Please critique my new Gaming PC build

[swyfter]

Hi everyone, first time poster, long time lurker.

I've decided (with many others) that I will be purchasing a new PC as soon as Intel drops the price on their quad cores. I've come up with a build from newegg that I would like you to look over to see if you have any suggestions on better deals or something I've missed. I'm not interested in overclocking yet but I do wonder if I will have ample cooling with my case choice and stock fans. Any suggestions on those will be much appreciated. Thanks for reading!

If possible, I would like to keep my budget under $2000. Cutting big corners without a performance loss would be nice. =)

CPU= Intel Core2Quad Q6600 $270~

Motherboard= Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R $129

Memory= Patriot eXtreme Perfomance DDR2-800 $80

Video Card= Gigabyte Geforce 8800GTX 768MB $529

Hard Drive= Western Digital Raptor 74GB 10k $270

Sound Card= Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi eXtremeGamer 7.1 $91

Optical Drive= LITE-ON Black 20x DVD-RW $36

Case= Antec Nine Hundred Black ATX Mid Tower $100

Power Supply= OCZ StealthXStream 600W $85

Operating System= Windows Vista Home Premium $210

Total=$1801

Thanks again for any and all suggestions!

 

[grieve]

I would consider adding a cheap storage drive... nice rig for the $ you have there.

 

[swyfter]

Aye, I actually am moving my storage drive from my old PC to the new one. Thanks for the suggestion though. I've made a few tweaks and added Vista into the cost since I do need to plan for that. =)

 

[aevm]

Nice rig...

I heard that there are some problems with the ExtremeGamer and it's better to get ExtremeMusic. Also, the mobo already has sound, maybe you don't need a sound card at all.

You may want to replace or add some fans. I'd recommend Noctua or Scythe here, they're quieter than most.

 

[The_Prophecy]

CPU= Intel Core2Quad Q6600 $270~

Motherboard= Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R $129

Memory= Patriot eXtreme Perfomance DDR2-800 $80

Video Card= Gigabyte Geforce 8800GTX 768MB $529

Hard Drive= Western Digital Raptor 74GB 10k $270

Sound Card= Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi eXtremeGamer 7.1 $91

Optical Drive= LITE-ON Black 20x DVD-RW $36

Case= Antec Nine Hundred Black ATX Mid Tower $100

Power Supply= OCZ StealthXStream 600W $85

Operating System= Windows Vista Home Premium $210

Total=$1801

Suggested Changes:

Video Card: eVGA Geforce 8800GTX - This is the same card I have. Higher clocks on both the core and ram than the Gigabyte 8800 card.

PSU: Enermax Liberty 620W - More expensive, but has Modular cabling support which will help with cooling (the 8800's get pretty warm). Also cleans up the case quite a bit.

Hard Drives: Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500GB SATA - Grab a couple of these and RAID 0 them. You'll end up with essentially the same performance for much less money.

RAM: Super Talent 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2-800 - If you want to overclock, this is the RAM to get. Don't count on getting all of those MIR's either. This one has a lower base price than the Patriot.

Everything else looks good. Enjoy the new rig.

 

[markish]

yeah i really recommend if ur going to go with the 10k rpm HDD setup that you atleast get another and go raid 0 or dont do it all. even if you do i would get a storage drive like maybe 200gb or even bigger depending on how much you need. that one hard drive will never be enough space for you and you dont even get the full 74gb. also after installing the OS your probably going to have that hard drive half way or a little more then halfway full.

 

[markish]

oh and i just noticed you put $270 on that hard drive and the hard drive is actually only $150

 

[Shocking]

I would use the 9800 GTX instead of the 8800... but that's me