suggestions for work/gamer machine?

[sentofuno]

i'm going to build a new box soon for gaming but also for some work. i will be using a lot of virtual machines to test things so i want to get the most out of my setup

i am looking at a Q9300 chip and a 8800GT card, and would prefer an asus board. but should i get a board with an intel or nvidia chipset? is one better than the other at certain things? i've heard all-intel machines are better at virtualization, for example. also i don't know much about how chipsets compare - feature lists i can look up quite easily but as regards to performance, i could use some help


any suggestions appreciated, thanks in advance

 

[sentofuno]

tbh i have never overclocked in my life and don't want to start on this machine. it may be off-topic but how good are those 'auto-overclocking' features on some motherboards?


a guy i worked with tried overclocking one machine. we RMA'd the chip and the board soon after..

 

[lameness]

Auto OCing features are hopeless, stay clear of them.

OCing isnt so scary, as long as you do research and dont do anything stupid it really is hard to fry anything.

Have you thought about the e8400.... its cheaper than the quad and in most games and apps it will be faster.

 

[sentofuno]

you reckon a 3ghz dualcore will beat a 2.5ghz quad? i'm thinking about the virtual machines i'll be running you see, individually they won't require much grunt but i will have a large number of them. i'd rather sacrifice speed for quantity as far as they go. but i am still open to suggestions at this point.


thanks all for the advice so far.

 

[chookman]

You could go as cheap as a P35 if you dont want SLI. If you want SLI then you could go Intel with a X48. If you want the ultimate from you Q9300 (3.5ghz overclock) go with the Nvidia 790i.

Note x48 chipset doesNT support SLI

The Quad will do virtual machines better. If you want something cheaper the Q6600 is still a good choice. The 8800gt will run any game you want to play ok. And your best going with a P35 board, as you probably want need SLI and x38 only really adds PCI-e2.0 support which at the moment has little impact.