Heyas,
My P4 2.8 Northwood with 1GB RAM and a X1600 Pro is getting a little long in the tooth so I'm looking at replacing it.
Haven't put a PC together from scratch yet, but have tinkered around with the insides replacing components etc a fair bit.
Will be used for mid-high end gaming and other general uses (torrents, media). Will overclock, but nothing extreme.
This will be built entirely from scratch, taking no parts from old box, no monitor needed. My ceiling budget is £1000.
At the moment I'm looking at:
Lian-Li PC-7 PLUS Aluminium Midi-Tower Case - Black £49.99
(£58.74)
Corsair HX 520W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-520HXUK) £59.99
(£70.49)
Gigabyte GA_965P_DS3 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £69.99
(£82.24)
Intel Core 2 DUO E6600 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - Retail £173.99
(£204.44)
Tuniq Tower 120 CPU Cooler £24.99
(£29.36)
GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GX22GB6400UDC) £114.99
(£135.11)
BFG GeForce 8800 GTS OC 320MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £164.99
(£193.86)
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 250GB ST3250620AS SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM £46.99
(£55.21)
Pioneer DVR-111BK 16x16 DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter - (Black) OEM £18.99
(£22.31)
Logitech Cordless Desktop EX-110 - Retail £17.99
(£21.14)
Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound (3.5g) £5.99
(£7.04)
Total : £892.81 inc VAT
A few questions:
1) Is the E6600 worth buying over the E6300? I've seen so many contradictory benchmarks, some stating that the extra 2mb and different design make a 5-10% difference in performance at equal clocks and others claiming they make little or no difference. I've also read around the forum that both can achieve 3ghz fairly easily. What future applications might the extra 2mb of cache have?
2) I've noticed a lot of people have started to recommend the Noctura CPU cooler over the Tuniq. Any opinions?
3) Gigabyte DS3 or Asus P5B or Asus P5N-E SLi? Abit Fatal1ty FP-IN9? I've seen so many mobo suggestions thrown around the forum that I'm completely lost. Some have said that the DS3 overclocks well with the 6300/6400 but the Asus mobos suit the 6600 better. Is this rubbish? I can't see myself ever needing firewire and I'm unlikely to SLi.
4) At what screen size might a 8800GTS 640mb become worthwhile?
5) Is it a good time to consider upgrading? Are there any particulary notable incoming products that will be better choices/significantly push down the price of current components?
6) and finally, do I still need to buy case fans?
Any comments are appreciated.
Thanks!
My P4 2.8 Northwood with 1GB RAM and a X1600 Pro is getting a little long in the tooth so I'm looking at replacing it.
Haven't put a PC together from scratch yet, but have tinkered around with the insides replacing components etc a fair bit.
Will be used for mid-high end gaming and other general uses (torrents, media). Will overclock, but nothing extreme.
This will be built entirely from scratch, taking no parts from old box, no monitor needed. My ceiling budget is £1000.
At the moment I'm looking at:
Lian-Li PC-7 PLUS Aluminium Midi-Tower Case - Black £49.99
(£58.74)
Corsair HX 520W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-520HXUK) £59.99
(£70.49)
Gigabyte GA_965P_DS3 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £69.99
(£82.24)
Intel Core 2 DUO E6600 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - Retail £173.99
(£204.44)
Tuniq Tower 120 CPU Cooler £24.99
(£29.36)
GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GX22GB6400UDC) £114.99
(£135.11)
BFG GeForce 8800 GTS OC 320MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £164.99
(£193.86)
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 250GB ST3250620AS SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM £46.99
(£55.21)
Pioneer DVR-111BK 16x16 DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter - (Black) OEM £18.99
(£22.31)
Logitech Cordless Desktop EX-110 - Retail £17.99
(£21.14)
Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound (3.5g) £5.99
(£7.04)
Total : £892.81 inc VAT
A few questions:
1) Is the E6600 worth buying over the E6300? I've seen so many contradictory benchmarks, some stating that the extra 2mb and different design make a 5-10% difference in performance at equal clocks and others claiming they make little or no difference. I've also read around the forum that both can achieve 3ghz fairly easily. What future applications might the extra 2mb of cache have?
2) I've noticed a lot of people have started to recommend the Noctura CPU cooler over the Tuniq. Any opinions?
3) Gigabyte DS3 or Asus P5B or Asus P5N-E SLi? Abit Fatal1ty FP-IN9? I've seen so many mobo suggestions thrown around the forum that I'm completely lost. Some have said that the DS3 overclocks well with the 6300/6400 but the Asus mobos suit the 6600 better. Is this rubbish? I can't see myself ever needing firewire and I'm unlikely to SLi.
4) At what screen size might a 8800GTS 640mb become worthwhile?
5) Is it a good time to consider upgrading? Are there any particulary notable incoming products that will be better choices/significantly push down the price of current components?
6) and finally, do I still need to buy case fans?
Any comments are appreciated.
Thanks!
