New Computer

B

Blindsfell

Poster Extraordinaire
Joined
May 14, 2007
Messages
3,554
Posted this on the css website to help build it and here is my final product. Tell me what you guys over here think.

Final Product
Power Supply - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182032]Rosewill 600 W RP600V2 SLI Ready[/link] ($80)

Motherboard - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131030]ASUS P5B LGA 775 Intel P965 Express ATX Intel[/link] ($102)

CPU - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115017]Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Kentsfield 2.4GHz 2 x 4MB L2 Cache LGA 775[/link] ($250)

Video Card - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150252]XFX Nvidia GeForce 8800GT 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP SLI Ready[/link] ($220 mir)

Sound Card - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16829102012]Creative Sound Blaster Audigy SE 7.1 Channels 24-bit 96KHz[/link] ($40)

Case - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811226020]SIGMA ORCA ORCA WB Black SECC Steel ATX Mid Tower[/link] ($50 mir)

Hard Drive - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136074]Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD3200AAKS 320GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s[/link] ($75)

CD Drive - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106100]LITE-ON Black 16X DVD-ROM 52X CD-R 32X CD-RW 52X CD-ROM SATA[/link] ($30)

RAM - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231122]G.SKILL 4GB(2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel[/link] ($75)

Monitor - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824001242]SAMSUNG 920BM Black 19" 5ms LCD Monitor 300 cd/m2 1000:1[/link] ($235)

Headset – [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826104055]Logitech Premium Headset[/link] (Done)

Mouse – [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826104076]Logitech G5[/link] (Done)

Keyboard – [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16823126034&Tpk=Logitech%2bG15]Logitech G15[/link] (Done)

OS - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116400]Microsoft Windows XP Professional 32 bit[/link] ($140)

Thermal Compund - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835100007]Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound - OEM [/link] ($10)

Case Fan - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835150037]MASSCOOL BLD-08025S1M 80mm Blue LED Case Fan[/link] ($10)

Total Price: ~ 1310 :(

Here is my final product I plan to buy. If anyone has any other comments/suggestions please do post. I will be purchasing sometime between now and June 29 (birthday). A few other notes for comments:

The pc will be used for a little bit of photoshop, and video editing. Mostly for gaming and internet use. Another little bit for homework (word, excel, ppt). I will be using the stock cooling for everyhting along with an additional case fan. I dont overclock and dont plan to. I may possibly go into SLI or dual monitors but I doubt it and if so, it will be a long time. I plan on upgrading a few things after I get some more money. I plan on upgrading my OS to vista ultimate 64 (when vista is ready), my vid card to a 9800 gx2 when the price goes down and my g card is getting old. My case to a full tower if i go to sli or multi hard drives. So basically i plan on keeping this basic build for a while. I think a quad core will give me a long time ;)
 
Stay away from Rosewill PSU's, their quality has apparently plummeted in recent months. I've read about an extraordinary amount of failures. Look into Corsair, I'm thrilled with my 550VX and it was about the same price as the one you've specced.

Also, I got a Samsung 20x DVD-RW w/Lightscribe for the same price as the one you've specced a couple weeks ago. 16x vs 20x doesn't make a WHOLE lot of difference, but it's still a difference.
 
I would say also if you are going to overclock it, see if you can obtain a G0 stepping Q6600 instead of a B3. The G0 overclock better. Otherwise looks good!
 
well if its for gaming (which im guessing for) get a full tower case. yes you will end up putting more, but you will have more fans for the amount of heat that your whole pc will be putting out. you will also have more cable room and it will just suit you alot better. Thats my opinion anyways. Otherwise looks great
 
Definitely go with a better psu, something tried and true, instead of 'store-brand' garbage.

Brands to look for: Antec, BFG (ones based on Fortron), Enermax, FSP/Fortron (more expensive models), PCP&C/OCZ, Seasonic.

Also, I don't see the need to spend $140 on XP now if your planning on upgrading to vista later. You shouldn't buy into all the blathering and hype saying it's horrible, as it's a perfectly fine OS, and all the useless garbage like aero is just as easy to disable as it was in XP.

And you can do a lot better for that price on the monitor... for $230 you can expect to get last year's 22 inchers, or for $300 you get this year's. The 920BM isn't anything special -- it's a TN panel like all the rest.

