Several questions relating to new PC (psu, slots, sound)

[llcawthorne]

Hi! I was tossing together a new Core i7 PC and had a couple of questions.

First, I was planning to re-use my old computer's 700W OCZ Game-XStream power supply. Will it be strong enough to drive a Core i7, two 8800GT's in SLI, and about four 7200 rpm hard drives - or should I think about replacing it with something like an 850W?

Second, the motherboard I am looking at has three PCI-Express slots for SLI (Asus P6T). With dual slot 8800GT's, I am going to end up with one PCI slot and one unused SLI supporting PCI-Express slot left. My question was, will those PCI-Express cards with the tiny little connector work in a full sized PCI-Express 2.0 slot that is meant for a video card, or do I basically just have one normal PCI slot to work with and an empty card slot that would only be used if I tossed in another video card? More directly, I was wondering if I could stick a PCI-Express sound card in that unused third SLI slot without problems.

Third question... Has anyone compared the Razer Barracuda AC-1 and the Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Gamer? I have enough in my budget to pickup a new Sound Blaster for the latest EAX support and music re-crystalization (or whatever they call it), but I wondered if I should just stick with my Barracuda AC-1. I currently have the Barracuda HP-1 connected to the HD-DAI port and my surround sound system connected to the digital out. I am toying with the idea of ebaying off the AC-1 and HP-1 headphones, and using my Sennheiser headphones that I connect to my surround sound and a desktop or clip-on mic of some type, at least until the Megalodon comes out and I see some info on it.

That's all my questions for now. I have a bunch of parts being delivered tomorrow to play with, and I can't wait to get off the wife's old computer and back into a gaming PC (my old Athlon 4400 which was due for an upgrade is a dead hunk of metal on my floor at the moment with lots of pretty scavengeable parts).

Thanks,

Lewis

 

[fullmetall]

Im looking at newegg right now, for some reason, theres no 8800 series in newegg anymore?? whats going on? a bug or something?

 

[llcawthorne]

Im looking at newegg right now, for some reason, theres no 8800 series in newegg anymore?? whats going on? a bug or something?

I noticed the same thing. I ordered everything for my new PC through them, except the video. Couldn't find a second 8800GT on mwave, NewEgg or Tiger. I figured they sold out of their stock and moved on to selling newer GPU's or something. I already had one 8800GT in my old system, so I e-bayed a match pretty cheap to play with SLI in the new system.

 

[indigoataxia]

Well 8800's are twice outdated now. They were first outdated when they were renamed 9800. This month they were again renamed gts 250. Same basic core, most of the difference is in the die size. Sites like newegg have probably sold out of the old stock of 8800 which they stopped making sometime last year. You can still find them on sites like amazon
http://www.amazon.com/PNY-GeForce-SLI-Ready-Graphics-VCG88512GXPB/dp/B000XD1JJK/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1236739151&sr=8-5

In reguard to your PSU issue, I checked your specs (assuming 4 sticks of ram and a pci-e sound card) and only came to 440w so I think you should be okay. A second opinion wouldnt hurt of course. Also you will need lots of amps, I would say at least 36 on a single rail or around 20 on dual+ rails.

For your second question, you cant use a PCI-E 1x card in a full size 16x slot. From looking at your motherboard it looks like you will loose your 1x slot if you have dual slot cards. If you havnt got your second 8800 gt yet you can get a single slot card for the first slot and you should be able to squeeze the sound card in between the video cards.

Sorry cant help ya on the third question about the sound cards.