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Quick gaming rig question

S

shiv

Limp Gawd
Joined
Nov 2, 2006
Messages
142
I haven't had a system for a little while now so am looking to be putting something reasonable together. For now, all I have to play on is my Samsung 50' 1080P DLP. I'm looking for the best way to be able to play games at 1080P with limited funds. I've decided on the following for sure:

-Antec three hundred case
-Gigabyte GA EP35 DSL3
-G.Skill 2x2gb 1000 ram
-W.D. 320gb single platter drive

I'm down to cpu decisions. I am going to overclock, fill all the 120 fan spots and use the Xigmatek 120mm cooler. Guessing for the current 240 ish price the 8800GTS 512 is the way to go and overclock to near 9800 speeds, but will I notice a big enough difference with a Intel E7200 ($130) vs a 2160 or 2180 ($50-60) clocked to speeds that most people are seeing?
 
At 1920x1080 you will be GPU limited so you are going to see very little difference between an OCed E7200 and E2180.
 
Or...I have a local Bestbuy that has the Visiontek 3870's in stock for the $129. I could get 2 of those to Crossfire (would have to save for the difference on the motherboard) for the price of the 8800 GTS. Would that help with the resolution. (will be playing COD4, GoW, GRID, etc)
 
A single 8800GTS 512MB would still be a better choice. It'll perform on par with HD3870 Crossfire and won't require you to get a new mobo that supports Crossfire.
 
Actually, you may want to wait a few weeks. New cards from both NVIDIA and AMD/ATI are going to arrive soon, and some are reportedly better than the cards we have out now.
 
Sweet! Went on Newegg to order and the BFG 9800GTX's are on sale for $40 off, making it only $10 more than the 8800 GTS! Also ordered the 4gb of ram, and upgraded to the DFI DK P35 m/b. Going tomorrow to pick up the case, a 2160, the Xigmatek, and a Antec Earthwatts 650. Hopefully this thing will run pretty smooth.
 
Microcenter-- actually has some good cpu prices and 20% off the Antec power supply. Case prices went down too!
 
You're much better off going with the E7200 imo. At stock speeds, the E8400 C2D chip are 20-50% faster than the E2200. Since the E7200 easily oc's to 3.0 - 4.0 GHz, it will outperform the E2180 class chip by even more. It's worth the extra 60 bucks.
http://xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/dualcore-shootout_4.html#sect0

Plus, you're not likely to be bottlenecked by your GPU for long with the GTX280 coming out in just a couple weeks.

A good read: http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1312483
 
The E7200 chips should probably be labeled as 3.0GHz chips. 2.53 is really an embarrasment to them. They ship as 9.5x266. Any solid motherboard can handle memory at 333. So the chip is easy to bump to 9.5x333 = 3.1Ghz.

I'm doing that right now on mine at stock voltages with the included free retail heatsink. Well, I'm actually at 8x420mhz = 3.35, but that's a minor point. The point I'm trying to make is that if your board can handle even minor FSB adjustments, which so many can, then running the E7200 at a minimum of 3.0Ghz should be standard operating procedures.


HOWEVER:
For the ultimate budget chip, the E2180 is still the king.
 
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