Building a super system and need some advice please...

[23rd_SATAN]

Here is my dilemna, I am trying to buy memory and realized there are a lot more options than I thought.

 

So far, here are my specs.

 

AMD FX-60

 

Two radeon XT1900XTC's

 

An ATI Xpress 3200 Crossfire MOBO

 

now, I know that this mobo needs 184 pin DDR ram, but beyond that it gets murky. The specs on newegg say it needs DDR400 PC 3200 ram, but it has a bus speed of 1Ghz? Does that sound right?

 

Also, what kinds are good, is a lower latency better, and how do I know what voltage to get?

[Andrew_McP]

Dual vid cards is a *complete* waste of money (unless you have a 3000x2000monitor ;-), especially for LOMAC which won't benefit from the spare graphics power. It's only really useful if you can only afford a cheap vid card now, and then add another cheap vid card later to boost frame rates. Two high end cards is just for bragging rights and very high FPS in the latest games... which is pretty silly when people generally use LCD monitors now which can't refresh at more than about 70Hz.

 

Obviously the faster the processor, the better. But don't expect too much from your very expensive chip. LOMAC will still slow down in busy situations. I prefer to do lots of research and buy a cheaper chip which will overclock a little, but obviously if I was richer I'd just buy a faster chip and forget the messing about. So good luck to you. :-)

 

As for RAM, things have got both more complicated and much simpler. You can now use normal pc3200 (200MHz) memory without it affecting the overall speed too much, because AMD's CPU-based memory controller is *much* more effective. And it's the link between the on-chip memory controller and the CPU core which is running at high speed, not the link from memory controller to your actual RAM. So you might want to try keeping your old RAM, and only updating it if there's an obvious problem.

 

However it sounds like you have a big budget, so in your place I'd just buy 2Gb of the most expensive RAM I could find. Just don't listen too hard or you'll hear the sound of dollar bills being torn up. ;-)

 

You could also try googling around for RAM recommendations. You'll find many, many types of RAM being used without any problems, and it's only overclockers who need to be really careful. Just about any old pc3200 RAM will do if you're not overclocking. I'm using low latency stuff which allows me to run at 240MHz and overclock my x2 3800 to within 400MHz of the fastest chips available at a fraction of the cost. But to be honest this is more down to luck than judgement. It wouldn't even run reliably at 220MHz on my old motherboard, so it's easy to get caught out when overclocking, and there are never any guarantees.

 

I'm not sure any of this has been very helpful, but it might help stimulate some discussion.

 

Andrew McP

 

http://img67.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mcpbench22ko.jpg

[emenance]

the best memory deal is here

 

http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?t=417043

 

 

get a gig or 2 of this quality stuff and you can overclock to some prime 95 stable and good settings

 

like many here will tell you , screw SLI , just get a 7800 gt or 7900 whatever it will serve. Look at my sig and look at people config at pcper.com one of the best MB out there now is the K8n diamond MSI board. http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/mainboards/display/msi-k8n-diamond.html

 

My last advice for you is dude !!!!!!! dont jump into the new crossfire ATI stuff , not only dont you require SLI but jumping it that kind of bleeding edge stuff for ATI is not anything you want to mess around with while learning this awsome flight sim.

[Nate Dogg]

I agree, skip duel gpu setups. Really not worth the money, especially ATI where it is just getting decent MB's out for it, it still has a long way to go.

What screen/resolution can you run? I would save your money and buy something you will benifit more from.

cheers

[walternowi]

If you do not overclock, get 2 x 1 Gb with low latency:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820227210

You can still overclock with this, but you have to loosen the timing. Mine can maintain the default 2-3-2-5 timing up to about 210 MHz.

 

If you plan to overclock, get 2 x 1 GB of DDR500:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820227066

This allows you to scale your FSB up to 250 Mhz without having to use the memory divider. I see you have an FX-60 cpu, the multiplier is unlocked both ways. You can get the low latency memory, keep the FSB close to 200 MHz and adjust the multiplier upwards. However, this does not allow you to fine tune the CPU frequency.

