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New cheap gaming setup

T

TJones2

Senior member
What do you think of these components?

1- GeForce 7900GS XT (already bought)
2- Antec Smart Power 450w (already own)
3- Intel E2180 (hear its good for o/cing)
4- Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L (high rating by users @egghead)
5- Mushkin HP PC2-6400 HP2-6400 (cheap and Mushkin)
6- Antec Sonata (old ver. I have kicking around)

Some thoughts. I prefer the ASUS P5K-E because it has firewire, eSATA, and wireless but it sounds like it doesn't have nearly the reliability of the Gigabyte board. If it did, I think it would be worth the extra $60 or so.

The CPU is good for overclocking I hear, but I'm not sure I really want something that involves running over spec. Would there be a better choice?

And RAM. I'm not sold on any particular choice at this point. I've owned top end Mushkin, and when they're not defective they're nice. Also looking at Crucial Ballistix (which apparently are going on sale soon) or G.SKILL F2-6400CL5D-2GBNQ (apparently highly overclockable). They're all about the same price. Ram has gotten so damn cheap!

The PS will be updated later, likely the Corsair HX520. Was going to put everything into a ancient case I picked up for a buck but figured heat might be an issue (only one front fan). Beige is so retro now.
 
7900GS XT? anyways, that the 7900GS is still a pretty good card in my opinion.

the rest of your spec looks alright, but I won't fork over the extra 60 bucks for the Asus mobo if i don't have any Firewire peripherals. The Integrated wireless card maybe useful, but did you already have CAT5 cables wired to your previous rig? If so, wireless on a desktop is somewhat less important (than say a laptop).
Also, you will be missing out a lot if you are not OC-ing the E2180. The whole point of getting it is to OC it to E6300 level which is 80 bucks more. If you are not comfortable with OCing, look to AMD.

 
If I don't get a motherboard with firewire, I'll just have to add a firewire card (which I already have) since I do need to import DV video. The wireless could be useful as I may be moving my computer to an area I can't run cable to. So, both useful features but not at the sacrifice of stability. I can afford a E6300, should I just go with that?

 
Think I'll stick with the E2180, if it doesn't clock well, then I'll sell it and get a faster cpu. Now for the ram. Should I just get the cheapest of the bunch, or go for one particular set?
 
It's the cheapest 2x1gb ddr2 800mhz you can get, and it's 4-4-4-12 to boot. I wonder how much v it needs, 2.0-2.1 prolly, but that's not a problem.
 
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