A new build, not sure what i want!

Soldato
Joined
29 Oct 2005
Posts
3,298
Hi guys,

Title is perhaps a little misleading - I do know what I want just not which components!

I want:
a quad core (was going to go for the cheapest intel and clock it)

8GB of RAM (not sure if the £30 price difference is worth the slightly tighter timings for the more expensive Geil RAM, and if the lack of heatspreaders will affect it - should I go for Geil or OCZ?)

4870 (not sure if I want the X2 or not, I will be gaming on a 24" screen and want it to last a good while)

Second graphics card (want the cheapest ATI card I can get which is passive and will run with the same drivers as the above 4870 - this is because I will be running 2x 19" secondary monitors from this card. It doesn't have to be too powerful, but I'd like to be able to take advantage of multimonitor games like supreme commander)

Sound card (do I need a separate one, or should I just use the onboard? What are the benefits - I'm not an audiophile!)

Motherboard (need something that can handle all the above with some overclocking - have been out of the loop for a while so am not sure which are the best, I want it to be as quiet as possible and have some decent features - £200 is my max - which chipset is the best at the moment?)

PSU (need something to drive the above, have been recommended seasonic, but was wondering if there is a better one out there. I would prefer a modular design, and am not sure what wattage to go for - should I get the highest I can so it runs more efficiently?)

Cooler - was going to go for an arctic freezer pro - will need a motherboard that can fit this.

HDD - this is the area I am most unsure of, do I go for a raid-0 of 2x320gb drives and get a big backup drive? or should I leave the hassle of raid and get a decent 320gb drive or bigger and just use that? Which single drive (apart from a raptor) would give me the best performance?

Thanks,

Daven
 
CPU Q6600 & Overclock (easily get 3.3ghz)
HSF anything but the ACF7....most overrated cooler ever!!
8gb ram unnecessary...just get a middle of the road 4gb kit e.g OCZ PC8500 platinum
Graphics Nvidia GTX 280
No need for additional souncard...onboard is good
Any ASUS mobo with a p45/x38 chipset you like
HDD samsung spinpoint F1 1 TB
 
CPU Q6600 & Overclock (easily get 3.3ghz)
HSF anything but the ACF7....most overrated cooler ever!!
8gb ram unnecessary...just get a middle of the road 4gb kit e.g OCZ PC8500 platinum
Graphics Nvidia GTX 280
No need for additional souncard...onboard is good
Any ASUS mobo with a p45/x38 chipset you like
HDD samsung spinpoint F1 1 TB

thanks but i want 8gb and a 4870! will check out the hdd and motherboards.

thanks
 
PSU (need something to drive the above, have been recommended seasonic, but was wondering if there is a better one out there. I would prefer a modular design, and am not sure what wattage to go for - should I get the highest I can so it runs more efficiently?)
Corsair HX520/620 and Seasonic M12s are good choises.
Considering you'll get also second graphic card, although low end one, for getting more monitors idle consumption won't be very low (already fastest cards have ridiculously high idle consumption) but I wouldn't get anything above that 700W.
Rule is pretty much that the bigger you get the lower the efficiency will be most of the time. (desktop use) Efficiency of PSUs starts to drop around 30% load and falls sharply under 20% load. (best efficiency in area of 40-70%)


What case you have?
Ultra high end graphic card and second card will generate quite a lot heat even during idling so cooling/layout should be good.


1TB WD Caviar Black is one real speed monster for 7200rpm drive, it beats 10000rpm 150GB Raptor almost cleanly.
http://www.storagereview.com/php/be...&devID_2=361&devID_3=348&devID_4=354&devCnt=5
 
well i was thinking a 1K watt PSU so i have lots of headroom and have it running at around 40-70% load.
Then you need to buy also second PC and use same PSU for powering them both. Or second 4870X2.

Deduct 15% from these values for some kind real consumption numbers of PC.
(looks like 4870X2 gets the objectionable honor of heaviest power consumer with its near 200W peak draw, although I'll wait X-bitlabs for real accurate numbers)
 
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