head hurts, need some advice

[ryanneedzhelp]

Ok heres the deal.. I'm building a system for pure Hi Def gaming and need advice on which rout to take.

The main reason for the upgrade is to play extremely high graphics on Age of conan hyborian adventures.

Problem: I was gonna go AMD 64 x2 6400+ but i keep seeing reviews on how the e6850 core2's are way better for gaming.. then i also read how lower versions are way cheaper and can be overclocked up to 3.6ghz and higher..

Original setup:
Mobo: AMD 580X Crossfire chipset
Proc: athlon 64 x2 6400 3.2ghz dualcore
Ram: 8ghz ddr2 800 dual channel
Video: 2 - radeon hd 3870 setup in crossfire mode
HD: 2 - Raptor x radeon hd 3870 10k rpm RAID 0
PSU: OCZ GameXStream OCZ700GXSSLI ATX12V 700W Power Supply
Monitor: Hi-Def LCD flat pannel of some type.
Windows vista ultimate 64mbit

I want the best possible performance in Gaming for that general price-range.. $2500ish

Can somone give me advice on a better setup..
im Fairly new to building comps. Ive built 1 so far with zero experience in overclocking or setting up in raid-0 etc.

Should i go pentium or amd?
SLI or Crossfire?
Best possible proc speed on a dual core?
also any noob friendly guides on how to use your suggested setup

Any general ideas on what mobo etc would be extremely helpful.
i wanna get this right the first time because im a poor college student that cannot afford to screw this one up.

Thanks in advance for any help i can get.



Cross-posting of the same topics in different forums isn't allowed. I left your thread in the CPU/Overclocking forum open.

esquared
Anandtech Senior Moderator

 

[Blain]

Read some "Help me build..." type threads in this forum.
They're thick with recommendations on your type of build. :laugh:

 

[MarcVenice]

e8400 overclocked to 4.0ghz. Only need 2x2gb of ram, 8gb is overkill. Prolly better to get a HD 3870 X2, instead of 2 crossfired HD 3870's. And get a corsair 620hx, or even 520hx, and not that OCZ PSU.

 

[ryanneedzhelp]

Originally posted by: MarcVenice
e8400 overclocked to 4.0ghz. Only need 2x2gb of ram, 8gb is overkill. Prolly better to get a HD 3870 X2, instead of 2 crossfired HD 3870's. And get a corsair 620hx, or even 520hx, and not that OCZ PSU.

Thanks a ton.

As for the video card.
SLI or Crossfire and would the hd 3870 X2 be good in crossfire mode?

and any tips on what mobo for that e8400 or any overclocking guides?

Thanks a ton