New Gaming PC - Help Appreciated

[khan31]

A while back I was creating a PC but held off as I wasn't in desperate need for one. However, now that my current PC is lagging well behind most others its time for a new pc. I'm looking at a ?700 gaming/video converting and editing PC and came up with this spec:

Motherboard: Asus P5E Deluxe X38 (socket 775)
CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q9450 2.66GHz
Gfx: Sapphire Radeon HD 4870
RAM: 4GB Corsair TWIN2X4096-6400C5 DHX
Hard Drive: SAMSUNG 500GB SATA-2 HDD
Power Supply: 750W Corsair CMPSU-750TXUK
DVD/RW: LG GH20LS 20x DVD-RW
Case: Antec 300
Cpu Air Cooling: Noctua NH-U12P CPU Cooler

X38 board for 4870 crossfire with both cards at x16
Q9450 as I hear it overclocks well and is near the top end CPUs in terms of performance so good value for money
HD 4870 is a good card for less than ?200
4GB RAM to run Vista 64bit
Samsung drives are supposedly really fast/reliable and cheap
750W PSU to supply enough power for crossfire cards
Case was recommended to me as it allows for good air flow
CPU Cooler is good for price

What do you guys think? To the more knowledgable is it a good setup? No glaring problems?

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

I have little knowledge about CPU coolers, so it must be good.
Rest of the rig is splendid, each and every part the best of its best. Value for money for all these parts is awesome. But be careful about the softwares you need to use, if they are compatible with 64-bit windows.

Good luck with the rig. It sounds tremendous value for money, just take care to only pick up a GDDR5 based 4870.

 

[khan31]

I thought all HD 4870s were GDDR5 based! Will have to make sure about that when it comes to buying! Have you had/heard of many problems with 64bit Vista? Thanks again mate!

EDIT - http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Comp...+Radeon+4870+512MB+PCI-E+2.0+?productId=32345 that look good to you mate? Very good price aswell! £183 and its £190-£200 everywhere else!

 

[The_gas]

Yeah looks good, or there is this one which is a little cheaper.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showp...5 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

I thought all HD 4870s were GDDR5 based! Will have to make sure about that when it comes to buying! Have you had/heard of many problems with 64bit Vista? Thanks again mate!

EDIT - http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Comp...+Radeon+4870+512MB+PCI-E+2.0+?productId=32345 that look good to you mate? Very good price aswell! £183 and its £190-£200 everywhere else!

Not all, board partners can go in for GDDR3 too. After the release of a 128 - bit 8800GT by POV, I'm scared by any board partner.


Yep, this one looks good enough!

 

[khan31]

Decided to save money and turn down X38 mobo/ crossfire cards. NEw set up looks as follows:

Motherboard: Asus P5Q P45 £76.25
RAM: 4GB Corsair TWIN2X4096-6400C5 XMS £52.45
Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda 500GB SATA-2 7200RPM/32MB Cache £46.43
Power Supply: 750W Thermaltake Toughpower £71.27
Case: Coolermaster CM 690 Black £55.58
CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q9450 2.66GHz £190
Gfx: Sapphire Radeon HD 4870 £172
Cpu Air Cooling: Zalman CNPS-9500 £25

Comes in at around £690 so fully built for £700 (Dads mate builds PCs). Looks good to me. Any guidance on the parts? Any glaring problems/errors? Thanks alot guys!

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

It looks perfect. I'm not sure, but even if the P45 is x8 crossfire, don't worry, because its PCI-E 2.0, which in turn means that it has same bandwidth as PCI-E 1.1 x16!

I think you could also save some money on the processor. Nehalem is just around, and spending that kind of money would seem foolish after some time. You are better off buying a processor as E8200, as hardly any game would benefit from a quad core, and E8200 is madly overclockable as well. If you would want to up the ante, you could even go with the E8400.

