Please advise with new rig setup

[Saicho]

Hey all,

I'm trying to build myself a box. There are a few options I have due to intel delaying the 9450 so I was wondering what you all think. Any suggestions are welcome.

Please note that I'm a complete newbie when it comes to OC'ing and SLI. Also if I say something incredibly stupid I apologize ahead of time =)

As I said my main concern is the chip. I want a Q9450, and I don't really want to wait since I haven't seen a solid date of release and I have quite a bit of free time and lots of games I'd like to try that my P4 3.4GHz and GeForce 6800 can't quite handle.

This gives me some choices. I was thinking of getting a GeForce 8800 GTX. I can either get the card now and wait for the Q9450 to come out (is that even an option? will my proc hold it back too much?) or I can go with another proc for the time being like an E8400 and then sell it when I can buy a Q9450.

This leads me to my next point. I want to OC the Q9450. I know that the 8x multi is inferior to something like the Q6600 and I've read that some think an OC'd 6600 is a better choice. I'm still leaning toward the 9450 due to the 45nm technology, and the fact that it can probably go further than the Q6600 on air. I don't really want to mess with water cooling, I think it's too much of a pain and not enough performance for the hassle? Am I wrong? What do you guys think?

To continue the OC discussion, can anyone recommend the RAM speed I need to get the most out of OCing the 9450? I'm a newbie in the area so any information will help. Will the ideal RAM be different for the E8400?

Also, can anyone recommend a good OC mobo? I've read people like the Gigabyte ones, but I'm still unsure about the chipset...

Which leads me to the final issue. I was looking at putting two GeForce 8800s in SLI until I read that you can't have a second monitor when they are in true SLI mode even if you have 3 video cards... I also read this was a driver issue and will most likely get resolved in the future. This is why I wanted to leave the SLI option available, and just stick in an old PCI-E card in the other slot to run my second monitor. I don't want to give up dual mons, I love it. Is there a mobo that does SLI and OC well?

Anyone have good/bad stuff to say about the Antec P182 case?

Any comments are appreciated. If I am totally missing something please let me know =)

Thanks for reading,
Saicho

 

[DSF]

My first question would be why quad core? What tasks are you asking the computer to do, and are they tasks that benefit from more than two threads?

 

[Saicho]

1. Multiple single threaded applications running in the background. Like I said I love my dual mons which means that I have lots of things open, i.e. I need lots of ram and the more cores the better.

2. I'm a software developer and the entire industry is moving toward multithreaded applications since cores aren't getting faster, there are just becoming more of them per proc. I'm just trying to prepare for what is coming. Besides, 4 cores OC'd to 3.6ish is still better than my 1 core at 3.4

But to answer your question directly, I will be using the computer for gaming mostly, although I do quite a bit of video and photo editing along with file processing and I run a lot of programs in the background. This is my reasoning for looking at a quad core.

 

[MegaVovaN]

Well, why don't you buy a Quad 6600 and sell it later if you think it isn't fast enough?
Buy aftermarket cooler and OC the 6600 and you have a quad computer on your hands...

P182 seems to be often recommended case around here - I say it as a good thing

Mobo that OC and has SLI is the X38 chipset (or does it have xfire? I'm not sure).

If you're going single card, get P35 chipset, there are a number of boards of different price/feature levels. Abit IP35-E and GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS3L are often recommended choices for around $100.
(Actually abit IP35-e is $70 AR on newegg right now).

For video card (if going single card) get the 8800GTS 512mb or 8800GTX.
These 2 cards are pretty similar in performance, but GTS 512 costs less (check out Hot Deals for sub-$300 prices).

If you decide on 8800GT 512 and then buy something faster, microcenter has 8800GT 512 right now for just $230 shipped (see Hot Deals)!

 

[Saicho]

What ram speed do I need for the 6600? Will it be optimal for the 9450 as well? Can you recommend a good aftermarket cooler for the 6600?

