yet another rate 'my computer thread'

[Morglum]

Right so i'm thinking of buying a new rig, don't bring money in the consideration, i saved up alot (meaning roughly 2000 euros for a new rig). Sadly i don't know much about computers. Ofcourse i know that a g-force 5600 is worse then a 8800gt or something but taht aside here it is:

- IN-WIN S564T M-tower Audio/USB Black/Silver,350W,A-Guide 350w
- Cooler Master PSU,Real Power, 620W,3SLI,PI,Active PVC,Modula
- Intel Quad Core Q9450 s775,2.66GHz,1333MHz,8MB,BOX
- MSI MB P35 PLATINIUM S775 ATX DDRII 800 GLAN SATA RAID
- Corsair 2048MB, DDR2,256MX64, 667,C5,Value Select
- Corsair 1024MB, DDR2,128MX64, 667,C4,Value Select
- WD 074GB,Raptor, SATA,10.000rpm,16MB*
- WD 074GB,Raptor, SATA,10.000rpm,16MB*
- WD 500GB,Caviar SE16, SATAII,7200rpm,16MB,
- Asus VGA NX8800GT-T2D1024EZ-HD PCI-express 1024MB DDR DVI TVOUT
- LG DVD 16x48 SATA Retail Black
- LG DVDRW+/- 20x DL LightScribe Retail, Black with beige baz
- Apacer Int. Card Reader USB2.0 14 in 1 reader/writer (grey,black,grey,zilver)

Now i send a mail to a store, asking for the best gaming pc there is for my budget this is what they have come up with.

I'll now transulate some stuff they have written with it why they chose that piece of equipment:

* Only 3gig ram, because with 4gig ram you'll need a 64 bit operating system. 2 raptors, in raid this means maximum speed.

So any advice is welcome since i don't even understand half of the mail they send me :)

cheers in advance Morglum!

Edit:

Ps: what to use vista or xp?
Pps: this rig doesn't cost 2000 euros btw, but it was hard to put a rig together for exactly 2000 euros, this one costs around 1500 euros

[8igdave]

Right so i'm thinking of buying a new rig, don't bring money in the consideration, i saved up alot (meaning roughly 2000 euros for a new rig). Sadly i don't know much about computers. Ofcourse i know that a g-force 5600 is worse then a 8800gt or something but taht aside here it is:

- IN-WIN S564T M-tower Audio/USB Black/Silver,350W,A-Guide 350w
- Cooler Master PSU,Real Power, 620W,3SLI,PI,Active PVC,Modula
- Intel Quad Core Q9450 s775,2.66GHz,1333MHz,8MB,BOX
- MSI MB P35 PLATINIUM S775 ATX DDRII 800 GLAN SATA RAID
- Corsair 2048MB, DDR2,256MX64, 667,C5,Value Select
- Corsair 1024MB, DDR2,128MX64, 667,C4,Value Select
- WD 074GB,Raptor, SATA,10.000rpm,16MB*
- WD 074GB,Raptor, SATA,10.000rpm,16MB*
- WD 500GB,Caviar SE16, SATAII,7200rpm,16MB,
- Asus VGA NX8800GT-T2D1024EZ-HD PCI-express 1024MB DDR DVI TVOUT
- LG DVD 16x48 SATA Retail Black
- LG DVDRW+/- 20x DL LightScribe Retail, Black with beige baz
- Apacer Int. Card Reader USB2.0 14 in 1 reader/writer (grey,black,grey,zilver)

Now i send a mail to a store, asking for the best gaming pc there is for my budget this is what they have come up with.

I'll now transulate some stuff they have written with it why they chose that piece of equipment:

* Only 3gig ram, because with 4gig ram you'll need a 64 bit operating system. 2 raptors, in raid this means maximum speed.

So any advice is welcome since i don't even understand half of the mail they send me :)

cheers in advance Morglum!

Edit:

Ps: what to use vista or xp?
Pps: this rig doesn't cost 2000 euros btw, but it was hard to put a rig together for exactly 2000 euros, this one costs around 1500 euros

So your not buildig it your self? You would save alot of money and make a far superior pc.

