Speccing a new PC - seek advice and opinion

I'm speccing a new rig for my cousin and fellow mid-life-crisis born-again gamer.

Money (almost) no object, but we just need a kick-ass gaming rig without unnecessary fripperies such as water cooling and neon intestines.

Intel and nVidia seem to be a given, so let's start at the top.

Processor - we're liking the Intel® Core™ 2 Quad Extreme QX6850 - seems to be the latest and fastestest.

Mobo - bit of a struggle with this one, but I think the SLI nForce 680i SLI (C55XE) fits the bill.

Memory - if the above two get the nod, then I'd guess DDR3 rated at 1333? (Damn, you'd think they could add another 4 MHz ) - from a reputable supplier; I see the name Corsair bandied about a lot. Oh, and am I right in thinking 2GB is the only viable option - 4GB sounds better but is pointless without a 64bit OS (which is pointless to a gamer)?

Graphics - Heh, over-the-top, but we're looking at a pair of 8800Ultras ^^. Anyone with an intimate knowledge of nVidia's roadmap happen to know if anything even more zoomy is likely within 2 months?

Sound - now this IS a pain. Is there any point in a soundcard since Vista killed the DirectSound API? I just love the Creative xFi, but is there a point?

Hard drives - we disagree here (cos he's a noob). I say get a pair of 150GB Raptors in RAID0 with a great big 1TB third drive for storage - he says he doesn't need much storage cos he never filled his 300GB after 2 years :/

Opticals - for the sake of future-proofing (an oxymoron in the world of computers, but anyway...) should we plump for a Blu-Ray R/W/RW multi-format jobbie with a fast DVD reader as main?

Finally, suggest a nice case for it all. Something like a nice Coolermaster jobbie with a shedload of fans but yet doesn't sound like a jet fighter taking off.

Oh, and I guess a humungous 1100W power supply would probably be wise ^^

Oops - forgot to mention - we're UK, so prices in £ if you please (we've already looked at systems for around £3500 - you can pretty much double that for the equivalent in US$ so you can get an idea of what we're looking at)

Thanks in advance for the masses of helpful replies

http://www.tomshardware.com/2008/01/...force_9800gx2/
I'd wait before getting the ultras

Ooh yum - that's a good start. Potential quad-GPU goodness to go with the quad cores ^^

as you say your in the uk, thought maybe this link maybe of some intrest to you.

http://www.beastcomputers.co.uk/

Just spec one here, they'll even build it for you.

http://overclockers.co.uk/

/slaps head - how could I forget about Overclockers?

Thanks, Mal ( and Volsung )

Still looking for opinions and comments though ^^

I run dual 8800 ultra's, and to be fair it's just plain overkill.

8800gtx
4gb ram
couple 150GB raptors
600+ PSU
decent tower

I had a look at that Beast site, and it's a rip off. Could build that 3000k machine for less then half.

4GB? Was I wrong about that, then?

I run dual GTX's, and THAT's overkill - still waiting for nVidia drivers that are anywhere near complete. Rubbish pop-ups and texture oddities in GW.

Oh, Vista doesn't help, but I see it as a soon-to-be-necessary evil.

Vista can make use of the extra. Just think of it as an extra large paging file.

Nothing wrong with Vista. Ignore all the negative people. Most people bad mouth MS because its the cool thing to do in geek land

Sigh - been to overclockers, and I can't see any option for system building - just off the shelf systems and components. o_O

Many new games do all their sound mixing in software, so it is doubly hard to say if a soundcard is necessary any more. Most new motherboards have good sound on-board too. But on the otherhand, why not......

My personal opinion is that a RAID0 falls into the "unnecessary fripperies" category. The small (and mostly unnoticeable) improvement in drive speed is outweighed by the cost (it would cost much less to get 1 300gig) and the risk factor of having things striped over 2 drives. Just get SATA drives for speed.
On the other hand, it makes much more sense to have your storage on a RAID1 for security.
Currently, I run an 80gig SATA drive partitioned into a 20gig (OS) and a 60gig (games, apps) and two 160gig SATAs in RAID1 for storage (mp3s, mpgs, etc.)
I will shortly be upgrading these to a 160gig and 2x500gig.
(As a side note - I was recently digitizing Hi8 videos at 720x480 directly onto the RAID1, so hd speed is not a big factor.)

