hi all

i finally collected the money (i'm a student ) for building my ultimate dream pc, but i have some questions about some things

in my country, the xeon x3220 is cheaper than the Q6600, is there any reason not to go for the xeon?

my case will be the TT armor with the side fan, will my cooler (ultra 120 extreme) still fit in the case?

will this cooler allow me to clock the C2Q to 3,2ghz?

do you guys have any suggestions, commentss on the parts below? feel free to say them!
these are the system specs:

xeon/core2Q 2,4 ghz quadcore
Geil black dragon 4x 1gb DDR2 800 cas 4
TT Armor case
Termalright ultra 120 extreme CPU cooler
8800 gtx (gigabyte is the cheapest here is that ok?)
OCZ modstream 750 watt (will this be enough, overclocking in mind?)
2x seagate 7200.10 320 gb
2x Scyte S flex fan for cpu cooler
AS5 thermal grease
DVD rom drive (will use the burner from my previous rig)
creative Xifi extreme gamer

for the motherboard, i might wait for X38 to come out here, if i'm not patient enough i will buy the asus p35 deluxe

feel free to answer/give comments!!!!

thanks in advance

While X38 is on the way, it may have issues that people are going to find out. Perhaps, a few bios releases will fix everything. P35, on the other hand, is mature and rock solid. Neither will support SLi. Only CrossFire. Also, X38 mobos will be more expensive than the P35 counterparts.

I would get one of these: ASUS P5K vanilla or Deluxe; Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R; Abit IP35 Pro. They overclock about the same, but cost differently.

Scythe S Flex have 2 versions. One is much faster (higher CFM). They cost about the same.

Thermal Specification: 85°C
http://processorfinder.intel.com/d [...] spec=slact

Thermal Specification: 71°C
http://processorfinder.intel.com/d [...] spec=slacr

In theory, the Xeon G0 will beat out the C2Q G0. In reality, I have seen most of the time Q6600 overclocks further than Xeon, whether they're G0 or B3. I would pay a little extra for Q6600 just to be safe.

thanks for the reply!

the Q6600 is only 5€ more expensive, so that shouldn't be a problem

the reason i will probably wait for x38 is for its support of pci express 2.0
i'm going to upgrade this computer in the future when dx10 is a standard, so the support of pci express 2.0 would be nice

i guess i will wait two weeks, if it isn't out then, i will go for the p5k vanilla

thanks!

PCI-E 1 is backward compatible with PCI-E 2 , :

http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/mainb [...] 93804.html

Note that these limitations have been revealed only for the Blitz mainboard series that uses CrossLinx chip. Other Asus mainboards on Intel P35 chipset should have no problems with PCI Express 2.0 graphics cards support.

mmmm

i'm considering to buy the whole lot now...

any other comments on the whole system?

Less-expensive RAM... that's all I can see. Also, the Radeon HD 2900XT might be a better deal at $400--it's most of the way to the GeForce 8800GTX in performance terms (but about 25W more power-hungry). I don't think I'd grab a deticated sound card--the onboard audio is pretty damn good now, so I that might just be a waste of your hard-found cash (not to mention 2-3 great games).

Other then that, I see no problems. I'd use an Abit IP35-E/Vanilla/Pro to overclock a Q6600--the IP35-E seems best for a budget ($120, not to mention a $40 MIR for the next 4 days at NewEgg), and the Pro seems to be the best, plain and simple ($185).

You shouldn't really worry about PCI Express 1.0 and 2.0--yes, 2.0 will be faster, but remember that X38 boards will be 20-40% more expensive. To me--the speed increase wouldn't justify the extra cost, especially after looking over a PCI Express x8 v. x16 setup for single-card systems... the difference between those two for a GeForce 8800GTS 320MB overclocked was only a few percent--nothing really worth nothing.

I'm not a big fan of the 2900XT. It competes against the GTS series, and in my opinion, fails. New drivers might change my mind, but I don't see it happening yet.

I consider the DS3 series to be the best budget overclockers myself. If you trust in mail in rebates, feel free to go with the IP35-E.

When it comes to PCI Express 2.0, will you be upgrading to a top-notch card in the future? Are you going to try and find a card better than the GTX in the future for this system? If the answer is no, you don't need PCI-E 2.0.

I am not a fan of SLI. If you go with an 8800GTS, you'll have to 1. Pay for the extra slot 2. Pay for the extra power and 3. The cards are more expensive.

The GTS SLI has more power, but it just isn't worth it in the long run.

The GTX is a monster right now, just use that

The rest looks good to me. I'm not going to bother reiterating what's said.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820144072

Is this the ram you listed? You want to o/c the quad to 3.2.

3200 / 9 = ~356 * 2 = 712

Sure the 800mhz ram can downclock to 712mhz. Or even better:

3200 / 8 = 400 * 2 = 800

That's 1:1 cpu/ram ratio.

i was thinking about doing the second one (400*2) so that won't give any problems?

also this ram is a a lot more expensive with you guys, with me it's only 180€, as i have a budget of 1800€ that shouldn't be a problem

aalso, i am looking to upgrade the GPU in the future, that's the whole point of my build, to upgrade it in the future...
guess i'll wait for X38...

any comments of the ultra extreme fitting in my case?

thanks for the replies!!!

No, I don't think it will give any problems at 1:1 ratio.

A quick google search says the cooler fits the armor. It has to fit a stanard atx case or else TR will do a massive recall of the product.

No problem.

i've made my choice
i will wait for x38, then buy the whole lot

thanks for all the replies, and when x38 comes out i will build the system and post some benches and pics