I am building two new comps as workstations at my business and am sure I went a little overboard. Here is what I have planned.

GIGABYTE GA-P31-S3G LGA 775 Intel P31 ATX Intel Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 (swapped from home system)
G.SKILL 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) (from home)
ASUS EN8600GTTOP/HTDP/256 GeForce 8600 GT 256MB
LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3250410AS 250GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
Thermaltake TR2 W0070RUC 430W ATX Power Supply
GIGABYTE GZ-X5BPD-500 Black SECC Steel / ABS ATX Mid Tower Computer Case


GIGABYTE GA-P31-S3G LGA 775 Intel P31 ATX Intel Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 Wolfdale
CORSAIR Dominator 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500)
ASUS EN8600GTTOP/HTDP/256 GeForce 8600 GT 256MB
LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3250410AS 250GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
Thermaltake TR2 W0070RUC 430W ATX Power Supply
GIGABYTE GZ-X5BPD-500 Black SECC Steel / ABS ATX Mid Tower Computer Case


Now for my home system this is what I am running with the new processor and ram.

Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 Wolfdale (New for home )
MSI P6N SLI-FI LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 650i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard
OCZ Reaper HPC Edition 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) (new for home )
EVGA 256-P2-N765-AR GeForce 8600GTS 256MB
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3320620AS (Perpendicular Recording Technology) 320GB 7200 RPM
LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner with LightScribe Black SATA Model LH-20A1L-05
CORSAIR CMPSU-520HX
XION Onyx XON-303 Black/Blue Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

Here is were my dumb noob questions begin.

First off will the 430W PSU with 18A on the 12V rail be enough for the two work comps?

Did I screw up and get to fast of ram for the second build with the E7200? Or will that be okay?

Okay I know the work computers are a little excessive, but I am sick of the turd I currently have. And I wanted to run dual monitors. Now for my home system I just orderd the E8400, but I am thinking I should cancel and get a Q6600. I dont play games on my computer. I really just use it as a workstation to do random stuff. HD video burning, going to hook it up to my Home theater, nothing all that special. I am thinking for the extra $25 bones the Q6600 would be better, but WTF do I know. Keep in mind I dont mess with O/C'ing or anything like that. When I want to go fast I get on a motorcycle. I just dont have the time to mess with O/C'ing.

Sorry for the long post with all the dumb questions, but any advice would be nice. And if I screwed up anything else dont hesitate to tell me. You guys have forgot more than I know about this stuff.

Your work computers hardly seem excessive by today's standards...maybe even underpowered by some standards. Interesting choice in the P31 chipset...low man on the totem pole. Also you chose very conservative dual-core processors as well...very conservative but good for MS Office and the like.

Yes, the 430W for those configs is just fine.

If you're going to use dual-cores (which is absolutely fine) stick with at least a E8400. I'd recommend the Q6600 in your case, better longevity.

Cheers and good luck.

We are a retail store and these to comps are only going to be used to multitask in the office. Excel, IE, no real computing. LOL my crappy dell would probably be okay with its P4 at 2.53ghz if it didnt have 512mb or ram.

Whew I was worried I screwed up with the small PSU and the 18A on the 12V. I kept reading stuff that says 12V rail 12V rail and though I screwed up.

I knew you were going to say get the Q6600. I almost ordered it before anyone even responded. I didnt realize it was only $25 more at Newegg. And I think I had looked and saw the FSB was only 1066 and thought that with the 2.4 gHz clock speed would make it slower than the 3.0 ghz of the E8400 and 1300 FSB speed. There I go thinking again. I guess I will return the E8400 and buy the Q6600 then.

Fogot to add will I even notice a difference from my E6600 to the Q6600? I like the computer to be snappy when bouncing around from program to program. I dont really care if it will render a movie 1 minute faster.

And also did I overbuy the ram if I am going to use the Q6600?

Lower fsb is desirable. You want lower fsb coupled with higher multiplier. It puts less stress on the motherboard chipset, and requires lower ram clock, which makes it easier and more stable to overclock. Q6600's 1066mhz stock fsb is an advantage over 1333mhz fsb. You can always bump it up to 1600 at 3.6ghz for an easy one minute oc.

O WTF do I know. LOL. I wont be doing any OC'ing. Everyone in the house uses the comp so it has to be idiot proof. And I may be the idiot. Anything else I should look at to speed up the home comp. HDD or anything else. I am not trying to spend a bunch of $$$$ on this, but if a small amount of $$$ will help then I am there.

O and I picked the P31 because it was cheap and it seemed like it had everything I needed. Is it bad?

Is there any reason if I switch to the Q6600 that I should have the PC8500 Ram in any of the 3 builds?

As you can see I really know jack crap about this stuff so your guys input is really appreciated.

P31 is bad if you ask the geeks in this forum. But then, they're used to higher end hardware. It's okay if you don't overclock.

Although p31 starts at $60, while the far superior performing p43/45 starts at $75. So p31 is far from the best bang for the buck at this point.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] rder=PRICE
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] rder=PRICE

Q6600 use a high 9x multiplier. At 1600mhz (4x400) fsb, 9x400=3.6ghz, which means 2x400 = 800mhz ddr2 at the ideal 1:1 multiplier. So 1066mhz ddr2 will not be necessary at 3.6ghz.

Layman's terms dagger layman. That flew over my head like a P51 mustang. So err send the ram back too and get PC6400 for all my builds?

