New Rig For Jon Competition :o)

[Evilweetabix]

Those OCZ sticks will OC like crap though, if they'll budge at all! They're DDR2-800 instead of the DDR2-1066 G.Skills I listed. OCZ makes some good overclocking sticks, but not in their budget series, which includes the Gold modules.

 

If you're concerned with wire management (keeping it clean inside in general), the CM690 has some pretty neat features. The PSU is at the bottom and there's a hole for the wires to go right behind the motherboard tray, just as an example.

 

yeah i had my doubts about them too - was looking at reaper 1066s originally because i liked the funky heatsinks - do the gskills that you recommend bring any performance gain - theres like a

[kingdingeling]

DDR3 only offers a marginal (at best!) performance gain to DDR2 at this point in time, so it's a waste of money buying a DDR3 supporting motherboard. Especially the hybrids tend to be rubbish at overclocking.

 

Regarding the G.Skill vs. OCZ question, the G.Skill DDR2-1066 will be just the same as the OCZ DDR2-1066. At stock, you will see a small performance increase at best, but once you get into overclocking, the

[anthony0131]

AMD Phenom X4 Quad Core 9950 2.60GHz Black Edition (Socket AM2) - Retail

Edited October 28, 2008 by anthony0131

[kingdingeling]

An Asus CPU cooler? You serious?

 

AMD only has the budget basement range covered right now, their top products (aka Phenom Quad Cores) can not remotely keep up with the processors Intel is putting out!

[anthony0131]

I agree intel are better but also cost alot more

 

the am2+ and 1066 ram has gone along way to closing the gap on intel and for a pc under the 1000.00 its a good buy

 

whats up with the asus cpu coolers imlooking at the artic square to add to my pc ? any advise would be

 

 

I noticed the error of the gfx card and well ..... i cant keep to a budget just ask my mrs :S

Edited October 28, 2008 by anthony0131

[kingdingeling]

Asus coolers tend to be crap, they do motherboards and video cards, not coolers Pretty much anything from the Thermalright or Scythe range is what you want The Xigmatek Rifle cooler is also a great buy!

[Evilweetabix]

well the overbudget bit isnt a problem as ill be migrating my samsung 1tb spinpoint and my DVDRW from my current setup so i can remove them which brings it pretty much down to the budget again

 

debating keeping my current cpu hsf (scythe infinity) as ive been dead impressed with it so far - currently cooling my 1.3ghz core2duo (OCd at 1.7ish) without the fan attached because the heatsinks on the fatal1ty mboard are too close to fit it. Although if this is an issue with the hsf cooling fins starting too low down then i might well change it because i suspect i will probably have the same problem on most motherboards, and in order to get a higher stable clock ill probably need the fan on it <_<

 

king - appreciate the info on the RAM, although i was referring to the difference between the gskills 1066 modules and the ocz reaper 1066 modules - theyre both meant to be pretty overclockable so i assume that the extra

[kingdingeling]

Whoops, you are correct about the motherboard cooling, those cheapo heatsinks don't work that well. I remember there were problems with a lot of the GA-965P-DS3's, as they had FSB overclocking problems cause the Northbridge got too hot. Take a look at the Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3P which has a heatpipe cooling system to cool the northbridge and the voltage regulators. The southbridge usually does not get that hot, so a heatsink is fine there.

 

Regarding the RAM, yea, you pay extra for the OCZ brand name and the funky heatspreaders, which really aren't necessary unless you're aiming for world record overclocks.

 

The Scythe Infinity is a great cooler, actually quite close to the Ultra 120 Extreme, so if you wanna save yourself 50 Quid, that's a good point

[Evilweetabix]

yeah think ill probably hang on to it until the motherboard arrives and i can test the fit (ill have to dig out the mounting prongs for the fan though *shudders at the thought of going into the loft*) Its a pain to mount/unmount though, although i suspect that this is more the fault of LGA775 than the designer

 

Is the only difference between the motherboards the heatspreaders? if so then the heatpipe version might be a better bet since there is virtually no price difference...

[kingdingeling]

There is a price difference, around 10 pounds I think. There are also a couple of other features, like another PCI-Express slot, more SATA ports and added RAID function I think.