Unless you actually have a Blu-Ray or HD-DVD player and plan to use the burner now, I would just get a Multi-format DL Lightscribe DVD burner and hold off on the Blu-Ray/HD-DVD until the format war shakes out and the drives become cheaper.

110watts - is that a laptop power supply?

Btw, as far as the cpu, mobo and RAM are concerned, I plan to upgrade mine in a while - after AMD & Intel's new processors have been out for a while and things have settled a bit. I've been looking at pretty much the same as what you have, although quad cores are probably overkill. I have to force my Guild Wars to run on one core anyway, to keep it from crashing.
Edit: SLI = fripperies too.

Give em a ring. The service cost £200+ I think.

Thanks again Mal - and thanks too, Quaker, lot of insights there. Cough - yes, 1100W :/

Oh, and for the record, I have a pair of 500GBs, non-RAIDed

Hehe - just as a test, I specced a comp at overclockers with top-of-the-range everything.

£4500 - approx $9000.

Er, lol?

pcoption.co.uk have the new amd quad core procssor

Off topic (but then it's MY topic ) but I did a little price comparison to see if rip-off Britain is still as bad as it was.

Current exchange rate - 1 US$ = 0.510568774 UK£

2 identical Dell XPS 2010 Laptops, one from dell.com, one from their UK site.

UK Dell - £2400

US Dell - $3800 = £1940.

So that's a "yes" then.

Your forgetting we have 18.5% VAT to pay, and the price difference is almost exactly that - a few quid off.

Take off VAT and it pretty much is £1900 range.

You forgetting sales tax?

To quoute wikipedia:
0-9.75% in state & local sales tax (not VAT); typically around 8.5%, but up to 16.75% when including other taxes

Getting the latest and greatest is such a waste. You could easily knock 30% off the price of a top rig by just going a step blow the top components. Get 2 8800GTs and Q6600. The performance difference would be small compared to the price difference. Get DDR2 1066 instead of DDR3 1333. DDR2 and DDR3 are pretty much the same when their clock speeds are matched.

Don't waste money on top of the line. Unless your stupid rich, in which case go right ahead.

Did you consider shipping? (Especially if you ship a dell from the US to the UK ) But, I really mean, whether shipping was included in one price or the other ... or both... or neither.

Yeah, shipping is irrelevant - just saying we pay a crapload more in Britain for the same stuff. You should see the price of PS3s over here ><

Nope, just stupid. I run a pair of 8800GTX on top of a Q6600 in an SVGA nForce 680i. Just 2GB of DDR2 PC2-6400. Thing is, he wants just a bit better than my rig, y'see

Seen tech forums saying 3SLI is having problems, as is the QX9650 processor. Infighting between Intel and nVidia, apparently.

Well if it just needs to be a little bit better than yours tell him to get the same thing you have with 4GB of ram.. That gives him the slight edge and doesn't spend all his money on hardware that's gonna be second rate in 3 months.

Heh, you have a point there

You could get four gigs of ram... but at the most 3.4-3.5 will be available. Last i checked it on my own computer, i was missing an entire sticks worth of one gig!

Wait for the 9000 series... Apparently their making a GTX2 card like they did with the 7950. Also hold off on the blu ray, Get a nice dvd drive with all the goodies instead.

And for god sakes, Thats just overspending. If he really wants something good, then just get a big monitor. And I mean with money like that... you could definately afford a massive monitor. Alienware curve once it comes out maybe?

Yeah, 4 gigs is about right. Vista32 is only going to "see" 3 gigs, but when you're matching sticks for performance, it's either 2 or 4.

Had a look at that Dell Curve (I refuse to still call them Alienware - it's a Dell in a funky case) - that is one wierd monitor! 2880x900 - wiiiiiidescreen. Even when it comes out, what's going to support a display like that? The idea's to stimulate peripheral vision - in order to do that, I would imagine software would have to be specially written or modded to work properly with it.

Damn, I'm enjoying this thread - some bugger's bound to lock it soon, or move it into Pwnd's playground ^^

[edit]Intel Core 2 Extreme Quad Core QX9770 3.2GHz 1600MHz 12MB £951.75 (inc Vat) ($1 864) lol?

There ya go! That's what your buddy needs to stay ahead of you.