MOBO for C2D and Xfire GFX - Help required

[mynameismatt]

Hi everyone, I need a little help selecting a suitable motherboard for the following setup. I am looking to build a new PC using these components but dont know what MOBO to buy. I have read various reviews that do not offer a clear cut winner in terms of features and price.

Intel C2D E6600
1 x X1950XTX - Possibly 2 running crossfire but only when I can afford the 2nd card so the MOBO needs to be able to support this.
2 GB OCZ Platinum RAM
2 x SATA 250gb HDD 16mb Cache

Ideally I want a machine that has pretty stable O-Cing capabilities that can chew through the most demanding of games and apps.

I am looking at spending around £150 max but would consider a few quid more if it meant I would achieve my above pre-requisites.

Also what is the minimum PSU required for this kind of rig?

Your help and suggestions would be much appreciated

many thanks

 

[rwaritsdario]

Any 975X will do for perfect Crossfire, even that the way youre doing itll be probably a waste of money. The Abit AW9D-MAX and Foxconn 975X7AB are the two best of this chipset for OCing.
I would wait for RD600 tough...

EDIT:

Also what is the minimum PSU required for this kind of rig?

Go up to the PSU forum and check out the stickies. 600W~700W to be on the really safe size. Watch for the amps too.

 

[mynameismatt]

Im not quite sure I understand what you mean when you say a waste of money. Do you mean that bcz ATI will release their new RD600 I would be better off waiting? Or do yo mean the config I have listed is shite?

thanks

 

[rwaritsdario]

SLI/Crossfire doesnt start to gain some performance boost until beyond 16x12 resolutions, also by the time youll have enough money to get the second card, their DX10 cards will be out and youll rather upgrade to a single one of those.

 

[mynameismatt]

Ok well, I was originally going to buy a 7900gtx but after speaking to friends and reading reviews I was convinced ATI would be a better move. I havnt seen any news on DX10 gfx cards apart from the hype/run-up to it. Do you know when there will be a DX10 card release? My current pc is shit and about to give up the ghost.

What would you recommend?

Many thanks for taking the time btw

much appreciated

 

[rwaritsdario]

The 7900GTX is a good card, but it comes at really high price. Same for the X1950XTX.
I dont know about europe but the hard launch for 8800GTS and 8800GTX is to happend a week from now in america. You can already pre-order them in asia.
The 8800GTS would be a better buy for that amount of money.

 

[mynameismatt]

Ok but the reviews I have seen so far indicate GDDR3 still? And the core clock speeds dont seem that impressive?

 

[kaleb_zero]

Although the 8800 will be an impressive performer with 128 pixel pipelines. It does not use a unified shader engine and as such will not properly comply with the DirectX10 standard (I believe it fails to meet some other parts of the standard aswell). RD600 will be a true DirectX10 card, in that it will have all the features to meet the DirectX10 standard. Note that ATI has already developed a DirectX10 unified shader GPU - found in the Xbox360, and R600 will be their SECOND DirectX10 unified shader GPU. Waiting for R600 would be my advice, but if you want to build a rig right now, get a x1900xt or 7900gt, you can always ebay the card later and get R600 or whatever you desire.

 

[kickbutt]

dx 10 do NOT req a unified shader aproatch (even tough m$ and ATI all talk about it)

EDIT
And for what I have read so far nvidias 8800 IS a unified shader with 128/96 shaders that can do pixel, vertex or geo

 

[rwaritsdario]

Its about waiting and see. But it will definetly outperform current cards.