Hi all, I've not been into the technical side of things for the past 18 months or so, but it's time to update my rig at some point over the next couple of months. I'm currently running an AthlonXP 2600+ with an nForce2 mobo - don't laugh.
I'll effectively be building a new machine, but carrying over drives and PSU from my current one. I'm planning basing it around the E8400 in an Antec P182 case. The focus of the rig will be quietness and stability - it's in the living room and is used for work and photography more than gaming these days. However I can't say I'll never turn the FSB up to 400.
Problem is, i can't decide what mobo to get. I like Asus mobos, and it seems the P35 chipset is a good mainstream board (the X38 would have no benefit to me) - which means an Asus P5K in some flavour. But I don't know which flavour. I was interested in the P5K Pro, as it's like a premium board but with the stuff I don't need chucked out. In it's favour, it's keenly priced, and has the Asus EPU power saving abilities which is appealing. But then I realised that (1) it's not a full size ATX board - it has an inch or two shaved off which doesn't affect things except to make the board a little more cramped, but (2) the 24-pin power connector is in a stupid place, and would prevent me from routing the power cables across the back of the Antec P182 case (which kinda defeats one of the main advantages of that case, imho).
So which P5K is most suitable? I'm not counting the premium boards with things like wifi that I have no use for, I'm not spending a 3-figure sum on the mobo. There's the basic, plain vanilla P5K, or the P5KR with the added RAID controller in the southbridge. Or there's the P5KC which accepts both DDR2 and DDR3 memory. Hmm. Any suggestions? I wonder if the P5K Pro and a 24-pin extension cable is the way to go.
For graphics, I'm thinking 512MB 8800GT. A little more than I wanted to spend but this card is clearly the price/performance sweet spot at the moment. But should I go with a cheaper one and put my own cooler on it (likely a Thermalright HR-03-GT, lovely and quiet with a large, slow fan), or get one of the slightly overclocked ones that come with a Zalman cooler fitted? Hmm. Any suggestions?
Finally, I've no idea what RAM to get. I'm assuming I want DDR2-800 - and that there's not too much benefit (when compared to the extra cost) of getting -1066 ram? Given that I'm not a mad overclocker (as mentioned, I may try to take the FSB up to around 400, which gives a CPU speed of ~3.6 GHz which I've read is easily do-able with the Wolfdales), which brand and speed of memory would you recommend that is best value? I'm looking at getting 2 gigs.
So far, the final build will look like this:
Intel E8400 Wolfdale CPU
Thermalright Big Typ VX cooler
Asus P5K - not sure what flavour
2GB RAM - not sure what flavour
nVidia 8800GT - not sure what flavour - poss. with Thermalright HR-03-GT
* Tagan TG480-U01 PSU (480W)
Samsung Spinpoint HD501 - 500GB
* 2× Seagate 7200.7 160GB
* 2× optical drives
Antec P182 case
* = carried over from current system
Your help and advice is much appreciated. I have to wait until next month before I can afford it, so it's going to be a test of self-restraint not to click "buy" on any of these items before then!