Building new PC need help please

[Puffy]

Hi there i am new here and I just wanted to see if what I was building was any good for the price I am paying.

here is the specs:

4GB (2x2GB) Corsair TwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC2-6400 (800), 240 Pins, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 5-5-5-18, DHX

320 GB Seagate ST3320620AS Barracuda 7200.10, SATA 300, 7200 rpm, 16MB Cache, 8.5 ms, NCQ

Asus P5N-D, NF750i SLI, 775, PCI-E 2.0 (x16), DDR2, 533/667/800, SATA II, SATA RAID, ATX £70.75 £83.13

512MB XFX 8800GT(AD) PCI-E 2.0 (x16), 1800MHz GDDR3, GPU 600MHz, 112 Streams, HDTV/2xDual Link DVI-I

650W TX Corsair PSU, single 12V rail, energy efficient, quiet & cool, fully compatible, 5yr warranty

Intel Core 2 Duo, E8400, Wolfdale Core, S775, 3.0 GHz, 1333MHz, 6MB Cache, Retail

Thermaltake Tsunami Dream VA3000BWA Black Aluminum Case with Window w/o PSU

In total it comes up to about £593.
Thank you for any help you can give me.

[staffsMike]

Looks ok but there are things I would change (pretty much all of it sorry lol)

Assuming your budget is £600

Intel Q6600 + scythe mine ~£155
4GB DDR2 ~£60
Abit IP-35 dark raider ~£65
Corsair 520w HX ~£60
Coolermaster CM-690 ~£50
500GB western digital AAKS ~£50
8800GT ~£115 -- But I'd wait for the new cards coming out in a week or so, ATI's will fit this budget I think and it will be a great performer.
Optical? You didnt specify one but DVD writers are about £18 now.

~ £555 (£575 with optical)

The reason I would take mine over yours.

I prefer western digital hard drives, everyone has a preference though.
520W is more than enough power for this and it's modular making cabling easy.
The case is just a bargain. Quiet and one of the coolest running cases money can buy right now. Great cable management and roomy to
The SLi board is a bit of a waste of time, concentrate on getting a decent single gfx card system and upgrading the gfx card when you see fit.
Quad over dual because the difference between them in games is pretty insignificant but the quad is far better at most other apps and especially multi tasking.

[Puffy]

Oh ok lol but I dont really multitask. I usually just do one thing at a time. Oh I ve changed my mined about the case I am starting to like the Thermaltake Armor jr case I think its a good case and your case is pretty good does it come in silver? Sorry to sound like a newbie but whats scythe mine??? Thanks for your help.

[FifthFreedom]

A Scythe Mine is this bad boy right here.

Computer hardware and software at amazing prices, available online from Scan Computers UK

It's a CPU cooler, keeps you Processor nice and cool.

This allows you to Overclock your processor, meaning you can probably get it to run at around 3.2GHz per core.

This means your PC will be faster then if you didn't have a big ass cooler.

[staffsMike]

A scythe mine is this

Computer hardware and software at amazing prices, available online from Scan Computers UK

It's an after market cooler which is far more capable of cooling the quad and is far quieter too

No the coolermaster only comes in that colour.

I'm not a big fan of most thermaltake products, bit lack luster usually. Nothing particularly wrong with that case but if you want superior cooling, and a decent quiet case the coolermaster is nigh on perfect (you need to remove the side fan though, thats a bit noisey).

Will you be overclocking at all?

The quad is so close to the performance in games that it makes little difference which you have, but in years to come and even right now the quad can make quite a difference in a lot of apps. It's just a better compromise chip to me.

[Puffy]

Ah man back to the drawing board for me lol. Oh and no i am not going to be overclocking at the moment maybe when the system gets a bit older. I really thought i had a good setup there lol.

[staffsMike]

It wouldn't be bad at all and it would certainly all work happily together.

The system I suggested is only my opinion afterall. It is certainly what I would build with £600 but others would probably disagree. Bangs for bucks though, mine is better.

Holding out of the graphics card is wise, as the new ones are set to be pretty awesome. So give yourself a couple of weeks to think

[FifthFreedom]

Yes, when it comes to new tech, the hasty decision is usually the wrong one.

Unless it's on today only, in which case, go for it...

[edp33]

This might help -> CPU scaling in games with dual & quad core processors

If it's just for games, I would go for the 8300 (2.83ghz) as the link suggests that most games are gpu bound if equipped with a CPU running over 2.67ghz and save £50. Agree with staffsMike's recommendations for the other parts, so the total would be £505

[ed^chigliak]

I have the scythe mine and it's fine except for the fact you cannot see if the fan is spinning and due to its quiet nature you might find yourself wondering if it's working when you first power up your new build. I also took an instand dislike to the standard intel plastic style push twist fixing method at each corner and will avoid in future. Atleast one of the push fixings will be inaccessible and you are almost certainly going to need to mount the CPU cooler before you put the motherboard in the case.

[Puffy]

Ok just one question is there anything good about the setup I've chosen? I think 4 gigs of RAM is enough for me. I read that article its made me more confused now. Its saying dual core is better at the moment and that its to do with the clock speed rather then the amount of cores you have. So could someone tell me what is realy worth getting? Thank you.

[edp33]

It's not that anything is bad about your system Puffy, it should have no problems with any of the latest games. It's that for the money your spending you could improve it in some areas and even safe money.

[staffsMike]

4GB is a great buy right now. Prices seem to be on the up so its a good time to get them.

I mean everything you want is decent, the E8400 is a great dual core, I just dont think dual is worth buying with quad are the same price (and easily overclock to 3.0GHz anyway).

Corsair power supplies are great, genereally made by seasonic who are pretty much the best manafacturer in the consumer market but 650w is just too much and the 520W is modular making cabling nice and easy

XFX are terrible , wouldnt touch them with a barge pole. The card is pretty good thouigh, one of the best bangs for bucks. It's just with the new card about to be released we just dont know whats best right now.

There are better motherboards out there and SLi really isn't worth it. For stock (no overclocking) you won't really notice the difference, apart from in your wallet

[vmong]

what about my build that i am due to make soon.

Intel core2 E6600
Asus P5n-E
256 Asus 8600 GTS
2gb Corsair
320 GB Seagate Barracuda
500W Cool Master

[staffsMike]

what about my build that i am due to make soon.

Intel core2 E6600
Asus P5n-E
256 Asus 8600 GTS
2gb Corsair
320 GB Seagate Barracuda
500W Cool Master

Are you suggesting he builds that or you want us to make suggestions?

[vmong]

contemplating a 8800 but since i dont have DX10 is there actually much point though?