How'd I Do?

Mujuro · Aug 8, 2005

bobsaget · Aug 8, 2005

Looks like all your research and comparing payed off.

You have a great system in the works there.

Are you planning on going SLi 6600GTs? If so, that might not be the best choice. SLIed 6800GTs are about the minimum SLI configuration I would go.

But anyways you have a nice mobo, and a very nice upgrade path ahead of you!

Have fun with the system and good luck!

Mujuro · Aug 8, 2005

That's exactly what I've been wanting to hear! I'm not planning on going down the SLi road, and I am not someone who needs full graphical capability at 1600x1200, I like a nice and simple 1024x768 for my games. I thought the 6600GT suited best for what I will be doing.

Nazo · Aug 8, 2005

6600GT is a great card, but, bear in mind that it started life as a somewhat outdated but great card (being a weakened NV40 after all.)

IMO, you are better off with one 6800 of any sort (even LE has more potential, though I guess you won't find that in PCI-Express -- heck, good luck finding it in AGP.) Don't get me wrong though. The 6600GT is a great card and beats the crap out of most things in that pricerange. You want 1024x768, and that's what I've found my 6800 to be absolutely perfect at, but, bear in mind that as resolution increases, memory usage increases, so the extra bandwidth the 6800 has on the memory bus makes all the difference in the world. Mind you, I'm using all the eye candy stuff. FSAA and AF, high quality settings in everything. (And no, you don't need huge globs of memory, it's just more important that it can access the memory better if you want that eye candy. I'm doing just fine with 128MB.)

Mujuro · Aug 8, 2005

Well, either way it's a huge improvement from a 1600+ and a FX5200, with room for upgrades.

Nazo · Aug 8, 2005

No kidding. ^_^ Mind you, a 2600+ is an improvement from a 1600+ and a... ANYTHING is an improvement from a FX5200...... Hard to not go up from there frankly.

Anyway, the 6600GT IS a good card. It can do great things with current games. I just think you should spend the bit extra for the card that will last you a bit longer (potentially longer yet if it turns out you get to unlock things, which is something the 6600GT lacks since there's nothing to unlock.)

BTW, smart choice on the processor. Venices are VERY overclockable. (Finally AMD hits 2.8GHz without some kind of water cooling solution.)

Mujuro · Aug 8, 2005

Thanks. I have a birthday coming up, so I'll see about a 7800GTX.

The 6600GT is more or less a temporary card until I can go all out.

Also, which programs would you recommend to test stability, burn-in the memory / processor, and simply benchmark the computer? And what order would you install software?

EDIT: Yeah, I l'm glad I got that processor. How easily should I be able to hit 2.4GHz?

Russ · Aug 8, 2005

Nazo said:
(potentially longer yet if it turns out you get to unlock things, which is something the 6600GT lacks since there's nothing to unlock.)

You can only unlock a 6800NU if it is AGP. PCI-E 6800's have nothing to unlock.

And you should very easily be able to hit 2.4ghz I think. It will probably take a voltage increase though.

Nazo · Aug 8, 2005

Sorry, my experience with PCI-express is rather limited atm. Lol, thinking seriously about that motherboard that's supposed to have AGP AND PCI-express if I ever do get around to upgrading.

As for stability testing, seems you just can't beat Prime95 really. In the correct settings it can put your CPU or your memory through absolute torture. The blend test tests both pretty well too. For testing a video card, well, ATI Tool is pretty good at detecting artifacts. Also, Doom 3 seems to currently be the best test (later anything based on it's engine will probably do.) They weren't lying when they said it used parts of the GPU that weren't in use before. I've found things like 3dMark05 were perfectly stable but Doom 3 would crash or show artifacts on certain attempted overclocks (and you can ask certain early Radeon X800XT users about this.)

BTW, you might want to still consider a copper heatsink. For cheap, the Venus 2 seemed like a pretty good heatsink for the K8 to me -- though it may be a bit loud. Personally, I'm considering getting this monster for my system: http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16835106044 Especially since technically I can use it on any processor I should have for a long time yet (K7, K8, even two types of P4 sockets or so.) Just a thought anyway. The aluminum one you are looking at is among the best for aluminum heatsinks, so you might not even see much difference.

As for the Venices, I've heard of the 3500+ hitting 2.8GHz before, on air. I wouldn't be surprised to see you hit 2.4GHz with a 3200+. Heck, you can probably count on getting to that with a 3000+. Probably will require a voltage increase, but, no big deal if you use reason and don't raise it to 2v or something stupid like that. d-: Even a pretty cheap heatsink should see a somewhat decent overclock, and you aren't looking at cheap.

EDIT: Just noticed, you didn't spare a penny on that power supply. The fact is, you should be able to find one that will work for you at only half that price. Heck, my current supply is working wonders for me. Mind you, I have no raid setup or anything, but, I have a ton of fans and a video card and cpu that aren't exactly known for their power saving capabilities...

Also, I'm not sure, but, I suspect you'll get better results from Arctic Silver 5 than from ceramique. It's only $2 more, so why not? The main advantage to ceramique pastes, as I understand it, is that they are not electrically conductive, so it's very hard to screw up and fry a motherboard/videocard/whatever.

Mujuro · Aug 8, 2005

Well, I've noticed a lot of people having problems with their computers all due to a faulty PSU. I want a rock solid PSU, and price didn't matter.

Nazo · Aug 8, 2005

That's fully up to you. I'm just saying you can get a good PSU for less, it's just not as easy. Also, people have a tendency to think they need insane amounts of wattage when, in fact, sometimes they could actually get by with a mere 350 or so even. Truth is, I don't need 420W myself, I just got this because it was a little more reliable in it's cheap price range than the others I was looking at at the time.

BTW, I looked at the numbers on the arctic silvers. AS5 is definitely faster heat transfer than ceramique. By a lot.

EDIT: Oh yeah, one tip I've discovered. Since you aren't afraid to put a lot of money down on a good case, you might want to look at full towers as well if you have the space. When I switched from a mid-tower to a full tower I saw an amazing drop in temperatures. They just have that much better airflow because things are so much less cramped. Of course, you run into problems like cables not being long enough, this sort of thing, not to mention that it takes up so much space and weighs insane amounts (I suspect my full case with everything in it now weighs as much as my very old 19" CRT.) Another problem being that if you keep it down on the floor as one would tend to do with such a big case, it gathers dust more quickly (I've already had to dust out some serious dust bunnies, and I got the new case no more than two months ago tops -- thinking about trying to rig up something to get it back up to my desk's level again.) Mind you, if you want the uber-high quality lian-lis or whatever, you're looking at 2x the cost. If you don't a little more generic (but still higher quality than my cheapy) I saw a lot of good potential cases though for the same sort of pricerange you're looking at already. Mind you, my old case was no Lian-Li, so you would probably still get better results (my old one used to be an antec -- before the dreaded powertools changed it into some kind of monster covered in electric tape, holes, and fans everywhere -- my current one only had to have the side fan cut into it and some fans mounted kind of sideways, though it sure wasn't easy as it uses some thick tough metal.)

How'd I Do?

Mujuro

n00b

bobsaget

Supreme [H]ardness

Mujuro

n00b

Nazo

2[H]4U

Mujuro

n00b

Nazo

2[H]4U

Mujuro

n00b

Russ

[H]ard|Gawd

Nazo

2[H]4U

Mujuro

n00b

Nazo

2[H]4U