First New System Build, Few Questions?!?!? (UK)

[undies20]

Hi, I am planning on building my first pc for gaming and general usage (such as music, movies, photos, burning etc) and would to be able to play games such as Crysis. A primary concern is ensuring that the system will be easily upgraded in future and last for a few years as I am not a hardcore gamer. I have a £1000 budget and this is the current system I am thinking of building:

CPU - Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 G0 Stepping (2.4GHz 1066MHz) Socket 775 L2 8MB Cache (2x4MB (4MB per core pair) Retail Boxed Processor
Motherboard - Asus STRIKER EXTREME 680I SLI Socket 775 onboard Audio ATX
RAM - Crucial Ballistix GB Kit (4x1GB) DDR2 667MHz/PC2-5300 CL3 2.1 V unbuffered non-ECC
Graphics - XFX 8800GT XXX Edition 512MB GDDR3 Dual DVI HDTV Out PCI-E Graphics Card
HD - 1x Raptor 74GB and 1x Western Digital WD5000AAKS 500GB SATA II 7200RPM 16MB Cache - OEM
Case - Antec P182 Gunmetal Grey Super Mid Tower Case - No PSU
PSU - Coolermaster RealPower 700W Modular PSU - SLI Ready

op system - window vista 64 bit

Just a few questions:

1. do you think the Hard drive, being 1 raptor for the operating system, and one 500gb SATA drive purely for storage, is a good idea? any problems with this set up?

2. is the Q6600 quad a better choice than the e6850 for my uses?

3. would the 8800gts be better than the 8800gt? having looked at reviews it seems the price-performance is better in the 8800gt.

And just any general suggestions or views on the system.

Thanks

Undies20

 

[aardwolf]

1. Works good for me... most people here will talk you out of raptor in favor of seagate 7200.11 as a better price/performance ratio.

2. music/movie WATCHING, or ENCODING? quad's better for encoding... e6850 probably more suited for WATCHING. Crysis in particular supposedly is optimized for quad core, however (but I've seen conflicting reports -- you may want to research this more).

3. I believe the option is really gt or ultra... GTS seems like you're not really gaining much for the dollar increase.

As for PSU, I've heard that the P&P 750 is an optimal PSU. I just got the ThermalTake 1200w (pricey) & LOVE it.

I'm not familiar with that case; just got the Antec 900, and air flow is fantastic. Really, the airflow is in a league of 1. I'd weight other veterans' advice higher than mine on these forums. Enjoy your build!

 

[undies20]

Excellent, thanks for the help. Guess I was just making sure my research isn't missing anything as I'm looking to buy the parts next week. Thanks for the reply!

 

[aardwolf]

Well, you ARE missing an optical drive... it is going to be difficult to install the OS without one...