Need help finalizing my computer buildFollow

Huge mistake on the processor. You might as well light $100 bills on fire. Also paying $400 for an operating system borders on the clinically insane.

Let me pop over to the egg and over some suggestions. I'm sure others will do the same.

Patriot eXtreme Performance 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820220144
$139 after rebate.

Paying $100 more for non micron ram that will perform almost identically is silly.


EVGA 122-CK-NF68-T1 LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 680i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188012
$199 after rebate.

Feature rich relatively future proof motherboard with simplified overclocking bios. Well worth the slight premium over the P965 chipset. Trust me on this one. SLI ready, which you may never use, but more importantly offers 3 PCIEX16 slots which you might depending on where video card technology goes.

Intel Core 2 Duo E4300 Allendale 1.8GHz 2M shared L2 Cache LGA 775 Processor

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115013
$169

Like stealing. Overclocks to E6700 performance on stock cooling with about three seconds of setup in bios. If your worried you might break something because you've never overclocked anything before, buy 2 and still save $200.

You won't though, as the chips are almost 100% idiot proof. Pushing them too hard just causes them to throttle back without damaging the chip. There hasn't been a price/performance deal on processors this sweet in a long, long time.


EVGA 320-P2-N811-AR GeForce 8800GTS 320MB 320-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 HDCP Video Card

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130082
$259 after rebate.

Look, I know it's tempting to buy the best video card possible when building a new gaming system, but it's really, really, really a bad time to pull the trigger on the GTX. That aside, let me be frank for a minute here. You monitor is absolute junk. You will notice zero difference between this card and a GTX on your monitor. To be perfectly honest, you'd probably notice zero difference between a $100 7600GT and a GTX on your monitor. Buying a GTX for that piece of junk is like buying 20 inch racing tires for your '87 Chevette.

Hence:

Acer AL2223Wd Black-Silver 22" 5ms DVI Widescreen LCD Monitor 300 cd/m2 800:1 Built in Speakers

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824009102
$259.99

Now we're talkin :) Throw that other thing away. Or, if you like, run it in tandem with this one. No, really throw it away. At any rate, you'll see a ten fold difference in actual gameplay with this setup than with the GTX choked by that monitor. Not to mention it's cheaper.


As power supples go, I might not be the best person to ask as I'm a bit of a cabling/airflow freak and would probably go with something with modular cabling, or at this point possibly even two separate power supplies with one dedicated to the video components to avoid having to worry about rail voltage for future upgrade. The one you've chosen would work great, though.

I'd really really really really wait on Vista Ultimate. Until there's some actual reason to have it, you'd be much better off with XP Pro. Right now, it's just going to give you unneeded headaches. You'll always be able to upgrade if some Vista killer app comes along or new DX10 only games start getting to market. Right now it's just throwing $$ away you could spend on other things that you'd enjoy far more. Hookers and dope, for example.

With the money you save on the OS you could consider some different case and cooling options or whatever.

Anyway, that should get you started re-thinking a little. Let us know what you decide.

Good luck.




Edited, Mar 29th 2007 5:55pm by Smasharoo

Mine is more cost-effective. $55/month or $1800. I might need to get a better power supply and a different case with more fans though.

Note: I live in Canada, our economy is retarded.

Honestly look up what came out 1 year ago. Buy that for 1/4 what you're going to pay for a new PC. In one year do it again. You could have a new PC every year for the price you pay for what's hot today every 4 years.

This was also suggested to me. Is this a logical step and something I should look into?


@Driftwood
No sound selection has been made. As for antiviral programs that also has not been determined. I currently use Norton on my old rig but I am also open for suggestions that would better suit this rig or towards any computer.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/18/overclocking-guide-part-1/index.html