Id suggest Vista and id also suggest vista 64bit and get 4gb of ram.

Also you will onyl see the performance increase from a raptor in the already short loading times of games and when movig very large files. having 2 in raid is not really required unless you are moving very big things indeed and if one dies then you lose all your data on them as raid 0 splits it haldf and half. Without one it is not readerble.

You are buying a case witha 350w psu then replacing it with a 620w? Ive not checked that case but normaly a cheap case coming with a cheap psu may not have the suffient air flow to cool the high performance pcs. I presume you wont be overclocking your cpu though? Then again looking at that motherboard i dont think it has much overclocking compasity anyway.

Id say thats a very expensive quote for what it is really. but then its probaly the raptors putting it up, even though they probably already have hefty premiums on them. And that cpu come to think of it.

Also it appears they are selling you a DVD drive and a DVD rewriter drive to make more money. Why not just get a DVD wr drive to start with? You wont ever use 2 drives at once.

which store is this?

[Morglum]

just a local computerstore in my neighboorhood, thanks for your advice though very much appreciated!

[8igdave]

Do you think you would be willing to try building it your self? Its actually very straight forward. Things just slot into places and they will onyl go in one way.

The hardest bit is plugging the front pannel connectors on the case into the motherboard and thats only because they are fiddly buggers!

I could help run you through it. I ahve done with many people and been there with seval friends to help them out if they got stuck but most people ven without any hardware knowllage manage it fine.

As long as you dont have the comen sence of a squashed apricot you should manage :)

[Morglum]

i can build the pc myself, i'm just a total nubcake when it comes down to chosing stuff. Like should i take the 8800 gt or the 8800 gt-x (i'm just picking an example to make it clear). I know nothing about why i should pick that motherbord with that graphics card and such. Thats my problem i can't pick the actuall hardware, placing it in myself in the pc is okay :)

[8igdave]

i can build the pc myself, i'm just a total nubcake when it comes down to chosing stuff. Like should i take the 8800 gt or the 8800 gt-x (i'm just picking an example to make it clear). I know nothing about why i should pick that motherbord with that graphics card and such. Thats my problem i can't pick the actuall hardware, placing it in myself in the pc is okay :)

MM how many pounds is 1500 euros? I could give you a spec in pounds at your budget for you to then buy. HOwever our parts normaly cost more then they should if the pound to euro ratio (or at least i know it is for dollars) was kept to. So i can probably go over that pound budget and still be within your budget. If taht makes sense...

[Morglum]

my budget is 2000 euros.

1 euro is roughly 1.50 pound.

But the pc can be really over the top notch gaming pc aye, i don't care about the money, don't try to save some money if there is something better around :) (but ofcourse do look at performance and such)

Question: when do the g-force 9 series come out?

[8igdave]

Well serposidly the 9600GT comes out in a few weeks. Although tahts going to be low end to combat the 2400 and 2600 or the 3400s.

The powerful beats will probably not be till june/jully.

MMM unlimited budget hey? I trust youll be overclocking? Also what size monitor? If your under 22" you should upgrade as well. Nothing beats gaming at 24" and with a high end gaming pc you have the power to do it.

If your overclocking im split between the E8400 which i know will go to 4ghz on air and one of the new Q9s however they are on pre order every where i beleive. But they do have some good overclocking potential id imagin.

The Q6600 will do 3.6ghz on air but the new cpus are 10% faster clock for clock. So a Q9450 at 3.6ghz is more like 4ghz Q6600.

[Berrik]

Don't know know much has changed since this was posted.

http://en.expreview.com/?p=233

[Mo0rbid]

just so you know, you don't have to post every single thing about your computer, for example:

3800+
7800GT XXX
2Gb 533Mhz PC4200

is enough info


oh, and use XP. vista will lower your gaming performance as it stands now


had to size down your spec
Q9450 2.66GHz
3072MB CL5
8800GT 1024MB

It looks very good. It'll last for some time onwards

[8igdave]

just so you know, you don't have to post every single thing about your computer, for example:

3800+
7800GT XXX
2Gb 533Mhz PC4200

is enough info


oh, and use XP. vista will lower your gaming performance as it stands now


had to size down your spec
Q9450 2.66GHz
3072MB CL5
8800GT 1024MB

It looks very good. It'll last for some time onwards


As far as im conserned giving me the full spec is alot better. As he still needs to know which motherboard etc to get. Or which hard drives.

