Seacrched and Scrounged, Need Some Advice

[nosix]

This is my second build, but my last one was 5 years ago; I am finally replacing it. I started looking at new product, getting myself familiar, and much to my surprise Intel beat out AMD in the performance race. Needless to say this caught me off guard. So, I bought a E8400 Wolfdale and I plan on OCing it. I did some more research and have found everything for my build less the following (Ill try to keep it brief):

MOBO
I am currently lost as far as finding a motherboard goes. I have been steered in too many directions and have lost all bearings, from mobo’s for $70 to mobo’s for $200+. Any help would be appreciated.
-What I want:
-Intel P45 & LGA 775
-Solid onboard RAID/OCing features
-4 DDR2 slots
-Preferably ATX
-Anything else is fluff to me

MEM
Memory, memory, memory… where was I? This I have little more direction on. Since I will be OCing my Wolfdale, I need some quality RAM that can handle it.

This is what I was thinking, so far:
G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231184

I know 1066 my be overkill, so I was wondering what you guys recommend.

GFX
Video Card! What’s a gamin’ PC with out one? There are like 65536 different video cards and I still haven’t figured out how to differentiate between the onslaught of same-ity. I’ve done some scrounging and really only narrowed it down to two “makes”:
-GeForce 8800/9800 GT 512MB
-Radeon HD 4850

Where do I go from there? Here, is what I determined, to the knowledgeable and loving(?) people of these boards. Please use your super-recommendation powers and help me fight the evil powers of confusion!

Thanks

 

[toosober]

I am running an e8400 on a Gigabye EP45 DS3R board. It has great overclocking options and RAID. You can find this board for under $130.
I am running my chip mildly overclocked to 3.6 with an Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro. This CPU cooler is under $30.
I am running 2x2gig DDR2 Corsair ram. I would choose some CAS 4 DDR2 800 RAM and run the bus 1-1.
I would choose the 4850 card over the NVidia only because you can run Crossfire with the 4850 later down the road, SLI is not supported on the current Intel chipsets.

 

[nosix]

Thanks for the suggestions, Any specific 4850 you would recommend?

 

[evongugg]

Sapphire.

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.

 

[evongugg]

Get a Asus or Gigabyte P45. If you want to do Crossfire get a X38/X48 from Asus or Gigabyte.

Memory:

G.SKILL PI Black 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory - Retail
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231209 $69.99

 

[nosix]

Thanks on the rec for the video card.

Ya, I planned on grabbing a good PSU around 700W (looking at JonnyGURU), thanks for the heads up.

I had looked at that mem before, but didn't realize it OCed so well.

Thanks for more recomendations, any specific MOBO?

 

[Onus]

Jonnyguru is a great place to look for PSU reviews. HardOCP.com is another good site, and HardwareSecrets.com is the third one I know that actually tests them properly, under loads, under realistic operating conditions, and measuring noise as well as just voltage.

 

[shortstuff_mt]

+1 to that DDR2 800 G.Skill RAM. 4-4-4-12 timings at 1.8v to 1.9v is awesome.

These new Gigabyte boards look like great overclocking boards:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=2010200280+50001314+107172615+1387939004&Configurator=&Subcategory=280&description=&Ntk=&SpeTabStoreType=&srchInDesc=

Get the UD3P if you think you'll ever want to add another GPU in crossfire, otherwise the UD3R would be fine.

 

[nosix]

You guys have been great. Really fast replies and I have pretty much everything nailed down now!

Thanks