Also, that case looks a bit cheap... It shouldn't be hard to find a comparable deal on a Antec or CM -- even at $35 AR you're still paying $16 for shipping, and the good newegg deals have free shipping usually.
 
One thing you have to watch out for is that you are getting 4gs of RAM and a 32bit operating system. A 32bit operating system can only access ~3.3 Gigs of that RAM. Although supposedly, the operating system can secretly access the other .7gbs. And like Dryft said, the Rosewell PSUs don't work very well, my friends just broke after 30 days of using it ( I might ad that it broke right after the warranty was up :P ). And lastly I would spend a little bit more on a good 3rd party water cooling set up or good heatsink+fan for the CPU. Hope it all works out for you!
 
The 32bit OS can address about 3.75GB, but the rest is used by hardware pre-OS so you do get the benefit. I'm running Vista 64 Ultimate for this reason since I plan to put another 4GB in for SolidWorks.
 
Change power supply to Corsair 520HX, or a Pc Power and cooling 610.
Change your motherboard to a P35 chipset like a DS3R, or a P5K-E/wifi
If your overclocking you want something more than a stock heatsink like a tuniq tower ultima 90, theralright ultra 120 extreme.
Switch your thermal paste to MX-2
 
For 10 dollars more after rebate you could upgrade to a much better 8800GTS
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130317

They are only going to be on sale fore another week I believe, so you gotta buy it quick. Everything else looks great, except mabey get vista instead of XP, because you are going to need it eventually anyways. And if you are going with the Q6600 make sure you get a decent heatsink, because that processor is VERY overclock friendly. If you don't overclock it, then it isn't worth getting :D
 
Looking over the thread, a lot of people have covered most of the bases I'd have pointed out.

Specifically, go with a better PSU. Make sure the processor is a g0 stepping rather than a b3. Go with the 8800GTS, better performance for $10 more.

Also, if you're getting XP Pro, go with XP Pro 64. It's about the same price, but supports as much RAM as you want to put in it, rather than the roughly 3.7 GB. I built one for a friend recently and crammed 8GB of RAM in. Disabled the page file, and he can alt-tab between all kinds of power-hungry games and applications without a stutter.

The two things I'd add, though.

For your thermal compound, go with:

ARCTIC COOLING MX-2 Thermal Compound
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835186020
Outperforms Arctic Silver 5, non-conductive, and cheaper.

And invest in an after-market heat sink. Does wonders for speed, especially with such a good processor.

ARCTIC COOLING Freezer 7 Pro 92mm
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835186134
I don't think I'll ever shut up about this one. It just works so well.
 
Well if you have no intention of overclocking a Q6600, then you might want to spend the same amount on a dual core that is MUCH faster. A slow quad core doesn't do you any good for gaming. You are going to want to overclock a Q6600 g0 step to at LEAST 3.0ghz, or else it isn't worth it. You can do this with stock cooling as well I believe, as Q6600 g0 step seems to overclock quite nicely without heating up. :)
 
[quote1207886609=Ephyu]

Also, if you're getting XP Pro, go with XP Pro 64. It's about the same price, but supports as much RAM as you want to put in it, rather than the roughly 3.7 GB. I built one for a friend recently and crammed 8GB of RAM in. Disabled the page file, and he can alt-tab between all kinds of power-hungry games and applications without a stutter.

[/quote1207886609]

If you decide to go with a 64 bit OS, there's really no reason to start using XP64 at this point in it's lifecycle. From what I've been reading, Vista 64 already has better driver support, and it's going to be a lot more future-proof than XP64. I've been running it without a hitch, and quite honestly I'm impressed with it. You can get a System Builder License of Vista 64 Ultimate from Newegg for around $160-180 I believe.
 
[quote1207911435=Blindsfell]
Posted this on the css website to help build it and here is my final product. Tell me what you guys over here think.

