Help me build a super computer!

witnessmenow

Ok so I wanna build a beast of a computer and i was wondering if any of knowlegable folks could help me out! I'll have loads of questions for ye, i've built pcs before but i really wwant to do a class job on this one and have everything considered!

I will be using the PC mostly for gaming.

First thing a really need to decide is my processor. Definitly going with intel, question is what one?

Can get the QX9650 for a lot lot less than retail, but can get the Q9550 for half that agian. I dont mind spending the extra money if there is substantial enough diffrence. So my first question is:

Is there much of a diffrence between QX9650 and Q9550?

Also feel free to suggest other processors if you think there worth mentioning .Follow up question would be:

What Mobo do you suggest?

Thanks in advance for the replies, and dont worry i'll have more questions after we get past the above 2

Spear

Budget?

witnessmenow

€1500 kind of money, More if i think its worth it (i really dont think i'll need to spend that much even). Less if i think im not sacraficing much! Have a monitor, keyboard and mouse im happy with.

But i can get the CPUs for way cheaper than they normally cost.

Im thinking of 4gb of ram, 2X GT8800 (or whatever there called), big power supply, Whatever for hard drives, case and cooling.

Spear

witnessmenow wrote: »

€1500 kind of money, More if i think its worth it (i really dont think i'll need to spend that much even). Less if i think im not sacraficing much! Have a monitor, keyboard and mouse im happy with.

But i can get the CPUs for way cheaper than they normally cost.

Im thinking of 4gb of ram, 2X GT8800 (or whatever there called), big power supply, Whatever for hard drives, case and cooling.

The 8800 series is replaced by the 9800, so you could look at the 9800GX2.

witnessmenow

Thanks for the reply!

I guess this will be my third question:

What Graphics Card/s Should i get?

There a massive step up in price!
Do you reckon two 512mb 8800GT XT in SLI out preform one 1gb 9800GX2 by much ? If they were any way close i'd go with the 9800GX2 so i'd have the slot open for going SLI down the line

We'll say my budget for graphics cards is in and around the €400-€450 mark

EDIT: This fairly answers my question, i guess its the 8800 for me so

KerranJast

One of the lads in my thread made a good point re: graphics cards. 2x 9600 SLI would be more than enough oompf for a year or so. The 9900 series from NVidia will be out soon and could be a big improvement on the 9800s.

RoyalMarine

what size monitor do you have?
and what harddrives & optical drives are in your current computer?

no point buying new ones if the ones you have are good.

witnessmenow

22" monitor

I'll prob leave my hard drives from my current where they are, 250gb and a 320gb .. hardly worth it. Might just buy a few 500gb and maybe a raptor...are they worth it?

Spear

If you're going with 4GB of RAM you'll probably want a 64bit OS as well. My personal recommendation would be Corsair's stuff, but you'll want to up the voltage slightly if it's in the form of 4 modules.

AlmightyCushion

With a 22" monitor I'd probably get an 8800gts. It should do you fine. Sli would be a bit of a waste of money at the resolution of that monitor.

Sqaull20

I would get something like this...



Add a Q9450 if you can get it for sub €200 and a good cpu cooler...

Sli is not pointless @ 1680 by 1050 especially when you turn on AA and other effects, games like Crysis, Call of Duty 4, Assassins Creed and upcoming games need that power...

http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/geforce_9600_gt_sli_performance/page8.asp

AlmightyCushion

Never said it was pointless I said it was a bit of a waste at that resolution. I knew it would show some improvements but I didn't think it would show as much of an improvement as that link shows. Witnessmenow, if I were you I'd go with the build squall has above. It's a quality system for the money.

mathias

Crysis, Call of Duty 4, Assassins Creed and upcoming games need that power...

I just built a killer machine myself , with SLI and two 8800's , but cmon now , Crysis is the only one of that bunch that needs power ,

Assassins creed and COD4 dont ! They'd run on almost anything !

