Stuck for choice - spec questions...

Neill_J

Neill_J

Neill_J

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Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
109
Location
Stamford, Lincolnshire
Hi

Need some help in choosing components please...

Usage:

Gaming, internet, office use, tv and dvd's.

Budget:

would probably aim to spend somewhere in the region of £500-700

Thoughts:

Noise: I would like a much quieter system than what I have now
Overclocking: Would like ability to do this - though nothing extreme required!
Timing: Don’t need to purchase ASAP, so can wait a month or so if worthwhile waiting for a bit of new tech

Got:

Case (Akasa Eclipse), Hard disk, Floppy disk, DVD, TV cards, keyboard, mouse.
Monitor - using old one for now (Though am aiming to get a nice Dell 24" at some point)
Operating system (xp pro)

Need:

CPU - undecided but contenders are 2140/60/80 (cheap end) - E8400 (mid end) - Q6600/Q9450 (upper end)

CPU cooler/fan/paste - Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro (is a fan included?) with some artic silver 5 - is this ok for the above chips?

Motherboard - either a P35 or X38 - but which one to get? what are considered the best of each range (without being overly expensive)? what does the X38 have that makes it better than the P35?

Memory - would like 4gb, and to have no trouble if I overclock, so is 8000/8500 type ok? Which brand to get though? the gskill 4gb pack I have seen looks ok:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-022-GS&groupid=701&catid=8&subcat=817

Graphics card - some brand of 8800GTS - which is quiet? and are these ok to power a dell 24"?

PSU - corsair hx 620 - are they ok to power all the above and is it fairly quiet?

Thanks, Neill
 
Somewhere near the middle of your budget, I've changed the CPU cooler to a Tuniq Tower as it is a bit better, the PSU to the HX520w as it is easily sufficient for your system. The main differences between P35 and X38 is that the X38 chipset supports Crossfire at 16x for both lanes and also supports PCI-E 2.0, these aren't terribly important for most people at the moment.

BFG GeForce 8800 GTS OC 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £139.99
(£164.49) £139.99
(£164.49)
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £64.99
(£76.36) £64.99
(£76.36)
G.Skill 4GB DDR2 PQ PC2-6400C5 (2x2GB) CAS5 Dual Channel Kit (F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ) £49.99
(£58.74) £49.99
(£58.74)
Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - OEM £123.99
(£145.69) £123.99
(£145.69)
Corsair HX 520W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-520HXUK) £59.99
(£70.49) £59.99
(£70.49)
Tuniq Tower 120 CPU Cooler (Socket 478/754/939/940/AM2/LGA775) £27.99
(£32.89) £27.99
(£32.89)
Sub Total : £466.94
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £8.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £83.28
Total : £559.17
 
Wow...where to start.....

Akasa case...Ugly but very good seems to be the general opinion. is your HDD Sata or IDE? A 24'' screen will have high res and you will need a high end GPU. Might want to stick with 22''.

from there. Id go either 8200/8400 or Q6600. The Q6600 is very overclockable but to be fair a quad shows little over a dual in most applications. I like my 6600 though. The AF pro comes with a fan and paste applied. for the money you cant beat it.

Motherboard...Stick with P35. X38, from memory, gives you 2 full PCI-E lanes which is useful only if you want to run 2 GPUs.

If you want 4GB you will need Vista 64 bit. 6400 will run at 800mhz which will be plenty. Read up on FSB and RAM speed.

8800 GT..........

PSU is sweet.
 
chrispystix said:
Wow...where to start.....

Akasa case...Ugly but very good seems to be the general opinion. is your HDD Sata or IDE? A 24'' screen will have high res and you will need a high end GPU. Might want to stick with 22''.

Hi
Case was a cheap buy of an auction site... looked ok on reviews and seems to have loads of room...
Disk is a Sata 2 500gb samsung
22" may be ok, but 24" is tempting :) anyway that is a decision for later...

from there. Id go either 8200/8400 or Q6600. The Q6600 is very overclockable but to be fair a quad shows little over a dual in most applications. I like my 6600 though. The AF pro comes with a fan and paste applied. for the money you cant beat it.

ok thanks, to much choice in the CPU market! think may edge towards quad core though as games like SupCom will benefit more I think

Motherboard...Stick with P35. X38, from memory, gives you 2 full PCI-E lanes which is useful only if you want to run 2 GPUs.

If I was to go with X38 though which is a good one?
how about this? (Asus P5E Intel X38)
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-249-AS&groupid=701&catid=5&subcat=946

If you want 4GB you will need Vista 64 bit. 6400 will run at 800mhz which will be plenty. Read up on FSB and RAM speed.

Yes, I am probably going to go 64bit eventually but dont mind the limit in 32bit for now with regards to 4gb

8800 GT..........

hmmm yes not much in it between GT and GTS, what about 2 x 3870's for a 24" screen though?

PSU is sweet.
Click to expand...
 
semi-pro waster said:
Somewhere near the middle of your budget, I've changed the CPU cooler to a Tuniq Tower as it is a bit better, the PSU to the HX520w as it is easily sufficient for your system. The main differences between P35 and X38 is that the X38 chipset supports Crossfire at 16x for both lanes and also supports PCI-E 2.0, these aren't terribly important for most people at the moment.

BFG GeForce 8800 GTS OC 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £139.99
(£164.49) £139.99
(£164.49)
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £64.99
(£76.36) £64.99
(£76.36)
G.Skill 4GB DDR2 PQ PC2-6400C5 (2x2GB) CAS5 Dual Channel Kit (F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ) £49.99
(£58.74) £49.99
(£58.74)
Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - OEM £123.99
(£145.69) £123.99
(£145.69)
Corsair HX 520W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-520HXUK) £59.99
(£70.49) £59.99
(£70.49)
Tuniq Tower 120 CPU Cooler (Socket 478/754/939/940/AM2/LGA775) £27.99
(£32.89) £27.99
(£32.89)
Sub Total : £466.94
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £8.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £83.28
Total : £559.17
Click to expand...

Hi, thanks for this, I keep swinging between buget and extravagance, this seems to fit the bill for midrange nicely.
Is the gigabyte board a good stable one with nice OC capabilities?
The reason I am considering the 21xx range of CPU's was to go cheap while waiting for the Q9450 to become available and cheaper(ish), I assume the board is ok for 45 nan tech?

Is there not a benefit from stretching a little on the Ram to PC 8000 type (more headroom)?

anyway whichever way I go it will be an improvment on the current rig - 2.53ghz P4, 1 gb 3200 DDR1, getting on for 4 years old now I think, just doesnt quite cut it with modern stuff!

Thanks, Neill
 
The Gigabyte could be changed for quite a few other P35 motherboards in the budget - Asus (P5K series) and Abit (IP35 series) also do good models. They shouldn't have any problems with 45nm CPUs, you may want to check if there is a new bios available before you try to upgrade the CPU though.

PC8000+ isn't hugely beneficial to my mind for something like a Q6600 unless you are overclocking pretty heavily given that PC6400 would allow 3.6ghz (2.4ghz is the stock speed) if your CPU was capable. If you are thinking about getting a 45nm CPU then it makes a bit more sense but you probably won't be using anywhere near its capabilities until then.
 
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