Also it would be a msitake to go XP. Vista is perfectly fine for gaming. The differences arnt huge and the new service pack will be out soon. Some games also would require hackign to play on xp. Like i said in another post, the anti vista bandwagon has long gone.




Currently (without knowing if you ahve a nice big moitor or will overclock)you could go for:

Q6600 OEM (doesn't come with a heat sink) or a E8400- overclocks really well. or a Q9450 but may be hard to find stock.

Turniq 120 tower

Artic silver 5

8800GTX (any GTX can be overclocked, the faster gtxs are just overclocked standard ones as they are all made in the same place. The companies juist do the overclocking for you... for a price of corse).

Abit x38 Quad GT - abit make by far the best bios's - easy to navigate andn easy to overclock.

The X38 comes with PCIE2 ready for the next gen graphics cards which may make some use of the new PCIE-2 technology.

Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer Fatal1ty Professional - a good sound card and really you dont need to spend any more then this on a sound card.

Western digital AAKS hard drive, size is you choise. Fast, reliable and quiet. The Seagates are faster but louder i beleive.

Optical drive, i have a pioneer but the samsungs are just as good and cheaper. Really any DVD Rewriter which is sata. Id suggest Samsung SH-S203D 20x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter

If you arnt so bothered about money then the 620w corsair psu would be great. Although now these pritty much cost the same as the 600w M12 Seasonic which is superior and of better quality. If you wana save money just get the 520w corsair. You dont need any more power then that but if you have the money and wana make suer your future proofed the 600w m12 seasonic would be a good buy.

IF you go for a Q6600 then get 4X1gb of any 800mhz 4-4-4-12. As all you need is a FBS of 400 to reach your max overclock on air of 3.6ghz (DDR2 times the fbs by 2 to give 800mhz so 400fbs = 800mhz DDR2 ram) .

If you are gonig for the Q9450 or E8400. Then id suggest 4x1gb of 8400+ 1000mhz Blastics ram. It will allow you to get to those higher overclocks.

[Morglum]

i got a 19inch screen, upgrading would be possible, but this screen isn't that old yet so i'm not sure. About the overclocking, never done it before so i don't know how :)

anyway enough computer talk for now! Time to paint the town red :D

[Ragenrok]

I would rather go witht he corsair HX620, the modular PSU's are alot nicer for cable managent and it never hurt to have that extra power just incase lol.

and 8igdave is right. moorbid needs to get off the Anti-vista train as its dieing out fast. Vista is fine. There is mabey a 5% performance drop that he will not notice wiht the computer parts his looking at.

Vista is very stable and the new Service pack coming out here shortly fixes the last of the major flaws it had which arn't even that bad.

Just grab Vista home premium x64 and 4 gigs of ram and you will be laughing.

[8igdave]

i got a 19inch screen, upgrading would be possible, but this screen isn't that old yet so i'm not sure. About the overclocking, never done it before so i don't know how :)

anyway enough computer talk for now! Time to paint the town red :D

Trust me, the moment you move onto a 24" that 19" will look tiny. Youll never be able to go back :p


I would rather go witht he corsair HX620, the modular PSU's are alot nicer for cable managent and it never hurt to have that extra power just incase lol.

and 8igdave is right. moorbid needs to get off the Anti-vista train as its dieing out fast. Vista is fine. There is mabey a 5% performance drop that he will not notice wiht the computer parts his looking at.

Vista is very stable and the new Service pack coming out here shortly fixes the last of the major flaws it had which arn't even that bad.

