new pc

[cabooseUK]

Hey im new here and would like to begin by saying Hi to everyone!

After years of using my current crap pc i have saved enough money to buy a new one, and would greatly appriciate some advice (and i have one or two questions)

Heres are the main components i was gonna buy, and would you recommend i change anything?

CPU: Q6600
MOBO: Asus Commando
RAM: Crucial Ballistix 2GB PC-8500C5
PSU: Thermaltake ToughPower 750W
GPU: 8800GT
HDD: Seagate Barracuda 250GB
Case: Thermaltake Armor

All the smaller things such as thermalpaste arent worth mentioning i wanted to know if there was anything i should change before actually taking the plundge and buying all of this stuff? The main question i have is i was gona buy a water cooling kit (Swiftech H20-220 Apex Ultra+) and everything seems good and compatable, then i saw that the kit came with a northbridge waterblock, and started to think, ill have to remove the cooling that comes with the motherboard and put that on. But wont that leave the southbridge without some sort of cooling on it? and do you think i should buy each watercooling part seperatley, i looked around and found for around the same price as the swiftech kit i could get all the same components just without a northbridge cooler and a better radiator, what do you think?

thanks in advance for any help!

[BUFF]

don't get a Commando, get something P35 based instead.

[cabooseUK]

I was thinking of geeting an Asus P5K premium but nit sure if the watercooling kits northbridge waterblock fits it, the motherboard has been the hardest component to chose any advice?

[hse180]

I was going to get the Asus Commando but was advised against it. Ended up with the P5k wifi deluxe and not looked back since. The Abit are also a great board too.

[Pob255]

If you get a motherboard with a heat pipe linking the north bridge to the south bridge then yes you'd need something to replace the south bridge cooler if you watercooled the northbridge.

You should be able to get away with just a good heat sink on the south bridge as they don't tend to get that hot (although does depend on chipset, should be ok on the P35)

Also if the Mosfet are also have a heatpipe linked cooler that could probably do with being replaced as well.

Don't ignore the small costs, you can be supprised how quickly a lot of little smallish items can suddenly add up, £10 here, £5 there, another couple of quid for that and suddenly your costs just went up by £100.

I'd not bother going that high on the memory personally, PC8500 is rather overkill, esp on a 266fsb based CPU. Some decent PC6400 should be fine and cheaper, you still be looking at a OC of 3.6ghz before you even start to OC the memory
Same goes for the PSU, it a bit over kill, unless you can get it for a good price (only reason I have a 700w PSU is it was on half price sale )


Good Luck if you go the water cooling route I've still not had the courage or cash to try that one yet.

[MiNiMaL_FuSS]

I wouldnt bother with water, I used to use watercooling, but you can get such good cheap air cooling now the difference is really very minimal and it's not worth the maintenance time.

I'd also agree with a p35 based board

[staffsMike]

Unless you are planning on trying to get that q6600 above 3.6GHz i'm agreed with the above. Water cooling just seems like a lot of hassle to me. A case with good airflow will provide plenty enough cooling while remaining in some cases next to silent. You will get a q6600 to 3.4Ghz quite easily with the big tower HSF's.

I would change the PSU to the corsair 520W HX, it's all you will need and will help keep it all quiet

With air cooling there's no point having PC8500 RAM, you'll be fine with PC6400 for about £30.

I'd go with an Abit IP-35 or IP-35pro (both on scan super savers for £64 and £99 respectively)

I'd get a western digital AAKS hard drive and a 500GB at that, but each to their own.

Best cases for air cooling and quiet/silent operation at the moment are the antec P182 (silence) and the 900 (overall cooling qhile remaining quiet) but that thermaltake is fine i'm sure.

All my suggestions are based around air cooling as i've never bothered with water cooling so if you are dead set on water cooling they make not make as much sense.

[cabooseUK]

Thanks to everyone for there advice! and ive decided to go with a thermalright ultra 120 extreme for the cpu and a thermalright HR-03-GT for the card, and ill just through a few scythe fans in there to. Ive also decided to change my ram to a cheaper ballistix 2GB PC6400. The motherboards im currently researching to see which will best suit me its either the asus P5K premium or the abit IP-35pro, and ive also saved quite a nice sum of money to thanks again.

[staffsMike]

All good choices

Ballistix is fantastic overclocking RAM but if you are overclocking 1:1 between CPU and RAM you will have to bust 3.6GHz on the Q6600 to even be running the RAM at stock speeds so if you need to save a bit more money then corsair or Geil RAM will be fine and offer no less performance.

[MiNiMaL_FuSS]

I'm using Ballistix, best value for money 6400 ram in my opinion. I'm looking to go up to 4gb of te stuff shortly (currently 2gb)....great for clocking with tight timings.

oh and i agree with the cosair psu, the 520 and 640 are both exceptional.

[Thorsson]

I have the WD HDD myself, but if I were buying today I'd find the 32Mb cache on the Seagate 7200.11 hard to resist.