Requesting a review

[Vitaminous]

Chassis/case:
NZXT Lexa (without PSU)

PSU:
Enermax EG701AX-VE SFMA(24P) ATX12V 600W

CPU:
AMD Opteron 175 Denmark 1GHz HT (OEM)

Motherboard:
Asus A8R32-MVP Deluxe

Video Cards:
A) 1. Sapphire Radeon X1900XTX 512MB GDDR3 PCI Express OEM
2. Connect3D Radeon X1900XT 512MB GDDR3 PCI Express OEM (will overclock to XTX)
B) Connect3D Radeon X1900 Crossfire Edition 512MB GDDR3 OEM

Hard Drives:
A) Western Digital Raptor WD1500ADFD 150GB 10,000 RPM OEM
B) Western Digital Raptor WD1500ADFD 150GB 10,000 RPM OEM

Media Drives (CD/DVD/Floppy/etc.)
A) LITE-ON Black ATAPI/E-IDE DVD Burner With LightScribe and 5X DVD-RAM Write Model SHM-165H6S - OEM
B) LITE-ON Black ATAPI/E-IDE DVD Burner With LightScribe and 5X DVD-RAM Write Model SHM-165H6S - OEM
C) MITSUMI Black 1.44MB 3.5" Internal Floppy Drive OEM

Input (mouse/keyboard...):
A) Logitech G5 Laser Mouse
B) Saitek PZ30AU Eclipse Keyboard
C) Wacome Gaphire4 4"x5" tablet (USB)

RAM:
Patriot 2GB (2x 1GB) 184-PIN DDR SDRAM 400 (PC3200) Unbuffered System Memory PDC2G3200LLK

Sound Card:
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Elite 7.1 Channels PCI Interface Sound Card

Display (already have a 19" LCD from BenQ):
Viewsonic N2750w Black 27" 16:9 1368x768 HD LCD TV (8ms response time)

Lighting:
A) LOGISYS Computer CLK4BL 4" Blue Cold Cathode Light Kit
B) LOGISYS Computer CLK4BL 4" Blue Cold Cathode Light Kit
C) LOGISYS Computer CLK4BL 4" Blue Cold Cathode Light Kit
D) LOGISYS Computer CLK4BL 4" Blue Cold Cathode Light Kit
E) LOGISYS Computer CLK12BL 30cm Cold Cathode Kit
F) LOGISYS Computer CLK12BL 30cm Cold Cathode Kit

Cooling:
A) Artic Silver 5 Thermal Paste
B) Thermaltake Big Typhoon CL-P0114 120mm Cooling Fan with Heatsink
C) Spire FlowCooler HD05010S1M4 Hard Drive Cooler
D) Spire FlowCooler HD05010S1M4 Hard Drive Cooler
E) ARCTIC COOLING Pro 2LTC 80mm Blue LED Light Temperature Controlled Fan
F) ASPIRE CF12SL-UBL 120mm Blue LED Light Cooling Fan

Cables:
A) Link Depot 19" UV Blue Latch Serial ATA Cable Model SATA-L0.5-UVB
B) Link Depot 19" UV Blue Latch Serial ATA Cable Model SATA-L0.5-UVB
C) Link Depot DVI-D male to DVI-D male dual link Cable, 10ft, Black
D) Thermaltake Blue 19" IDE(ATA66/100/133) Round cable Model A2048
E)GENERIC 18" Blue 2-Connectors Floppy drive cable round, Booted Model 2106-R218-BU

Webcam:
Logitech 961419-0403 QuickCam® Pro 5000 USB Interface WebCam

Digital Camera:
Canon SD450 5MP Digital Camera 3X Optical Zoom

UPS:
Powercom King Pro KIN-1500AP 1500VA 900W UPS

Speakers:
Logitech THX Z5300e (NewEgg doesn't sell the Z-5500 anymore :\)

Headphones:
Logitech 980158-0403 3.5mm Connector Internet Chat Headset

Media:
A) Verbatim 4.7GB 16X DVD+R 100 Pack Disc
B) Pack of 100 Jewel cases
C) CORSAIR 133x 1GB Secure Digital (SD) Flash Media Model

MP3 Player:
Creative Zen MicroPhoto Dark Blue 8GB

Mousepad:
fUnc SU-BK-BK Surface 1030 Black Base Mousepad

Games:
A) Quake 4
B) C&C: The First Decade
C) Battlefield 2
D) World of Warcraft + prepaid card (60 days)
E) Need For Speed: Most Wanted (Black Edition)
F) Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas
G) Far Cry
H) Star Wars: Empire at War
I) Warcraft III Battlechest

Opinions? Suggestions? Comments?

 

[Bobthelost]

You're not overclocking then? Otherwise since you're going top of the line everywhere else and buying what looks like middle of the road RAM.

 

[Vitaminous]

I intend to overclock, and trust me, it's not middle of the road RAM.

 

[imported_Nineball]

I wouldn't consider RAM that can hit DDR540 at 2-2-2-5 at 2.7v is middle of the road.

