Noob do all computer build

[brianwilson1990]

I have built a computer about 6 years ago and its time to upgrade. I already purchased a new asus maximus extreme-v and a new Intel I7 2600k and CM HAF-x case.
Is it possable/ fairly easy to use a 32gb ssd for the Intel smart cache and a 64gb to load the os and most used programs or would this be to much for little gain? I also want to run 2-4 hdd 500gb-1tb in raid with this setup.

I am going to get either 1 ati 6950 or 1 gtx 560 now and 1 more later. does SLI or Crossfirex have a longer future ahead of it?

I love xp but want more than 3.5gb of RAM so should i jump to Windows 7 or xp64sp3?

Any help would be great. I have been out of the game a long time.

 

[boiler1990]

Is it possable/ fairly easy to use a 32gb ssd for the Intel smart cache and a 64gb to load the os and most used programs or would this be to much for little gain? I also want to run 2-4 hdd 500gb-1tb in raid with this setup.

From what I hear, using caching and a SSD boot drive are a little pointless. You'll get better performance from the 64GB OS drive with a few programs on it. Keep in mind W7 64bit takes up about 20-25GB after updates. It's worth it IMO.

I am going to get either 1 ati 6950 or 1 gtx 560 now and 1 more later. does SLI or Crossfirex have a longer future ahead of it?

CF or SLI 6950s/560Tis will perform around a GTX 580 at 1920x1080.

I love xp but want more than 3.5gb of RAM so should i jump to Windows 7 or xp64sp3?

Go for W7 64bit. Driver support is significantly better than XP 64bit, and you can use XP mode if you get Pro or Ultimate (which I've used several times quite smoothly. It won't play Sim Copter, however )

 

[CaedenV]

SSD cashing has limited usefulness in the real world other than windows startup times, unless you buy a large SSD... in which case you would not need the cashing. So if you are like most people and use sleep mode instead of doing a cold boot then you will basically never see the performance increase for most things. And cashing an SSD is just redundant, so I would not bother. Just buy an 80+GB SSD which will have space for windows and a few games, and then have a large HDD/RAID setup for other files and programs.

SLi and xFire are here to stay. Unless doing video work, or other things which require CUDA then I would stick with AMD for med/low end GPU's as they are a little cheaper, and draw less power. If going high end, then it is nVidia all the way

Win7 32bit will do 4GB of ram (yes, I know it isnt supposed to work with a 32bit OS but they cheated somehow). But I highly suggest going win764bit. Someday (though not soon enough) 32bit will die a glorious death, at which point you will want a 64bit OS so you do not have to buy it again. Besides, with ram so cheap why not buy 8GB?

Avoid XP64 like the plague that it is! I had to run it in order to use Adobe Premiere at one point (it requires a 64bit OS) and finally decided on a duel boot of XP and XP64 because it was too annoying to get it to run anything smothly. Thankfully win7 x64 does not suffer the same issues. But many products, and even web browsers are beginning to switch over to 64bit, so it is only a matter of time before it becomes required.