New system - opinions and help

[badger]

I'm in the process of speccing up a new gaming system, just got stuck on a couple of bits...

The CPU
E6600, X6800 or QX6800? Never been keen on overclocking but it seems straightforward with C2Ds, so an E6600 is a possibility. I was considering an X6800 or QX6800, but the price difference between the extreme and standard C2Ds is huge - the cost of another 8800GTX. Which would be better, E6600 and 2x 8800GTX, or Extreme C2D and 1x 8800?

Motherboard
I need a motherboard that has two PCI slots, SLI capability and at least six SATA ports (RAID not important), does such a thing exist?

[Nick Smith]

from what i've heard the extra gtx won't make a huge amount of difference in performance tbh, but then again again the QX6800 will be a bit overkill for the time being

the e6600 will be fine for all games at the moment, as will one 8800gtx.

[kalniel]

*nods* better to save the cash and upgrade the gfx card down the line.

[badger]

Oh, I should have mentioned that I have a 24-inch monitor. Won't 2x GTX make a difference at 1920x1200?

[Nick Smith]

Oh, I should have mentioned that I have a 24-inch monitor. Won't 2x GTX make a difference at 1920x1200?

i think one GTX should be ok for that res...not 100% sure though

[shaithis]

I am running all my games at 1920x1200 or 2560x1600 (surprising how many don't allow this res)

All my games are running silky-smooth.....the only one I haven't tried yet is STALKER, I am still waiting for my copy to arrive

My CPU overclock has topped-out at 3.5GHz and I was getting noticeable framerate increases at every step up to there with a single 8800GTX.

[Queelis]

Q6600 maybe, and overclock it? That would be helluva lot cheaper and future proof (although with this lot of money to spend, I don't think it's an issue).

[badger]

Q6600 isn't worth it, that's in the region of £500. I may as well pay the extra hundred or so and get an Extreme.

[Toobad]

Q6600 price will be reduced (to $530 from current $851) by Intel on 22nd of this month. Mobos with the new Bearlake chipset are tipped to appear early June and if AMD launch their Barcelona quads in July as is now widely expected, Intel have promised to drop their Q6600 to a spoiler price of $266 at that time.

[badger]

Still, from what I can tell the quad cores currently offer no significant performance increase compared to their dual core counterparts. I saw some benchmarks where the quad cores came out slightly worse than dual.


Any ideas about a motherboard?

[Sprite]

680i if you want SLI.

[aidanjt]

Still, from what I can tell the quad cores currently offer no significant performance increase compared to their dual core counterparts. I saw some benchmarks where the quad cores came out slightly worse than dual.


Any ideas about a motherboard?

It depends on whether the software you're using is smart enough to realise that your system has more than 2 cores, and that's increasingly the case, more and more software is being developed to open more threads per core to fairly distribute work when they need it.

[DratUK]

For your choice of mobo if your staying with SLi

http://www.giga-byte.co.uk/Products/...GA-N680SLI-DQ6

http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/107...ion/index.html

Seems to be rock solid out of the box, so atm none of the issues that plagued early boards seem to be an issue with this one.

£181 from Scan.

[badger]

For your choice of mobo if your staying with SLi

http://www.giga-byte.co.uk/Products/...GA-N680SLI-DQ6

http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/107...ion/index.html

Seems to be rock solid out of the box, so atm none of the issues that plagued early boards seem to be an issue with this one.

£181 from Scan.

10 SATA ports and 3 PCI? Excellent stuff.
That is spot on, cheers buddy.

I assume it's reasonably future-proof with regards to Quad Core?


Reckon I'll go with an E6600 and 8800GTX now, and upgrade the graphics or CPU later on as and when it's needed. What kind of OC can I expect from a 6600, 3Ghz? Higher?

[aidanjt]

All the 680i boards I've seen are quad capable, the Gigabyte also. The only thing that comes to mind with that board, what the hell do you need 4 RJ-45 ports?.. who honestly uses more than 1 on their PC? :|

The Q6600 should reach 3Ghz on a good air cooler, with no problems on liquid.

[shaithis]

1What kind of OC can I expect from a 6600, 3Ghz? Higher?

I would be miffed if I didn't get 3.3+ seeing as I have built around a dozen E4300 systems for ppl recently and all are running at 3.2GHz or above.