 

Hope this helps.

[walternowi]

23rd_S,

 

I see you are asking about watercooling over at the IL-2 forum. IMHO, the best source of information regarding water cooling is the XtremeSystems Water Cooling Forum.

 

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=70

 

Do spend the time and read all the stickies. That is a very good guide for beginners. Their take is NOT to buy a kit but assemble the system piece by piece. I am doing a little bit of research in this area. I would like to water cool my rig and really push my Opteron 146.

 

:beer:

Nowi

[TucksonSonny]

Here is my dilemna, I am trying to buy memory and realized there are a lot more options than I thought.

 

So far, here are my specs.

 

AMD FX-60

 

Two radeon XT1900XTC's

 

An ATI Xpress 3200 Crossfire MOBO

 

now, I know that this mobo needs 184 pin DDR ram, but beyond that it gets murky. The specs on newegg say it needs DDR400 PC 3200 ram, but it has a bus speed of 1Ghz? Does that sound right?

 

Also, what kinds are good, is a lower latency better, and how do I know what voltage to get?

 

 

Or get some inspiration here: Spring 2006 killer gaming rig

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,1939881,00.asp

 

BTW, Corsair TwinX 3500LL Pro (2x 1024MB) was used!

[hitman]

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1908196&CatId=2020

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1649411&CatId=1083

2 of these

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1929943&CatId=1826

thats what I would get if I had the money...

[X_Man]

No No No - you want power!

 

 

 

A8N-SLI Deluxe (most recent BIOS v1016)

AMD Athlon 64 4000+ OC'ed @ 3.0GHz (HTT 272*11)

Prometeia Mach II GT Phase Change Cooler (Chip Temp: -22ºC with LOMAC running)

OCZ 2GB DDR400 RAM (1G matched pair)

Western Digital Raptor 74GB 10K RPM SATA HD

2 BFG 7800GTX OC (SLI)

Audigy 2Z

Turtle Beach HPA Headset

TrackIR 4

Saitek X-52

Saitek Cyborg Evo Force

CH Pro Rudder Pedals

[X_Man]

And the setup (pre X-52 upgrade)

 

[Groove]

I dont understand why people buy FX-60 CPUs.

[NEODARK]

IF you have the money and want the unlocked multi, I dont see why not.. (although I prefer Andrew's way)

 

X_Man,

 

There is no such thing as a "100K RPM" raptor ;)

 

hmm, maybe I should setup lockon in my 57" HDTV

[X_Man]

Neo - You should! :D

Andy is on the money - I went to SLI because of the move to a 52" (1920x1080p). I tried the 62" but sitting 6-8 feet away was still too close. :(

 

Also, it takes a lot of power to run with V-Sync (for TrackIR) on and having a Refresh Rate of only 60Hz. The idea here is you want your avg fps to be around 50fps all the time with a lowest fps of at least 30fps.

 

My next upgrade will be the new 16MB cache HDs. This will hold me over until the next generation games using PhysX Ageia card capability hit the market.

[NEODARK]

why v-sync for trackir?

 

I havent heard about this

[X_Man]

I turn V-Sync on to solve the "tearing effect" when you pan. You don't notice it as being a problem until you turn V-Sync "ON" - then you can never go back. :D

 

http://forums.ubi.com/6/ubb.x?a=tpc&s=400102&f=23110283&m=128108064

[zoot]

I may be a little late, but if you are looking for cooling try

 

"Thermalright" XP series

 

IE=xp90, xp120, xp90c

 

I have an xp-90 on my P4 3gig - oc'd to 3.3 and i run about 25degrees , highest ive seen is 35. my old athlon used to run 45 in the same case.

 

dont take my word, some online accounts say this is the closest thing to watercooling and they run between 45-70 bucks

 

got mine from newegg

 

couple notes: to put in on some processors you will need a 5 dollar set of brackets, so make sure you do your research before you buy. mine needed the brackets. no big deal but heres some advice - use a thermal paste that is NOT conductive. installation isnt hard but I did drip a little onto the board at the very last second and did not want to remove the whole thing for one little drop. BTW system up and running no problems since last august.

