New Setup - Comment on my Box

Big B

But, the XTX has more pipelines than the XT, so do know that it's simply not a matter of clock speed. The XTX has more stock grunt. At the same clock speeds (core/mem), the XTX will perform better than the XT.

Asus isn't a bad all around choice, but you may want to hold off and see what DFI has coming down the pipes. They do have a 975X board, but that's the Infinity line, which can OC, but it's not their LanParty boards. Given that they have some of the major players that helped Abit rise to success years back, if you don't have to buy right now, I'd certainly wait for some DFI offerings to hit shelves. Epox seems to have gotten their quality control under control, so they could be another alternative, and likely cheaper than what Asus or DFI will offer.

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vol7ron

The ASUS price will drop. I have some time to wait, but not much. My proc is coming soon. If I was going just for price I would have waited til next year to buy the proc when the prices on mobos and procs and memory will be much lower, but I'm a budgeted enthusiast.

In my opinion anything is better than my vid card right now. The asus x1900xt was going for $350 which seems like a steal, but i may hold off a few more days.

As for motherboards, I've had ABIT TYAN and ASUS - asus is definitely my choice. Their overclocking is made simple, not because of the software, but mainly because whenever i overclock too far I don't have to do anything =) I know ABIT, DFI, and Gigabyte offer similar features, but ASUS I trust (plus they topped the charts on the benchmarks).

Look at my old (shitty) setup right now -- it out performs many other systems. I can tell you its not the proc and it's not the memory (and I dont think it the vpu), I'm pretty sure its the mobo.

Big B

Yeah, Asus is always a safe bet and easy to find. I've never seen those boards go to hell easily. Abit has had some problems as of late, but they're under new ownership with USI. Hopefully, they'll come back without relying on gimmicks (ie Fatal1ty) and living soley off their name.

DFI has really risen up in the past few years, and I think they finally got the kinks worked out with their NF4 LanParty boards. They also had some of Abit's engineers come over, which is a good part of the reason they're sought after.

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Merlin

Like I said in one of my other posts, do not get the Asus P5W DH Deluxe unless you are prepared for a load of hassel. I built a conroe systrem with the ASUS P5B and it required a bios update to function properly.

Asus P5W DH Deluxe WiFi
"In order for a Core 2 DUO (Conroe) processor to work with this mainboard you may require to perform a BIOS update which will require an older processor or contacting Asus for a new BIOS chip."

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vol7ron

First of all, that's the P5B - its on the 965 chipset that wasn't built for Conroe - 975x is. Second of all, go read my response to your post. I've never had a problem with any ASUS board, not to mention Anandtech had no trouble with the P5W DH and as I said earlier, it topped the charts.

unclebob

I dont think this is a problem anymore, only with older issues of the board. Boards now come with the conroe supporting BIOS. Check this:

Overclockers UK Forums - OcUK: Best Conroe Motherboard selection on the web!!!

Hey Volron why did u go for this board rather than a 7950 GX2?

max12590

He said he doesn't want to spend $500 on a video card. I'm pretty sure it sells for well over $500. Yea, the lowest on newegg is $500 but it is sold out. Then it's $519.

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unclebob

Thats still a lot cheaper than here in the UK, cheapest 7950 I've found is £364 ($694)

max12590

Yea, components are always expensive overseas. Ironic considering that you live closer to where they are manufactured.

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In the words of a certain Battlefield 2 commander, "They're spawnin' like crazy at the Gas Station and then tryin' to Forrest Gump it down the Interstate."

unclebob

Yeah maybe I should fly to the States, swallow 20Gb of RAM, shit it out in the UK, sell it and make a fortune!

I guess also the dollar is quite weak against the pound, so everything seems super cheap in the States.

vol7ron

I was gonna get the x1900XTX cuz I found it for $335, then I talked myself into getting the 7950GX2 because it "was only $165 more" and I wanted the best, but now I talked myself out again and am getting something inexpensive until the DirectX 10 videocards are released. Then I'll fork over some cash. I should also have more money around then too.

vol7ron

To anyone who's curious about this, they both have the same pipelines. XTX is just clocked faster.

Exfoliate

Yeah we might have a load going wrong over in the state but at least our hardware is as cheap as it comes. And yeah the pound is a lot stonger than the dollar, especially now. It's like 40% better or something.

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vol7ron

Here's my new setup:

Case: Ultra Silver Aluminus Mid-Tower (Silver-Yum)
Case Fans:
Ultra 120mm Ball Bearing Fan Titanium (mirror finish)
SILVERSTONE FM121 120mm 2 Ball Case Cooling Fan (CCF 110 - wow!)
Power Supply: Ultra X2 550W(mirror finish)
Processor: Intel Core2 Duo E6600
Heatsink+Fan: Aerocool GT-1000 Cooling Tower (Gold Plated)
Motherboard: Asus P5W DH Deluxe WiFi
Memory: Mushkin Redline DDR21000 2GB (2x1024MB) 4-5-4-11 stock
Video: XFX GeForce 7900GT (getting new when Dx10 comes out)
PCI Fans: Vantec Spectrum Fan Card with Blue UV LED (2x70mm 17.73 ~ 29.54 CFM)
Hard Disk Drive:
Western Digital Raptor 36GB 10,000RPM 8MB Cache
Western Digital Raptor 74GB 10,000RPM 16MB Cache