New Build ($1500-$2000) - Please Review

[darunium]

Hi All,

Thanks in advance to anyone who takes a look. This is my first custom build, so I've done the obligatory months of research and so far am pretty comfortable that I've considered most of my options for each component.

Location: US, Boston
Usage Considerations:

• Primarily for gaming (also for watching movies via 46" 1080p TV)
• Kept in bedroom, ideally powered on all night for scheduled tasks (backups, virus scans, etc.). I'm a light sleeper so keeping it running all night means really making it quiet, which I've wrestled with whether or not it is really feasible or not (giving up this spec would've pushed me towards the Antec 1200 for example, and I wouldn't worry about quiet PSUs or noisy fans). Nevertheless, I think that to me the change to my usage if it is powered on overnight is pretty significant, so I felt that it would be worth a try to get it down to the noise level I can sleep with from across the room. Reviews of various components have also led me to believe that <25dBA is virtually inaudible from across the room. Any opinions in this regard are appreciated. Noise level during significant operation (i.e. gaming, watching videos), don't matter to me, only idle noise levels and HDD read/write noise levels.
• No CPU overclocking planned. Modest RAM overclocking potentially. Modest GPU overclocking potentially.
  
  Planned Lifetime: I know the dangers of "future-proofing" a computer, but my gaming demands are modest. I generally come across games 1-4 years after they come out, and am generally fine with playing them on lower graphics settings, with that in mind, here is my goal:
  
  ​
• be able to run current-generation games (say late DX10) on high graphics settings for the next 1-2 years
  
  ​
• be able to upgrade (see specific plan in build, main upgrade planned is getting another of the same GPU for CF/SLI when prices drop, and if the performance gain is there and the price is right changing to a gulftown CPU in a couple years) to play next-generation games (say early DX11) on moderate to high settings for the following 1-2 years
  
  ​
• be able to play next-next-'generation' (say mid-DX11) games at reasonable settings for the remaining life of the system. This will probably do me fine for quite some time, as frankly the time I have to game is relatively low :-(

I've had a lot of thoughts and considerations for each of the components below, so I won't get into why I made each decision unless specifically asked, but if asked I'm happy to explain why, for example, I steered away from a SATA6Gbps controller, or didn't get a Blue Ray drive.

Build:

• CPU: i7-920 (upgrade: possibly a gulftown in 2 years if performance/price is right) ($280)
• MoBo: Asus P6T Deluxe (or Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD5?($250) Funny enough I've given some of the least thought to the MoBo. Not sure which to go with, the P6T Deluxe seems more user friendly and the 16xPCIe 2.0 spacing is nice for CF/SLI, but the UD5 is 40 bucks cheaper, no small chunk of change) ($290)
• RAM: 3x2GB DDR31600, OCZ Platinum CL7 ($205) (or Patriot Viper CL8 ($175), not sure if its worth saving the 30 bucks)
• HDD : 1xWD Caviar Black 640GB ($65), 1xWD Caviar Black 1TB($90) (upgrade to a SSD in a few years as the technology matures. Getting an SSD now for my notebook which I use for multitasking a general application use where I feel the SSD makes more sense as the performance gains for gaming seem marginal)
• GPU: 1x HD5870 ($400) or GTX480 ($500) (haven't yet decided. I plan to get one card now, and in a year or two get another for CF/SLI when the prices drop to get that significant performance boost to upgrade the computer for its intended purpose. Alternatively if single-card options are better at that time, I could go that way. The 5870 seems like a better deal for the money and for the power demand, but the GTX480 seems to handily beat it in terms of performance, so shelling out the extra money may be worth it if it increases the longevity of the system at reasonable cost.)
• Sound Card: Creative X-Fi xtremeGamer ($50)
• Case: Antec P193 ($170)
• PSU: Antec CP-1000 ($130)
• CPU Cooling: haven't looked into it yet, something cheap at solid performance for a non-overclocked CPU (not sure if I trust the stock fan...) (<$20)
• Optical Drive: CD-RW/DVD-RW, Samsung SH-S223L (16x/48x DVD/CD read) ($20)

