All,

I am thinking about the following purchase: Any suggestions or critiques will be welcomed.

--Thermaltake Tsunami VA3000
--EVGA 790i Ultra
--Intel E8500
--EVGA 8800 GTS (KO edition)
--Thermaltake W0131 (850W PSU)
--2GB Kingston PC 10600 DDR3
--Masscool 92mm CPU cooler

--Also included some Artic Silver 5 Thermal Compound and 2 Seagate SATAs.

Thank you in advance.

My main questions: What are you planning on using the build for? What is your budget? Are you planning on SLI? Why DDR3? Out of curiosity, what hard drives are you getting?

If you're not planning SLI you might be better off with an Intel chipset. Also, for the very marginal performance benefit DDR3 isn't worth the price difference. You can get DDR2 that will still satisfy your overclocking needs for far less. That extra money could be used to get more RAM or maybe a better graphics card if you are looking for more performance. Also, even with SLI that powersupply is complete overkill.

-mcg

^Agreed.

Should work. But here are some changes I would make:

-Swap CPU for the 8400, not worth the extra $ for the 8500.

- Unless planing to SLI get a good X38/P35 board

- Swap HSF to Freezer 7Pro or Xigmatek HDT-S1283
http://www.frostytech.com/top5heat [...] ELHEATSINK

- Do makesure your 8800GTS is the 512MB and the newer G92.

-DDR3 is an overkill.

My recommendations:

X38-DS4, P35-DS3x, or P5K
E8400
2GB+ DDR2 800 (DDR2 1066 seems to have compatibility problems)
(G92) 8800GTS/8800GT (stock, non factory OCed. You can easily OC it yourself)
Xigmatek HDT-S1283
PP&C 610

@MrCommunistGen: Thanks for your response. Basically, I bought a Dell XPS 5 years ago, and had no clue that their case was not upgradeable.

I'm planning on using the build for Master's Courses in Java Programming, gaming, photoshop, and the occasional movie. My budget is $2000 or less, and I'm not currently planning on SLI. I really didn't have a reason for DDR3 except that the board said it supported it. The drives were Seagate SATA 3gb HDs.

Thanks for the tips regarding SLI, DDR and the PSU. What would you recommend as an adequate PSU?

@Shadow: Thank you for your response. I'll look into the 8400 and X38, along with that 610 PSU.

Regards,

N

For clarification the PSU Shadow is recommending is a PC Power & Cooling 610W which is a very good PSU. Since you don't need SLI you should only need a PSU in the 500W range. Corsair makes very good power supplies so you should check them out. Many of them are made by Seasonic whose power supplies tend to be far more expensive.

For the hard drives I was inquiring about capacity and generation. For the model number the generation is listed after the rotation speed after a "." For example 7200.11 is 11th Generation and is currently Seagate's most modern. Generally unless there is a big price difference I'd suggest going with the latest generation since they tend to be superior. Another good drive to look into is Western Digital's "AAKS" line (eg 6400AAKS, 7500AAKS for 640GB and 750GB drives respectively).

-mcg

MrCommunist: They were Seagate Barracuda 500GB 7200.11 drives. I appreciate the info regarding HD versions. I'll definitely check out WD drives as well. The suggested adjustments look like they'll save me a bundle.
Thanks again!

--N

An idea, you can get 4Gb of decent 800MHz DDR2 for less than $100. Although you can't use it all with a 32-bit OS it should help ensure longevity of your system and is certainly cheap enough.

-mcg

Corsairs are now being made by CWT (Channel Well Technology) according to Jonnyguru.com, and they still rock

Okay...based on the recommendations, I updated as follows. Any thoughts on this new build?

--Thermaltake Tsunami
--Intel E8400
--Gigabyte GA-EX38-DS4
--XFX 8800 GTS 512MB G92
--4GB Corsair DDR2 800
--PPC 610W

Along with a WD AAKS 750GB and the Xigmatek referenced earlier.

Thanks!

^Looks good

When installing the RAM remember to increase RAM voltage

this is my build costing £1550 i think the price is not to bad but i don't know what it equates to $'s

CPU INTEL Q6600 SLACR 2.40GHZ gonna try to OC to around 3.6'ish
FAN THERMALTAKE CL-P0257 (BLUE ORB 140MM + 17DB)
MAINBOARD ASUS RAMPAGE FORMULA X48
SOUND INTEGRATED
VIDEO RADEON SAPPHIRE HD4870 X2
RAM CORSAIR TWINX XMS-2-8500 2x2GB
HDD 2 X 500GB S-ATA 16MB
THERMALTAKE TSUNAMI VA3000
MONITOR BENQ G2400 24" WIDESCREEN
PSU THERMALTAKE TOUGHPOWER 1000W
And Vista Ultimate 64

the reason for the 1000W is i may decide to stick another 4870X2 in my system