feedback on two possible builds?

[Meph]

O, gurus of computer builds, I have been tempted by your voluminous knowledge and advice to build my own rig. This will be my first build, and I'm pretty good with computers (and very good with electronics & assembly), but am anxious about the individual component choices & how well they go together... and how well they will suit my needs. I ask for your advice.

First, here's what I'm doing. I'm replacing a 5 year-old P4 w/64 MB AGP GPU that is now having severe enough issues with XP SP3 that I have been able to convince my wife I should just get a new computer rather than doing a wipe/re-install on the old

What will I use the new computer for? First, driving two 24" Gateway displays. Two huge monitors help me be more productive with my work (word processing, Excel spreadsheets, Acrobat, e-mail... the usual office productivity-type stuff, but also with the occasional use of GIS software like ArcGIS or Google Earth, manipulating large database files & remotely-sensed imagery, which can be memory- and processor-intensive). I also have a creative streak, so I somewhat routinely Photoshop 50+MB lossless TIF files, and I'd like to get back into having fun with Bryce--and the faster I can get Bryce to render, the more I actually use it... so long story short, a good processor/memory/GPU combo is key for me. I don't do high-end FPS gaming. I have played (and will play subsequent versions, if/when I get the time/money to get into them) the Age of Empires/Mythology series, Civ, Diablo, NWN, Mechwarrior, and various (WWII) flight combat and flight sim games.

Finally, I got a new camcorder for Christmas (a hard-drive model), so I'll be doing some low-end video editing/encoding and DVD-burning.

I know that I'll need two GPUs to drive the 24" monitors to the res I want/need. Since I'll be needing two GPUs and I do some gaming, I might as well get a Crossfire or SLI setup.

So, without further ado, here are the two builds I have put together. Build #1 is a bit of a high-end build... future-proofing for games that might come out in the next ~2 years. Build #2 is a bit lower-end, but still a supercharged V10 compared to anything I've ever used.

Almost forgot. Both builds would likely involve me over-clocking. Build #1 would definitely go to 3.0 GHz. Build #2 might go that high, or (if I need to stay safer/cooler, just to 2.66 GHz).

I'd really appreciate it if you could take a look at these builds, especially giving me feedback along the following lines:

1. Will this stuff all work together?
2. Is there a similar component I should choose instead for price/performance reasons?
3. Is there going to be a big difference in the applications I'm using between Build #1 and Build#2?
4. Any other feedback is appreciated as well.

Thanks in advance. I'm new around here, but I'm finding this forum invaluable for all my tech questions.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Build 1

Newegg.com - ASUS P5K-E/WIFI-AP LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX Intel Motherboard - Intel Motherboards
149.99

Newegg.com - Intel Core 2 Quad Q9450 Yorkfield 2.66GHz 12MB L2 Cache LGA 775 95W Quad-Core Processor - Processors
$329.99

Newegg.com - G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory - Desktop Memory
$104.99

Newegg.com - SAPPHIRE 100242L Radeon HD 4850 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card - Desktop Graphics / Video Cards
$189.99 each (+ $30 rebate)

Clocks in @ $1332

Quote:

Originally Posted by Build 2

Newegg.com - ASUS P5K PRO LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX Intel Motherboard - Intel Motherboards
$104.99

Newegg.com - Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Kentsfield 2.4GHz 2 x 4MB L2 Cache LGA 775 Quad-Core Processor - Processors
$194.99

2 X Newegg.com - G.SKILL 2GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Desktop Memory - Desktop Memory
$40.99 each

Newegg.com - PNY VCG86512D2GXWB GeForce 8600 GT 512MB 128-bit GDDR2 PCI Express x16 HDCP Ready Low Profile Ready Video Card - Desktop Graphics / Video Cards (not sure how/why a "low profile" card came up)
$79.99 each

[etnietering]