Questions:
- Monitor: right now I plan on trying to get away with my LG 42LH90. I can't find hard specs on it, but while the latency appears to be low (2ms), the input lag is understandably high, estimated by some users around 30ms. I've done research on the monitor specs of interest, and have seen some on offer for $200-$300 (20" is fine for me I think, 20-24" is the range I'm looking in.) Monitor specs would be 1920x1200 resolution, 0 input lag, 2ms response time, don't care about viewing angle, 16:9 aspect ratio, DVI or HDMI input. The question is, can I get away with my TV, or would I really be better off just going for the monitor now while sales are on?
- RAM OC: A lot of MoBo list that to use DDR31600 you have to OC to 1600, but other MoBos list 1600 DDR3 as natively supported. What's the situation here? Is this just a case of weird spec reporting? Does the X58 north bridge limit the stock-supported RAM clock? If so, is that going to be the same across all MoBos, or are there differences among them?
- i7-930: What would I get with the 930? Is it worth the extra 40 bucks?

Thanks again for any advice or opinions, they're greatly appreciated. Please feel free to ask me any questions about the choices I made above.

 

[MisterDonut]

You don't need 1366 for gaming if you're using single card. Get an i7-860 (since you're not overclocking, the TurboBoost on the 860 runs circles around the 920; can even consider the cheaper i5-750) and 5850. 1KW is complete overkill. You can get by with a single 5850 and TX650 or something. Stock will do fine. 4GB of DDR3 (Corsair or G.Skill here; I wouldn't remotely consider OCZ DDR3. Ton of DOA's). Get a P7P55D with the 860?

 

[gdawg33]

CPU Cooling: haven't looked into it yet, something cheap at solid performance for a non-overclocked CPU (not sure if I trust the stock fan...) (<$20)

go with the cooler master hyper 212+ link:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835103065

 

[darunium]

You don't need 1366 for gaming if you're using single card. Get an i7-860 (since you're not overclocking, the TurboBoost on the 860 runs circles around the 920; can even consider the cheaper i5-750) and 5850. 1KW is complete overkill. You can get by with a single 5850 and TX650 or something. Stock will do fine. 4GB of DDR3 (Corsair or G.Skill here; I wouldn't remotely consider OCZ DDR3. Ton of DOA's). Get a P7P55D with the 860?

I agree, but I plan on going CF/SLI with another of the same card in the next two years once the prices on current cards drops. The X58 chipset gives me the requisite 2 16xPCIe2.0 slots for that option, or for going CF/SLI with a different card in a couple years.

From what I've been seen so far, neither PCIe3.0 or 32 lane GPUs are being spoken of/are on the horizon, so I figure I have at least two more years of new graphics card options before my MoBo can't handle them, and to me I feel that the GPU will essentially determine what the system will be able to handle in terms of gaming (if required, I could always improve cooling and overclock the i7-920 if I was really running into a CPU wall).

 

[darunium]

go with the cooler master hyper 212+ link:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835103065

Thanks! That looks like a solid cooler at a reasonable price that will also fit the constrained above-CPU space in the P193 (due to the impingement of the side fan).

Is there a difference between thermal pastes, or are they all pretty much the same?

 

[modestninja]

Hi All,
[*]RAM: 3x2GB DDR31600, OCZ Platinum CL7 ($205) (or Patriot Viper CL8 ($175), not sure if its worth saving the 30 bucks)

Steer clear of the OCZ ram. They've had tons of problems with compatibility and DOA sticks, so I'd go with the Patriot Viper or some G-Skill (ie: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231304). You'll save money and prevent a headache of having to deal with OCZ's issues.

Also, going from CL8 to CL7 doesn't give you much of a boost in performance.

 

[modestninja]

[*]GPU: 1x HD5870 ($400) or GTX480 ($500) (haven't yet decided. I plan to get one card now, and in a year or two get another for CF/SLI when the prices drop to get that significant performance boost to upgrade the computer for its intended purpose. Alternatively if single-card options are better at that time, I could go that way. The 5870 seems like a better deal for the money and for the power demand, but the GTX480 seems to handily beat it in terms of performance, so shelling out the extra money may be worth it if it increases the longevity of the system at reasonable cost.)

Personally, I'd scale back to a 5850 for now since at your resolution, it will handle pretty much every game you can throw at it (and has a lot of OC potential). Then, in a year or two take the money you saved, plus the money for a second CF/SLI card and you'll be able to buy a card that will handle all of that gen's games and high settings.

