first build - component questions (yay)

[umich2010]

Hello all,

Well, it has been a hectic few months trying to keep up with all the changing technology as I planned my first build. Today was my birthday (hello $) and since I haven't bought the meat of my machine yet, I decided that I might as well upgrade a few components with the extra cash. So far I have a Samsung SATA dvd burner w/ lightscribe, an Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro, and a Corsair VX 550 psu. I have a few questions concerning mostly the motherboard and GPU, which were areas I was originally set on before I had this extra influx of dollars. Originally I was going with:
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L and MSI 8800GT OC (the one with the good cooler)

But due to recent events, I thought I might as well consider:
Gigabyte GA-EX38-DS4 (due to overclocking headroom) and XFX 8800GTS 512 g92 (Comes with COD4 which i would buy anyway)

The rest of the components are:
Case: hec 6C11BB Black 0.8mm SECC Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Retail $36 (I dont care what the case is)
Hard Drive: Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD3200AAKS 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM $70
GPU: XFX PVT88GYDD4 GeForce 8800GTS (G92) 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Retail $229
RAM: G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1000 (PC2 8000) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F2-8000CL5D-4GBPQ - Retail $75
CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Kentsfield 2.4GHz LGA 775 Quad-Core Processor Model BX80562Q6600 - Retail $220
PSU: Corsair VX550 $60
HS/F: AC7
Optical: Samsung 20x SATA

First of all, if I will probably never use RAID or crossfire and do not plan on overclocking past 3.0-3.2GHz, would I really be better off with the X38 chipset? Or do you thing the DS3L technology will hold me over until Nehalem or whenever the next major upgrade is? Also, I will probably go with the GTS video card just because it's better and it comes with cod4. I have a copy of XP pro that I will use initially and eventually i'll get vista64. I will mostly be gaming at 1680x1050 and web browsing, etc. Toss in a little Python programming here and there for school too...

Thanks a lot

 

[umich2010]

has anyone used the gigabyte x38? Is it even a good board?

 

[uguv]

I think you're fine using the P35 board for an 8800gts and a Q6600 @ 3ghz.

My last upgrade was right when the X38s came out; they were all pretty expensive so I stuck with a P35.

 

[umich2010]

So the pcie 2.0 won't make any difference either? Or would there be some benefit with it? I have read that most graphics processors barely use the full bandwidth of pcie 1.0, but if 2.0 is there, would there be a difference in performance? No other advantages to x38 besides oc potential, raid, pcie2.0, etc? I'm not asking to be talked into an x38, but I would jump on it if it added any performance increases over a p35.