OK a few things I can think of:
1: You do not need 2 GPUs to run two monitors. Pretty much all GPUs these days have dual output, so you'll only need one. I run 2 20" monitors off of a 8800GTS and it works like a charm.
2: Be sure to get a case fan or two. This will be especially important if you're if you're overclocking. The hot air needs to get out of the case, and you don't want it all running through the power supply. I have 2 Hiper 120mm fans in my case that you can't even hear.
3: If you're doing a lot of video/image editing, I would get a bigger hard drive. 250 GB might seem like a lot (especially if you're coming off one with 40 or something), but when you're video editing, it'll get eaten up very quickly.
4: I don't know if noise is an issue for you, but some video cards have really loud fan assemblies on them, so you might want to look into an aftermarket VGA cooler. I just put the Zalman vf1000 on my video card, so I can personally recommend that one, but I've also heard that the ones from Arctic Cooling are really good, as are the Thermalright ones.
5: The case. If there is one thing that can ruin your first computer building experience, it's the case. I've never heard of that company, and it's not all that expensive, so you might run into things such as: extremely sharp edges (which hurt), screw holes not lining up exactly, the whole back bowing out slightly due to a heavy PSU, shoddy power switches, LEDs that burn out, etc. I have a silverstone, which I can also personally recommend, but its about 5 times more expensive. I did just build a computer for a friend of a friend, and used this case: Newegg.com - COOLER MASTER Centurion 534 RC-534-KKN2-GP Black Aluminum & Mesh bezel / SECC Chassis ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Computer Cases which I was very impressed with, especially for the money. It comes with fans, too.
6: The 8600GT only has a 128bit memory interface. This will be noticable while gaming, so you might want to go with something with a 256bit. If you don't want to shell out many more $$, the 9600GT has a 256bit interface, and it looks like it can be gotten for not too much more.

Other than that they both look like great builds. I've been looking at the Xigmatek coolers, and have heard some good things about them, so let me know how the installation of that goes. I might be getting one when I upgrade next. Also, both the case you picked out and the one I recommended have a duct for the CPU to draw in cold air. This will most likely have to be removed with the huge Xigmatek. I've heard though that the push pin design of the cooler doesn't work out all that well, so you might want to spring the $7 for one of these: Newegg.com - XIGMATEK ACK-I7751 Retention Bracket - CPU Fans & Heatsinks Might make you feel better too knowing that the 600g of metal is actually secured to your mobo.

Hope this helps.

[Meph]

thanks for the advice. The 3 case fans I plan to buy didn't make it into the cut & paste, for some reason. I definitely need a dual-GPU set-up to drive the total resolution I'll be gunning for. I've verified this with NVIDIA, too. I'm trying to keep the low-end build low-end, yet not hamstrung, so I'll look into the 9600s.

I'll probably move up to a ~320 GB HD, but as I'm not going to be storing much on the drive, I don't need a cavernous drive. My current rig has a 250 GB drive and if it weren't for my entire CD collection ripped at MP3s, I'd have over 100 GB free. (I tend not to clutter, and back-up/archive frequently.) And, as storage price falls faster than anything else, I can always ick up a second/larger/external drive at a later date.

The case is indeed one area where I'm very very very unsure. In another thread, someone said that the Rosewills were great values--just different-gauge versions of a more-prestigious name.

To be honest, I'm leery of the Xigmatek. It's so frickin' HUGE, I'm worried about clearance issues. I've had headaches in the past when upgrading components in other computers, with slots not lining up with the brackets in back, or the mobo somehow not being perpendicular to the back, and having to rearrange cards because the slots were too crowded together and some capacitors were poking up too far, etc. So if anyone has a recommendation for a CPU heatsink/fan that is less bulky, yet very goog at cooling and not terribly expensive (and not water... I'm not ready for water-cooling on my first build), I'd love to hear it.

[etnietering]

OK, yeah 24" monitors are crazy resolution, which would probably benefit from two videocards. There are a few cards from both nVidia and ATi that have two chips on one physical card. They generally end in 'X2'. This most likely won't save you much if any money, but it will probably be less of a headache. Here is one: Newegg.com - ASUS EAH3870X2/G/3DHTI/1G Radeon HD 3870 X2 1GB 512-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready Video Card - Desktop Graphics / Video Cards

Video Editors tend to be pigs when it comes to space, and they like to have a 'scratch drive', which is like a page file but special just for that program. These tend to be huge. So you might want a bigger drive - you can get a 1TB drive for <$200.

I had a RAIDMAX case for a while, which I liked pretty well. It was sort of cheap though, and loud. My friend really likes Antec cases, and Antec is a big name in PSUs and stuff so they tend to be high quality. Rosewill, I believe, is newegg's home brand, and so it is very likely that they are re-branded cases. Just be sure to read the reviews, and if people are complaining about something make sure it's something you can live with.

The Xigmatek is a monster, yes. They do make one that's smaller - Newegg.com - XIGMATEK HDT-SD964 92mm Rifle CPU Cooler - CPU Fans & Heatsinks it uses a 92mm fan instead of a 120mm one. Still pretty big though. Stuff from Zalman is great, like this one: Newegg.com - ZALMAN CNPS9700 LED 110mm 2 Ball CPU Cooler - CPU Fans & Heatsinks but it's still really big, so that doesn't help. They do also make ones like this Newegg.com - ZALMAN CNPS7700-CU 120mm 2 Ball Cooling Fan - CPU Fans & Heatsinks but those are older and so you might not have as much luck trying to overclock.
I have a water system in my computer - and yes, they're way more trouble than they're worth.