Just grab Vista home premium x64 and 4 gigs of ram and you will be laughing.

ty :)

[Randomness]

having 2 in raid is not really required
Yeap, RAID0 is not really worth it - the performance increase with it is very minimal:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=2101&p=1

[8igdave]

Yeap, RAID0 is not really worth it - the performance increase with it is very minimal:
http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=2101&p=1


thought you were being sarcastic at first. But yeah those benchmarks show practicaly no performance increase and its only seconds off loading times and no seconds at all on some. Only the synthetic benchmarks show decent performannce increases and they really mean nothing.

Just like 3dMark should should be banned in terms of testing performance of hardware as it means jack all really. Like the 2900xt used to score really well in 3dmark but get beaten by the 8800GTX in games.


Bottom line: RAID-0 arrays will win you just about any benchmark, but they'll deliver virtually nothing more than that for real world desktop performance. That's just the cold hard truth.

[Crash250f]

This is all just what I heard. Don't treat it as fact, but its they way I think it works.

RAID0 Does well in benchmarks because it actually does pretty much double the read/write times over a period of time, and it scales up linearly with the more harddrives you add. The reason it doesn't do so well in games is because games load lots of small texture files and things like that, where seek time is more important than read/write time.

Thats just the way I look at it. I might be completely wrong.

[Graven]

I'm actually going to use this thread to ask a question about a laptop, because I don't want to start a new one for one simple question, which may even not be quite answerable for now. How do you guys think this laptop is going to handle WAR? At whatever settings possible, I don't really care unless it's very low or something of the sort.

-CPU AMD TURION X2 TL-58 1.9GHZ
- DISPLAY 15.4" (44 CM.) WXGA
- RAM 2 GB DDR II , 1GB ROBSON FLASH
- HDD 250 GB
- VIDEO ATI HD2600 TC 1024MB
- DVD-RW SUPER MULTI
- HDMI OUT, LAN GIGABIT
- WLAN 802.11 A/B/G, BLUETOOTH

[Morglum]

No way you're gonna hijack my thread boy nooooo noooo noooo young bucky!

I know a 24"inch screen looks freaken sweet! Some of me mates have that :) Actually the only problem i have for it, is that i don't got much room, and i mean really i'm here at the desk now and if i hit it to hard (the desk) stuff falls over :). I've send my mail to a different store also, they just replied back that they have been very busy this week but will certainly look at my mail. Ofcourse they will, they can make loads of money :p gonna be interesting to see what they come up with. Will keep you updated.

[8igdave]

I'm actually going to use this thread to ask a question about a laptop, because I don't want to start a new one for one simple question, which may even not be quite answerable for now. How do you guys think this laptop is going to handle WAR? At whatever settings possible, I don't really care unless it's very low or something of the sort.

-CPU AMD TURION X2 TL-58 1.9GHZ
- DISPLAY 15.4" (44 CM.) WXGA
- RAM 2 GB DDR II , 1GB ROBSON FLASH
- HDD 250 GB
- VIDEO ATI HD2600 TC 1024MB
- DVD-RW SUPER MULTI
- HDMI OUT, LAN GIGABIT
- WLAN 802.11 A/B/G, BLUETOOTH

cant say ive ever heard of a HD2600 TC 1024mb. Ive haerd of the 2600XT for desktops and id imagin there is a laptop version but there is no way they would give it 1024mb of memory for it.

Also id suggest stick to the core 2 duos as tehy are genearly faster then the amds. Also why do you have 2gb of DDR2 and 1gb of "robson flash" ?

Seems like a very strange spec indeed.

[8igdave]

No way you're gonna hijack my thread boy nooooo noooo noooo young bucky!

I know a 24"inch screen looks freaken sweet! Some of me mates have that :) Actually the only problem i have for it, is that i don't got much room, and i mean really i'm here at the desk now and if i hit it to hard (the desk) stuff falls over :). I've send my mail to a different store also, they just replied back that they have been very busy this week but will certainly look at my mail. Ofcourse they will, they can make loads of money :p gonna be interesting to see what they come up with. Will keep you updated.