[*]Sound Card: Creative X-Fi xtremeGamer ($50)

There's very little reason to use a seperate sound card for gaming these days. The onboard sound on either mobo as good as the add-in card and you won't have to deal with Creative's terrible drivers.

[*]Case: Antec P193 ($170)

This is a good choice for silence, I'd verify that it will fit the GTX480 if you decide to go with that card.

Another choice to consider would be the Silverstone FT02 (~$230) or RV02 (~$160). They are pretty close to the same case except for the hd bays and the exterior. Both offer excellent cooling and are very quiet.

 

[mfenn]

I agree, but I plan on going CF/SLI with another of the same card in the next two years once the prices on current cards drops. The X58 chipset gives me the requisite 2 16xPCIe2.0 slots for that option, or for going CF/SLI with a different card in a couple years.

I'm sorry, but that logic just plain silly.

Two years from now, a single card will be way faster than 2 5870's in Crossfire, not to mention the fact that people on ebay will still be trying to get ~$150 out of them, which is just ludicrous.

$290 is just a ridiculous waste of money on a motherboard. If you're not an extreme OCer (think LN2), then that motherboard is no where near twice as good as a $145 one.

Get an i7 860, which is faster than the 920 (without the need to overclock) and also get a GA-P55A-UD3 for $130. Enjoy the higher performance of the 860. Then take the $160 you just saved, and put it towards a future GPU upgrade. Tomorrow's GPUs will be faster, quieter, and less power consuming for greater performance. Besides, money in the bank appreciates in value, computer components depreciate (like mad).

 

[Ichigo]

He can just go with an i5 750 easily.

 

[MisterDonut]

I'm sorry, but that logic just plain silly.

Two years from now, a single card will be way faster than 2 5870's in Crossfire, not to mention the fact that people on ebay will still be trying to get ~$150 out of them, which is just ludicrous.

$290 is just a ridiculous waste of money on a motherboard. If you're not an extreme OCer (think LN2), then that motherboard is no where near twice as good as a $145 one.

Get an i7 860, which is faster than the 920 (without the need to overclock) and also get a GA-P55A-UD3 for $130. Enjoy the higher performance of the 860. Then take the $160 you just saved, and put it towards a future GPU upgrade. Tomorrow's GPUs will be faster, quieter, and less power consuming for greater performance. Besides, money in the bank appreciates in value, computer components depreciate (like mad).

mfenn is psychic. Single cards are fast enough to do everything. Multi-card setups were cool when Crysis came out, but now even one card setups can handle it. I might have thrown in a few more adjectives into mfenn's post, but you get the gist.

 

[epidemis]

Hi All,
[*]RAM: 3x2GB DDR31600, OCZ Platinum CL7 ($205) (or Patriot Viper CL8 ($175), not sure if its worth saving the 30 bucks)

Get G.skill CL7@1,5 Voltage http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-335-_-Product

 

[Silenus]

He can just go with an i5 750 easily.

If he is not overclocking AND he can get the 860 for around the same price then the 860 is better. Really though OP... you should overclock whatever you get! You can still do a mild overclock and leave turbo boost, HT, and all power saving features enabled. The Q6600 in my sig is significantly overcloked and I have ALL the default power save features of the CPU still enabled. 100% stable.

Secondly....there is really no need to leave you machine running. Whatever scheduled tasks you want it run at night can be run by waking the machine, running them, and putting it back to sleep. That being said if it is in the room with you and waking during the night you still want it to be quiet. My point is simply that sleep in Win 7 really works well!

 

[gdawg33]

Is there a difference between thermal pastes, or are they all pretty much the same?

Depending on other things going with a better thermal paste might get you between 4 to 8 degree's off your temps but its up to you

I would suggest either arctic silver 5 or tuniq tx-3
the tuniq is very hard to put on but got better results when I tested the both of them.
links
tuniq http://www.newegg.com/Produc/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835154007

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

 

[epidemis]

In addition, get http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...70&#37;20vapor

Keeps your card very very cool, which means reduced fan spin.

 

[darunium]

Wow, thanks for all the great advice!


Let me see,

- On the MoBo, thanks for the price suggestion (getting a cheaper MoBo), I just really don't know how to effectively differentiate between the mainboard options besides ease of use, especially since I'm not planning on significantly overclocking. I noticed that there are solid reviews on the ASRock Extremes, which come in at $160, are there any X58 boards that people would suggest for a lower pricepoint but acceptable performance for someone who really isn't doing a lot of overclocking? An easy-to-use BIOS would be nice, and appropriate spacing between 16x PCIe lanes is key, although I've got a fan right on the GPUs (P193).


