*REVISED* $2,800 Budgit. specs sound decent/compatable? (EDIT)-might go hardware instead, are these specs compatable/decent? *REVISED*

Moga - your system is very nice. I've thought on and off about building a similar system. My random thoughts -

- The Intel SSD is nice, but the bang/buck isn't there yet. They are also constantly dropping the price every few weeks and introducing new models. At this point, imo, its better to stick with fast hard drives, and in a few months when the SSD cycle slows down a bit get one.

- Think hard about 6GB of memory. If you plan on 5 boxing inside Vista64, it takes up between 3.5gb-5gb of memory depending on rez and graphic settings. Of course it'll swap if you have less memory, but that leads to terrible lag in Dalaran. Unfortunately the I7's are triple channel memory, and I don't know if you can do 9GB (3x2GB, 3x1GB) or have to stick to 12GB as the next leg up (6x2GB). Also some of the motherboards are very limited, ie having only 3 or sometimes 4 (!?weird!) memory slots. The difference between buying 8GB of DDR2 ($50-100!) and 12GB of DDR3 ($500+) is insane right now.

Its imo a really tough call, the i7 is == the quad core in price right now, but the price difference between DDR2/DDR3 and the quad core and i7 motherboards are very significant. I decided to instead stick with 2 PCs and 5-box that way, rather than try to build a mega-PC -- imo the i7 CPUs are going to go through a big upgrade in 2009 and I'd rather get the 2nd generation of them than the first gen.

earlier today when i posted newegg had 3x2gb ddr3 1333 ram for sale at $149.00....right now it is $189.00 for 6gb.

at this time you can have any combination of memory, 3gb, 6gb, 9gb, or 12gb....and you can use the ram in groups of two like normal ram, but you have to switch it to duel channel memory and you will take a performance hit doing this. but don't think you will notice the difference either way you go at this point. maybe next year it will be more noticable when they write software to take advantage of this processer and memory.

ok i have completely revised the build hopefully this will work better, lol i feel like such an idiot when it comes to computer parts but everybody here has helped so much i can't tahnk you all enough ^_^. this totals to just over $2,700 with shipping and there is $50 in mail in rebates. i have also decided to go with the i7 processor.

Processor:

Intel Core i7 920 Nehalem 2.66GHz LGA 1366 130W Quad-Core Processor

Power Supply:

Antec TruePower Quattro TPQ-1000 1000W ATX12V / EPS12V SLI Certified CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS Certified Active PFC Power Supply

Case:

Antec Nine Hundred Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

Motherboard:

MSI X58 Eclipse SLI LGA 1366 Intel X58 ATX Intel Motherboard: ok now this looked like a nice mobo a little pricy though but thats alright it totals my CPU and mobo to the same as what i was going to spend on the last build. all advice here is extremely welcom though

HDD:

Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 ST3500320AS 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive: i'll get 2 of these and i'm going to look into raid0 setup that Tsunami mentioned in a couple posts back.

Graphics card:

HIS Hightech H487F512P Radeon HD 4870 512MB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card: from what you guys have said 2 of these works just as well as 1 or even 2 of the HD 4870x2's so i guess i will go with 2 of these for the price of 1 of those.

Memory:

G.SKILL 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Triple Channel Kit Desktop Memory: had decent reviews and seems good.

Other:

LITE-ON Black 4X Blu-ray DVD ROM SATA Model DH-4O1S-66

Monitor:

1x Acer P244Wbii Glossy Black 24" 2ms (GTG) HDMI 16:9 Full 1080P Widescreen LCD Monitor: main will go on this

1x ASUS VH226H Black 21.5" 2ms(GTG) HDMI Widescreen LCD Monitor: this 1 will be for 2 of my slaves i have another monitor for the other 2.