KamiKazi

What I'd go for with your budget: Click

witnessmenow

mathias wrote: »

I just built a killer machine myself , with SLI and two 8800's , but cmon now , Crysis is the only one of that bunch that needs power ,

Assassins creed and COD4 dont ! They'd run on almost anything !

Mathias im interested to hear what CPU you bought as i believe i remember reading you work for intel, im co-oping in shannon and thats why i have access to the cheap CPUs


@Squall: Thanks very much for the detail you went into. I'd say I'll be using them alright, there prices are great! Would it make much diffrence going for a Q9550 instead, i'd still be well in budget

EDIT: 1000 posts , a milestone thats only been reached by 1,745 other boardsies

witnessmenow

Ok if i was to buy right now this is what i'd go for, opinions please

Case:
Antec Nine Hundred, ATX

Mobo:
MSI P7N Sli Platinum

CPU:
Undecieded - Possibly Q9550

CPU Cooler:
No Idea, please recomend one!

Ram:
4gb OCZ DDR2 Pc2-6400

Hard Drives:
2 x samsung 750gb sata II

GFX:
Thinking maybe - 2 x Sparkle 9600GT, 512mb

DVD drive:
Samsung SH-202N

Extras:
TEAC 7-in- card reader & Floppy Drive
abit Wireless Card

Overall I'm looking at about €1100 or so. What do you think?

Grim_Wreeper

looks good, Are Sparkle graphics card supposed to be good. and as far as I'm aware, windows only uses 3 gig RAM unless you go 64 bit.

jakedixon2004

Is That u Eric?

Sqaull20

mathias wrote: »

I just built a killer machine myself , with SLI and two 8800's , but cmon now , Crysis is the only one of that bunch that needs power ,

Assassins creed and COD4 dont ! They'd run on almost anything !

Fair point, Cod4 doesnt need insane power but Assassins creed does, most of the new games are going to need that power too..

2 x 9600gt's for €220 is just too good a deal to pass up imo, they can get close to a 9800gx2...

@ Wreeper sparkle are a pretty good brand,they are just not that well known.All brands are virtually the same card most of the time..

@ Witness if you can get a Q9550 cheap go for it...

Grim_Wreeper

jakedixon2004 wrote: »

Is That u Eric?

F no.


And I think I'm going to go for 2 EVGA 8800GT (superclocked).cause I already have one and it's a beast of a card.

Blowfish

witnessmenow wrote: »

Ok if i was to buy right now this is what i'd go for, opinions please

Case:
Antec Nine Hundred, ATX

Mobo:
MSI P7N Sli Platinum

CPU:
Undecieded - Possibly Q9550

CPU Cooler:
No Idea, please recomend one!

Ram:
4gb OCZ DDR2 Pc2-6400

Hard Drives:
2 x samsung 750gb sata II

GFX:
Thinking maybe - 2 x Sparkle 9600GT, 512mb

DVD drive:
Samsung SH-202N

Extras:
TEAC 7-in- card reader & Floppy Drive
abit Wireless Card

Overall I'm looking at about €1100 or so. What do you think?

The other option if that is your total budget is to drop the second HDD and put it towards dual GTS's at €163 each.

TerrorFirmer

When did video cards start becoming so friggin cheap? I paid 300 for my GTS about 6 weeks ago!

mathias

When did video cards start becoming so friggin cheap? I paid 300 for my GTS about 6 weeks ago!

Theres quite a range of GTS cards out there at the moment , depending on which one you bought the price can vary a lot , along with the performance , I bought 2 tuned 1GB gainwards ... not cheap !! and not small either , had to modify those huge red heatsinks just a tad !!

I went for the striker extreme motherboard.

I went for the Q9550 by the way.

Grim_Wreeper

And how do you find the Q9550? that's the one that I'm looking at!

mathias

Its a flyer , no issues so far , but the system is only two weeks old , Its running Vista 64 and Ive had one blue screen so far , and that was a motherboard driver issue , once I got all the latest drivers there were no problems.