- Getting the HD5850 for $300 and upgrading to another single-GPU in two years is a solid idea, as opposed to getting the HD5870 for $400, and then getting another for a couple hundred in a year or two, I'll think on that. What attracted me to the dual HD5870 approach is that while running them in CF doesn't double their performance of course, it comes remarkably close, with 65% or great improvements in fps in most games with 2 rather than 1, so going with a single HD5850 now and then dumping it in two years for another GPU only makes sense to me if single GPU cards will give me almost double the performance in two years for $300-$400 I think. Also, the HD5850 seems to have some trouble playing current DX11 games at higher graphics settings, getting into the dangerous 20-40fps territory on test systems that I don't want to have to deal with with a new box.

As for the argument against going single HD5870 now and dual HD5870 in a couple years (that single GPUs in two years will be way faster than a dual 5870 now), I'd counter with cards from 2008 like the 4870, where dual 4870s in CF still match or beat the GTX480 now. I don't see any reason to believe that 4 years from now 2x HD5870s will not be able to run current games at reasonable graphics settings. If there is a revolution in GPU design in the next couple years that makes the single-card gain tremendous over doubling on the older card, then I can scrap the 5870 and buy a new card 2-3 years down, presuming that x16 PCIe2.0 is still the standard, where I get screwed is if PCIe3.0 becomes not only available but mainstream, which is hard to tell when that will occur. Specs are due late this year, but how it will take them to be implemented I haven't seen any news of. Nor have I seen news of x32 PCIe2.0 implementation.



- I decided not to go P55, obviously it's a choice I considered, but for the $100-$200 more on the MoBo and triple channel memory I pay, I get 2 16xPCIe lanes. This gives me more GPU upgrade possibilities, and if I can replace the GPU in two years rather than scrap the whole system I'm happy with that. I understand that more involved gamers would take advantage of the high performance at low cost of the P55/i5-750/HD5870 and just junk the box in two years, but frankly with only that premium to get 2 16xPCIe lanes and have a shot at upgrading the GPU to extend the life of the whole box, I'd rather go X58. I figure that I won't hit a CPU wall too soon, and as I do I can upgrade the cooling system and start OC'ing the CPU to get more life out of the guy. Plus there is the chance of upgrading the CPU in a year or two, although it seems that Intel doesn't have a $200 gulftown planned since Sandy Bridge seems to be slotted to take over mid-level performance and idk if that will go into the LGA1366, and I have no intention of spending $500 on a CPU for a gaming system.



- On silence, thanks for the Win7 sleep tip, that will really cut down on noise when I need it, at night, and hopefully the rig as is will be quiet enough for the time it is woken without swapping out stock case fans.

- Yeah the soundcard isn't for gaming, I also use the box as a multimedia center and, most important, listen to a lot of music losslessly compressed. So while I've heard good things about on-board sound for some boards and for the reduced need for soundcards due to an improved WinVista/7 sound API (although I'm living with Win7 now with no sound card and am not thrilled about it although idk what my on-board sound controller is, but the sound on my Cowon D2 is significantly better, enough for most to notice), so for 50 bucks the X-Fi xtreme gamer seemed like a solid buy.

- Thanks for the RAM tip, I had heard that but the reviews I've seen didn't mention anything about it. In either case I'll just go with the Patriot Viper, I don't see any reason to believe I will find the RAM limiting, and the performance of almost all DDR31600 triple channel sticks I've seen reviews of is pretty much the same unless you get into serious overclocking.

As for why I'm not planning to significantly overclock, it's mainly for component longevity. If the GPUs or RAM only last 3-4 years who cares they'd be nearly obsolete by then anyway, but if something on the MoBo goes in 3-4 years and I'm still otherwise getting what I need from the system, it'd suck to have to scrap it.

Thank you again for all the great advice and responses, I really appreciate it!

Another question though, besides specific models with some added purpose like the Sapphire Vapor mentioned (thanks!), is there any real difference between manufacturers for video cards (i.e. EVGA v.s. Sapphire v.s. Diamond etc)?

