Small build

[vanillasnake21]

Hi, this is my first build and I wanna make sure I'm getting the right parts here's a list

CPU: Q9650 @ 3.0 Ghz
MOBO: nForce 780i
Ram: OCX 4gb DDR2 PC10800 (or whatever, basically the highest speed)
HDD: Western Digital 73gb 10k rpm (This will be for the OS, ill get a bigger one later)
GFX: Gefroce 260

total ~ 900 (and thats prerty much the top of my budget)

I was wondering why no one is getting q9650s (at least on ebay), it's only about 100 away from q6600. I know I can overclock, but really don't want to, because I do important graphics work and I would prefer stability to a few mhz of performance.

Tell me what you think, thanks.

 

[Proximon]

The price just dropped on the Q9650 last night. It's a good CPU and a good price now.

You should look at my guide, linked in my sig or at the top of the forum.

The speed of your DDR2 will not affect performance any significant amount. If you are not overclocking, or just doing a mild OC, 800Mhz RAM will suffice.

 

[vanillasnake21]

Great guide , do you think I should overclock? What speed would you suggest me stay at for top stability?

P.S Why won't 1033 ram be faster then 800? I remember seeing benchmarks for games w/o OC and it made a difference...

 

[Proximon]

As long as you are well-cooled and have a good motherboard (Like a P45) you should have zero issues running at 3.6Ghz. That's FSB 400Mhz x 9.

Sometimes you can squeeze one or two FPS out of a game by using a higher frequency. Mostly you'll only see a difference in synthetic benchmarks such as 3DMark Vantage.

 

[vanillasnake21]

Allright, thanks Proximon, I will bookmark your guide for future ref