Looks like I made all kinds of mistakes. I picked those MotherBoards because they took 1066 Ram and now I dont even need that ram. Seems like I should probably send back the MB's too and select something else.

It'll work fine. If you already have them, keep them. It's just not the most balanced system. Doesn't mean it won't work. I thought you didn't buy those yet.

Throttle, the E6600 is simply half of the processor that the Q6600 is. ...for many things you may not notice any difference, especially if you're running Windows XP. If you're running or connsidering running Vista I'd say that the Q6600 might offer smoother computing...for me, a quad Q9450 was easily subjectively smoother than a higher clocked dual E6850 in Vista.

The machines you spec'd for work are really fine for Windows XP 32-bit, should that be your choice. If you're considering any flavor of Vista you may want more RAM at some point but you'll start out fine as is.

Further, you'd be better off (peformance-wise) with a P43/45 mobo. Perhaps this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813128347

XP on the work comps.

XP for now at home. Vista at some point. I had heard I would need more ram so I am not worried there.

I did buy everything except the Q6600. I was going off of what I learned last year when I build my home system which was my first build. It seems as I should almost start from scratch. LOL

You'll be fine with what you've stated. I simply think a Q6600 would give you satisfactory performance for longer than an E6600 or E7200...especially as you upgrade software.

So would these be better builds. I have no problem with returning stuff and reordering. I just want to do it right. Should have came here first.

Work Comp #1

MSI P43 Neo3-F LGA 775 Intel P43 ATX Intel Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 (swapped from home system)
G.SKILL 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) (from home)
ASUS EN8600GTTOP/HTDP/256 GeForce 8600 GT 256MB
LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3250410AS 250GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
Thermaltake TR2 W0070RUC 430W ATX Power Supply
GIGABYTE GZ-X5BPD-500 Black SECC Steel / ABS ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

Work Comp #2

MSI P43 Neo3-F LGA 775 Intel P43 ATX Intel Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 Wolfdale
CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400)
ASUS EN8600GTTOP/HTDP/256 GeForce 8600 GT 256MB
LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3250410AS 250GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
Thermaltake TR2 W0070RUC 430W ATX Power Supply
GIGABYTE GZ-X5BPD-500 Black SECC Steel / ABS ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

Home Computer

Intel Q6600 (New for home )
MSI P6N SLI-FI LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 650i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard
OCZ Reaper HPC Edition 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400)(new for home )
EVGA 256-P2-N765-AR GeForce 8600GTS 256MB
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3320620AS (Perpendicular Recording Technology) 320GB 7200 RPM
LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner with LightScribe Black SATA Model LH-20A1L-05
CORSAIR CMPSU-520HX
XION Onyx XON-303 Black/Blue Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

Keep in mind I have all the stuff for the home Comp and am just swapping the old E6600 and G.Skill Ram to one of the Work Comps. What you guys think about these builds now?

That 650i is really bottlenecking q6600 badly. It's just unfit for a quad. It'd be better if the p43 from e6600 is used for the q6600 instead.

Also, consider getting 2 more gb of ram. 2 isn't enough those days. They're so dirt cheap anyways.

+1

2GB is really not enough for the long-term...unless you're going to stick to XP 32bit. Even if XP remains your choice, RAM is so cheap that you its hard to resist the 4GB sweet-spot.

So how does this look? I did some Motherboard swaping. I am wondering if the MSI P6N would be better with the Work Comp#2. If you cant tell I will be using the Work Comp#2 and the other Manager Work Comp #1. So I obviously want the better setup.

Work Comp #1

MSI P6N SLI-FI LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 650i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 (swapped from home system)
G.SKILL 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) (from home)
ASUS EN8600GTTOP/HTDP/256 GeForce 8600 GT 256MB
LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3250410AS 250GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
Thermaltake TR2 W0070RUC 430W ATX Power Supply
GIGABYTE GZ-X5BPD-500 Black SECC Steel / ABS ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

Work Comp #2

MSI P43 Neo3-F LGA 775 Intel P43 ATX Intel Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 Wolfdale
CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400)
ASUS EN8600GTTOP/HTDP/256 GeForce 8600 GT 256MB
LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3250410AS 250GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
Thermaltake TR2 W0070RUC 430W ATX Power Supply
GIGABYTE GZ-X5BPD-500 Black SECC Steel / ABS ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

Home Computer

Intel Q6600 (New for home )
ASUS P5Q LGA 775 Intel P45 ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail
OCZ Reaper HPC Edition 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400)(new for home )
EVGA 256-P2-N765-AR GeForce 8600GTS 256MB
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3320620AS (Perpendicular Recording Technology) 320GB 7200 RPM
LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner with LightScribe Black SATA Model LH-20A1L-05
CORSAIR CMPSU-520HX
XION Onyx XON-303 Black/Blue Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

Will the 4 gig of ram actually do anything in XP?

And do I have to get all the exact same RAM if I go 4 gig. I am hunting deals and the rebates only let you do it once. Maybe get some 2 gig sticks like these.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820227284

or these

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820227267

They are the same company, but one goes on less volts. And has timing that is maybe better. I dont really know. What is more important. Or what will work with my system.

The second one's timing is better, which means faster operation. Nothing you'll be able to feel though. The 2.1v isn't ideal, but should be fine. Considering the second one is cheaper and faster, it's better to get it.

As for 4gb of ram, if you use 32bit version of XP, it'll be able to use anywhere from 3.2-3.5gb of it. If you use 64bit, it'll use everything.