 

[MisterDonut]

Other than warranties and stock clocks (you can change yourself easily), no.

Overclocking really has no harm on the chip. 1366 doesn't turbo as well as 1156, so you'd actually get better speeds running stock with i7-860.

There's nothing that requires multi-GPU. As said before, single cards are fast enough to handle pretty much anything. Even if a game required CFX/SLI (highly, highly unlikely), there are already rumors about new, faster cards coming out sometime in September. There are also some issues with CFX'ing, especially on Crysis, etc. Even if you really, really wanted that fast card, the 5970 is more than enough. I'm not trying to force you to do what I'm saying; I'm just pointing out the differences and unnecessary-ness of it all.

 

[darunium]

There's nothing that requires multi-GPU. As said before, single cards are fast enough to handle pretty much anything. Even if a game required CFX/SLI (highly, highly unlikely), there are already rumors about new, faster cards coming out sometime in September. There are also some issues with CFX'ing, especially on Crysis, etc. Even if you really, really wanted that fast card, the 5970 is more than enough. I'm not trying to force you to do what I'm saying; I'm just pointing out the differences and unnecessary-ness of it all.

Yeah like I said I don't intend to go CF/SLI now, I was planning on getting a single HD5870 and then if I feel a performance pinch in a couple years, either get another HD5870 at what will hopefully be a far reduced price or, depending on the performance payoff and compatability, get a different single card and scrap the 5870.

 

[mfenn]

As for the argument against going single HD5870 now and dual HD5870 in a couple years (that single GPUs in two years will be way faster than a dual 5870 now), I'd counter with cards from 2008 like the 4870, where dual 4870s in CF still match or beat the GTX480 now. I don't see any reason to believe that 4 years from now 2x HD5870s will not be able to run current games at reasonable graphics settings. If there is a revolution in GPU design in the next couple years that makes the single-card gain tremendous over doubling on the older card, then I can scrap the 5870 and buy a new card 2-3 years down, presuming that x16 PCIe2.0 is still the standard, where I get screwed is if PCIe3.0 becomes not only available but mainstream, which is hard to tell when that will occur. Specs are due late this year, but how it will take them to be implemented I haven't seen any news of. Nor have I seen news of x32 PCIe2.0 implementation.

4870 CF beating a GTX 480 is bunk, plain and simple. It is at best, the same, and at worst (i.e. minimum FPS, i.e. what humans perceive as slowdown and stutter) 25&#37; slower.

Furthermore, history has shown that a doubling in GPU power every 2-3 years is quite normal. This follows naturally from Moore's Law. Case in point: Nvidia's 8800 Ultra which was released in 2007 scores 252 on Tom's "Sum of FPS" VGA charts. ATI's 5870 which was released in late 2009 scores 515 on the same benchmark. As you say, SLI/CF scaling isn't perfect, so it can't hope to double performance the way buying a new card does.

I also don't get why you're so up in arms about PCIe 3.0 and x32 slots. Current GPUs don't even touch the bandwidth offered by a PCIe 2.0 x16 slot. Check out the recent benchmarks of the 5870 in PCIe x16, x8, x4, and x1 modes. A 5870 in an x8 slot performs at 98% of the performance of one in an x16 slot. Furthermore, the 5870 gets about 95% of full performance in an x4 slot. Performance only really drops off when you put it into an x1 (!) slot. This indicates that a 5870 uses about as much bandwidth as an x4 slot provides. In short, PCIe 3.0 and x32 slots will not be relevant until about 8 years from now (Moore's Law again).

You also have you figure the X58 tax into the equation at some point. You might think that a 2nd 5870 will cost you $150 in two years, but it will actually cost you $150 + (X58-P55 mobo). At $250 to $300 actual cost, it won't look very attractive at all when compared to newer single-GPU cards. The economics of upgrading to SLI/CF have never made sense. SLI/CF only makes economic sense for people who are seeking the absolute highest performance right now or in special cases where the vendors have their pricing screwed up (e.g. 5770 CF when 5850s were selling for near $400).