[Meph]

thanks yet again... this is really good stuff, very helpful. The X2 cards sound interesting, and I might go that way if it weren't for a couple factors: 1) I might not be able to pull off the dual 24" monitors, and if I can't do that, then I'm going to just add another monitor to my current dual-19" setup (probably a faster response-time 21" or 22"); 2) two discrete cards means I can take advantage of a significant performance boost via SLI/Crossfire when I want to do gaming on a single monitor...

Oh wait... reading about that card, it does support Crossfire. And, according to one of the reviewers, with an NVIDIA setup, changing to SLI mode means a re-boot, while Crossfire means no reboot. That in and of itself is almost enough to make me go ATI, regardless of what card or card combo. Though the reviews make the size of the card sound potentially problematic.

I might need to re-think large chunks of this build. How do my mobo choices look for what I'm trying to do?

(oh, and I totally understand about the large volumes needed for video editing--but I can just plug an external drive in to handle the temp files, et al., right? At least, that's what I've used when authoring DVDs before and it went off without a hitch. And I've got a 500 GB external already.)

[ShyguyXPC]

well the 3870x2 is Crossfire on the card, its 2 chips in crossfire on one board, same as nVidia's GX2 cards, 2 GPU's in SLI on one slot. but you can Crossfire it with another card, 3870x2 or even a single 3850/3870 GPU card...

also makes more sense since you chose Intel P35 boards which should support Crossfire, & not SLI, so if you did go with a SLI setup & a P35 you'd be Sh*t out of luck.


I'm with him on the bigger HDD thing too, especially for video editing, I wouldn't go with anything less than a 500GB drive, since price has come down some in past months, now you can get a 500GB drive for a mere $15-20 more than some 250GB drives

oops didn't see your last part of your last post...

an external drive will work too, maybe a bit slower due to interface (if its USB 2.0), but if your using eSATA (External SATA), would get blazing speeds...

I'm mainly a gamer, dabble in some 3D apps & Photoshop here & there, self taught kind of thing, Better at 3D apps than I am in Photoshop or GIMP... but as to the gaming part, I have done some video editing & making videos with Adobe Premiere Pro & other programs, when recording ingame video using programs like FRAPS, its very important to have a fast massive amount of storage, otherwise can get some annoying stuttering in video. its one of the reasons with my quad upgrade I'm ditching the 2x 80GB RAID 0 setup in favor of a 2x 250GB RAID 0 setup... doesn't take long to build up 10-20GB's of uncompressed video, even when recording at half height. plus will need the extra space to edit video (scratch disk) when done recording.

but obviously from your last comment, you know that, amount of space needed


as to the CPU coolers, I've been out of that for a while so don't know which ones are best now, but yeah some of those Zalman & Thermaltake flower looking coolers can be a PITA too, have to make sure there is plenty of clearance around the CPU socket for them, so as to not be touching any components like chipset heatsink or capacitors or RAM etc etc.

[etnietering]

I haven't been keeping up all that much with the new motherboards (my 955x + pentium D works just fine for the time being), but if you want SLi I think you have to go with the nVidia chipset motherboards. I'm almost certain the newer ones from Intel (like the X48) support crossfire. Both of the boards you picked run on the P35 chipset, which does support crossfire, according to ASUS ASUSTeK Computer Inc. but not SLi, so yet another reason to go ATi. One thing with the P35 though, the main PCIe slot is 16x, but the secondary one is only 4x. I think some of the newer chipsets (P45 maybe) would have two x16 slots. That means more $$ though.

Those cards are monsters though, so you might want to go for a big case. They also take obscene amounts of electricity, so make sure you have a good power supply. The one you picked out says its SLi ready, but you might want to go for one thats a tad beefier, especially if you plan on overclocking. I know a lot of people swear by PC Power & Cooling, and they have a 750W one thats supposed to be silent. Newegg.com - PC Power & Cooling S75QB 750W ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply 100 - 240 V UL, ULC, CE, CB, RoHS - Power Supplies It's even on sale right now.

Edit: Also, the one you picked doesn't have any PFC. The PC P&C one has Active PFC. Here is a good link showing what Active PFC can do for you: Akasa AK-P550FF PCSTATS Review - Power Tests Simply put, the active power is how much you're using, the apparent power is how much is coming out of the wall.

And for the hard drive, yes an external should work fine. USB is slower than SATA, but it's better to have your scratch drive on a different physical disk than the main drive you're running off of, so you're pretty well off. A 500 GB external is more than enough for that.