Motherboard AM3 but which ddr2 or ddr3?

[Ryable]

ok so i have a budget of £300 i can push to £350 if absolutely necessary.

my current system specification

AMD Athlon64 X2 4800+

ATi Radeon HD4890 <<-- recently purchased in preparation for upgrade

2GB DDR2 RAM

what i want to upgrade to

AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition
£146.89

Motherboard with a minimum of 2 PCI-E x16 slots, 4 RAM slots capable of taking 16gb RAM
a budget of £100-120

minimum of 2gb RAM preferably 4gb <<-- if DDR3 option is taken if not i will still invest in some more RAM


any recommendations on motherboards? pro's and cons of going with ddr3?

 

[Ryable]

well crossfiring is a future possibility when the graphics card gets a bit old and wont meet requirements of latest game.

i just want a motherboard as future proof as possible.
models i've looked at since posting are;

Biostar TA790GX-A3

ASRock M3A790GXH/128M

^^Difference between them are minor, the ASRock has 2 more USB Headers where as the Biostar has an extra PCI-E

also some clarification on some practical differences between 780 and 790 chipsets would b nice.

i do not want to overclock as i will be relying on air as cooling, 1 80mm Fan as intake, 2x 120mm fans as exhaust

Is DDR3 worth the extra money?

 

[Ryable]

ok well i have my ati hd4890 which is overkill at the minute as i only have a dual core cpu

so my proposed build is

Corsair 4gb (2x2gb) DDR3 1600Mhz Twin3x £69.99
AMD Phenom II x4 955 Black Edition (Quad 3.2ghz)

Asus Crosshair III Formula AMD 790FX £142.99
or
MSI 790fx-gd70 £129.98

Asus build total = £355.56
MSI build total = £342.55

I am open to Intel but the above CPU can be clocked quite comfortably to 3.6ghz with no additional cooling needed. The nearest Intel equivlant is the I7 (Quad 2.6ghz) i hear the i7 has multi threading which compensates for the lower factory clock speed (<that is the extent to what my knowledge goes could any1 elaborate on this please)
that and baring in mind that Intel generally run cooler. Is it worth over a £50 price difference between the CPUs.

So my budget is £350ish but i could push it to £400

both of the motherboards are highly recommended, the MSI has 4 PCI-e x16 (2 @ x16, 2 @ x8) what does the pci-e speeds mean in terms of real performance? the 4 pci slots means the MSI board is more future proof than the ASUS?

having never overclocked before could i overclock the 955 to 3.6ghz on air alone, or would you consider this a risky project being it my first time on a £150 cpu?

i hear the bios needs updating on some motherboards to recognise the 955 is this still the case?

thank you for future responses, i realise i have rambled sorry.

 

[Ryable]

didnt realise the mobo's and RAM cost more for i7 so AMD it is.

So coming to the conclusion that the asus is over priced and seeing no real advantage over the MSI or Gigabyte.

So now it's down to MSI 790fx-gd70

or the above gigabyte

the MSI having 4 x pci-e x16 (2@x16, 2@x8) makes it more future proof but what hardware actually uses these slots? obviously the 2 x16 are for crossfire.

i just found out u can use x16 slots as pci-e x1 slots should i need extra can someone confirm this?
if this is the case the £3-5 price difference makes the MSI all worth it.

what slot will usb 3.0 use?

and i realise i am going off topic but will i pick up a case with adequate airflow for under £100 at the minute i have the outdated X-Blade

 

[Ryable]

pretty much settled for;

MSI 790fx-gd70
AMD Phenom II x4 955 (black edition)
Corsair XMS3 DHX 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1600C9DHX Twin3X http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-154-CS

now just deciding on a case max budget £60

Antec 300 http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-101-AN
CiT 1001 http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-048-CT
CiT 1003 http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-049-CT

just out of curiousity can i take a dremel to plexiglass? or will it crack?

a few more cases

fav but Cant find a UK retailer for the dragon cases

^ my 2nd fav i think or CiT 1001

 

[Ryable]

just trying to find reviews on the CiT1001(this 2nd) or RaidMAX X-Force (i really ike this 1)
or even the CiT 1003 (that big fan is ugly tho but that would be good air flow right? would it be setup as intake at factory ?

the antec is just too plain i would have to sand the paint off and give it a respray maybe put a window in it.

i like my flashy lights what can i say.

...no i dont drive a vauxhall nova b4 u ask

 

[Ryable]

these are budget cases if i had my way i'd go for a Thermaltake mozart tx or a
silverstone FT01 but there both over the £100 mark and im not willing to spend that on a metal box with bells and whistles.

as for the whole corsa joke i kind of beat you to it with the nova lol

and i like the cases that say "look at me", i'm afraid of the dark...

although the Thermaltake v9 has caught my eye