another build review

[black_b[ ]x]

8800 GTS (g92) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130312
GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS3L LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX Intel Motherboard http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128059
E8400 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115037
2x2GB corsair ddr2 800 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145184
ZEROtherm Nirvana NV120 120mm http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835887011

I'm re-using my CMStacker case, corsair 620w PSU, samsung DVD drive, and 73GB SATA raptor. Should i get a newer hard drive? its about 3.5 years old. I'd probably get a 400GB sata or maybe the 10k raptor.

Also, anyone have experience with that heat sink? will it fit on the motherboard? it looks like the north bridge fins are pretty tall, maybe i can just bend them inwards?

 

[silent-circuit]

Yeah, just bend of notch the northbridge HSF if you have to. The NV120 reviews /very/ well.

I'd say go with the Radeon HD 3870GX2 if you can come up with extra ~$100. It should be considerably faster than the 8800 GTS.

Otherwise looks good.

 

[engiNURD]

Looks good to me, too. What size monitor do you game with?

 

[black_b[ ]x]

thanks. the 3870 x2 seems to be $450. i went with that GTS because its $300 after rebate and includes crysis ($44). i'm tempted to get a hard drive and maybe a better motherboard (for SLI) but i figure this rig should be fine for a while. I don't really need the hard drive space though and the newer 10k raptor is another $160.

also, i'm just using a 19" 1280x1024 LCD. I may run it into my TV, but thats still just a 4:3 1080i sony HD CRT.

 

[Markyip1]

In that case you will have absolutely no need for SLI, which requires a resolution of at least 1920x1200 to be of benefit. Furthermore, keep in mind that SLI is a nVidia technology requiring nVidia graphic cards and an nForce based motherboard (which historically are not as good as the Intel competition, at least during the Core 2 generation.) If you are going to stick with the 3870 X2, getting another one for Crossfire would result in a graphics powerhouse, but again the same rule applies in that you'll need a res of at least 1920x1200 to take advantage of it. If you do go CrossFire, you'll want a P35 board with two PCI-E x16 slots (even though they won't be running at x16 speeds,) or an X-38 board (as X-38 natively supports CrossFire.)

 

[black_b[ ]x]

thanks everyone for your input. just pulled the trigger on the above system.