Gaming Rig

[Gunwitch]

Advice required on the following for a gaming rig please.
Sprout your opinions, advice and anything else you deem necessary

LN7875 Icemat Teflon Replacement Padsurfers £2.25 £2.64

LN14329 Asus M2N32-SLi Deluxe NF590 SLI, S AM2, PCI-E (x16), DDR2 533/667/800, SATA II, SATA RAID, ATX £84.39 £99.16

LN15182 AMD AM2 Athlon 64 4200+ Dual Core 2.2GHz, 2x 512KB Cache, Retail Energy Efficient £55.99 £65.79

LN18257 256MB Leadtek 8600GT Extreme, PCI-E (x16), Mem 1600 MHz, GDDR3, GPU 590 MHz, 2x DL DVI-I/HDTV £77.99 £91.64

LN6778 Icemat 2nd Edition, Black Professional Glass Mouse Mat £19.29 £22.67

LN14147 Antec P180 Advanced Super Midi Tower Case, Black (no PSU) £68.89 £80.95

LN17812 AKASA 12cm Auto Thermal Sensor Black Fan, 3 Pin Ball Bearing £7.89 £9.27

LN17088 Wolf King DK-2588U, Timber Wolf Gaming Keyboard, USB 1.1 USB Hub 1.1, Wired, Silver/Black £30.89 £36.30

LN11596 2GB (2x1GB) CorsairTwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC2-6400 (800), 240 Pins, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 5-5-5-12 £59.64 £70.08

LN17439 720W Enermax Infinity EIN720AWT Modular Quad SLi Quad Core Xfire EPS12v CoolGuard 80%+ Eff' £113.49 £133.35

Would i need to connect the g-card if i'm only having one to the psu? This is something i've not understood and would like it glarifying if at all possible please.

Thanks in advance

[RECOiL™]

Get a Core Duo 2 system

e6600 + ausus p5b ftw !

[staffsMike]

For a gaming rig you might want to consider the 8800 series as the 8600's are weak.

The Antec p182 is a revised version of the p180 and doesn't cost any more so i'd go with that.

The rams ok but you could get geil or crucial for the same money which is better.

Agreed with recoil.. e6600 + p5b + geil/crucial ram is what you want..and an 8800GTS 320mb

[Flewis]

Firstly that psu is way in excess, a cheaper psu such as the corsair 520W one would save you £60 and provide plenty of power.

For the £165 you are spending on cpu+mobo you could get a core2duo setup for that price. E4300 + asus P5B or gigabyte DS3P. The core2 setup will perform better and allow for some overclocking.

The 8600GT isnt really a great gamers card, saving on the psu you might be able to stretch to an 8800GTS, if not then an x1950XT would kick the 8600.

Otherwise fine, good case choice but the P182 is out now.

[Gunwitch]

Thanks for the advice so far, i'm not a fan of Intel at all, hence going the amd way.

Thought you needed a high powered psu though, glad to find out i don't.

[Agrippa]

Fan or not, why not buy the best product on the market rather than paying the same for less?

[Flewis]

If you do go with amd, dont bother with such an expensive motherboard. As people are moving to intel more its value will drop like a stone after youve bought it.

[Thorsson]

I'd say get a Bearlake, say P5K, and get some future proofing. But definitely go C2D. I've always been an AMD admirer, but the difference is too big to ignore.

[kalniel]

I like AMD too.. but I can't argue against the performance of the core 2 duo at the moment.

Definately agree about the 8800 though - the 8600 series are very poor.

[Gunwitch]

Well the boss has limited my budget so core duo is out the question.

[Thorsson]

Apart from the fact that Core2duo is no more expensive than AMD, you are spending a lot on the "nice to haves", from case to keyboard to mousemat. You'd be better off saving a little in those areas than in the key performance ones.

[Goose]

I used to favour AMD as well, but performance for cost wise, Cre 2 duo is just too good.

I have the exact system that staffsMike said:

Agreed with recoil.. e6600 + p5b + geil/crucial ram is what you want..and an 8800GTS 320mb

With a 520w corsair hx, and it is excellent! Also, it wasnt massively expensive, cheaper than a lot of the components on your list.

[NightshadowUK]

- Intel Core 2 Duo E4400 ~ £88.11

- Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro ~ £12.16

- Asus P5B-E iP965 ~ £79.63

- 256MB Sapphire Radeon X1950XT ~ £109.95

- Geil Ultra DDR2 2.0GB PC6400 4-4-4-12 ~ £61.09 + delivery

- 520W Corsair HX ~ £68.02

- Antec P182 Advanced ~ £90.46

- 120mm Sharkoon 1000 ~ £7.26 / 120mm Sharkoon 2000 ~ £7.04

- Wolf King DK-2588U ~ £36.30

- Icemat 2nd Edition ~ £22.67

- Icemat Teflon Replacement Padsurfers ~ £2.64

Total ~ £578

That system owns the original spec and WILL overclock to 3GHz.

[staffsMike]

Well from the original spec your budget is at least £600..

For which you could get pretty much what I bought for my last build

E6600 - £135 (check scans today onlys)
Asus P5b (i got the -E plus) - £85
Half Decent pc5300 RAM - £45 (get pc6400 for around £60 if you want to overclock)
Corsair 520w -£65
Antec p182 - £85
8800 GTS - £170

Thats £585 with the lower speed RAM, £600 with it.

Note: You didnt spec dvd/hard drives. £60 for this lot but i'm assuming you have them..

It'll be £700 with your keyboard, mouse and hard drives etc.. if you need them but not too much more than your original budget and theres still money to be saved if need be (lesser CPU, less fancy case, less fancy motherboard etc..)

EDIT: beat me to the punch there nightshadow lol... got links too haha

[NightshadowUK]

EDIT: beat me to the punch there nightshadow lol... got links too haha

I aim to please.

[Gunwitch]

Many many thanks guys, you may of just convinced me to go the Intel way!