The thing is, that Nehalem quad cores will be much faster, and after 1 year you'll feel your investment went wrong. Instead, save some money and keep it for a platform upgrade next year or maybe two years later. The E8000's have enough horsepower to keep any gaming machine happy! That is ofcourse, unless you're doing some video decoding / encoding, but as far as I know, very few encoders actually take advantage of quad cores, and with softwares like Babadoom coming into view, they will soon take over!

 

[khan31]

I think I might just do that. Buying one of the Dual Cores would save me around £90 which I could use to upgrade to nehalem in the next year and a half. Would that motherboard (P5Q) support nehalem CPUs when they come out?

You are legendary Kshitiz

 

[whitekickboy]

I think I might just do that. Buying one of the Dual Cores would save me around ?90 which I could use to upgrade to nehalem in the next year and a half. Would that motherboard (P5Q) support nehalem CPUs when they come out?

You are legendary Kshitiz

it should support it :P

 

[khan31]

Thanks mate!

Last question before I hit the place order button:

Which CPU is better overall (gaming/converting videos/photoshopping etc):

Q6600
or
E8400?

Obviously one is quad core the other is dual and one overclocks slightly better(E8400) than the other. However, I hear the Q6600 would serve me better until I get nehalem (1.5-2 years away) and for only £6 more than the E8400 is it the prime choice for me? Multithreading apps/games aren't too far away and dual core wouldn't suffice then.

THANKS once more to all that helped me!

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

Thanks mate!

Last question before I hit the place order button:

Which CPU is better overall (gaming/converting videos/photoshopping etc):

Q6600
or
E8400?

Obviously one is quad core the other is dual and one overclocks slightly better(E8400) than the other. However, I hear the Q6600 would serve me better until I get nehalem (1.5-2 years away) and for only £6 more than the E8400 is it the prime choice for me? Multithreading apps/games aren't too far away and dual core wouldn't suffice then.

THANKS once more to all that helped me!

First of all, you'll need a new board for Nehalem, as its a different socket, so this should clear up your first doubt. You might also need new memory because Nehalem only supports DDR3 memory.

Secondly, I guess Q6600 would be a better deal at those prices, because its quad core, and gaming performance obviously saturates after a point, so there'll be no difference between 3Ghz QC and 3 Ghz DC gaming wise. Photoshopping, however, would benefit greatly from a quad core, and some video converters too. So go for the Q6600 I think.

EDIT - And in regards to overclocking, I assure you you'll not be needing performance over 3.6Ghz which the Q6600's generally easily achieve.

Glad to help!

 

[khan31]

Thanks buddy. Will go ahead and buy all the parts for £650 from BT. I hope this is all I will need to have it built:

Motherboard: Asus P5Q P45 £76.25
RAM: 4GB Corsair TWIN2X4096-6400C5 XMS £52.45
Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda 500GB SATA-2 7200RPM/32MB Cache £46.43
Power Supply: Corsair Memory 750W TX SERIES ATX £76.36
Case: Coolermaster CM 690 Black £55.58
Gfx: Sapphire Radeon HD 4870 £179.98
Cpu Air Cooling: OCZ Technology Vendetta 2 £26.15
CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.4GHz £113.25
£656 delivered!

So for nehalem, a new mobo and ram would be needed. Will have to wait 2years at least then as that would cost around £300!

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

You would need an optical drive? Or you would use a current one?

Other than that, it looks alright to build a system. Be sure to have necessary ports though. Like check if the Sapphire card comes with necessary converters, if needed etc.

 

[khan31]

Sapphire card has most cables out of all the brands so must have the cables needed to connect to my LG 19" HDTV/Monitor.

I forgot to add I am getting this DVD/RW drive:LG Electronics LG 20X DVD+/-RW/12XRAM IDE BLACK WITH SECURDISC

My motherboard should have IDE slots so should be fine I hope.

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

You'll have to check about them. Intel ICH9 or ICH10 don't have a built in IDE controller, so motherboard makers use external ones like from Jmicron. Check if yours does...