 

[Vitaminous]

More comments, please.

 

[Bobthelost]

Ok, since your RAM was misleadingly rated as PC3200 then that comment of mine was balls

Not much to say, it's uber high end, although i'd go for TY DVDs rather than verbatims, i use Verbs myself but TY are nicer. Also think about a different drive as the second one, different drives have different strengths and weaknesses and this way you've got a bit more flexibility on burning DVDs and reading them.

The exslim is a great camera, but at high resoultions i find mine to be too noisy.

 

[Vitaminous]

Indoors or outdoors?

EDIT: It's the Exilim, not the Exslim. :\

 

[Bobthelost]

Yeah, Casio camera with pentax lense and huge LCD screen...

Indoors, and low light is disapointing, alright but it makes using the higher settings utterly pointless.

 

[SparkyJJO]

No need to OC the x1900xt to xtx because it would still run at xt speeds when in crossfire with the crossfire edition card which runs at xt speeds. Just FYI

looks good

 

[Vitaminous]

So you're saying I need to get an XTX?

Decided I'd get a Canon SD450 instead.

 

[Bobthelost]

I'd go look at some photo geek forums if i were you, tell them what you want to do with the camera and let them recomend something for you on that front.

 

[Vitaminous]

Added two fans (ARCTIC COOLING Pro 2LTC 80mm Blue LED Light Temperature Controlled Fan + ASPIRE CF12SL-UBL 120mm Blue LED Light Cooling Fan) because two of the four fans this case has don't have LEDs.

Damn, this thing is going to be bright.

EDIT: Oh, and I'm putting my current capture card in there aswell (Theater 550 Pro).

 

[imported_Nineball]

Originally posted by: Bobthelost
I'd go look at some photo geek forums if i were you, tell them what you want to do with the camera and let them recomend something for you on that front.

I've never heard of that happening before...odd.

 

[alimoalem]

go with the x1900xt.

if you're OCing, why not get the 170 or even the 165? you can spend the saved money on cooling

ram: that may be a good ram choice but there are other options. crucial ballistix would most likely OC better. (i know there are some issues with the ram and they're not too common but still)

are you getting 2 raptors to RAID 0 or something? you probably won't benefit (you actually might experience a decrease in performance) cause it's not geared towards gaming. still a good choice with going with the raptor 150

very nice case choice

nice psu choice. i don't know how much it costs though so you could cut back to 500w if the difference is more than $40.

nice mobo choice...but are you gonna SLI in the future? have you thought of DFI, you being the overclocker that you are?

hope you like my opinions

 

[SparkyJJO]

Originally posted by: Vitaminous
So you're saying I need to get an XTX?

Decided I'd get a Canon SD450 instead.

No. Getting an xtx card won't do any good because it'll slow down when in crossfire to match the speed of the crossfire edition card (which is running at xt speeds). So xtx if you plan on crossfire is worthless - xtx is good only for single card setups. Of course, if you OC'ed both cards....

 

[Howard]

Why do you need two DVD burners?

EDIT: Too much money for me to look.

 

[Vitaminous]

Nineball: I assume you didn't quote the right person.
Alimoalem: I'm not getting watercooling, and Nineball get's 20°C with this heatsink (I don't know what his room's temperature is). 175 is better IMO.
Why would I experience a decrease in performance with RAID?
SLI? Wtf? We're talking about Crossfire here dude.
SparkyJJO:
Back this up with benchmarks if you have any.

 

[Bobthelost]

RAID0 Is very overated, there are few circumstances where it improves performance, sadly boot time is one of them so people assume wrongly that this means the rest of thier computing experience will be as quick. Benchmarks tests and reviews show it isn't for the most part.

2 Raptors would let you have the OS on one HD and games on another, which would speed things up a little, or if you do video transcoding have the read file on one HD and the write on the second which would again speed up performance.

 

[Vitaminous]

What about RAID1?

 

[Bobthelost]

RAID 1 won't help performance much at all but it will protect you from losing a HD and thus all your files. I don't do it because it does need twice the drives and because nothing i have saved on my HD's is that important to me (I prefer a backup to DVD every few months)

Very short version is don't bother, i am assuming this is for gaming 1st and foremost?

 

[Vitaminous]

Editing (photo/video etc) and gaming, yes.

iPod Nano 2GB -> Creative Zen MicroPhoto Dark Blue 8GB.

 

[Bobthelost]

Editing photos would probably be best with a RAID0 setup, editing video probably the same, transcoding the video would work best with two seperate discs if memory serves.

Might as well go for RAID0, just make sure you have good backups (a third HD would be a very good plan, that way you could set the machine to back up every evening, worst case would be that you lose a day's work).

 

[Vitaminous]

Final decision: No RAID, the stuff I do isn't important enough.
Added a few games and a cable which I forgot to add earlier.

Anyone else would like to say something?

 

[wetcat007]

Add Half-Life 2 and Counterstrike 1.6/Source if u dont already have those to the game list.

 

[Vitaminous]

I have them all.