Make space, build an extension or knock a wall down lol. Its worth it :p

[Graven]

cant say ive ever heard of a HD2600 TC 1024mb. Ive haerd of the 2600XT for desktops and id imagin there is a laptop version but there is no way they would give it 1024mb of memory for it.

Also id suggest stick to the core 2 duos as tehy are genearly faster then the amds. Also why do you have 2gb of DDR2 and 1gb of "robson flash" ?

Seems like a very strange spec indeed.

It's a pre-built laptop, I have no option to change whatsoever, and it's the only one I can afford which also has reasonable specs. The video is Radeon 2600 HD, with up to 1024 memory hyperthreading. And the robson flash (whatever the hell it is :\ ) comes for free with the purchase, like a gift.

[8igdave]

It's a pre-built laptop, I have no option to change whatsoever, and it's the only one I can afford which also has reasonable specs. The video is Radeon 2600 HD, with up to 1024 memory hyperthreading. And the robson flash (whatever the hell it is :\ ) comes for free with the purchase, like a gift.

can you send me a link?

[Crash250f]

I wall mounted my fhd2400. If you dont mind some slight imperfections of a tn panel like viewing angle/backlight bleed, its sooooo worth it. At least if your really into gaming. Oh, and the fhd2400 is glossy, so it looks even sexier, unless its in a really bright room. If my house is burning down, its the first thing I'm grabbing. :p

One downside is you have to upgrade your vid card more often to play at 1920x1200 maxed, but with the comp your building, I have the feeling that it would be doable.

[8igdave]

I wall mounted my fhd2400. If you dont mind some slight imperfections of a tn panel like viewing angle/backlight bleed, its sooooo worth it. At least if your really into gaming. Oh, and the fhd2400 is glossy, so it looks even sexier, unless its in a really bright room. If my house is burning down, its the first thing I'm grabbing. :p

One downside is you have to upgrade your vid card more often to play at 1920x1200 maxed, but with the comp your building, I have the feeling that it would be doable.

never seen much about that monitor. Im going to be getting the benq FP241w shortly. I have a friend with that really cool looking asus 22" one as well. Dont serpose you know the one im on about, looks kinda space age lol.

[Graven]

can you send me a link?

Yup, I most certainly can, but I really doubt it'll help you, since
a) the info is copied exactly from that link
b) the link is in bulgarian, the site of Technomarket, since it's from there that I'm going to buy it

Here are two links, first is the general laptop in the MSI site, the second is the exact model I'm going to buy.

http://global.msi.com.tw/index.php?func=prodtmpspec&prod_no=1237&maincat_no=135&cat2_no=271&cat3_no=#menu

http://www.technomarket.bg/product_detail.php?product_id=09033214

[8igdave]

Yup, I most certainly can, but I really doubt it'll help you, since
a) the info is copied exactly from that link
b) the link is in bulgarian, the site of Technomarket, since it's from there that I'm going to buy it

Here are two links, first is the general laptop in the MSI site, the second is the exact model I'm going to buy.

http://global.msi.com.tw/index.php?func=prodtmpspec&prod_no=1237&maincat_no=135&cat2_no=271&cat3_no=#menu

http://www.technomarket.bg/product_detail.php?product_id=09033214

have you looked at the dell vostro for alternatives and Hp seem to offer good things to.

[seVere]

Get vista, 64 bit x2 and a motherload of ram. Also that graphic card is out of date now.

Better one.

http://game.amd.com/us-en/unlock_radeonhd3870x2.aspx?p=1 Its 2 gpu procressors on the one card, its like having to graphics cards in the one computer and saves power & space in the computer.

Also if that card gets outdated, you can buy another one and connect them up to have 4 gpu's in one computer. Thats hardout.

Wont break the bank as well. ;)

And if you want to go crazy.

Buy something good, otherwise it will outdate fast.

http://game.amd.com/us-en/unlock_phenomblack.aspx

4 cpu, so much power. Comes with over clocking options.

[8igdave]

Get vista, 64 bit x2 and a motherload of ram. Also that graphic card is out of date now.

Better one.

http://game.amd.com/us-en/unlock_radeonhd3870x2.aspx?p=1 Its 2 gpu procressors on the one card, its like having to graphics cards in the one computer and saves power & space in the computer.