- I decided not to go P55, obviously it's a choice I considered, but for the $100-$200 more on the MoBo and triple channel memory I pay, I get 2 16xPCIe lanes. This gives me more GPU upgrade possibilities, and if I can replace the GPU in two years rather than scrap the whole system I'm happy with that. I understand that more involved gamers would take advantage of the high performance at low cost of the P55/i5-750/HD5870 and just junk the box in two years, but frankly with only that premium to get 2 16xPCIe lanes and have a shot at upgrading the GPU to extend the life of the whole box, I'd rather go X58. I figure that I won't hit a CPU wall too soon, and as I do I can upgrade the cooling system and start OC'ing the CPU to get more life out of the guy. Plus there is the chance of upgrading the CPU in a year or two, although it seems that Intel doesn't have a $200 gulftown planned since Sandy Bridge seems to be slotted to take over mid-level performance and idk if that will go into the LGA1366, and I have no intention of spending $500 on a CPU for a gaming system.

I'm sorry, but this part makes no sense.

First, who says you can't upgrade the GPU in a P55 system? If I understand your logic, you are saying "If P55, Then Junk the system in 2 years", "If X58, Then Upgrade the GPU". This is faulty logic, because (1) you can in fact upgrade a GPU in a P55 system and (2) for the same performance reasons as above (that is, a single GPU will offer double performance in 2 years).

Second, there 1366 has no future past the end of this year. Same for 1156. Neither socket is going to have any sort of longevity, and there will be no Gulftowns for less than $700 (A new Gulftown Extreme Edition is supposed to come out later this year and the current 980X is going to be relabeled and knocked down to ~$750).

Bottom line: if you want to go X58 just for the heck of it, be my guest. It's your money, and more power to you. I just don't think it's the best option for your use-case.

 

[MisterDonut]

What ^ said, but I'm just too lazy to type it. Word for word, literally.

 

[RaistlinZ]

Bah, let the man spend his money on what he wants. This nickel and dime'ing business doesn't mean much over the span of 2-3 years. Sometimes satisfaction of getting what it is you really wanted is worth the small price premium. Just go with what you want, OP.

 

[darunium]

...

Hm, that makes sense, that single-GPU cards in 2-3 years will certainly be no worse than CF/SLI cards now, so the P55 is just as easily GPU upgraded to single-GPU cards, and the money saved by CF/SLI would be equalled by the added cost of the X58 MoBo and triple channel memory. The HD4870 CF info btw I got from the Anandtech review of the GTX480.

My thoughts on the PCIe3/x32 PCIe2 were not to say that I think they're coming or that they'd be necessary, like I said the specs for PCIe 3 won't even be decided until the end of this year, they were just to point out that it doesn't seem like the x16 PCIe2.0 standard will change any time soon. That came out of the last time I was involved with a box, when I got burned by the AGP-PCI jump and realized the importance of observing standards to avoid the untimely obsolence of systems.

So, considering that CF/SLI won't give me a performance improvement with my purchasing schedule that I can't get with single GPUs, it makes sense that a P55 board would save me money and give me almost equivalent performance and upgrade options in the tasks I'm interested in.

At the end of the day, though, I'll probably still go with the X58. My case will be the same and my PSU would be only slightly cheaper (CP-850 for $110, although I could probably go with a far smaller 650W PSU for $60-$70 if the sound performance was there), so the cost increase isn't that big, and to me there's a peace of mind factor of knowing I've got those extra x16 and x1 PCIe slots.

Thanks for the help! I really appreciate the back and forth, it helps to understand what the options are. Hopefully others facing the same decisions will see it.

I'm still thinking on a MoBo. The ASRock X58 Extreme got good reviews and only runs $170, but idk if anyone else has another board in mind.

 

[mfenn]

Hm, that makes sense, that single-GPU cards in 2-3 years will certainly be no worse than CF/SLI cards now, so the P55 is just as easily GPU upgraded to single-GPU cards, and the money saved by CF/SLI would be equalled by the added cost of the X58 MoBo and triple channel memory. The HD4870 CF info btw I got from the Anandtech review of the GTX480.

My thoughts on the PCIe3/x32 PCIe2 were not to say that I think they're coming or that they'd be necessary, like I said the specs for PCIe 3 won't even be decided until the end of this year, they were just to point out that it doesn't seem like the x16 PCIe2.0 standard will change any time soon. That came out of the last time I was involved with a box, when I got burned by the AGP-PCI jump and realized the importance of observing standards to avoid the untimely obsolence of systems.

