ok get the rampage forumla instead of the maximus 2 formula
get the corsair or pc power n cooling 750 w
get the mushkin hp 800 mhz ddr2 4gb kit
get an antec 900
geta 4870
get the 640 gb hdd instead of the 500gb
I'll use it mostly for gaming but I would also like it to do well in running apps. Do you think the Q9550 is a good enough performance/price increase over the E8400?
Also, im really struggling on what GPU to get.
Should I get a GX2, 4870 1gb version, or the gtx 260 with the 216 cores?
Not really planning on overclocking right now, but if I did it would only be a little bit.
For games (most) that don't take advantage of 4 cores, they will run a bit slower on Q9550 than E8400 cuz of the clock speed. 2.83Ghz vs 3Ghz.
Can't generalize gaming cuz everyone plays different games. Say, this pc is only for Crysis, ATI would be the worst choice. Go through the benchmarks of the games that YOU play and decide on a gpu:
There a lot cheaper and there pretty decent sticks as well from a reputable company. They will overclock to about 1130MHz when you beef up the voltage and they will do that on C5 timings. They don't get too hot either.
Check out www.mygpu.info for some lists of reviews there is also a a ranking down the side on the homepage of best graphics cards overall and where they rank.
If you can afford it I recommend the GTX 280 its a damn good card and yea once again it does depend what games you are going to play
actually you made a good RAM choice, very good sticks. keep very cool, also i would recommend an ATI card like the 4870 (1gb model for youre monitor size i guess), they are very powerful for the price
You are about to answer a thread that has been inactive for more than 6 months. If you still wish to proceed, please ensure that your posting is original and does not duplicate or overlap any prior responses to this thread.