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New System when?

C

cgp163

Junior Member
I'm planning to drop a bunch of change on a new system, I've been putting it off because I wanted to wait for a few things. I wanted a Core 2 Extreme QX9650 and a X38 motherboard (I'm thinking the GIGABYTE, GA-X38T-DQ6) and DDR3. Well they all are here. Now I am wondering about the whole graphics card situation. The 8800 GTs seem pretty good I don't really think I should spring for an "Ultra" at this point. Not enough bang for the buck by comparison. The real question is, I keep hearing rumors of new cards coming from NVIDIA on the high end. People are talking about something being released with Crysis. I don't mind waiting a few weeks, but I don't want to wait three or six months. Anybody have any good advice on what's expected from NVIDIA and when?
 
If you're going to wait for new technology, you'll be waiting forever. There's always new stuff coming out. Of course, if new stuff is IMMINENT to come out (1 - 2 months) for a MAJOR revision in hardware (think Pentium 4 days to Core 2 Duo), then it's not a bad time to upgrade.

Imminent revisions would be something like the 8800GTS refresh which is supposedly more powerful than a GTX now, ATI's new line of graphics cards that may hopefully bring down 8800GT prices down.

As for Core2 Extreme, those chips are overpriced. You can get a Q6600 for much less and with a bit of OC'ing, get near to the performance of Core 2 Extreme and save a lot of money. Don't fall for Intel's stupid pricing schemes, more performance stock from them costs a LOT more than simply OC'ing.
 
Personally, water cooling requires a sizable investment and a higher degree of risk than a high quality copper heatsink aircooler. You should be fine with the latter; unless you're the type to squeeze every bit of performance out of your parts by water cooling and are willing to pay extra for this capability (and accept a degree of risk that if the water cooling system ruptures or fails, your computer is toast), then you should do fine with air cooling.
 
Anandtech did a review on water cooling kits and they found that they are more expensive, more complicated and actually perform worse than todays best air coolers, I will try to find the link...
 
8800GT + Q6600 + P35 is the best deal out right now, and the best deal we've seen in a long time. Especially with the cheap ram you can find.
 
ok, he's looking at a $1000 cpu, and $350 mobo, and VERY expensive DDR3. I personally wouldn't drop that much change on it but that's just me. There's not a cpu out there like the QX9650 b/c it's a penryn core and the others are simply G0 conroes. The X38 is also supposed to support much higher oc's, esp with ddr3. He should be able to get quite a bit over 4.0, even on air that that proposed system.

@OP, you should check out the asus blitz extreme that AT had yesterday. It has an integrated waterblock for the nb/sb, which should (if asus gets it right) save you some decent change.

The only other thing that you might want to consider would be a 780i mobo for sli. You could get a huge perf boost from having 2 8800gt cards and spend quite a bit less than you would for one 8800 ultra.
 
Well I'm lucky to say I can spend $5000-$6000 if I really want to. Except for graphics cards I try and upgrade only every 4 years. I should have said future-proofing is important. That change any opinions? Any idea when we'll see 780i boards?
 
no, it doesnt change any opinions.

spending 5000 on a computer that will barely outperform a computer that you spent 1800 on is....dumb.

regardless of how long you intend to keep it for.
 
it depends on his budget/income. I personally LIKE to spend a few hundred here and there to keep my midrange system as a midrange system pretty much all the time. I don't spend anything like $5000 in a 4 yr period, but I never have the ultimate 1337 computer, either. That doesn't mean that I CAN'T spend the money. Ditto for cgp163. What if he's a middle eastern prince or a pro ballplayer or whatever? The point is, he's looking for the best, let's help him attain that.

780i boards are supposed to be out before xmas, so figure a month or less. If you do wait that long then you might consider waiting until mid jan. It would placate your value-conscious self if it exists and you would still attain nearly the same level of performance b/c you could then get the following:

-780i mobo = $300 for high end rig
-4GB ddr3 1333 ram will probably be a little bit more reasonable by then, certainly in the $100/GB range or less
-Q9450 will have a stock clock of 2.66 (8x333) and will only cost $316 msrp.
-you could buy 1 8800gt now if you have pci e and another one in jan, or just wait until jan for both of them and spend around 450 total for the two.

With a $200 case and $300 for water cooling, that would put you at around $2000 total for a system that would almost definitely oc to withing 200 mhz or less of the same rig that you could buy right now in a xfire mobo but for a lot less $$, plus you would have the latest and greatest sli setup which is a LOT better these days with nvidia's huge performance advantage.
 
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