Very hard decision - need immediate advice

[BigCoolJesus]

OK, so this isnt my first go at building a custom PC. Its only been a year since i built my last sweet machine, but since ill be going off to college soon i decided to upgrade one last time (new chipset, etc)

But like i did last time, im running into video card trouble.

First, heres what im planning on getting

AMD Athlon 64 4000+ (San Diego core)
Asus A8N SLI Deluxe
(2x) 1GB PQI DDR400 (PC3200) RAM
Soundblaster Audigy 2 ZS Gamer edition
(2x) SATAII 160 Western Digital hdd's (RAID 0)
etc etc.......

But, ive run into money issues, which is why my video card decision is still not resolved.
Ive had to drastically cut back on the cpu for money (went from FX-55 to 4000), and that did the trick to get me into price range, but heres the murky part.

In my original set-up i was going to use the Geforce 7800GTX as the video card (just one for now), and even at the $600 price tag, i can still get it, but it will be that much harder to gather up the neccesary funds.

So, ive narrowed it down to these cards (keep in mind, the higher the price, the longer it will take to get the money to buy it):

Nvidia Geforce 7800GTX ($600)
Nvidia Geforce 6800 Ultra ($500 or so)
Nvidia Geforce 6800GT ($350)

ATI X850XT PE ($550)
ATI X850XT ($450)


Now, just to say it here and now, THE ONLY CARD I WOULD OVERCLOCK IS THE 6800GT, its been the card ive been using for the last year, i know its limits. Again, the only card out of all of those i would overclock at all is the 6800GT.

OK, with that out of the way, can i get some help?
I know that ATI and Nvidia is a huge "fanboy" type of fight on some forums, but just as a avid gamer and computer fellow, give me the honest, no propaganda answer.
(o and this is going to be a heavy gaming computer)




On a side not, is it worth spending $120 bucks on a Sound card, or is the Onboard audio for the A8N SLI Deluxe fairly decent? (and will it tax cpu power like ive been told about older boards)???


Also, would you reccomend i get the x64 edition of Windows XP, just to have it so i dont have to upgrade later on??




Thank you so much in advance.

 

[GuitarDaddy]

I didn't see your monitor listed, but unless you've got a 24"-30" monitor anything more than the 6800GT is overkill in current games, save your money until the extra graphics power is really needed. And I would drop the CPU back to the 3700+ and moderately overclock it. I have the 3700+ clocked at 2.8ghz and it costs around $325 and has the same 1mb L2 cache as the 4000+

I've been using the onboard sound and it seems fine for the speakers I have. If you have some high dollar multimedia speakers then get the Audigy, otherwize the onboard sound will be fine

 

[Kaspian]

Originally posted by: GuitarDaddy
I didn't see your monitor listed, but unless you've got a 24"-30" monitor anything more than the 6800GT is overkill in current games, save your money until the extra graphics power is really needed. And I would drop the CPU back to the 3700+ and moderately overclock it. I have the 3700+ clocked at 2.8ghz and it costs around $325 and has the same 1mb L2 cache as the 4000+

I've been using the onboard sound and it seems fine for the speakers I have. If you have some high dollar multimedia speakers then get the Audigy, otherwize the onboard sound will be fine

couldnt say it better myself......go with the 6800gt and invest or save the xtra$$$ somewhere else...

My nf3 onboard sound has been working fine with a pair of yamaha speakers and a sub...if u r planing on 5.1 or even 7.1 sound the go for the audigy...

😎

 

[BigCoolJesus]

Originally posted by: GuitarDaddy
I didn't see your monitor listed, but unless you've got a 24"-30" monitor anything more than the 6800GT is overkill in current games, save your money until the extra graphics power is really needed. And I would drop the CPU back to the 3700+ and moderately overclock it. I have the 3700+ clocked at 2.8ghz and it costs around $325 and has the same 1mb L2 cache as the 4000+

I've been using the onboard sound and it seems fine for the speakers I have. If you have some high dollar multimedia speakers then get the Audigy, otherwize the onboard sound will be fine

To reply....

i have a 19" Flat Panel Liquid Video LCD screen (unforunately its VGA, sigh)

so, if i got the 6800GT and did a stable overclock to around 430mhz/1170mhz, that would be sufficient for any games that come out in the next 6 months or more? (such as Battlefield 2 and games like those)??



and for the cpu, i was looking at the 3700 *San Diego* core, but will the A8N be able to overclock it to good frequencies? (and is it stable/reliable??)
By this i mean, im the kind of person that, although i know i wont break it overclocking it, it just seems like im *screwing* myself over, to put it into words, when i overclock, because it doesnt seem like it would work as good as the actual processor of that speed (meaning, it would seem like even if i overclock a 3700 to 2.8GHZ, a stock FX-55 would still beat it) or is this totally incorrect???




Also, i probably should have mentioned this, but for my audio im using 2 very high preformance speakers hooked up to an amp, and then im running the amp to the computer (using a cheap sound card at the moment), plus i have a subwoofer and two more rear speakers (home theater size speakers) hooked up to the amp.
So should i get the sound card?



As i kinda said above, the only reason im a little hesitant about downgrading to lesser components (the 3700+ and the 6800GT) and overclocking them to speeds equal to better components, is becuase i feel like even though its the same speeds, it still wont be good as the next up model (like an Ultra is still better then a OC'ed GT), but is this way of thinking totally unfounded?

Im also a little hesitant because i dont know how good the A8N overclocks (with my last board, K8V, it overclocked like crap, and at around 220mhz FSB the memory started to fail and i had infrequent lock ups) and i dont want that to happen again..... so can anyone verify how good the A8N will overclock, and how stable my entire system would be once its overclocked????


Thanks for the help, its greatly appreciated.

 

[BigCoolJesus]

Also, if i got a different cooler for the video card, what would you reccomend for overclocking (assuming im going to get the 6800 GT)??

is the Arctic Cooling NV Silencer 5 Revision 2 a good cooler for overclocking??


thanks again.