PLEASE may I ask your advice and expertise?

vwgolfman · 18 Dec 2007 at 17:56

I've spent the day trying to determine which items I shall require in order to upgrade my machine. All I have managed to do though is confuse myself!

PLEASE may I ask help from you knowledgeable people?

I want a new Mobo, CPU, RAM and Graphics card.

CPU I think I shall buy the Quad Core 6600 unless somebody tells me I really ought to buy a Core 2 Duo. I play a few games but mainly use my machine for business. I don't know how many of the business applications I use utilise Quad Core properly.

So I need a SKT775 Mobo. I don't require SLI but I do require RAID.
I would like an ASUS board with an nForce chipset if poss.
Please advise.

I have been looking at Corsair TwinX Dual Channel RAM.
Should I buy PC2-6400 (800MHz) CAS 4 or PC2-8500 (1066MHz) CAS 5?

How do 8800GTS's compare with 8800GTX's?
Many people seem to think that the new technology is with the GTS.
Please advise.

Many thanks to anybody who can help me.
I am desperate to get this sorted out as I want to order these parts and have them for Christmas. Chances are I'll have to order them tomorrow.

fobose · 18 Dec 2007 at 18:52

Why do you want a nforce board if your not going to Sli? Intel is 100x better IMO. Intel's RAID controllers are much better too

The new GTS are nearly as good as a GTX I am sure. Also go for PC2 6400 ram, PC2 8500 is a waste of money unless your going to overclock your quad to over...3.5GHz (I think?)

Ben M · 18 Dec 2007 at 19:24

if all you use your PC for is office work and a few light games, then an E2180 and a geforce 8800GT would be more than adequate, and save you circa £170 over a Q6600 and a GTX

closeratio · 18 Dec 2007 at 19:27

Ben M said:
if all you use your PC for is office work and a few light games, then an E2180 and a geforce 8800GT would be more than adequate, and save you circa £170 over a Q6600 and a GTX

Seconded! That cpu and that gpu are both great if you're not a hardcore gamer and you don't play on a 24"+ screen lol

And that cpu clocks pretty damn easily as well

Ben M · 18 Dec 2007 at 19:30

oh and same thing with the RAM, PC2-8500 is overkill, PC2-6400 is fine

WarBird · 18 Dec 2007 at 19:43

Ben M said:
if all you use your PC for is office work and a few light games, then an E2180 and a geforce 8800GT would be more than adequate, and save you circa £170 over a Q6600 and a GTX

i totally agree there.

what sort of games you wanting to play btw?

vwgolfman · 18 Dec 2007 at 20:30

Firstly I want to thank you all for your help and this post is by no means meant to disregard your advice but....

Although I don't want to pay silly money for things such as a Core 2 Quad Extreme Edition QX9650 I don't really have a budget.

I would like a system which can more than cope with whatever I wish to do just incase

If a GTS is better than a GT then I am happy to pay a little more money to obtain one. However I think a GTX/Ultra may be a little more than I require.

I am not really an Overclocker and have always wanted a solid and reliable system (not risking crashing due to Overclocking).

Please can you guys confirm/elaborate on:

1) fobose's claim that "Intel is much better than nForce" (in your opinion). Do you agree?

2) Intel's RAID solution is much better than nForce's. Again do you agree or do you have any experience of this?

3) If I am not an Overclocker would a Core 2 Quad Pro 6600 (2.4GHz Unclocked) be worth getting over a Core 2 Duo E6850 (3GHz Unclocked)?
Do I make sense LOL?

Is it easy to Overclock a Core 2 Quad Pro 6600 to 3GHz (to make it at least equivalent in performance to the Core 2 Duo in the case of an application not utilising all 4 cores)?

If I get the Quad core and don't overclock it, will it be noticeably slower than the Core 2 Duo mentioned above?

With regards to the Memory do you all agree that I am better off purchasing 800MHz CAS4 than 1066MHz CAS5 (and then probably having to muck about clocking the Mobo in order to achieve that RAM speed)?

Sorry for so many questions.

Come on guys tell me what Mobo, RAM, CPU and Graphics you would go for?

What about an ABit IP35 Pro are they good?

fobose · 18 Dec 2007 at 20:36

Regarding the Intel RAID. There are so many threads on here about people complaing how naff nvidia RAID 0 performance they get with 2 drives or more because of the nvidia RAID controllers bottle necking at around 100-120MB/s (might be slightly higher)

Also with the quad/duo I would go with the 3GHz duo if your in to gaming. If lots of games require quad core in the future you can always upgrade but to be honest I doubt you will use quad to its full potential for quite some time!

Ben M · 18 Dec 2007 at 20:36

Is it easy to Overclock a Core 2 Quad Pro 6600 to 3GHz?
yes, with a cooler like an arctic freezer 7 pro

(not risking crashing due to Overclocking).
once you have a system set up stable it will stay like that for years.

Come on guys tell me what Mobo, RAM, CPU and Graphics you would go for?
E2180
abit IP35 pro
8800GT
PC2-6400 (4gb if on 64 bit, 3gb if not)

vwgolfman · 18 Dec 2007 at 21:07

Hi Ben,
I'll go with the ABit IP35 Pro then. Just before I do though, can I ask whether the ABit IX38 is a much better performer?

It appears as though both of those boards work fine with 1066MHz RAM so would the performance be better with 800MHz CAS4 or 1066MHz CAS 5?

If I had 2 x 1Gb TwinX Corsair running dual channel and then added a single 1Gb into one of the other slots (running 32bit OS) would this work OK?
Would it affect the overall performance of the total memory?

closeratio · 18 Dec 2007 at 22:54

vwgolfman said:
If I had 2 x 1Gb TwinX Corsair running dual channel and then added a single 1Gb into one of the other slots (running 32bit OS) would this work OK?
Would it affect the overall performance of the total memory?

It *should* work ok, but there's always a chance it won't. Thing is it might be better to just get a 1gb kit (2*512MB) as that means that they'll be able to run in dual channel as well. You don't get a massive performance increase with dual channel as opposed to singlew channel, but every little helps

vwgolfman · 18 Dec 2007 at 23:04

Good point.

I am finalising my choice of hardware now and wondered what you (and anybody else thinks) please.......

ABit IX38 or ABit IP35-Pro.
The IX38 has PCI-Express 2.0. What is this?
Also the IX38 suggests up to 1066MHz memory speeds. Is this something I would want in the future?

Core 2 Quad 6600 OEM
Heatsink and Fan (I hope to clock the CPU to 3GHz).

2 x 1GB Corsair TwinX DDR2 PC2-6400 (800MHz).
I could get another 2 x 512MB as you say.

8800GTS graphics card.