New computer for Xmas

[GungSeng]

Hey everyone

I am getting a new computer for this Christmas and I want you, the experts, to confirm if these components are fully compatible with each other. This rig should be almost the best money could (well, almost) buy and if you have ideas or suggestions I will be happy to take them. Thanks. here are my components:

CPU

AMD FX-55 Socket 939 (Not negotiable)

Memory

Corsair XMS3200XLpro TwinX (2 x 512Mb) 1GB Dual Channel

-OR-

Corsair TWINX2048-3200PRO (2 x 1034mb) 2GB Dual Channel

(Can I get above ddr400 on the nForce 4 mobos?)

Motherboard

MSI K8N Neo4 Platinum

-OR-

ASUS A8N SLi Deluxe

-OR-

Giga-byte K8NXP-SLI

(Depending which one comes out first and if they get reasonable reviews.)

Graphics Card

ATi Radeon X850 XT Platinium Edition PCI-Express

(HIS, ASUS or some other good ATi manufacturer)

Soundcard

Creative Soundblaster Audigy 2.0 ZS

( I was thinking about the Platinum one with the 5,25" bay control unit, but it is black so it looks ugly. )

System Boot Drive

Western Digital Raptor 36gb with SecureConnect

(Secureconnect is the WD Special SATA cable, which improves the signal and stuff like that...)

Storage Drives

Samsung Spinpoint 120gb SATA

(Since nForce 4 supports SATA 300 and current SATA drives only support SATA 150 so I am going to use this until the SATA 300 drives come out and then I am going to buy 1 Terabyte worth of seagate drives. . Please tell me if I'm talking out of my a***.)

Power Supply Unit

Thermaltake Xase Silent Purepower 560 watts ( Should be enough, dont you think? )

DVD RW +/- Drive

Plextor PX-712SA (SA = Serial ATA) (It is beige but the Silver Bezel with the Lian Li negates it.)

Monitor

Iiyama Vision Master Pro 454 19" CRT (I was also thinking about Viewsonic P95f. TFT is not an option.)

Case

Lian Li V1000 Silver with Window kit

(Originally I was thinking about Thermaltake Damier Series but the reviews said it was too crowded inside.)

Card Reader

Mitsumi 7 in 1 cardreader internal floppy drive (Silver) (For my digital cameras memory card etc..)

Fan Control Unit

Aerocool GateWatch Silver LCD Bay Controller ( Takes 2 x 5,25" bays to fit. )

Speakers

Logitech Z-5500 5.1 (If I still have money left after this... Probably not )

Mini-Mods

Streetglow Neon tubes and strobes with pc adaptor kit ( www.Streetglow.com)

Matrix Orbital LCD display ( Silver bezel and 4 line screen )

---------

Phew, that took almost an hour to write. Good of you read it completely so far. As you can see this rig is aimed towards the ultimate Half-Life 2 experience.

Well, what do you think?

My current rig is Intel PII 333mhz as my AMD 1.5 ghz broke down during the summer as my pal tried to OC it without me knowing it. The bastard.

Let the comments flow, brothers.

 

[meltdown75]

wow, what do zombies do for a living?!?!

just kidding, looks uber sweet. good luck with the build

 

[GungSeng]

So everything is compatible?

 

[Zero Plasma]

I think it's ok,but why no lcd?And will you use that much power?Are you a big gamer?And why would you want a terabyte,do you have a lot of programs,pics,plan on backing up dvds?If you want to spend the money i'm all for it but I want an hdtv,dvd recorder(with hdd),7.1 sourond sound would be nice(I hear the xbox 2 will support it.(He goes on and on for one more hour.)Have fun with your build.

 

[GungSeng]

I dont trust TFTs (yet), because they don't give pure black colour, changing away from native resolution causes problems and view angles are small.

Yeah, I am a BIG gamer and I have lot of programs and pics and stuff so I need quite a lot of storage.

Thanks

 

[Gnoad]

Why a SLI mobo, and no SLI? Get 2 6800GTs and blow away that X850. Also, I'd say ditch the corsair ram for OCZ Platinum rev.2 1GB. The PSU although not bad could be much better, like OCZ, antec, or enermax. I'd also get the 74gb raptor as it is a little faster (very little though) and is NCQ. I don't know if you have much of a budget, but these changes should be better performance wise but cost alot more. A good suggestion is just get 1 pci-e 6800gt now, which is still quite fast, then buy the other when you get money. Just my 2 cents.

 

[dc5]

if you're going with an sli motherboard, why not make use of it? i would suggest getting 2 nvidia 6800 ultras.

 

[GungSeng]

Good point on the raptor. I might as well get 74gb with Native Comman Queueing. I've heard that the OCZ PowerStream 520W is pretty good. so I might take it instead.

Sorry, but I'm sticking with the X850 and the corsair.

 

[dc5]

Originally posted by: GungSeng
Good point on the raptor. I might as well get 74gb with Native Comman Queueing. I've heard that the OCZ PowerStream 520W is pretty good. so I might take it instead.

Sorry, but I'm sticking with the X850 and the corsair.

may i ask why you're sticking with the x850 and not the 6800 sli?

 

[imported_Computer MAn]

Originally posted by: Gnoad
Why a SLI mobo, and no SLI? Get 2 6800GTs and blow away that X850. Also, I'd say ditch the corsair ram for OCZ Platinum rev.2 1GB. The PSU although not bad could be much better, like OCZ, antec, or enermax. I'd also get the 74gb raptor as it is a little faster (very little though) and is NCQ. I don't know if you have much of a budget, but these changes should be better performance wise but cost alot more. A good suggestion is just get 1 pci-e 6800gt now, which is still quite fast, then buy the other when you get money. Just my 2 cents.

