High-end desktop advice

[mason.kramer]

I'm building myself a new high-end desktop. I figure I can blow about $3,500 on the guts, and I'm going to cannibalize an older computer to get some of the other stuff, including optical drives, keyboard, case, stuff like that. I'm also splurging on a 30" dell or apple LCD and probably a 24" to go on the desk alongside it.

Application:
I intend to dual boot this machine in Vista and XP. I will use it for productivity apps, multitasking, photoshop, and gaming. I want the machine to "do it all". Because it ruins my life when a harddrive dies, and because RAID is easier than periodic backups, I now require RAID in all my setups. I figure I have about 800GBs of media stored on various systems across my house, and I want to consolidate it all in one secure place, so I've added in a lot of storage space and a RAID 5 card(hey! it's cheap). I'm sure when HD media becomes normal I will quickly outgrow what I've got here. But hell, what can ya do, right?

Trolling a few other posts about similar topics, here's what I've come up with, this is what is saved in my New Egg wishlist, at $3,300. The things which are most doubtful to me are the CPU - should I get a quad core? Should I wait for the drastic price cut? I heard the latest batch of 6600's is oc'ing crappy? The sound - I've never used onboard audio, but it should be fine, right? The PSU - 4 big drives, 2 big video cards, is 750 enough, I sure hope so, because it's a big price difference to the 850+ range.

Anyway, I'm a few hundred bucks under budget, so I figured I'd post my rig here and see what you have to say before I click the buy button, which should be happening pretty soon.

Mobo:
EVGA 122-CK-NF68-T1 LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 680i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail

CPU
Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 Conroe 2.4GHz LGA 775 Processor Model BX80557E6600

Vcard
2x EVGA 768-P2-N837-AR GeForce 8800GTX 768MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 KO HDCP Video Card

RAM
G.SKILL 4GB(2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ

HDs
4x Maxtor MaXLine Pro 500 7H500F0 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive

RAID card
3ware 9650SE-4LPML PCI Express x4 SATA II Controller Card

PSU
PC Power & Cooling Silencer 750 Quad - Copper EPS12V 750W Continuous @ 40°C (825W Peak) Power Supply - Retail

HSF
Tuniq Tower 120 P4 & K8 CPU Cooler - Retail

Sound
Onboard - is there a problem with this?

 

[mason.kramer]

Oops, I meant to post this in the "whole rig" forum. But, since my question is mainly about the CPU, I'll leave it here unless a mod wants to move it.

 

[RedShark]

Before someone else says it:

"RAID != backup"

Virii / accident / controller failure / power surge etc

Your setup looks good to me. Hard to go wrong with most of those components.

 

[luihed]

. Because it ruins my life when a harddrive dies, and because RAID is easier than periodic backups, I now require RAID in all my setups.

Ummm maybe your getting the wrong idea about raid..... if your HD dies then yes you can be up and running again ( quickly) using raid1 but if one hard drive corrupts or gets a virus, both drives will be affected......

Use raid if you want a quick uptime during HD failure but its not the best solution to back up data......

 

[mason.kramer]

Oy, I don't care, leave me alone about the RAID, everyone's saying the same thing I've heard it all, and the fact of the matter is, I want it, it's what I want. My question is about the CPU more than anything.... But thanks for your replies

 

[belmicah]

For a $3500 machine, YES get a quad core. 750 Watts should be OK (for now at least). Onboard sound is OK unless you are an audiophile.

 

[ynnek888]

Ugh, I don't know why you would want to spend all that money on a nice computer, and not get a good soundcard and speaker setup too..

If gaming is your thing, ultimatley you probably want to get an X-Fi (for the latest EAX support) and hook it up to some nice home theater setup. People would jeer at this and say go for the DDL solutions like that X-Meridan card .. but, lets save ourselves the grief and not get into that argument and just leave it up to you to research and which one to get, okay?


Else, if serious audiowork is your thing, then you'll probably get something like M-audio or EMU PCI card, or an external audio interface's.. and probably use studio monitors and balanced in and outs and what not... But thats a whole other world.

If you were looking to this, then I'd highly suggest you spend the money on and quietness, and cables to move that computer out of your computing room.. Cause it will be silly to spend all that money on a nice audio interface, studio monitors, mics, only to have that beast of a computer with fans roaring drowning it all out.

EDIT: Actually, I highly suggest you to spend some thought in quieting that system down anyways, for your own sanity. Not to mention the heat being poured into the room!

 

[luihed]

Oy, I don't care, leave me alone about the RAID, everyone's saying the same thing

Sorry dude but I cant leave you alone.... I hear it from other people telling me about my raid setup so its my turn to bug you.....lol...