Spec check

subroutine · 25 Sep 2007 at 11:19

Spec check please

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Product Name Qty Price Line Total
Tuniq Tower 120 CPU Cooler (Socket 478/754/939/940/AM2/LGA775) £27.99
(£32.89) £27.99
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GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GX22GB6400UDC) £39.99
(£46.99) £79.98
(£93.98)
Arctic Cooling Arctic Fan 12025L 120mm Fan - 3 Pin £4.99
(£5.86) £4.99
(£5.86)
Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - Retail £153.99
(£180.94) £153.99
(£180.94)
BFG GeForce 8800 GTS OC 640MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £209.99
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Western Digital Caviar SE16 320GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (WD3200AAKS) £41.99
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Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium 64-Bit Edition DVD - OEM - 1Pk (66I-00788) £56.99
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Asus P5K Intel P35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £74.99
(£88.11) £74.99
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Total : £775.34

I'm going to order the above in the next couple of days to catch the Geil RAM offer. I already have a Tagan TG580-U15 580W ATX2.01 Easycon PSU and I've just purchased an Antec P180B . Does anyone know if the PSU cables are long enough to reach the MB in the P180 ? . I was originally going to buy the Leadtek graphics card but it's just gone up to the same price as the BFG so I went for that one instead . I'm aiming to overclock to 3ghz which shouldn't be a problem from what I've seen in other topics. Does the above spec look about right ?

subroutine · 25 Sep 2007 at 11:39

Thanks for all your replies

. I'll change the HDD to the Seagate as I didn't realise the WD was out of stock . I avoided the 2900XT due to extra heat a power usage but this has just come into stock -

HIS ATI Radeon HD 2900 Pro SILENT Heatpipe 512MB GDDR3
£170.36 inc VAT

From a gaming point of view, I mainly play RTS so I'm wondering if it would be a better price/performance option, especially if it clocked to xt speeds.

subroutine · 25 Sep 2007 at 13:24

melbourne720 said:
Your misses wishes you moved more air?

That's the exact opposite of mine...

Especially after a few pints of Bass

If I needed to extend the PSU cables, which of these two would I require ? -

Akasa 20/24-Pin 30cm PSU Extension Cable
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CB-021-AK&groupid=701&catid=48&subcat=153

Akasa 8-Pin 30cm PSU Extension Cable
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CB-022-AK&groupid=701&catid=48&subcat=153

subroutine · 25 Sep 2007 at 19:39

melbourne720 said:
Change the fans to Sharkoon ones, they move more air, and are quieter.

Which speed, the 1000 or 2000 ? . I'm only adding an additional fan in the upper drive bay to cool the graphics card.

subroutine · 27 Sep 2007 at 10:26

I made a few of your suggested changes and put my order in. To hit 3ghz, given the RAM (4GB) I've ordered, would it be better to lower the multiplier and run 375x8 rather than 333x9 ? . Thanks again

.

subroutine · 27 Sep 2007 at 11:22

melbourne720 said:
I've only tried the 2000, but the 1000 are supposed to be good too. If the rest of your rig is silent, then go for the 1000, else 2000.

I ordered the 2000 as I value cooling over noise

.

melbourne720 said:
If you go 375 x 8, then you might get more memory/system bandwidth, but you'll be putting you chipset under more strain. Alternatively, 9 x 333 will give you the same processor speed, less bandwidth (whether or not that is a limiting factor) and less strain on your MB.

Personally, I always use the 9x multi to it's fullest. The only obvious exception is that if you're going for some 8 x 400 RAM sync goodness (3.2GHz on the CPU)

I see, I suppose it all depends on the CPU temps . Would it be possible to run 8 x 400 on stock CPU volts and if not, what voltage is the CPU likely to need ? . Thanks for your help

.

subroutine · 28 Sep 2007 at 08:54

Thanks

. I'll post back when it's all built and running. I spotted this topic -

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=17783924

which suggests there could be an issue with the PK5/Q6600 GO and speedstep . Has anyone else got this combination running that can say for sure this isn't a general probelm.

subroutine · 6 Oct 2007 at 21:10

I built the system today and installed Vista 64. All the drivers are installed and it's curently running at stock but I haven't done any stability tests yet. Once that's done I'll OC to 3 or maybe 3.2GHz and post back the results. I can't get coretemp to run correctly, it just keeps running up multiple instances of coretemp when I run it up and I have to CTRL/ALT/DEL to stop it.

subroutine · 7 Oct 2007 at 07:43

Thanks stickroad, I've got coretemp running with F8 and 'run in admin mode' on the desktop shortcut

. Everything is running fine but I've noticed the BIOS is version 0414 . The Q6600 GO is only officially supported at version 0603 . Here's the details -

http://support.asus.com/download/download.aspx?SLanguage=en-us&model=P5K
BIOS update file for P5K (Version 0603)
Revise Conroe G0 stepping CPU temp. offset value

I don't want to flash the BIOS unless it's really essential. Does anyone know what the latest version would do over the version I'm running ?

Thanks.

subroutine · 9 Oct 2007 at 11:38

I'm now running the following and happy with it -

334*9 - 3GHz
MEM - 5:6 - 400MHz - Stock speed of the Geil ultra

CPU BIOS - 1.35V
CPU CPUz - idle 1.304v
CPU CPUz - prime small FFT 1.24v

CPU temp -
idle - 34°C
prime small FFT - 54°C

MB load temp (which I assume is the chipset) - 43°C

3DMARK06 - 10118 - default nvidia control panel settings.

There's quite a bit of volt drop on the CPU from the BIOS setting, especially under load. I've tried upping the CPU voltage to 1.4, MEM 1:1 (712MHz) and running 356*9 - 3.2GHz but the temp increase means it's not really worth the real world gain . The MB temp rises in excess of 50°C and the CPU to 57°C . I also checked with Asus support and they said I may get an error with the BIOS I'm currently using at boot and have to hit F1 to continue. Since I'm not getting that error and everything is stable, I'm not taking the chance of flashing the BIOS . I would if you could get a BIOS savior for the P5K but I don't think you can.

subroutine · 9 Oct 2007 at 13:13

What about the chipset temp ?

subroutine · 9 Oct 2007 at 13:19

What would be a safe chipset temp and what's the advantage of running 1:1 with the memory ? .

subroutine · 9 Oct 2007 at 13:27

So would the 3GHz overclock be better with the RAM @ 1:1 - 668Mhz or is it better to leave it @ 800 , 5:6 ?. Thanks for your help

.

subroutine · 16 Oct 2007 at 11:26

My system has been stable at 3GHz so I went for 1:1/3.2GHz -

The NB voltage had to be upped to 1.55 to get over 350 FSB.

400*8 - 3.2GHz
MEM - 1:1 - 400MHz - Stock speed of the Geil ultra

CPU BIOS - 1.4V
CPU CPUz - idle 1.352v
CPU CPUz - prime small FFT 1.248v

CPU temp -
idle - 37°C
prime small FFT - 57°C

MB load temp (which I assume is the chipset) - 49°C

3DMARK06 - 10193 - default nvidia control panel settings.

It doesn't seem to have made much difference to the 3DMark06 score but I assume that's more down to the graphics card.