So, considering that CF/SLI won't give me a performance improvement with my purchasing schedule that I can't get with single GPUs, it makes sense that a P55 board would save me money and give me almost equivalent performance and upgrade options in the tasks I'm interested in.

At the end of the day, though, I'll probably still go with the X58. My case will be the same and my PSU would be only slightly cheaper (CP-850 for $110, although I could probably go with a far smaller 650W PSU for $60-$70 if the sound performance was there), so the cost increase isn't that big, and to me there's a peace of mind factor of knowing I've got those extra x16 and x1 PCIe slots.

Thanks for the help! I really appreciate the back and forth, it helps to understand what the options are. Hopefully others facing the same decisions will see it.

I'm still thinking on a MoBo. The ASRock X58 Extreme got good reviews and only runs $170, but idk if anyone else has another board in mind.

If you don't plan to go SLI/CF, the Corsair 650TX will easily power the build. Since you want the machine to be quiet, it is especially important to avoid oversizing the PSU. This is because a PSU's efficiency (and therefore heat output and therefore noise) is a function of the current load. Generally, PSU's have horrible efficiency below 20&#37; load (the curve is very steep here, so every little bit counts), max out around 60%, and slowly start to drop off as you approach 100%. For example, an overclocked 920 with 5870 draws about 141W at idle and 401W at load. 141W is 16.6% of 850W, but 21.7% of 650W. Likewise, 401W is 61.7% of 650W, but 47.2% of 850W. Thus, a 650W is pretty much the perfect size for the system you're envisioning. You would lose the ability to CF 5870's with the 650W (I don't think it's a big loss, but you get full disclosure from me ).

ASRock X58 Extreme is a good board, and one of the few reasonably-priced X58 boards around. I wholeheartedly recommend it.

Have fun with whatever you decide to build!

 

[darunium]

If you don't plan to go SLI/CF, the Corsair 650TX will easily power the build.

ASRock X58 Extreme is a good board, and one of the few reasonably-priced X58 boards around. I wholeheartedly recommend it.

Have fun with whatever you decide to build!

Thanks, the 650TX also gets a nice noise evaluation from silentpcreviews, and it's on sale now for a fantastic $60.

I'm pretty sold on the ASRock X58 Extreme based on Anand's, Tom's, and xbitlab's reviews of the board. Nevertheless I'm seeing a disturbingly high number of owners (~20%) having problems POSTing with anything more than 1DIMM of RAM in the board. Why have no reviews picked up on this? Is it possible that the first lots of the board shipped were great, but once they got the solid reviews ASRock shifted to cheaper components to cut down on cost an improve margins? Or is there some foolish thing that a good chunk of users is doing with the board that they shouldn't?

 

[mfenn]

Thanks, the 650TX also gets a nice noise evaluation from silentpcreviews, and it's on sale now for a fantastic $60.

I'm pretty sold on the ASRock X58 Extreme based on Anand's, Tom's, and xbitlab's reviews of the board. Nevertheless I'm seeing a disturbingly high number of owners (~20&#37 having problems POSTing with anything more than 1DIMM of RAM in the board. Why have no reviews picked up on this? Is it possible that the first lots of the board shipped were great, but once they got the solid reviews ASRock shifted to cheaper components to cut down on cost an improve margins? Or is there some foolish thing that a good chunk of users is doing with the board that they shouldn't?

Check out my edit above for more info about the PSU selection.

From quickly skimming the Newegg reviews and looking at ASRock's BIOS page, it seems like firmware 2.20 has a bug that causes the system to be unable to post in several memory configurations. ASRock has version 2.30 out now that fixes the problem. If your board comes with 2.20, all you need to do is install 1 DIMM, flash to 2.30 and then install the other 2. No big deal, IMHO.

 

[darunium]

From quickly skimming the Newegg reviews and looking at ASRock's BIOS page, it seems like firmware 2.20 has a bug that causes the system to be unable to post in several memory configurations. ASRock has version 2.30 out now that fixes the problem. If your board comes with 2.20, all you need to do is install 1 DIMM, flash to 2.30 and then install the other 2. No big deal, IMHO.

Thanks, that makes sense, and after reading this post, which compares the two boards I'm really interested in, the Asus P6T Deluxe ($250) and the ASRock X58 Extreme ($170), and notes that the newegg users are probably just commenting on their own errors, I think I'll go with the ASRock board for a whopping 80 bucks less.