...

DX10 games will at least require 2Gb in most instances, while 4Gb will likely become the norm. for most gamers here, as soon as 64-Bit OSs become the norm...Don't underestimate the future requirements and needs of PCs...People used to say that 2Gb was to much, yet it has been proved wrong...

The applications of today and tomarrow may only use 2-3Gb, but what about in a month or a year? DX10 games like Crysis are going to use a lot more memory then you may think...Not to mention Crysis develpers have already noted that 4Gb may not be enough in a few years for some DX10 games...Look at Supreme Commander, a perfect example of why quad-core and 4Gb are a good thing, and it has been shown already that is going to be the trend in the future...

 So do you want this system to last, or do you want to have to upgrade it much sooner then planned in the future? In short, if you have the cash, get it and stop fooling around with yourselves when it isn't even true...Or wait tell DDR3 comes out, whichever way you go, 4Gb is going to become the norm. in high-end and mid-level systems in a couple of years...

Respectfully,

PROACEX1

PROACEX1:

NinjaStrike and peavelover:

"I agree with it, 2 gigabytes, 3 at the maximum will be completely sufficient for today's and tomorrow's applications."

 

Lols, you are going to be extremely surprised how many games and other apps use 4Gb of system memory alone today, let alone tomarrow...

DX10 games will at least require 2Gb in most instances, while 4Gb will likely become the norm. for most gamers here, as soon as 64-Bit OSs become the norm...Don't underestimate the future requirements and needs of PCs...People used to say that 2Gb was to much, yet it has been proved wrong...

The applications of today and tomarrow may only use 2-3Gb, but what about in a month or a year? DX10 games like Crysis are going to use a lot more memory then you may think...Not to mention Crysis develpers have already noted that 4Gb may not be enough in a few years for some DX10 games...Look at Supreme Commander, a perfect example of why quad-core and 4Gb are a good thing, and it has been shown already that is going to be the trend in the future...

 So do you want this system to last, or do you want to have to upgrade it much sooner then planned in the future? In short, if you have the cash, get it and stop fooling around with yourselves when it isn't even true...Or wait tell DDR3 comes out, whichever way you go, 4Gb is going to become the norm. in high-end and mid-level systems in a couple of years...

Respectfully,

PROACEX1

From what I understand, he'll not be running a 64 bit system.  32 bit systems are designed to not use more than 3GB.  It was unrealistic at the time that that much memory would even exist.  Sure, 4GB might become the standard, but it'll be a while, and until nearly everyone is on 64 bit systems, they won't design games with 4GB as the minspecs.

Ah.  Sorry.

And there's nothing to say that he can't upgrade the system later. As in, when funds become available...  Just because you want a killer rig doesn't mean you have to buy it all at once.  Stages work fine, and upon completion, upgrades can be made.  It's just common sense.

I will go with vista once theres a sp 1 out.  I just figure let someone else deal with all the heartache..lol

I have no desire to be a part of a Worldwide Vista Beta Test with an entry fee of $100+ and a perfectly good computer.  No thank you.  XP works very well.  I think I'll stick with it.

The horse is dead, but we can kick it a few times more.

Vista or XP notwithstanding, running a 64-bit Windows OS is the only way to get windows to address more than 3GB of RAM. There is a Windows XP 64-Bit edition, but as I mentioned earlier, driver support is definately not what it should be.

As well, it's been mentioned several times that currently, all games are being written for 32-bit systems. So even if you do manage to run a 64-bit OS, your games and 32-bit apps will still run in 32-bit virtual machine "sessions" under your 64-bit OS. >.<

Lesson learned, do your research before you do anything drastic.

 Oh, and TempetKing? You've already got a Crossfire-Compatible (if not optimized) motherboard. I'd go with a butt-kickin fast X1950 for now, and add another later. Why go NVidia when you've got a roadmap for ATI upgrades? :D

Re: the comments on Intel for gaming- I admit Intel processors are awesome with the coming of Core2Duo, but I personally would still never buy a motherboard with an intel chipset for a gaming rig. Sorry, but it's not the speed or performance, but it's the feature set built into the BIOS. I want the capability to do whatever I want with a chipset, based on the hardware I buy, instead of a dumbed-down (but bluescreen-free) chipset.

W0rd.

I would def. go with ATI card, but I am wanting something that is Dx 10 and Kick butt powerful, thats part of the reason i have been holding off on getting the card just yet.  Now as far as overclocking and modifing my MOBO, I dont know the first thing about that....part of the reason why I went with the intel board.

Now I probably should mention that I dont really play FPS at all, that might change some of the recomendations.

Also I am a audiophile, so anything that would improve my sound quality is more than welcomed.

Based on the requirements I think you're good to go with what you have... The cool part is that the ATI HD 2000 series cards are out! In just a few weeks you can prolly spec out a nice DX10-compatible ATI 2900 or 2600, and score another later on for XFire goodness. If cost is an issue the 2600's will do you just fine. Running in XFire x8/x8 mode, you won't get the most out of a pair of 2900's, and you don't hard-core FPS, so it shouldn't matter. Just spec out a nice, FAST 2600 card and you'll be good w/ the likes of Starcraft II, *AND* be DX10-compliant. :D

CheapAsianGamerGuy:

The horse is dead, but we can kick it a few times more.

First thing I thought of?

Yea, sorry, I went and posted a bit too much on the issue...

@TheLarrikin's funny pic: Lolz...

 

Respectfully,

PROACEX1

I have been hearing alot about Intel droping their prices on processors on July 22, now Im not too sure about this but If this is the case I should probably wait till then to get my processor correct? 

Also can anyone tell me about the P35 new intel mobo's, I'm just kinda interested....