Ideally I don't want to go SLI. However I do own a 24" monitor and plan to game at 1920x1200 ideally. Is this the deciding factor to go SLI?

Also, ideally I'd like a quiet system, so that's another reason I didn't want to go SLI as with 2 cards running I think it would be significantly noisier than build 1?

I chose the quad in each because it's virtually the same price as the e8400.
Build 1 is ATI and uses a better overclocking mobo I think. Smaller Antec case because I don't think I need the extra room since not SLI. Build 2 is SLI and uses the larger Antec case to house SLI. Also PSU is larger.

Which one would give the best performance in games like World of Warcraft, AoC, Crysis, Sins of the Solar Empire, etc? Wow is what I play the most though.


Build 1:
Q6600 2.4GHz 2x4mb 65nm
Asus P5Q-Deluxe
OCZ Reaper OCZ2RPR800C44GK DDR2 2X2GB PC2-6400 DDR2-800 CL 4-4-4-15
Sapphire ATI RADEON HD 3870 X2 1024MB GDDR3
Antec NINE HUNDRED Ultimate Gaming Case Black finish
PC Power & Cooling (S61EPS) Silencer 610W SLI-Ready
SAMSUNG Black SH-S203B DVD Burner
Razer Lycosa Gaming Keyboard w/ Backlit Programmable Keyboard
Razer Deathadder 3G 1800DPI (5 buttons)
Dell 2408WFP 24" Monitor
$1726.17


Build 2:
Q6600 2.4GHz 2x4mb 65nm
EVGA 132-CK-NF78-A1 DDR2 SLI Mobo
PC Power & Cooling Turbo Cool 860
OCZ Reaper OCZ2RPR800C44GK DDR2 2X2GB PC2-6400 DDR2-800 CL 4-4-4-15
2 x BFG 8800GT OC2 512MB 675Mhz Core
Antec TWELVEHUNDRED Ultimate Gaming Case Black finish
SAMSUNG Black SH-S203B DVD Burner
Razer Lycosa Gaming Keyboard w/ Backlit Programmable Keyboard
Razer Deathadder 3G 1800DPI (5 buttons)
Dell 2408WFP 24" Monitor
$1946.55


Side question: Are the PSUs chosen in each build enough wattage to support for any future upgrades in video card in either config (newer single ATI or newer SLI cards)?

The second build will give better gaming performance. 2x8800gt is faster than single 3870x2. 780i overclocking performance isn't ideal, but it's enough to push q6600 to 3.6ghz, so it's good enough. Psu should be more than enough for current build. Consider up to 800 watt for more upgrade headroom. No reason to go above 800 for any kind of setup.

the second build is better,as dagger have said if the game support SLI support the 8800GT SLI will outperform the 3870X2 by miles.

Ok, then another question:

Which would be better in the SLI (eventually): 8800GT or 8800GTS?

Also taking into account that right now I only want to run one card and pick up the other later, but I need to know whether to get GT or GTS for future gaming performance in SLI once games I want to play likely will require more GPU power.

^(G92) 8800GTS 512MB in SLI. Just wait until the new cards are out.

If you want to only buy one card right now and the other one later, why dont you wait the new cards? (gtx280/260, 4850). Maybe only one of them will be better than a SLI or xfire solution.

Good advice.

I'm concerned on the price point though of the new cards.

Anyone know what they are going to come in at?

I think I'm going to go with the sli build, but just one 8800gt oc2.

Then when the gtx280 drops I'll get one, then get another later if a game comes out a few years down the road that might need two.

I think one 8800gt oc2 for now is good since I will mainly just be playing wow at 1920x1200. Would that suffice at full graphics on?

You said you are going to game. Get the E8400. It might cost the same as the Q6600. BUT the E8400 does better in gaming.

What about in World of Warcraft and Burning Crusades?

I heard that a quad might be better for that game (which I play the most).

Not sure about those. Still, both are enough, so you won't notice much of a difference.

Keep in mind quad does well even in recent heavy games that are not quad optimized. The reason being supporting modules being moved to spare cores, thus freeing up cores dedicated for main process.

Unreal 3 results:
http://www.anandtech.com/video/sho [...] i=3127&p=4
The improvments are small, but it's there.

The handful of real quad optimized games out there, like Lost Planet, provides better scaling.

WoW and Wow: Burning Crusades is definately a single threaded, single core game. It doesnt care how many cores you have it's just going to use a single core and because of that the CPU with the highest clock frequency is "better" for this game.
AoC and SINS are mostly single threaded but move some tasks, such as AI sprites, onto a 2nd core. They won't use the 3rd and 4th core of a quad.
An E8400 and Q6600 at stock speeds - clearly an advantage with the E8400. When OC'd usually the E8400 will still have a slight advantage.
That advantage is usually small enough to say it just doesnt matter which CPU you choose.

i have been getting ready to build a system and debating on the quad vs dual. i play warcraft as my main game and found out that warcraft does indeed support multi core.
http://www.dailytechnobabble.com/2 [...] -warcraft/
what i got out of it is that it offloads network and sound to another core but the game itself play on a single core. but in that sense seems like dual core would be good enough.