Ive ran some encoding tests , and Ive never had a system as fast as it , Im still getting the figures together , but so far , at a conservative estimate , Im looking at at least a 35% inprovement in speed encoding large video files ,( Over my AMD 4800 x 2 ), these would be 12GB grabs from my mini DV camcorder , encoding to xvid.

Encoding mp3's to lame VBR zero is ridiculously fast , I havnt got round to running some real benchmarks yet , but Im expecting good things.

nibble

Here's what I'd go for, you could definitely do it cheaper but if the cash is spare why not? It's not SLI because I would never but an Nvidia board, there's no arguing P35/X38 are far superior especially in terms of overclocking..
You could switch the Q6700 for a Q9550 if you wanted but it's not going to be much better really.
The DFI has tons of overclocking options and looks sweet IMO too! The X38 one is similar but a bit more pricey.





I put in a pretty nice case, you could cheap out on that if you wanted too but that's something I'd never do
For cooling a few Zalman F3's or Scythe S-Flex's for the case and for the CPU a Thermalright IFX-14 or an Ultra-120 Extreme, you could get a Scythe Mugen either. They're basically top of the air cooling pack.

PogMoThoin

:rolleyes: Nice, but I'd change the hd to either a 1Tb or 750Gb f1 sata's with 32Mb cache. Not a fan of sli myself either, I prefer intel mobo's and a single gpu.

c0rn

Hi everyone.

My first post

Was looking at the config you have so far and it looks sweet I have to say.

Thought I should drop my 2 cents as well hehe.

The hard drives you have picked are Samsung 750Gb, is that the SpinPoint F1 model? If so then they are going to fly. In many reviews they are faster then Raptor drives in many tests.

Here is a big review of hard disks for you.

The Samsung F1 drives are really fast and so are the Western Digital Caviar SE16. I would deffo take a look at them if I was you

Hard drives effect your system more then most people actually think.

Hope that my little thoughts help you towards your goal.

witnessmenow

Hey , Welcome to boards!

Thanks for the link, I didn't realise they were that good, i was only buying them cause they're dirt cheap! €160 for 1.5TB of storage...mmm .. yes please!

Ok so i'm happy with most things so far, things i need to decide on:

• Graphics cards: I've basically three options: 2x 9600GT, 2x 8800GTS or a 9800xx (at the moment the 9600's are edging it in my mind)
• CPU cooler, have no idea whats good, never used anything but a stock one before!

Blowfish

witnessmenow wrote: »

• CPU cooler, have no idea whats good, never used anything but a stock one before!

If you are going for bang for the buck, this is the one you want.

c0rn

For your CPU Cooler I would deffo go for something from the ZALMAN 9xxx series or a Tuniq Tower, they both have amazing cooling power and don't sound like jet planes.

Frostytech has a nice review of the Tuniq Tower here, you can also see many other coolers in comparison in that review.

You can of course stick with the stock cooler, I can't honestly say if they are any good I always just put my ones in the bin (well not really but you get the point hehe).

But with the rest of the stuff that you are getting I would really want you to go for something else then a stock cooler, it would hurt my soul to see a stock cooler in a new comp like that

witnessmenow

c0rn wrote: »

For your CPU Cooler I would deffo go for something from the ZALMAN 9xxx series or a Tuniq Tower, they both have amazing cooling power and don't sound like jet planes.

Frostytech has a nice review of the Tuniq Tower here, you can also see many other coolers in comparison in that review.

You can of course stick with the stock cooler, I can't honestly say if they are any good I always just put my ones in the bin (well not really but you get the point hehe).

But with the rest of the stuff that you are getting I would really want you to go for something else then a stock cooler, it would hurt my soul to see a stock cooler in a new comp like that

Thanks for the links! Ok to save your soul I'll go for a non stock cooler. Heart is kinda set on the tuniq now but hardwareversand dont have it Komplett do thought @€;46 so i might buy it from there

Also im considering changing the motherboard. I've built 4 pcs, 2 with Asus mobos , one with MSi, and one with unknown! The asus ones were more expensive, but the just seemed like much nicer boards. Im thinking of going for the Asus striker Extreme Although im not up on my mobo knowledge at all anymore so i dont know. I know its max bus speed matches my cpu.