Operating System:

Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium SP1 64-bit English for System Builders

World of Warcraft:

4x WoW batle chest can probably get for $20-30 on ebay but i am just pricing off of newegg ($37 each)

4x Wotlk, right now it seems like Newegg has the cheapest price on these but i will look around more ($37 each)

so i compltely revised what i was originaly going to go with. at first i had contemplated the i7's but i couldn't find verey many usefull reviews on the i7 vs the older core 2 quad processors. so how does this setup look? i am going to look into the raid0 thing, it sounds really interesting. i have herd a little about it but never really thought much of it. thanks again everybody for every thing! ^_^

here are some suggestions since you asked:

your 4870 video card is the 512mb version, for $30 more you can get the 1 gig card.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814161247

when you place your order have newegg pick the ram that will be compatable with your motherboard, these motherboards and memory are very new and there are some compatibility problems. not a big deal but i have read some reviews of people sending their memory back a couple times to get the right one. don't want to waste time waiting for fed-ex to ship your memory.

here is something that i have done that I don't hear anyone else doing. I have a 24" monitor with hdmi, and a 19" dvi monitor. what i do is make my 19" my main and my 24" my alt monitor. this does two things for me.
1. 19" is big enough to run 1 instance of wow on and with the 24" divided in 4, it gives my alts a bigger square to view each in. it is easier on my eyes not having that big screen so close either, it is set back and to the side of my 19" for easy viewing.
2. when i am not playing wow the 24" is turned into a t.v. so I can watch t.v. and surf the internet on a smaller screen which is easier to navigate on the smaller screen also.

Oops, didnt realize I messed up earlier in my post, corrected the list now. As far as the SDD, it is the only thing I am not 100% on. I have been trying to read up on it and its read speeds are amazing, however its write speeds are slow at best. I have heard WoW is not write intensive but mainly read from the drives. Would a raid5 setup be better for accessing WoW or the raid0 with 2 velociraptors?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by 'Moga',index.php?page=Thread&postID=158051#post158 051

Oops, didnt realize I messed up earlier in my post, corrected the list now. As far as the SDD, it is the only thing I am not 100% on. I have been trying to read up on it and its read speeds are amazing, however its write speeds are slow at best. I have heard WoW is not write intensive but mainly read from the drives. Would a raid5 setup be better for accessing WoW or the raid0 with 2 velociraptors?

---

for me I think SSD are best for older systems that need a boost, e.g. you don't want to by a new computer just want a little more performance, than add an SSD. with the i7 it supports raids on the MoBo and the processor does best when it can access large amounts of information. there are plusses and minuses for doing a raid0 and raid5.

with the raid0 any 2 7200 HDDs reading/writing will be the same or faster than a single 10k HDD for less money. with the raid5 you have 4 HDD reading and writing at the same time, this is good if you are constantly writing huge files. this is overkill but cheaper than an SSD and more capacity. Raid0 with 2x velociraptors should be faster all around than an SSD and still cheaper with more capacity.

the only problem with a raid is, if one HDD fails you lose all the infomation and with 2 HDDs the chance of a failure is twice as high. so that is why you need a data drive to back up the files on the raid and to store data that is not accessed much like photo's and music and porn.

Thanks for the info. I will definately look into it!

[quote='Tsunami',index.php?page=Thread&postID=15805 6#post158056]the only problem with a raid is, if one HDD fails you lose all the infomation and with 2 HDDs the chance of a failure is twice as high. so that is why you need a data drive to back up the files on the raid and to store data that is not accessed much like photo's and music and porn.
[/quote]
hmm interesting idk if i want to do this if that is the case, but if i get another HDD to back up everything i will probably do it.

i didn't notic those video cards weren't 1gb, i changed those to the 1ns you sudgested. as for the monitors i was thinking a little about those and i think i am going to go with 3 of the 21" monitors instead of the 24" because the monitor i have right now is a 19" kind of old junky LCD. also i hadent thought of that the way you have your monitors but now that i think about it it seems much better then having the main on a bigger monitor. as for the memory compatability issue i was looking at mobos again and i think i am going to go with this instead:

[color=#000000][url='http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131351']ASUS P6T Deluxe/OC Palm LGA 1366 Intel X58 ATX Intel Motherboard[/url], acording to reviews on the memory it is compatable with this board and this 1 is a little cheaper.[/color]

after changing these things around everything totals up to just around $2,850 with shipping, so thats not bad considering this is acualy better then what i was originaly going for at this price.

Hmm, I wonder how much performance going with triple channel RAM will net you.

9GB over 8GB.

This Post Has Been Edited, Please Refer To The OP For Updated Information/Topic

thought i would bump this instead of make another thread because this already has a lot of useful information in it. ^_^

Thanks! ^_^

Yo-Yo Freak