Also if that card gets outdated, you can buy another one and connect them up to have 4 gpu's in one computer. Thats hardout.

Wont break the bank as well. ;)

And if you want to go crazy.

Buy something good, otherwise it will outdate fast.

http://game.amd.com/us-en/unlock_phenomblack.aspx

4 cpu, so much power. Comes with over clocking options.

The graphics card you have stated relies on crossfire technology to use both cards and therefore is limited by not giving the power of 2x a 3870. Just because there are two cards does not make it faster then one. it still looses to the 8800GTX and teh GTS and the GT is pritty much on par.

Also the phenom is a terribel buy. Its quite obiously you like amd i take it.

The Phenom is slower clock for clock compared to the Intel quad cores. It has bugs in it due to a rushed release and stupid testers which means when pushed over 2.4ghz there is a chance the pc can infact crash.

They genearly cant be overclocked past 2.8ghz on air ayway as aposed to 3.6ghz for the Q6600 on air.

It doesn't ioverclock anywhere near as well andn costs the same as the q6600. The q6600 beats the phenom in every area so there is never any reason to buy one.

Also 4 cores isn't always more powerful then 2. Most games do not use 4 cores. I can only think of 3 games that do and 1 of them isn't out yet. The dual cores overclock to higher speeds because they arnt limited by the heat which 4 cores produces and are therefore faster in games and 2 core aplications.

Quad cores are currently only really usefull for decoding where they trample all over dual cores. But i do beleive in the up coming year quads will be supported alot more.

[seVere]

The graphics card you have stated relies on crossfire technology to use both cards and therefore is limited by not giving the power of 2x a 3870. Just because there are two cards does not make it faster then one. it still looses to the 8800GTX and teh GTS and the GT is pritty much on par.

Also the phenom is a terribel buy. Its quite obiously you like amd i take it.

The Phenom is slower clock for clock compared to the Intel quad cores. It has bugs in it due to a rushed release and stupid testers which means when pushed over 2.4ghz there is a chance the pc can infact crash.

They genearly cant be overclocked past 2.8ghz on air ayway as aposed to 3.6ghz for the Q6600 on air.

It doesn't ioverclock anywhere near as well andn costs the same as the q6600. The q6600 beats the phenom in every area so there is never any reason to buy one.

Also 4 cores isn't always more powerful then 2. Most games do not use 4 cores. I can only think of 3 games that do and 1 of them isn't out yet. The dual cores overclock to higher speeds because they arnt limited by the heat which 4 cores produces and are therefore faster in games and 2 core aplications.

Quad cores are currently only really usefull for decoding where they trample all over dual cores. But i do beleive in the up coming year quads will be supported alot more.

I don't know on what planet it loses to the 8800.
http://xtreview.com/addcomment-id-4105-view-Radeon-HD-3870-X2-review-and-benchmark.html

It beat it to bits.

Also They fixed the Phenom with the patch.

Please post links to vaild information otherwise what you are saying means noting. I would however get 4 cores, its not going to outdate as easy as 2. Its also good for rendering and future games.

[8igdave]

I don't know on what planet it loses to the 8800.
http://xtreview.com/addcomment-id-4105-view-Radeon-HD-3870-X2-review-and-benchmark.html

It beat it to bits.

Also They fixed the Phenom with the patch.

Please post links to vaild information otherwise what you are saying means noting. I would however get 4 cores, its not going to outdate as easy as 2. Its also good for rendering and future games.

The phenom has not been "fixed" the patch makes it run 15% slower as a result of being able to get higher overclocks which is totaly pointless.

