Officially building new PC! I need advice!

[WhiskeyRomeo]

... thinking of getting two ATI 2900 HD graphic cards and link them.

That linking is called "Crossfire". Just like linking 2 nVidia cards is called SLI.

Crossfire and SLI require different motherboards.

Striker, P5N32-E and P5N-E are examples of SLI MBs.

Examples of Crossfire motherboards would be P35 chipets: GIGABYTE GA-P35-DQ6 or abit IP35 Pro

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Productcompare.aspx?Submit=Property&N=2010200280&PropertyCodeValue=705%3A9908%2C717%3A27337%2C717%3A19337%2C717%3A28997%2C736%3A7588&bop=And&CompareItemList=N82E16813128046%2CN82E16813127030

 

I do not think 2x ATI 2900XT HD in Crossfire will be a good choice. Without knowing what games you plan to use or what future games you'll buy its impossible to say that 2 ATI 2900XT HD will beat 1 8800Ultra or even beat 1 8800GTX. It would be better to compare 2x ATI 2900XT HD with 2x 8800GTS. Both cost about the same. In todays games the 2x 8800GTS usually beats 2x ATI 2900XT HD although you can find certain games where the ATIs do better than nVidias. On average, across most games nVidia is better than ATI at the moment. And at the moment 1 8800 GTX will usually beat 2x 2x ATI 2900XT HD @ 1600x1200 resolution.

Top chart shows single card performance over 7 games tested at the THG website.

2nd chart shows Crossfire / SLI performance over the same games.

1x Nvida 8800GTX=2281 & 2x ATI HD2900XT CF=2099 & 2x 8800GTS SLI= 2472

 

THG single video card charts: http://www23.tomshardware.com/graphics_2007.html?modelx=33&model1=857&model2=706&chart=278

 

THG CF/SLI video card charts: http://www23.tomshardware.com/graphics_sli2007.html?modelx=33&model1=867&model2=807&chart=338

[Troffmeister]

Nvidia all the way for me - i was a 3dfx fan boy , and now i am a nvidia fan boy - lol :-)

 

to me nvidia and games , is like bread and butter )

[Raised_Dead85]

Okay then ill go with the 8800gtx SLI.

 

Thanks WhiskeyRomeo. I dont have much time to look around for anything more for my PC building. Busy moving out. I will have about 7 days of nothing to do so ill be online alot and lots of research. We are having a change over of command on the 30th August. After that then we going to have alot of free time. Those days are going to drag until we get our bird to fly out of this sandbox!

[VMFA-Blaze]

Its good to hear that your finally on the way home ...

 

I'll bet you can't wait to hit the deck back here on US soil...

 

Hang in there my-man...

 

 

~S~

 

Blaze

[Raised_Dead85]

Yeah its dragging on right now!

[Raised_Dead85]

Hey guys check this MOBO out and tell me what yall think about it!

 

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3127546&CatId=1533

 

To me it looks great. Its made by MSI are they good company to go with?

[Troffmeister]

well after being seriously dicked around for the last 2 weeks plus by the pc seller / builder - i get my new rig delivered on monday - its sitting in a depot about 6 miles away awaiting monday - sat afternoon now - i have tracking details etc no sat deliveries grrrrrrrr!

 

man i am annoyed and frustrated - just hope come monday pc is all ok , and everything i paid for is there and works

 

i will report back , hopefully using the new rig )

[VMFA-Blaze]

Hey guys check this MOBO out and tell me what yall think about it!

 

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3127546&CatId=1533

 

To me it looks great. Its made by MSI are they good company to go with?

 

That seems to be a little high in price.. I checked out Tiger Direct, and its now listed at $213.36 USD, find it listed on toms web sight and you'll see the difference ...

 

But the most popular board at present is the Striker Extreme according to Toms Hardware..

 

I personally prefer Asus to MSI, But just so that you get all of the details concerning the pros and cons of all of the available MB's check out the link that I've included... Then you can decide for yourself whats right for you're purposes...

 

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/seven-650i-sli-motherboards-compared-uk,review-2296-5.html

 

~S~

 

Blaze

[Raised_Dead85]

Oooorahhh Blaze. Good info thank you:D:D:D. i need to check Toms page more often.

 

I agree Striker is way to go with ASUS. One thing that did catch my eye was the sound card that i want to buy when i build the PC. The MSI board that has 16gig ability of ram and money saver one that i want is the Xtreme fatality SB card which is built into the motherboard. Now since i am running out of time ill be ordering main hardware in couple days.

 

Hey Blaze we actually have two days left of just training our replacements. Im am really happy right now because they are actually here and we fly out soon.

