Right its less than a month now til I can begin building my new rig...

Alexrose1uk · 20 Feb 2006 at 15:40

Already got the SonataII Case and the 450W smartpower psu to power the machine.

I'm also getting a:
x2 3800+
2GB G Skill GZ
Asrock Dual SATA 939 PCI-E/AGP mobo
OcUK Value Floppy Drive (in black of course)
2x Liteon SHM-165P6S-02C 16x DVD±RW/RAM (Beige/Black/Silver)
1/2x Hitachi Deskstar T7K250 NCQ 160GB SATA-II 8MB Cache

Here's what I really want help with.
What gfx should I get? Until I can afford all of it, I'll use my 9800Pro as interim gfx but, should I get the x850xt for 146 or save a bit more and get the x1800xl for 211, is the price increase worth it?
I also wonder is it worth paying more and getting a 250GB Hitachi drive over 160GB if I can only afford one, are they a fair bit faster in the larger model, I'd heart they were almost as fast as raptors in raid, but is this only true of the bigger drive?

Also, I'm a raid noob, whats the best/fastest stripe size to set, and is raid reliable these days?

fenderbass86 · 20 Feb 2006 at 15:47

save up and get the X1800XL, much better than the X850XT.

ACESHIGH · 20 Feb 2006 at 16:01

fenderbass86 said:
save up and get the X1800XL, much better than the X850XT.

agreed, but id get the X1800XL now or ASAP, as all X1800 & 7800 series are end-of-life & not being produced anymore.
as Gibbo said prices of replacement cards are likely to cost more.

Alexrose1uk · 20 Feb 2006 at 16:10

I have to wait til I get paid. I'll make it priority to get the x1800xl asap though. I would already have the system, but my mums being an ******* over money, even though she knows I only work part time and all my weekends.

Will try and get the mobo, cpu and gfx next month, and use
old ram, hd and dvd drives as interim. I should JUST be able to make it on the money I'll get.

semi-pro waster · 20 Feb 2006 at 17:27

Alexrose1uk said:
Also, I'm a raid noob, whats the best/fastest stripe size to set, and is raid reliable these days?

Raid is only as reliable as the drives you are running, I'm presuming from your desire for speed you are thinking about Raid0 which can be fast(for selected applications) but does offer a much greater risk of data loss. The main use for it is in editing and working with large files which if you aren't doing then I'd probably suggest isn't worth it.

I'd agree with the others that the X1800XL is worth the money, in which case you may want to reconsider getting the ASrock motherboard since you won't need the AGP functionality.

syke · 20 Feb 2006 at 17:51

X1800XL for the money, and would work well with that rig.

Alexrose1uk · 20 Feb 2006 at 19:50

For the money (£50) the motherboard seems about the best out there anyways, besides the agp may stand me in good stead in case of problems in the future.

Mostly gaming, and I'd heard raid was uber fast, I thought perhaps with two hitachis it'd be fairly reliable, but from what you say perhaps not and I'll just stick to two seperate sata/one larger sata drive.

Webster · 20 Feb 2006 at 19:56

Get a raptor and another hdd for storage, set you back about the same.

Depends whether you're willing to sacrifice some storage for the faster access times.

Also what about looking for a 160 Opteron, are you going to be overclocking? even if not, the 160 has the 1meg cache of a 4400+ X2

Alexrose1uk · 20 Feb 2006 at 21:10

Not sure about whether I'll overclock or not, hence the ram with the nice tight timings, and I really cant afford to spend more on my pc. I'm already overspending the original budget lol

ACESHIGH · 21 Feb 2006 at 09:07

Alexrose1uk said:
Not sure about whether I'll overclock or not, hence the ram with the nice tight timings, and I really cant afford to spend more on my pc. I'm already overspending the original budget lol

With the X1800XL it will be a great rig, dont be persuaded to think otherwise.

Alexrose1uk · 21 Feb 2006 at 15:14

to be persuaded it be a good rig without that card? lol... as I'm coming from an amd athlon xp 2800 and 9800Pro, it'd be a huge jump regardless, but as I should be able to save the money, no reason not to get the gfx now, rather than the month after, instead of the ram and drives.

Alexrose1uk · 21 Feb 2006 at 15:18

Also, looking on the net, due to the speeds, why would I want to get an opteron 160? 1.6GHz vs 2Ghz, I know it has more cache, but its gonna be slower, even with the cache, and as the 3800+ is 205 roughly on the net if you look, its a better buy, and more speed guaranteed imo. Btw, what stepping is the 3800+ these days? I heard there were issues with earlier steppings, have these been corrected?

ACESHIGH · 21 Feb 2006 at 15:41

I actually meant in regards to changing processor / HDD & spending even more money. Musnt have worded exactly right. Heck even with the X850XT it would be nice, just i think the X1800XL will do it more justice (more rounded spec).
The earlier optys clocked extremely well current ones not so high. If it was me i would keep the X2 as they appear to be clocking well now.

Alexrose1uk · 21 Feb 2006 at 15:53

Yeah, I've heard most of these have clocked to 2.2/4 easily and some of em up to about 2.7/8 on air, sometimes even stock.
I'm planning to keep the Hitachi deskstars unless someone convinces me otherwise, although on light of what was said I might not raid em, and preferably x1800xl.

What ya think?