And ok then ill post links to one of the most reptuable reviewing sites around on why the 3870 X2 is a bad buy becauise it either loses to the GTX or beats it by 1/2 fps which is not worth the hassel of having Crossfired cards and the 8800GTX can be overclocked quite alot and its not in these tests:

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/01/29/amd_ati_radeon_hd_3870_x2/12
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/01/29/amd_ati_radeon_hd_3870_x2/9
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/01/29/amd_ati_radeon_hd_3870_x2/8
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/01/29/amd_ati_radeon_hd_3870_x2/10
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/01/29/amd_ati_radeon_hd_3870_x2/7

What’s interesting though is that the GeForce 8800 GT’s availability woes appear to have ended and you can now pick up a standard-clocked Inno3D GeForce 8800 GT for just over £150 (inc. VAT) (http://www.ebuyer.com/product/134393). Again, that’s pretty good value and a pair of those is about £35 more expensive than a single 3870 X2. While we didn’t include a direct comparison here, we can safely say that it should perform better than the 3870 X2 in most scenarios.

8800GTS SLI would quite obiously win. Do you need benchmarks for them as well? There is a old Bit-tech review which i found on the 8800GT cards in sli this is old remember and its still beating the 3870 X2 so the G92 GTS would do alot better. Thats the 512mb not the 620mb or 320mb as they are old hat and replaced:

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2007/11/02/nvidia_geforce_8800_gt/6


Some review sites will infact use cut sceens etc to show their cards which they are being paid to review to look better also. If a review site shows the card they are reviewing to beat everything sometimes its just to good to be true.

While the Radeon HD 3870 X2 has the potential to become one of, if not the fastest graphics cards released to date, it’s not something that I can recommend over Nvidia’s current flagship GeForce 8800 Ultra and 8800 GTX cards because it’s only as strong as its weakest link. Sadly for AMD’s graphics product group, that means there’s a long road ahead with driver support for this beast because, even from just looking at current releases, I believe there will be scenarios in the future where CrossFire isn’t as well supported as it probably should be.The fact it relys on Crossfire technology to come close to theese cards is not a good thing. Crossfire is not garranteed to be supported and sometimes can take months to be supported.

[Morglum]

another company replied to my email and this is what they have come up with:

- intel core2 quad9450, 2.66ghz, 1333fsb, 45nm, 12MB L2 cache
- Motherboard ABIT IX38 quad GT s775
- OCZ memory 4GB, DDR2 PC8500 1066MHz
- 2 x Hard disk seagate 250 gb SATA300 in raid
- 1 x hard disk seagate 500gb SATA300 data storage
- Nec dvdrw double layer
- NEC dvdrom 16x
- XFX Geforece 8800GT XXX 670M 523MB DDR3
- apacer 17-in-1 card reader
- Case gigabyte Aurora black, full aluminium
- Power Supply unit be quiet! 700watt
- Windows Vista home premium NL oem 64bit version

Price 1929 euro

This better then my first post or worse (price is more because vista is included i bet)

[8igdave]

another company replied to my email and this is what they have come up with:

- intel core2 quad9450, 2.66ghz, 1333fsb, 45nm, 12MB L2 cache
- Motherboard ABIT IX38 quad GT s775
- OCZ memory 4GB, DDR2 PC8500 1066MHz
- 2 x Hard disk seagate 250 gb SATA300 in raid
- 1 x hard disk seagate 500gb SATA300 data storage
- Nec dvdrw double layer
- NEC dvdrom 16x
- XFX Geforece 8800GT XXX 670M 523MB DDR3
- apacer 17-in-1 card reader
- Case gigabyte Aurora black, full aluminium
- Power Supply unit be quiet! 700watt
- Windows Vista home premium NL oem 64bit version

Price 1929 euro

This better then my first post or worse (price is more because vista is included i bet)

If your overclocking tis not a bad pc and its the exact same motherboard as me so i can tell you where all the thinsg you need are. The quad would overclock really well on a good air cooler like the tuniq 120 tower and youd get alot of extra speed. The graphics card is a good card, but the manafacture are appalling with customer service. i would check who your warrenty is with because many people who know about XFX would not touch them with a barge pole.

I personaly dont like the case and would question as to what psu it actually is. Also it may be cheaper to buy the vista OEM your self.

Dont bother with raid, its not needed. Save money and get a 320gb or 500gb instaed.

The 1066MHZ ram is wasted if your not overclocking could save money on the OCZ 800mhz without loss of performance.