Building soon, looking for some advice

[CeZemal]

1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc
Mainly gaming, school work, folding@home, interwebs etc
2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
$3000 but could do more
3) Where do you live?
Tennessee, but have a friend who lives in Kentucky I can ship to so as to avoid sales tax (10%)
4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. The word "Everything" is not a valid answer. Please list out all the parts you'll need.
Case, mobo, CPU, ram, video cards, power supply, optical, solid state boot drive, HHDs, Monitors
5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
keyboard, mouse, headset
6) Will you be overclocking?
I'd like to do some moderate overclock work
7) What size monitor do you have and/or plan to have?
I would prefer 3 23" monitors (don't have them yet)
8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
Plan to order on Monday
9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? etc.
CrossfireX USB 3.0 SATA III would all be nice
10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If so, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?
Need to get a 64-bit OS


Here's my list so far:
Silverstone FT02B-W

Silverstone Strider Gold 850W PSU

Asus P67 Sabertooth

i7 2600K

Mushkin Enhanced Silverline 8GB DDR3 1333

Possibly 2 HD 6950s to flash? Still unsure on GPU setup

Thinking about a couple Samsung Spinpoint for hard drives, not sure about the SSD though

3x Dell U2311H (not sure which site to order from, Amazon seems to have them the cheapest at 309 even though I've seen people say they can be had for 269?)

Cooler Master Hyper 212+

All that totals up to about $3000, or should anyway. Any comments or suggestions to help me out with the missing parts?

 

[Dangman]

What matters more to you: Good bang for the buck performance or as much PPD you can get for folding@home?

SSD wise, go for the Crucil C300 series SSD or Intel's 310 or 510 series SSDs. Size wise, go for the largest you can afford.

PSU wise, at $200 shipped, that PSU isn't that good of a buy considering that you can get 1000W modular PSU for $190 shipped:
$190 - Silverstone ST1000-P 1000W Modular PSU

The difference between Silver and Gold rating is rather small and would take probably half a decade or more to actually make it worthwhile.

 

[CeZemal]

Price / performance is usually best for F@H. Just hardware that I can crush graphics settings over 3 monitors that can also be used for folding, which I realize is just about any combination of high end cards / CPU, but I don't know if one is better than the other. I'm leaning towards AMD cards though (always do), and wonder if I should get 2 6950s to flash (and which ones at that) or just play it safe and get 2 6970s and call it a day.

I actually didn't see that PSU you linked at all when I was browsing through PSUs lol good find

 

[Dangman]

Price / performance is usually best for F@H. Just hardware that I can crush graphics settings over 3 monitors that can also be used for folding, which I realize is just about any combination of high end cards / CPU, but I don't know if one is better than the other. I'm leaning towards AMD cards though (always do), and wonder if I should get 2 6950s to flash (and which ones at that) or just play it safe and get 2 6970s and call it a day.)

I'm sorry, your answer confused me even more: Gonna rephrase the question: What matters more to you? Good bang for the buck gaming performance or good bang for the buck folding @ home performance?

The problem is that it's a one or the other situation: AMD cards generally provide significantly less PPD than a cheap Nvidia counterpart. However AMD clearly holds the crown for best bang for the buck gaming performance where the closest Nvidia SLI counterpart to HD 6950 2GB Crossfire easily costs $84 to $100 more (GTX 570 SLI).

 

[CeZemal]

Ohhh sorry. Definitely gaming performance. Gaming is my number 1 priority whereas F@H is something I'd like to do more or less on the side when I'm not around, though I didn't realize there was such a big difference. AMD would be best since the 2GB of VRAM does seem to help over large multi-monitor resolutions on some games, and will likely continue to be useful in the future. I personally have always favored the Red team when it comes to video cards, but that's just me.

Also there's a Crucial C300 128GB for $199 free shipping, or an Intel 320 series 120GB for 210 after a $30 off special on newegg... That seems to be about where my price range is ending up for SSD (also because any more than that amount of storage for me would be a little too much). The next closest drives near that price range are 80GB drives that are around 160... but those two in particular seem to be an awesome deal. The Crucial is cheaper and is SATA III and has higher read / writes than the Intel, but the Intel is an Intel... Argh

 

[Dangman]

Ohhh sorry. Definitely gaming performance. Gaming is my number 1 priority whereas F@H is something I'd like to do more or less on the side when I'm not around, though I didn't realize there was such a big difference

Yeah it's pretty bad: At one point some $60 Nvidia cards outfolded a few $300 to $400 AMD cards.