I also actually forgot that i can get tax back, i seen over on unreal.ie that you can send hv.de your tax number and they will recalculate the price, any one have first hand experience of this? This also means I might have an extra few euro to throw around, although TBH im happy with everything so the only thing i'd consider spending more money on was GFX cards, even then though i wont be buying 2 9800s!!

So are 2x8800s much better than 2x9600?

Can i also just thank everyone who has replied to, its a great help when building a pc to have the input of all ye!

c0rn

Well when it comes to GFX cards this is a hard issue. If you do a little google searching will find way way to many forums with verbal "fights" on this matter.

I would say that in general 2x8800 cards are better then 2x9600, BUT! this all depends on the games you play, how much money you want to pay and so on. Look at me I have nearly got everything I need ordered and on its way but I still can not make up my mind on a GFX card.

What kind of games are you going to play mostly? Or is it more 3DMark scores you want (it seems like many people only care about this). How much money do you want to put into the card/cards?

With that info I think I could drop you some ideas of what could be good for (after my opinion of course hehe).

PogMoThoin

This is the only cooler thats better than the Tuniq tower, doesn't come with a fan tho so add this 3000rpm one. I'd also add a fan controller to enable you turn it down.

If you don't add a fan controller opt for a lower speed Sythe fan to reduce noise.

Bomber6

Hold up, you're even dreaming of buying a 750i??? :eek:, not even a 780i is as high quality chipsets for Intel processors in terms of overclocking etc. anyway so I wouldn't recommend getting one over a P35 or x38. While the MSI board is one of the best, if you can do without SLi get an x48 board such as this:
http://www.motherboardpro.com/DFI-LanParty-DK-X48-T2RS-DDR2-Motherboard-X48-Chipset-Crossfire-Ready-X48-Motherboard-p-557.html
I know its an American website but its a great price (even if it's only a higher binned x38) and for shipping, get a friend to ship it over as a gift for your "birthday" with a birthday card for extra proof . You should look at Gigabyte boards otherwise or Asus but the DFi is the best it seems.
Also, try Crucial Ballistix PC2-8500 RAM or even GeIL, they use good chips (Micron?) and are very stable oc'ers, try dabs.ie or get them from newgg.com (US again)
Your processor is good but its also a good time to buy from the US or even UK with exchange rates. Also, I don't see the point in buyig a very expensive CPU at the moment, search google for 'Nehalem' and buy a good ol' Q6600 or e8400 (4GHZ!!!)
I always take the view to get one good graphics card rather than 2 seperate ones that use more power and are no real advantage as of yet, no computer can run Crysis well on 'Very High' anyway!

For cooler check out this article:
http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=548201

Hope this helps

nibble

PogMoThoin wrote: »

This is the only cooler thats better than the Tuniq tower, doesn't come with a fan tho so add this 3000rpm one. I'd also add a fan controller to enable you turn it down.

If you don't add a fan controller opt for a lower speed Sythe fan to reduce noise.

Actually a bolt mounted Scythe Mugen (formerly Infinity) beats a tuniq by a bit and if you put two fans on it in a push-><-push config it's even better than a single loud high speed one. But that needs a little modding...
Hehe just go watercooling and be done with it;)

witnessmenow

:rolleyes: emmm no

Was balancing my accounts (or doing a quick excel, whatever you want to call it) yesterday and I really shouldnt be getting a computer at all!! Im going into final year of college , already have a decentish pc and have all the modern games consoles.

Thats not stopping me from getting it, its just stopping me from watercooling it!:p

EDIT: Put in the order for the Q9550 yesterday, but its back ordered

And im buying off the company that makes them!?

Anti

So much wrong with so much said here. I dont even know where to start.