Id have to agree with him. If you want the best of the best SLI is it. And the OCZ is IMO the best memory out there. But if you wont go SLI then just a normal Nforce4 Ultra board.

 

[jvarszegi]

You obviously don't have an unlimited budget, or you would just max everything out; for instance, you originally chose a small single system drive apparently in an effort to save money. What's your maximum budget, and what are you roughly up to already?

 

[GungSeng]

I presume that X850 still beats dual Geforce 6800GT's and it costs around £400 while dual GT's cost around 470£ (good ones, like XFX.)

I am definately not an ATi fanboy, but my aim is to get max everyting in HL2. Tell me more about SLi Geforce 6800Gt's. If they are better than I might just get converted

 

[piroroadkill]

That's a sweet ass system, beats the crap out of my current machine.

I don't know why you don't want a TFT, but hey, each to their own.

But just a 19" CRT? I have a 21" CRT at work (sure it's old) but you can afford a lot more in the CRT route so you might as well go all out... (Of course, you'll probably want a small CRT or TFT on hand for LAN parties... hehehe)

 

[Gnoad]

Well, I don't wanna sound mean so this will be the last time I say it. If your getting an FX-55 with an SLI mobo, why wouldn't you want SLI? 2 6800GTs will smack around a X850 like a chainsaw through butter, and it would just seem like a waste having the SLI mobo and the best cpu you can get. The X850 will MSRP at $550, will likely sell at $600-$700, which is so close to buying a SLI setup already. PCI-E 6800GTs are kinda scarce right now, but with the amount of money your spending, wht not get the best?

edit: ok, just saw your above post after posting this. And yes, SLI 6800GTs will destroy a single X850.

 

[GungSeng]

Well, Max budget is around £1800 and we're already getting close to it.

I wanted a single drive in order to fit all the other stuff into the 5.25" bays, like the Gatewatch and matrix orbital display, wich both take 2 places to a total of four which is quite a waste of space so I am saving for future expandability.

 

[Gnoad]

dont wanna sound like a dumb american, but how much is £1800 in $?

 

[2Xtreme21]

Anyway, yeah, nForce 4... best money can buy... dual 6800 GT / Ultra in SLI. I'd sacrifice some for that... as that will deliver un-matchable quality.

For example, I really doubt you'll notice a difference between a high end Ath 64 and the ridicuously overpriced FX-55. You'll certainly notice a difference between a x850 XTPE and 2 6800 GT's / Ultras. (By difference, I mean unmatchable framerates.) If you're set on the Radeon, that's fine, but you may be kickin yourself later.

PSU should be more than enough. You may want to drop it down to like a 480W Antec.

Don't bother getting 2 GB of RAM. 1 GB should be plenty.

It's a very nice system... but I wouldn't buy a "Ultimate PC" without taking advantage of SLI technology.

 

[jvarszegi]

This dumb american googled on "british pound exchange rate" and came up with 1.78 inside of ten seconds. That makes £1800 out to be roughly equivalent to $3200 US.

 

[GungSeng]

Well, £1 = 1.9$ so it is around $3420.

A screen bigger than 19" causes problems with games like CS, because the screen is too big and I can't watch the screen without not seeing what is going on the edges. At least to me it is too big.

2 Ultras in SLi would be cool but is getting awfully expensive and the PCI-E ultra come out sametime as x850 does.

 

[Gnoad]

On a side note, I was under the impression the 6800ultra is NOT SLI compatible, so the highest end was the 6800GT. Am I wrong?

 

[jvarszegi]

GungSeng, unless you ARE an ATI fanboy, and it sounds like you're approaching your spending limit, why don't you get a 6800 Ultra to start off? I can pretty much guarantee your system will kick the crap out of most stuff out there anyway. Then in a few months you can add a second one. I mean, you can't even see a 20fps difference with the naked eye when you're talking 50fps vs. 70 or whatever.

I glossed over the review, but does the x850 offer Shader Model 3 hardware support like the 6800 does?

 

[2Xtreme21]

Originally posted by: Gnoad
On a side note, I was under the impression the 6800ultra is NOT SLI compatible, so the highest end was the 6800GT. Am I wrong?

Yes, you are incorrect. The 6800NU and the 6600 Vanilla will be the only cards in the 6800 lineup that will not be SLI compatible.

 

[Gnoad]

If you want to save about $400, drop the FX-55 for a 4000 or a 90nm 3500. Both will OC to FX speeds but be much cheaper, saving you lots of money. Even if you could OC the FX-55 to a higher level, the performance difference will be very small compared to upgrading to SLI 6800GT.

 

[GungSeng]

Gnoad,

The nVidia GayForce 6800 Ultra PCI-E SLi compatible card comes out in January, if I remember correctly.

My friends would get awfully angry/envious at my "show off" SLi 6800 Gt's/Ultra's so it would be beneficial to use a single card x850 in order not to angry them or what do you think

 

[jvarszegi]

Originally posted by: Gnoad
If you want to save about $400, drop the FX-55 for a 4000 or a 90nm 3500. Both will OC to FX speeds but be much cheaper, saving you lots of money. Even if you could OC the FX-55 to a higher level, the performance difference will be very small compared to upgrading to SLI 6800GT.

Gnoad, I am what you would call an uber-newbie when it comes to most of this stuff, so forgive me in advance before reading the next questions.

I've been doing lots of reading lately, and lots of people on boards are saying that systems using the latest cards experience a processor bottleneck. Does this mean that to get the full worth out of a top-end SLI setup you'd need the absolutely best processor(s) going? Even then, is there the possibility of a processor bottleneck?