Upgrading for the first time in many years; completely lost!

Streeteh

Streeteh

Streeteh

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Hallo!

I've decided i need to upgrade from 939 as tbh, my clawing to keep the system up to date is just becoming pathetic now. Every DIMM slot is filled, every sata socket used and the CPU is so heavily overclocked i sometimes hear it begging for a pillow to be held over its face.

So, quad core eh? Looks rather spiffing to me so i've decided i want one, problem is i don't have a bloomin' clue. Here's what i've got so far:

19217188.jpg


Is this any good?

I've chosen an Asus board purely because i've had good experiences with them in the past.

I've chosen the 6700 cpu as its cheaper than the 6600 (i'm assuming due to being OEM? I can't notice any difference that makes it lower performance than the 6600) and has a bigger cache than the 8200.

The ram, yet again i've just had good experiences with OCZ in the past, their lifetime warranty is very well executed.

Any ways in which i could improve the spec? I want to keep it as close to £300 as possible and also would rather avoid going for 'this week only' offers at present as i won't be buying until early next month.
 
Personally I would stretch your budget a little bit and get a Thermalright Ultra Extreme (TRUE). I have one using a xigmatek fan, on a P5Q board with a Q6600 and it made so much difference compared to my old Artic Freezer 7 Pro (which is SO dam noisy). This is definitely a good idea if your overclocking!
 
+1 I too would spend a bit more on the cooler - for the reasons stated above.

It's the one thing i regret with my recent upgarde - another £10-£20 would have bought me a quiet'ish pc.
 
Looks good to me. That board is a solid overclocker. As for the processor, the q6700 is effectively the g0 stepping q6600 but with a x10 multiplier (as opposed to the x9 on the q6600), so its a very good chip and great for overclocking.

On the RAM front, I understand what you are saying about TWO, but its almost a given that there is some great priced DDR2 on there each week. If I were you, i'd set a budget of £40 and get the best RAM available that week.

As for the cooler, I have heard good things about the Freezer 7 you got there. However, I will recommend you what I recommend everyone, the Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme or the Noctua U12P. Admittedly, over your budget but they are the best air coolers and will happily cool your future systems too.

Edit: Hehe, I seem to be beaten on my cooler recommendation. But please let the loud chorus of support for the Thermalright (TRUE) influence you decision :)
 
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Good heads up there, cheers.

The Ultra Extreme is quite a jump though, over double the price. If you guys really feel that's the only cooler for the job i'll stretch to it but a couple of concerns would be:

I have a relatively small case (Antec 300), it looks massive frankly, will it even fit in the case?

I only plan to overclock to approx 3ghz, is this a little overkill for the task?

Noise level is pretty important to me so as i say i'll go for it if there's no other suggestions, i was just wondering if there was a slightly cheaper one that might be good enough for my rather unadventurous overclocking.
 
The TRUE will fit in that case. For only 3.0GHz it may well be overkill, but the with the very low tems you will be getting I bet you will want to push it further :D
 
The Noctua cooler is another good 'un apparently. But that is even more money as far as I remember. The AC7 will get you to 3ghz easily, but as I said, its noisy!

I think there are other alternatives, others will give you a better idea though. I think one is a tuniq or something. I'll have a quick look now for you.

EDIT: Here are two that I have seen used and recommended a fair bit. I cant comment on performance though.
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-000-TQ&groupid=701&catid=57&subcat=1395
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-002-SB&groupid=701&catid=57&subcat=1395
 
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they are indeed :D

The TRUE does not come with a fan though, personally I use these as they are fast and quiet. However, they are not cheap, I'm sure some other members know of cheaper fans than work quietly and well on the TRUE.

Edit: Alternatively, this cooler performs almost as well as the TRUE but comes with a fan (none other that the NF-P12 that I linked to).
 
Streeteh said:
Looks like TRUE it is then. Sorry for being thick but is the 'TRUE' a different product to the one below:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-060-TR

Or are they one and the same?

[EDIT] Just saw the post above, cheers for the other recommendations wrayvon but with the overwhealming support for the 'TRUE' cooler i don't think i can pass up on it :)
Click to expand...

Good choice, I definitely recommend the TRUE, I was just giving you some cheaper alternatives ;)
Oh and in terms of fans, I got my Xigmatek's from the site of the bay for rather cheap....
 
Utter gents the lot of you. I've decided to go for the Akasa ultra quiet fans, i know they don't move much air in comparison to the more expensive fans but they are utterly silent (i've got three in my current case) and as has been said before, i'm not a huge overclocker so i'm sure the heatsink will be more than sufficient.

Worse case scenario the fan isn't powerful enough, in which case i'll just lob it into the spare fan slot in the case, learn my lesson, and buy a more upmarket fan.

Thanks so much for the help everyone. I forgot how utterly excited i get when planning a PC rebuild, i feel like a five year old :/

[EDIT] Keep missing your posts wrayvon! Just had a look where you said and they are surprisingly cheap... very very tempting.
 
Ah wicked, cheers for that, looks like it can be run at pretty much the same speed as the platinum stuff for a tenner less.

Will stick it in as a placeholder and see if anything better shows in the TWO offers when i buy the lot. Just been looking at overclocking the 6700 in advance. Seen people by far exceeding 3ghz at stock voltages on far less impressive coolers than the TRUE, methinks i'll be having fun with this setup.
 
Well, it's all up and running. Tell you what; these 775 cpu mounting screw thingies are a chore, and i thought the AMD clip of death was bad! Thanks again for the advice, the heatsink is an utter beast, it has approximately 1cm of headroom in my case which is good.

At stock the 6700 hits around 45C while under load. How much can these core2s take before they go pop? Have i got much headroom for overclocking?
 
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