 

So looks like ill be going with the striker MOBO. Ill be reading more about it and other articles from the link that you gave me.;)

[VMFA-Blaze]

Glad to help Marine....

 

I have the fatality card, I purchased it separately but I cant get it to install properly with Vista... But that's ok.. the Asus sound card rocks, I've got the Asus plugged into my Sony 7.1 Digital Audio Control Center... So if I want to watch a Blue Ray or HD disk on the computer DVD player I get the full movie audio, and Lock On or any game that I choice to play sounds cool..

 

By the way do you know what you'll be flying back on? Is it a C130 or are they going to charter a civilian air line flight...

 

 

~S~

 

Blaze

[Raised_Dead85]

By the way do you know what you'll be flying back on? Is it a C130 or are they going to charter a civilian air line flight...

 

 

~S~

 

Blaze

 

Its C-130 out of Iraq to Kuwait. C-130 ride out of Iraq is fine but coming here was a blast because we did a combat land and you could feel every single g that was pulled and every sharp turn which gave me a huge chills!

 

Once we get to Kuwait we will fly out of Civilian Airline except its just going to be Marines on board and the Attendants which are civilians!

[Troffmeister]

my new pc is being sent back for a full refund today - after 24 hours of frustrating testing and problems ,becoz of loads of problems and instabilities etc despite what looked like a very nice built and components etc physically - usage proved to be a pile of untested junk - my old pc i am back on now ran better - so christ knows what they did when they built it ?

 

i never even got to try a game or see the 3d vid card gtx8800 in action - i was expecting trouble - so i was not disapointed !:-(

 

not a good experience the last 3 weeks

once i get my Ј1100 back - its back to the drawing board and try again with a new competent retail outlet !

 

lets just say that i am mightily foxtrot offed right now !

[Raised_Dead85]

my new pc is being sent back for a full refund today - after 24 hours of frustrating testing and problems ,becoz of loads of problems and instabilities etc despite what looked like a very nice built and components etc physically - usage proved to be a pile of untested junk - my old pc i am back on now ran better - so christ knows what they did when they built it ?

 

i never even got to try a game or see the 3d vid card gtx8800 in action - i was expecting trouble - so i was not disapointed !:-(

 

not a good experience the last 3 weeks

once i get my Ј1100 back - its back to the drawing board and try again with a new competent retail outlet !

 

lets just say that i am mightily foxtrot offed right now !

 

Wow im sorry man, thats why you should build it youre self:D:D:D

 

Anyways you get good experience and you would know whats what inside your rig!:)

 

Hey good luck on what ever your plans are for the computer;)

[Troffmeister]

Thanks , i am so freaking mad about it all

 

today i have had to pay 60 uk pounds to ship it back - and i have to wait until friday night to get my 1100 ukp refunded along witht the 60 ukp post - thats assuming i don't get even more scammed than i have been already over the last 3 weeks

 

the people i bought from are the biggest bunch of masturbation artists the world has ever known imo !

[Troffmeister]

Well after a saga longer than Harry bloody potter , pleased to report i did get my 1100 uk pounds back

 

so today i ordered the following new pc spec from a local reputable pc shop as follows - should have it later this coming week - unless Satan intervenes again to further roast my testicles for all my evil deeds over the last 38 years - lol anyway :-)

 

Yep forgot to say the spec below cost me uk pounds 1015 - which includes vat tax at 17.5 %

so 1015 ukp in total to pay

 

Case: Cooler Master Centurion

 

Power Supply: Antec True Power Trio 650W

 

Processor: Core 2 Duo E6850 4MB cache 3ghz

 

CPU Cooler: Standard CPU Cooler

 

Graphics Card : ASUS GeForce 8800 ULTRA 768MB PCI Express

 

Memory: 2GB Corsair DDR2 VS XMS2

 

Motherboard: Asus P5N-E SLI Plus Socket 775

 

Hard Disk Drive One: 250GB Caviar SE16 SATA 300

Hard Disk Drive Two: 250GB Caviar SE16 SATA 300

 

Optical Drive : NEC DVD-RW

 

Sound Card: Soundblaster Audigy SE 7.1

 

Monitor: None

Keyboard: None

Mouse: None

 

Operating System: Microsoft Windows XP Home with disk

 

6 x usb ports 1 x ethernet port

[Raised_Dead85]

Nicly done Troffmeister. I hope everything works out for you especially its going to be second time. I had some issues and i see why it these problems came up because the other day i made a different more better decision that if it went fine at first!

[Troffmeister]

Thanks for the kind words and support

 

just had it confirmed by phone i will collect it on thursday - i will report in later this week hopefully on new rig all is ok - please god )