Just a little background info: I only play MMO's and im building this computer to replace my 5 year old alienware... (biggest mistake of my life)

My goal is to play Age of Conan flawlessly w/ high-max graphics and possible future proof for 2-3 years

Option A:

Note* This option does not support PCI-E 16x 2.0 and cannot SLI in the future

Case: Antec P182 Gun Metal Black 0.8mm cold rolled steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6811129025

Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS3L LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX All Solid Capacitor Intel Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813128059

Power Supply: RAIDMAX QUANTUM RX-700 ATX12V V2.2 / EPS12V 700W SLI Power Supply
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6817152033

Processor Heatsink: ZALMAN CNPS9500 AT 2 Ball CPU Cooling Fan/Heatsink
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835118003

Operating System: Microsoft Windows Vista 64-Bit Home Premium for System Builders Single Pack DVD
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6832116204

Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 ST3500320AS 500GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6822148288

Video Card: EVGA 512-P3-N841-AR GeForce 8800GTS (G92) 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814130325

Memory: G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820231122

Processor: Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Kentsfield 2.4GHz 2 x 4MB L2 Cache LGA 775 Quad-Core Processor
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819115017

Case Fans: Scythe DFS123812-2000 120mm Case Fan
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835185053

Total w/ Shipping: $1223 - $60 rebates = $1163

Option B:

Note* This option has room for future upgrade w/ a better motherboard/SLI compatibility, but no new case and I will be forced to reuse an old Alienware I have.

Processor: Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Kentsfield 2.4GHz 2 x 4MB L2 Cache LGA 775 Quad-Core Processor
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819115017

Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 ST3500320AS 500GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6822148288

Power Supply: RAIDMAX QUANTUM RX-700 ATX12V V2.2 / EPS12V 700W SLI Power Supply
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6817152033

Processor Heatsink: ZALMAN CNPS9500 AT 2 Ball CPU Cooling Fan/Heatsink
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835118003

Operating System: Microsoft Windows Vista 64-Bit Home Premium for System Builders Single Pack DVD
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6832116204

Video Card: 2x EVGA 512-P3-N801-AR GeForce 8800GT 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814130318

Memory: OCZ SLI-Ready Edition 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820227269

Mother Board: XFX MB-N780-ISH9 LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 780i SLI Intel Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813141005

Total w/ Shipping = $1332 - $140 = 1192 - Kinda puts me over budget...

What i generally want to know:

Will option 2 out-perform option 1?

Is it worth the extra money?

Should i invest in better video cards for option 2? (2x option 1 video cards is my limit)

Should i go with 1066 memory or higher, instead of the 800? (will there be a big performance increase?)

Does the powersupply seem like it will stand the test of time/upgrades? Should I get a better one for the future?

Any information on this would be great. Thanks in advance.

i like the first one better...i dont like SLI (i find it kinda dumb tbh - technology is moving too fast)..and that mobo is excellent, even if it doesnt have pcie 2.0 (no gfx card today can take advantage of it...and in the future ull probably need to change mobo - due to socket...im not 100% sure about this but wait for a reply)

btw: save urself money and ...get Vista from ....the web...if u know what i mean >.<

1) yes option 2 will outperform 1 - since it has SLI but the gain isn't really worth it imo...unless on high resolutions.

2) depends...on what ur giving up to get the SLI

3) gts vs gt...almost no difference tbh....sli vs 1 card almost no difference unless ur plannign on playing very high resolution...i would rather save the $150 to by 1 new card like...2 years laters

4) i hear there isnt much difference...ppl usualyl buy 800 and OC it

5) PSU looks fine...however, i think there might be a better one than that for that price...there is a listing of best psu's somewhere on these forums

1066mhz memory doesn't show to much of an improvement. I'd personally go for either low latency DDR2-800 (CL4 or CL3) or more memory for future proofing.

thanks for the quick replies

theres one issue i have about the pcie 2.0 slots... they seem to be the new hotness... w/ the new dual core GPU's comin out and im wonderin if im gonna screw myself in the long run if i dont get a motherboard that can support them now...

I honestly prefer the single 1 powerful card (gtx and ultra are out of my price range) thats why i went w/ that GTS OC

The sli just seems cool lol, but i dont play past 1400x900... everyone tells me that it still gives a performance increase even if its 10-30%. The performance increase regardless of resolution, is there im told.

A friend of mine has something similar to option 2, and he ran a 3d mark 07 and got a 12000 w/ sli enabled and a 10000 w/ sli disabled... the only thing that i think might have screwed up those numbers is that he runs XP

those numbers seem very very low in my opinion, and it really turns me off buying that setup if i'll score the same...