The reason I was leaning more toward buying the E8400 instead of the Q6600 for reselling is because once the Q9450 comes out, no one is going to want the earlier gen quad core, while the E8400 will still be good because it's the current gen dual core... Thoughts?

 

[Saicho]

Originally posted by: MegaVovaN
Mobo that OC and has SLI is the X38 chipset (or does it have xfire? I'm not sure).

it's xfire =(

 

[Roguestar]

Why do people buy quad core processors for running "multiple single-threaded" applications? Ever heard of multiprogramming? CPUs have been dealing with more than one program at once since before dual core became mainstream. Tch.

Saicho: DDR2-800 will give you enough overhead to run the Q6600 CPU at 3.6GHz without touching the RAM settings.

 

[Saicho]

Originally posted by: Roguestar
Saicho: DDR2-800 will give you enough overhead to run the Q6600 CPU at 3.6GHz without touching the RAM settings.

Thanks! 3.6 was just an example, I'd like to take it as far as it can go of course...Will DDR2-800 suffice for air cooling?

Originally posted by: Roguestar
Why do people buy quad core processors for running "multiple single-threaded" applications? Ever heard of multiprogramming? CPUs have been dealing with more than one program at once since before dual core became mainstream. Tch.

Are you talking about preemption? Of course processors will context switch into running a different process when it needs to wait on an I/O request. This sort of thing is usually handled by the operating system's process scheduler. People learned quickly that time sharing > batch =P

However, to answer your question, people buy quad core processors for running "multiple single-threaded" applications to run them simultaneously instead of "pseudo-simultaneously". The ALU on each core can do calculations for the processes simultaneously.

Edit: answered question.

 

[Roguestar]

Originally posted by: Saicho
Are you talking about preemption? Of course processors will context switch into running a different process when it needs to wait on an I/O request (or in and out once the associated time quantum has expired... it's less sequential than that). This sort of thing is usually handled by the operating system's process scheduler. People learned quickly that time sharing > batch =P

However, to answer your question, people buy quad core processors for running "multiple single-threaded" applications to run them simultaneously instead of "pseudo-simultaneously". The ALU on each core can do calculations for the processes simultaneously.

Nyess, I know this... but I mean that there'll be very little difference. Not enough to warrant splashing out £££ in my opinion.

As to your other question, DDR2-800 should be fine indeed. You shouldn't need to worry about it overheating unless you're overvolting it a lot.

 

[Saicho]

Ty Roguestar.

I actually agreed with you back in the early days of dual core and the like, but now that developers are thread-savvy I think we will start to see bigger gains from more cores than we have in the past. This is all just opinion though of course.

Now I need to decide between the 6600 or the 8400 for now. 6600 is faster, but I can probably re-sell the 8400 easier.

I also need to decide between an SLI chipset (even though I don't want SLI quite yet) or the P35.

Also, in order to push the 9450 to 3.6 I'd need DDR2-900 right? For a 1:1 ratio that is since the FSB is 333, OCing to 450 on 8x multi yields 3.6, correct?

Maybe I should get the DDR2-900, this way I can see if I'm able to push the 6600 to 4?

 

[Saicho]

Oh, another question:

Will it matter if I'm going to have 8GB of Ram with a 64bit OS instead of 4GB with a 32bit OS for the ratios and speeds and what not?

 

[MegaVovaN]

Depends on the apps you'll be using, I kind of doubt Superfetch will make good use of EIGHT gigabytes of RAM!

With 32bit you will only be able to use 3.2 gb, no matter whether you have 4 gb or 8 gb installed.

 

[Saicho]

No, I mean will the amount of ram I have change the optimal ram speed I need to buy in order to achieve a 1:1 ratio?

 

[Roguestar]

No, amount of RAM doesn't change it so no need to worry about 4 or 8 making a difference. If you could find a cheap set of DDR2-1066 that'll give you more than enough overhead for overclocking, or you could get a decent set of DDR2-800 and push them a bit, depends which is cheaper.