Also there's a Crucial C300 128GB for $199 free shipping, or an Intel 320 series 120GB for 210 after a $30 off special on newegg... That seems to be about where my price range is ending up for SSD (also because any more than that amount of storage for me would be a little too much). The next closest drives near that price range are 80GB drives that are around 160... but those two in particular seem to be an awesome deal. The Crucial is cheaper and is SATA III and has higher read / writes than the Intel, but the Intel is an Intel... Argh

Flip a coin.

 

[CeZemal]

Well the folding issue would likely not be a factor anyway, so AMD it is. Now, should I hit up some 6950s to flash or go for 6970s to avoid hassle and potential head ache?



So it's a toss up between Crucial and Intel. The Crucial is faster, uses SATA3, and is 10 bucks cheaper, but the Intel has allegedly great reliability and stability while being slower and more expensive. Now, I've never used a Solid State drive before, so my question is, besides benchmarking and what not, how much difference does that speed actually make? Not to say Crucial has a bad rep on SSDs, but I've seen lots of people swear on Intel SSDs. So is that speed worth not having that little warm and fuzzy an Intel drive would give a user who's new to SSD?

 

[Dangman]

Well the folding issue would likely not be a factor anyway, so AMD it is. Now, should I hit up some 6950s to flash or go for 6970s to avoid hassle and potential head ache?

Really depends on whether or not A) if you're gambling man, and B) if the performance difference between HD 6970 2GB and HD 6950 2GB is really worth it for you.

So it's a toss up between Crucial and Intel. The Crucial is faster, uses SATA3, and is 10 bucks cheaper, but the Intel has allegedly great reliability and stability while being slower and more expensive. Now, I've never used a Solid State drive before, so my question is, besides benchmarking and what not, how much difference does that speed actually make? Not to say Crucial has a bad rep on SSDs, but I've seen lots of people swear on Intel SSDs. So is that speed worth not having that little warm and fuzzy an Intel drive would give a user who's new to SSD?

Makes a pretty decent difference. With that said, if you're that concern, Intel would be the safer choice.

 

[CeZemal]

I think I'll go with the Intel and 6970s. Looking through Newegg, I see some non-reference cards with nice coolers on them, like the Gigabyte with the windforce on it. Anyone shed some light on these types of cards? Do the extra cooling fans play nice with each other in an SLI / Crossfire config? And if they don't, would them being in the FT02 alleviate those issues since it's continually blasting air at them?

 

[Dangman]

I think I'll go with the Intel and 6970s. Looking through Newegg, I see some non-reference cards with nice coolers on them, like the Gigabyte with the windforce on it. Anyone shed some light on these types of cards? Do the extra cooling fans play nice with each other in an SLI / Crossfire config? And if they don't, would them being in the FT02 alleviate those issues since it's continually blasting air at them?

As long as there's that extra full expansion slot of space between the two cards, there should be sufficient cooling for those cars while inside the FT02.

 

[CeZemal]

Yeah the Sabertooth has 2 pcie 1x between the 16x slots, and the video card only takes up 2 so there'll be one between. I mean, the FT02 will be blowing air straight up through it so I think it'll be just fine. The 3 fans are said to have the HD 6970 at like, 50C at load and quiet as anything.

So yeah, just put in the other. Switched the PSU to the 1KW unit you found for me, got the Intel SSD, a 1TB Spinpoint F3 and a 2TB 5400rpm spinpoint as well. Found 3 Dell U2311H on ebay for 275 a pop, had to order the mobo off amazon because newegg was sold out, but hit 2 day shipping so it should be here around the same time anyway (same with the monitors). Other than that, I got what I said I would. Little over 3 grand all said and done, can't wait to put it all together and fire it up for the first time

EDIT: Also ordered a displayport cable for the main monitor (will use DVI for the other two). Should I get DVI to DP cables for the other 2 monitors though? To connect from the DVI ports of the video card to the DP input on the monitors or would that not make any difference at all?

 

[Dangman]

EDIT: Also ordered a displayport cable for the main monitor (will use DVI for the other two). Should I get DVI to DP cables for the other 2 monitors though? To connect from the DVI ports of the video card to the DP input on the monitors or would that not make any difference at all?

Nah not needed for the other two monitors.