Im wonderin if he just used the wrong benchmark

Thats true the performance does increase regardless of resolution. But if your average FPS increase from 65 to 90, for example, it's not really doing you any good. It still might be worth SLI if you know your game has problems with minimum FPS being very low to increase the min FPS smooth out the game. You'd have to know how your games respond to SLI. Also you might upgrade your monitor If you're keeping your 14x9 monitor and still want SLI I'd look close at the 9600GT. Maybe pair those with a Q9300 2.5Ghz Yorkfield quad?
Im not a fan of the Raidmax brand of PSU. For only $5 more you could get a Corsair 650TX

Did you ask your friend what resolution he ran the benchmark at? Did he use AA/AF? It may have been run at a higher resolution and so the scores seem lower.

def dont want bigger than a 22" monitor, and i keep it to 1400x900 out of preference. dont like to squint to read text...

other than that, i want the max for my money... i just want it to last me as long as possible before i need to upgrade again. leanin towards option B, cause after rebates its almost the same price. Just need to maybe add some fans to fix up my old case

nother question:

Someone was tellin me that home premium is alot more buggy than ultimate, any truth to this?

PSU for both of them are cr@p. I recommend Corsair or PP&C.

or you could go with option A, but still recycle the old case and save yourself some green.

There are some new heatsinks out that are better than the old ones:

http://www.frostytech.com/top5heatsinks.cfm

I like Option A except for the power supply.

Top Tier PSU:
http://www.tomswiki.com/page/Tiere [...] ngs?t=anon

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forum [...] p?t=108088

http://www.jonnyguru.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1460

Silent PSUs
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article699-page1.html

AMD Certified PSUs (Single+Crossfire):
http://ati.amd.com/online/certifiedpsu/index.html

Certified SLI-Ready Power Supplies
http://www.slizone.com/object/slizone_build_psu.html

PCI-E 2.0 is useless today and wont be fully utilized for some time. Toms did a review of PCI-E 2.0 vs x16 vs x8 vs x1 recently. If someone wants to check out the site for that and link it it might shed some light on this for you.

SLI is only useful at 1900x1200 or higher. Its not cost effective at resolutions below that. Basically in 2 years, 2 8800GTS's will not be near as good as 1 current mid range card. Save yourself the $200, or just set it aside for 2 years when you need to upgrade your video card. The quad core helps future proof a bit, 4GB of memory should still be plenty. You won't be screwed not having PCI-E 2.0. And as mentioned, next time you will want to upgrade your CPU, it will be a new Nehalem socket requiring a new mobo anyway.

I actually just bought a X48 board for that reason. I play at 1920x1200 and in the Tom's article there was a slight increase in performance at high resolutions with PCI-E 2.0. I wanted to be sure that in 6mos or so if I throw a high end card in my system that I was getting it's full performance. I had some bad experiences with my 680i board and if I were you I would lean more toward an Intel chipset. I agree with the other's though that DDR2 800 at low latency would be your best option or you can get some DDR2 1066 (which is really just overclocked 800 anyway) and underclock it and decrease the timings.

Don't buy 8800Gt's.
Look for the 8800GTS G92 cards. You can find them for less than $200.
They are faster, they run cooler, they very easily overclock 100mhz or more.
Right now, for the price you can buy these cards, they are a far superior choice to the 8800GT.
For instance, here is one for $169 after a $50 rebate!
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814134037

I would pay ~$220 for a GTS WAY before I would pay $190 for a GT

ok, i understand that. Im not completely sold on SLI as it is, BUT that dont change the fact that dual core GPU's will probably replace the current 8800's eventually, am i right?

Question: Do you need a 2.0 slot to run the new 9800's effectively? if not, then i can go w/ a cheaper but more solid motherboard. If i do need a 2.0 slot to run the future cards, then im definantly going w/ the more expensive motherboard w/ either 2 cheaper cards in SLI, or a single better card.

The quad will last me the life of the computer. I never upgrade CPU's. I doubt not getting a new one will bottleneck a newer card would it?

Basically im building it to last w/ very limited upgrades. maybe a HD or extra ram, and at the very most a newer GPU in the future

In all honesty tho, i would love to go with option A, IF the motherboard had a PCI-E 2.0 slot.... Thats really whats holding me back

There arnt any motherboards like that w/ a single 2.0 slot on the market is there? looked around cant find one

Also, if lets say i went w/ option A, is the GPU i have ok, or is there something in that price range w/ better performance? GTX/Ultra is kinda outa my price range