P35 DS3R Build Recommendations

[chefswg]

Howdy I'm moving on from my aging deminsion 8200 and building a C2D comp. I live in Alaska so I can't purchase my components through newegg, and so I've found zipzoomfly.com to ship up here with a reasonable shipping fee. That said if anyone knows of any other online retailers that ship to AK and also are competitive, please let me know. Here is the build I have in mind...
Case: Antec Nine Hundred
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=140146

Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS3R
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10005276

PSU: Corsair HX Series CMPSU-620HX 620W
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=373110

CPU: Core 2 Duo E6750
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10005522

Memory: Crucial Ballistix DDR2 800 2 Gig kit ---PURCHASED ALREADY---
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=80061-9

Video Card: 8800 GTS 320MB GDDR3
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=322837

DVD-Combo: Liteon DVD 16x + CD-RW 52x32x52 Serial ATA
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=175503

Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 320Gb
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=101457

OS: Vista Home Premium 64-bit
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=604698

This computer will be firstly aimed at gaming but also mp3 encoding, some picture editing, the usual internet and home use. However I am not interested in dropping the dough to purchase the 8800gtx or think that sli is ideal for 2 8800GTS cards, for a later upgrade, so I'm all about going single GPU now and probly buying another card in a couple years to replace the single 8800GTS.

Questions...
1. I'm currently not and unable to do any overclocking on my Dell but I think that I will have interest in overclocking this build. For a modest OC for this build to say 3.0-3.2Ghz on the processor in the Antec 900 case, do you recommend something other than the retail HSF on the e6750? Any recommendations that are available at zipzoomfly?

2. If you were going to drop the money and buy now would you go for the e6750 or go quad core? I really haven't fully been convinced quad core is all that right at this time.

3. My 22" LG LCD supports resolutions up to 1600X1050, 3000:1 contrast ratio, and 2 ns response time. I've read that the 320mb version of the GTS is all that is needed for resolutions under 1600X1200. However is it possible that there could be some benefit in the future having a 640mb version for upcoming DX10 games or is the GTX the only option that will provide a noticable performance increase?

4. I know that XP currently is the faster windows platform for probly all games atm, with more driver support. But can anyone really recommend purchasing a copy of XP at this point when its certain that Vista will be mainstream before too long? Also it just seems to me that 64bit is also going to be standard as it's almost certain that memory requirements are going to continue to be pushed well beyond the 3gig max of the 32bit OS's. Looking for peoples opinions here.

5. Please feel free to critique the build with any recommendations. Again I'm not going to go SLI/CF or buy a GTX/ULTRA, unless prices drop below $400.00.

Building this comp sometime in the beginning of September.
Thanks,
Shaun

 

[Nerd]

the stock hsf is probably not going to work very well for oc. You might consider something like this:

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=316511

or watercooling. Keep the processor, it's good and will handle most anything. Same with the video card unless you want really high fps.

vista with the support of dx10 will be the way to go for gaming definitely. And I suggest you either build sooner or don't start thinking about this until September as most of this will go out of date quickly.

 

[Maziar]

i have seen many benches , many got 3.0+ with stock hsf

my suggestion : get a q6600 if u can

the difference between 8800GTS 320 and 640 isnt that much in resolution lower than 1600x1200 , if u want a performance increase , then get a GTX

 

[chefswg]

Got the computer build in mid August and I've had some time to run through some games and do an overall test of the system. Firstly I'll update what I ended up with as far as configuration.
1)Antec 900 case
2)Gig p35ds3r MB
3)intel 6750 cpu
4)4 gig crucial ballistix 4x1gig memory
5)EVGA 8800GTS 320mb
6)corsair 620 psu
7)WD 500 gig 7200 HD
8)Running Vista 64

Overall very pleased with the computer, it went together with out any problems what so ever. Plugged everything in and turned it on, installed the OS and updated it. The rest of the driver installation went with out a hitch.
I bought Bio-shock and have been playing it for a couple of weeks and everything is running smoothly on max setting. I installed FEAR and ran the benchmark loop on max setting with 100% above 40fps. Battlefield 2142 also is running well on max settings. I haven't tried any other games yet but thus far only Command and Conquer has not installed on vista 64.
As far as Vista 64, I'm happy but also mildly disappointed that it isn't running a couple of programs that I'd like to have installed. Yahoo music jukebox is one of them. Itunes runs with any problems thus far so I'm still able to procure music online.
Anyhow, I hope this helps someone out.

 

[trevorblain]

Hey, great timing on this post reoccurring, last night I bought more or less the same setup (got a q6600 g0, and G. Skill ram) and am now getting the pre-build jitters! I've always been an asus man myself, so it took a few deep breaths to break away and go with Gigabyte.

Glad to hear you are happy with it, wish me luck!