Still looking at a new gaming rig; prices have come down so much, however, that I probably won't wait much longer. Still have a question about PSU and Graphics card; I took some care in order to have a setup that can be easily upgraded. Ideally, I'd be able to keep, when I upgrade in 3-4 years: the case, the hard drive, the DVD drives, the PSU. For this setup, the Corsair PSU 520W is probably powerful enough for the current configuration. But, within 3-4 years? Or do you think we'll all need 800-900 Watt monsters within a couple of years? Also, still doubting between the 8800GTS 640MB and 320MB. I want to keep the card for 3-4 years, then it probably will get replaced with a newer, more powerful one. Any advice on which Graph. Card and PSU to get?
I'm in a similar position. For upgradablity I've decided on a motherboard that can take Dual/Quad Core CPU, 1333 FSB and DDR2/DDR3 RAM. For now I'm looking to get an E6600 with 2GB DDR2 1066 and an 8800 GTX. Asus and Gigabyte both do hybrid type boards with support as mentioned above. Asus P5KC Gigabyte GA-P35C-DS3R. You should get at least a 600w PSU with 2 PCIe connectors. I've calculated my expected power draw to be just under 450w and I have a 600w PSU. For longevity you should definitely get the GTS 640MB. The extra RAM will come in handy before long though it depends on your monitor size/resolution.
Thanks for the advice. My monitor is a LCD, 1280*1024 Max. and native resolution. And I just got it so I'm not planning to upgrade it anytime soon. Although I guess I might within 4 years from now (for bigger screen & resolution, and better response time).
The Corsair units are quite efficient, and from what I've seen, they're some of the best damn units you can get right now. I'd rank their 520HX closer to other 600-650W units. It's built like it's 620W bigger brother, which was shown running dual 8800GTX's in SLI and a high-end Core 2 chip. SLI 8800 setups recommend 750-800W PSU's, FYI. Corsair PSU's kick all sorts of ass in every review, every proper review, that I've read.
Yeah, every review I read about the 620 unit was very positive about it too. Often with the remark "it is a bit expensive, but you get what you pay for". Then again, if I compare with other PSU's in its range (600-650Watt), it is not really that expensive... I expect to be ordering it somewhere in the middle of this week... so that I have the entire weekend + Monday (taking a day off for working extra hours) to try it out and enjoy it. But then I need a great game to test it out with too... I was thinking Colin McRae's Dirt, or Dark Messiah of Might&Magic could be nice to take the machine for a test drive B)