Forget sli, its a complete waste. And im not being bitter, ive been using it since it came out with 6800 ultras. Just get a 9800GTX or a 9800Gx2. Personally id get 8gb of ram if you can afford it. But obviously you will need a 64bit Os for this. Q9450/9550/9650 is what you should be looking at, obviously there is a big price gap preween these chips. To be honest, you more then likely wont even use the grunt these cpu's have. So why not just get a Q6600. For a board, well thats personal choice, do you need 3 pci slots for your sound card tv tuver and somethins else. Do you need 8+ sata ports ? Also do you need 1.5TB of storage ? With my last pc i ended up with 2.2TB storage, but used less then 500gb as most of the warez *cough* was on external drives. The few places not to skimp is the cpu cooler, the psu and the case. These are the 3 most critical parts of any pc build.

I see alot of people here going for 1000w (1Kw) psu's... Why loike ? your pc will never pull that ammount, and your only gonna be increasing your esb bills. Ive ran 6 hdds, tri sli etc etc ona 620w psu. And it was grand.

An example for you, a friend of mine who is a sparks decided to see how much his pc would use under full load, not a fantastic spec but a good c2d, 8800gt few hdds and all that jazz and it never pulled more then 200w. The only thing you need to look for is strong rails.

A good cpu cooler is a must, something like a tuniq tower, ot a TR ultra 120 extreme. Not the cheapest of coolers, but so much better then that ****ty artic cooler. The tuniq comes with a fan and a pci speed bracket, the TR ultra 120 extreme has no fan, so add one yourself.

And as for a case, obviously its persnal taste when it comes to looks, but remember to get one with good airflow and is easy to work with.

witnessmenow

Anti wrote: »

So much wrong with so much said here. I dont even know where to start.

Forget sli, its a complete waste. And im not being bitter, ive been using it since it came out with 6800 ultras. Just get a 9800GTX or a 9800Gx2. Personally id get 8gb of ram if you can afford it. But obviously you will need a 64bit Os for this. Q9450/9550/9650 is what you should be looking at, obviously there is a big price gap preween these chips. To be honest, you more then likely wont even use the grunt these cpu's have. So why not just get a Q6600. For a board, well thats personal choice, do you need 3 pci slots for your sound card tv tuver and somethins else. Do you need 8+ sata ports ? Also do you need 1.5TB of storage ? With my last pc i ended up with 2.2TB storage, but used less then 500gb as most of the warez *cough* was on external drives. The few places not to skimp is the cpu cooler, the psu and the case. These are the 3 most critical parts of any pc build.

I see alot of people here going for 1000w (1Kw) psu's... Why loike ? your pc will never pull that ammount, and your only gonna be increasing your esb bills. Ive ran 6 hdds, tri sli etc etc ona 620w psu. And it was grand.

An example for you, a friend of mine who is a sparks decided to see how much his pc would use under full load, not a fantastic spec but a good c2d, 8800gt few hdds and all that jazz and it never pulled more then 200w. The only thing you need to look for is strong rails.

A good cpu cooler is a must, something like a tuniq tower, ot a TR ultra 120 extreme. Not the cheapest of coolers, but so much better then that ****ty artic cooler. The tuniq comes with a fan and a pci speed bracket, the TR ultra 120 extreme has no fan, so add one yourself.

And as for a case, obviously its persnal taste when it comes to looks, but remember to get one with good airflow and is easy to work with.

Hey Anti, thanks for the input.

Disturbingly your trying to encourage me to spent more money, and im kinda tempted to do so! Can i just ask you a few questions about your comments?

Firstly what mb of a 9800 should i be getting? much diffrence between the 512mb and 1024mb other than €200?

Is 8gb of ram really nessacary? Is there anything out that currently demands that much ram? I can afford to get it , if there is a need for it.

I've Q9550 ordered (i prob could change it) but im getting it for a bit less than €200 so its not the component that is hogging my finacial resources.