Final Product
Power Supply - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182032]Rosewill 600 W RP600V2 SLI Ready[/link] ($80)

Motherboard - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131030]ASUS P5B LGA 775 Intel P965 Express ATX Intel[/link] ($102)

CPU - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115017]Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Kentsfield 2.4GHz 2 x 4MB L2 Cache LGA 775[/link] ($250)

Video Card - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150252]XFX Nvidia GeForce 8800GT 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP SLI Ready[/link] ($220 mir)

Sound Card - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16829102012]Creative Sound Blaster Audigy SE 7.1 Channels 24-bit 96KHz[/link] ($40)

Case - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811226020]SIGMA ORCA ORCA WB Black SECC Steel ATX Mid Tower[/link] ($50 mir)

Hard Drive - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136074]Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD3200AAKS 320GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s[/link] ($75)

CD Drive - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106100]LITE-ON Black 16X DVD-ROM 52X CD-R 32X CD-RW 52X CD-ROM SATA[/link] ($30)

RAM - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231122]G.SKILL 4GB(2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel[/link] ($75)

Monitor - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824001242]SAMSUNG 920BM Black 19" 5ms LCD Monitor 300 cd/m2 1000:1[/link] ($235)

Headset – [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826104055]Logitech Premium Headset[/link] (Done)

Mouse – [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826104076]Logitech G5[/link] (Done)

Keyboard – [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16823126034&Tpk=Logitech%2bG15]Logitech G15[/link] (Done)

OS - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116400]Microsoft Windows XP Professional 32 bit[/link] ($140)

Thermal Compund - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835100007]Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound - OEM [/link] ($10)

Case Fan - [link=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835150037]MASSCOOL BLD-08025S1M 80mm Blue LED Case Fan[/link] ($10)

Total Price: ~ 1310 :(

Here is my final product I plan to buy. If anyone has any other comments/suggestions please do post. I will be purchasing sometime between now and June 29 (birthday). A few other notes for comments:

The pc will be used for a little bit of photoshop, and video editing. Mostly for gaming and internet use. Another little bit for homework (word, excel, ppt). I will be using the stock cooling for everyhting along with an additional case fan. I dont overclock and dont plan to. I may possibly go into SLI or dual monitors but I doubt it and if so, it will be a long time. I plan on upgrading a few things after I get some more money. I plan on upgrading my OS to vista ultimate 64 (when vista is ready), my vid card to a 9800 gx2 when the price goes down and my g card is getting old. My case to a full tower if i go to sli or multi hard drives. So basically i plan on keeping this basic build for a while. I think a quad core will give me a long time ;)
[/quote1207911435]

Just a couple things ( looks like everyone already hit it on the money)

Don't go cheap on the powersource. I have a 400w Enermax I purchased years and years ago and this PS has followed me through three mobo bundles and has worked superbly.

You can do better on the case...look around and maybe spend an extra 20 bucks. Keep in mind constant cool airflow is the key. Make sure you have a case and fans to make sure your components stay as cool as possible.

Lastly, I'm not sure if this mobo is RAID compatible, but you should run RAID if you are able. In performance mode, RAID really makes a significant difference in gaming performance. As far as reliability goes, so long as you have some decent HDs, and you back up important files on external HD every now and then, you've got nothing to worry about. I've been running the same RAID for the last 4 years, no problems.
 
Get a P35 Chipset, the P965 chipset is not really good. I would suggest getting the Gigabyte P35 DS3L. It is a great board, I have it and it runs really good.
 
I agree with ephyu on most of his points, but I think you should get an 8800 GT superclocked. It has better prefromance than the GTS and almost rivals the gtx. It is also usually cheaper.
 
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136073

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131030
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16829102012

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811226020

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115029

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150252


http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106100

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231122

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824001242

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116215

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835100007

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835150037

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182032
 
[quote1208870730=Dryft]
If you decide to go with a 64 bit OS, there's really no reason to start using XP64 at this point in it's lifecycle. From what I've been reading, Vista 64 already has better driver support, and it's going to be a lot more future-proof than XP64. I've been running it without a hitch, and quite honestly I'm impressed with it. You can get a System Builder License of Vista 64 Ultimate from Newegg for around $160-180 I believe.
[/quote1208870730]

I've found the opposite to be true. XP-64 is (more or less) Windows Server 2003 - which has great driver support. It was not uncommon for people to use that OS for a workstation - so scanners, usb devices, graphics cards - all just seem to work. (That is more than I can say for Vista 64 Ultimate, which was problematic for things as simple as a USB thumbdrive or camera ). So far, all of my Win32 games 'just work' as well...

With 8G of RAM (4x2G), I find that I'll accidentally leave BFME, JDeveloper, Oracle, and a few other things running in the background while I play first person shooters - only to find them still running when I finish up gaming. Heh.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Back
Top