 

one other note: you will get this in your research but the model number has to do with the size of the fan you want to put on it[90/92 mm XP-90,120mm XP-120, the C means it is all polished copper-supposed to conduct heat better] I originally bought a tornado 5000rpm, was too loud so replaced with a low rpm fam and still have the low temps, but REMEMBER to have a case that will fit the heatsink because it is huge [you have to supply your own fan but installation is easy]

 

hope this helps, let me know if you want more info

[Prophet_169th]

I think us people with dual-cores may start seeing benefits in some up-coming titles.

[X_Man]

Yes you will - and that is when I'll get the Fx-90 and OC it to 6GHz. :joystick:

Is there any game in the pipeline other than BoB? We were hearing about IL-2 and LOMAC 2years before they hit the shelves.

[emenance]

This thread is funny Satan didnt even tell us what motherboard hes flying on.

 

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=43033 MSI neo 2 guide

[Horax]

I built systems myself. I will use an evil word when it comes to building systems. Wait. The New Conroe by Intel in benchmarks has crushed the FX 60. Thats coming form someone that has AMD 4000+. It would only be a couple of months. Also before that the AM2 will be here. So far it is nothing to get excited about but time will tell.

 

I am getting ready to build a new system. Yes, the money is burning a hole in my pocket. Wait it will be worth it.

[qrazi]

I agree with Horax. Right now the only reason to wait for AMD AM2 is to be able upgrade in the future, or get the Athlon FX62 instead of the Athlon FX60.

 

Definitly try to wait a month or so, and get the extreme edition Core 2. At that time, it will probably be the fastest you can get your hands on, without being the most expensive or hottest you can get your hands on.

 

As far as memory goes: Athlon64 loves low latency. So if you buy memory, go for the low latency stuff. Intels netburst (pentium4) loves big bandwidth, but i dont know yet which will benefit the Core series most.

 

As for the videocard, geforce 7900GTX or Radeon 1900XTX will both be powerfull enough, but the Geforce 7900GTX runs cooler, which is why i'd prefer that card.

 

Perhaps you can choose to run a stripping set of WD Raptors 150GB hdd's, if the above isnt expensive enough....

[23rd_SATAN]

This thread is funny Satan didnt even tell us what motherboard hes flying on.

 

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=43033 MSI neo 2 guide

 

 

yes I did, very first post. AND, I am not JUST learning this game, been playing it since the DAY it came out.

 

:megalol:

[23rd_SATAN]

As an update, I bought this system and so far it is working great. I could not be happier.

 

Although the AM2 stuff has me curious, I may just buy a new mobo, chip, and DDR2 ram, and sell the current one. The new ATI X3200 mobo with AM2 is supposed to be fast.

[JEFX]

Great Satan

 

I am in the wait now to buy very soon and I am very interested.

I just dont know what to do: buy AMD 5000+ or FX-62 or wait Conroe?

 

 

 

Can you give us some examples :

 

resolution?

in-game settings?

AA, AF?

FPS flying over Sevastopol?

FPS flying over one or two MSB 1990 battalions of hundreds of vehicles?

FPS shooting lots of rockets or bombs?

FPS when there are, say, 40 aircraft (or static ones) parked in the view?

 

thanks

 

JEFX

[23rd_SATAN]

Great Satan

 

I am in the wait now to buy very soon and I am very interested.

I just dont know what to do: buy AMD 5000+ or FX-62 or wait Conroe?

 

 

 

Can you give us some examples :

 

resolution?

in-game settings?

AA, AF?

FPS flying over Sevastopol?

FPS flying over one or two MSB 1990 battalions of hundreds of vehicles?

FPS shooting lots of rockets or bombs?

FPS when there are, say, 40 aircraft (or static ones) parked in the view?

 

thanks

 

JEFX

 

maybe when I get home from vacation.