I know what your saying about the Hard drives. But my current pc has 570gb and is bassically full, and there is stuff thats on my externals that arent on my PC so for the sake of €80 i'll prob go for the big space just to have alot of comfort room.

What PSU do you recomend so? 750w is probably a bit excesive!

As for the critical parts of the build : Im kinda thinking of going antec nine hundred (seems to have good reviews) and a tuniq tower (because its complete out of the box) ?

I dont imagine i do need 8 sata ports! 6 would be loads i think. I'd even gladly drop to 4 sata ports if the mobo had built in wifi. Sorry to be asking all you these questions but what board do you recomend?

Cheers

Caybar

witnessmenow wrote: »

I've Q9550 ordered (i prob could change it) but im getting it for a bit less than €200 so its not the component that is hogging my finacial resources.

Add ~€50 to the price of that for import duties, UPS man/woman will ask for it upon deivery

witnessmenow

Possibly, but it is being shipped from an Intel location to another Intel location so it might avoid customs, you know, just moving stock!:p

Thinking of going for this mobo at the moment will probably change my mind again yet though!

mathias

I see alot of people here going for 1000w (1Kw) psu's... Why loike ? your pc will never pull that ammount, and your only gonna be increasing your esb bills. Ive ran 6 hdds, tri sli etc etc ona 620w psu. And it was grand.

The main issue with power supplies is their performance under load and how much the rated current levels drop when running. Its not that anyone needs 1000W , its the fact that cheapo power supplies are notoriously unstable , NorthQ and Hiper( truly brutal!) being cases in point.

Going for a 1000W power supply gives plenty of headroom so to speak , and can rule out supply problems in most cases. Going for exactly what you need as opposed to going for the headroom on the other hand , can lead to lots of problems if the PSU cannot supply what its rated for , and that is the case with a lot of power supplies out there.

Also beware reviews where the only thing tested is voltage , its current under load thats most important , and thats a way more complicated test, Especially considering that computer PSU's are switched mode supplies as opposed to linear supplies.

This is a decent review ,
http://techreport.com/articles.x/7429/24

I went for OCZ by the way , 650W , and it works fine. My system is about the same as what you are about to order.

Regarding the ESB bill part , a computer adds a pittance to your bill when you actually work out how much of the total amount it uses. Heating, cooking and lighting are your main components of the bill. Also the Wattage rating on any appliance is the maximum it can use , and a computer rarely, if ever , uses its maximum power. You only pay for what you use.

A good efficiency rating on a PSU is a plus point as well. This basically means that most of whatever it does use is put to work doing what its supposed to do and not wasted in heat dissipation.

witnessmenow

Hi guys,

Sorry for diggin up an old thread but my Q9550 only got shipped yesterday so I realised now all I need is every other component!

Do you reckon this would be good to go with?

Motherboard: MSI P7N Zilent, 750i - No intention of using 3 SLI but this board just semms to be very good value. €120 + it comes with ZALMAN NP9500 cooler.

Case: Antec 900

PSU: I'd really like a modular PSU but i guess the way the antec is set up it doesnt matter that much since they wont be hanging down. Anyone care to recomend one?

Graphics: After much debating with myself (i've changed my mind so may times!) I think im going to go with 2 X 9600GT

RAM: 4gb Corsair DDr2

HDD: samsung spin point 750gb (probably X2)

Optical Drive: This Samsung - Or If any wants to recomend one thats particularly good at burning DL-DVDs I'd be all ears

Thanks in advance

EDIT: Jeez I'd like to know what courier Intel uses, got the chip this morning!

EDIT EDIT:

Caybar wrote: »

Add ~€50 to the price of that for import duties, UPS man/woman will ask for it upon deivery

I didnt have to pay customs either \o/

Nichololas

Screw all this computer component nonsense, just buy eight PS3s :pac:

cian1500ww

If you're looking for a place to buy parts I would highly recommend www.specialtech.co.uk

What kind of cooling are you going for: air or water ?