Hey there...I've been reading a lot on here and also on a few other sites about the various parts that people are speccing for new builds lately and I think that the below spec seems quite good for my purposes but just wanted to get a second opinion from people who will know better than me! The pc will be mostly used as a standard home pc for all your normal stuff with some slight gaming (nothing too serious) and some Autocad/adobe photoshop + indesign work. This is my first build so any potential pitfalls would be greatly appreciated! Added RAM, new GPU and DVD drive to old computer before.

I'm based in Ireland and I think I'll be buying mostly through www.E-Buyer.co.uk and some small stuff from Newegg because I have a friend going to the states in a couple of weeks who can bring some smaller stuff back for me.

so....

Newegg:

Asus P5Q-E P45 Motherboard €101 ($160) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131296
Intel Q6600 retail chip (3yr warranty vs. tray) €126 ($199) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115017
G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) €67 ($105) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231166
OR G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) €53 ($84) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231148
Sapphire Radeon HD4850 (x1) €111 ($175)http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814102747

E-Buyer:

Antec P182 Case €93 (£76) http://www.ebuyer.com/product/126946
Corsair 650TX PSU €76 (£60) http://www.ebuyer.com/product/135514
Arctic Cooling Freezer Pro-7 €20 (£15.50) http://www.ebuyer.com/product/105994
Sony DVD/RW €22 (£17.50) http://www.ebuyer.com/product/105994
Vista Home Premium 64bit (OEM) €75 (£58.75) http://www.ebuyer.com/product/105994
Hard drive, either this Samsung 750GB for €75 (£58) http://www.ebuyer.com/product/139739 or this WD Caviar 640GB for same €70 (£55) http://www.ebuyer.com/product/144339
The reason I ask is because I’ve read that the 750Gb uses 3x250Gb platters rather than 320Gb platters that are used on the 1TB drive. Therefore will the WD be faster - seems everyody on Toms raves about it?

Newegg delivery will be free and E-Buyer will be about €30 – same as hardwareversand but without the banking/language hassles?

So total price incl. delivery will be in and around €765 to €800 excl. keyboard, mouse and pci wi-fi card which I still need to choose.

Any thoughts on the above spec? I think the parts all work out but I could be wrong…my heads a bit fried looks at all the possibilities!

Thanks for taking the time to read though this and for any suggestions you might have!

Get the DDR2-800 memory. If you can still find a Gigabyte P35 board I'd go with that over a more expensive P45 board and save another $60.

With those changes you'd have an extra $80 to upgrade another component or just keep in the bank.

Like he said:

XIGMATEK HDT-S1283 120mm Rifle CPU Cooler - Retail

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835233003

http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] 67-12.html

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

XIGMATEK ACK-I7751 Retention Bracket - Retail

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835233019

don't forget to order the retention bracket because push pin mounting sucks.

You can save on the power supply:

ATI Radeon HD 4850 System Requirements

450 Watt or greater power supply with 75 Watt 6-pin PCI Express® power connector recommended (550 Watt and two 6-pin connectors for ATI CrossFireX™ technology in dual mode)
Certified power supplies are recommended. Refer to http://ati.amd.com/certifiedPSU for a list of Certified products.

I also agree with Deuce. For what is essentially a non-gaming PC, you can cut back on a LOT of things. What is the newest or most demanding game you want to play? You might be well served by an ATI HD3850 or nVidia 9600GT.
The cooler you've selected is fine. The one MrsB. linked is better, but will you be overclocking at all?
You don't need a 650W PSU. A Corsair CMPSU-450VX will be sufficient.
Does AutoCAD benefit from a quad? If not, get an e8400 or even an e7200.
Your original parts will outperform these, but likely not in ways you will notice. Depending on your budget, you do have some options.

looks good to me, I'll recommend you getting..
Intel E8500 3.16GHz ($199.99) over Intel Q6600 2.4GHz (You don't Quad-Core)
CORSAIR XMS2 DHX 4GB DDR2 800 Timing: 4-4-12 ($79.99) over G.SKILL 4GB DDR2 800/1065 Timing: 5-5-5-15
Antec Twelve Hundred/Nine Hundred over Antec P182 Case
PC Power & Cooling S610EPS ($89) over Corsair 650TX PSU
EVGA GeForce 8800GT Superclocked 512MB 256-bit ($120.99) over ATi Radeon HD X4848

Good Luck

Thanks guys for all the replies, great to get such quick responses.

Maybe I shoudl have been a bit clearer as to what I will use the machine for. I'm an architect so use quite a few different appliactions side by side at the same time, autocad, photoshop, illustrator, in-design, and like to jump between apps as quickly as possible, hence why i thought to go for a quad core rather than dual. I also do a bit of 3d work in both CAD and 3dsmax so the Quad will help out there fore sure...I also just have the feeling that it is more future proof than the dual, but I could be wrong here.

I don't know that much about Nehalem and don't want to wait around until 2009 to build this machine so want the best bang for the buck that I can get today for a system that will last about 4yrs. Don't mind doing some upgrading in that time but as little as possible really. I said that I don't want to do much gaming...but to be honest I know that once I get a new pc I will want to do some gaming on it, won't be able to help it! I just meant that it won't be the primary purpose for the build.

I had looked at the S1283 ebfore but they don't sell in in the store I was looking at. How big are they when fully packaged? I might be able to get my friend to bring that back from the states too but not sure. If I can't it seems that the freezer pro is my next best option price wise?

I choose the 650W PSU just to give myself a little breathing room for future upgrades that I 'might' want to do. it's only €15 more than the 550W version so i thought it was a good option. We can't get the PC power and cooling PSU's over here.

Can you guys recommend a good GA P35 mobo then? I looked on newegg and they seem to be about $35 cheaper than the P45 ASUS with e-sata which I'd like for my external HD. I just assumed that P45 was the way to go as it was the newer board so would be a bit more future proof?

RAM - I was looking at the 4-4-4-12 latency versions. G-Skill was coming in at $89 vs. the corsair at $109. Assume that G-Skill are an okay brand? We don't get them in UK/Ireland.

Also forget about the rebates...I won't be able to make use of them unfortuantely!

Thanks for all your help so far!

Top 5 heatsinks:

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

http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] 67-12.html

A budget board is GA-P35-DS3L for about $70.00.
You could get a P45, i. e. Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3L, for $120.00.