Campquake Senate

Ok, our tax return this year is really nice, enough for nearly a new computer for myself, and plenty for my wife to do/get some things she wants. Just hope the return shows in our bank account this week!

Here's what I'm getting:

http://canadacomputers.com/index.php?do ... cid=CPU.84 $280

http://canadacomputers.com/index.php?do ... AM.346.307 $110

http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php? ... cture=eVGA $280

http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php? ... cture=eVGA $400 (two of these for SLI)

$100 for 500Gb SATA drive

$1345 including tax.

Add $245 and $135 for 22" LCD and Vista 64 Premium

I can't wait. Wonder if it will improve my gaming skills. LoL! Hope to be joining in for much more online games now. My current system is not too shabby, but the above will last me some time. Currently, AMD 3700+, 2Gb RAM, GeForce 6800GT vid card.

I have nothing against Core 2 Quad's, but not many applications are taking advantage of 4 CPU's. Most applications are still written for a single CPU, not even dual core's are utilized very well on the hole. Personally, for that reason, I'd still take a higher clocked Core 2 Duo (Wolfdale preferred) before I'd take a lower clocked Quad core Conroe.

Some benchmarks on an older (but still competitive to the 9600 GT) 8800GT, an E8400 Duo (3.0 Ghz x2) scored 153 FPS vs. 124 FPS for a Q6600 Quad (2.4 Ghz x4).

This CPU in particular is less expensive, higher clock speed and faster in 3D Mark overall performance:
http://canadacomputers.com/index.php?do ... cid=CPU.84 $229.99

If you're going to do a LOT of video/photo editing, then you may still want to consider the Quad.

I have that mobo and a quad core. I love them. I am also running sli but with 8800gt's. In the bench marks I have seen the 8800gt's out perform the 9600gt's. The 9600gt's are only revamped older tech. They are close to the same price aswell.

With this setup I am in the top 10% on 3Dmark.

Hmm, ok, I might stick with the Quad, but for video cards, would I be better going with two 8800GT rather than two 9600?

I can't speak to the quad core or the 9xxx cards but i have dual 8800's ... feggin awesome!

Akira wrote:Hmm, ok, I might stick with the Quad, but for video cards, would I be better going with two 8800GT rather than two 9600?

That's a good question... The 8800 is an awesome mid-preforming card discounted because they came out with even more awesome high-end cards in the series. But the 9600 is just an entry level card for the 9xxx series. It's not best or indicative of what Nvidia will offer for their mid-preforming card this generation. Mostly, it's out there to compete with a card that ATI had offered. The 8800 has better spec's, but slight higher power needs. I'd go 8800 if I were you, oh, wait, I did! I have an 8800 GTX 768 OC.

Both ATI/AMD and nVidia use similar numbering methods on their cards to represent what they are capable of.

XXXX --- they are always four digits

Digit one represents how "pretty" they can make things look, its a reference to what directX version they run on. (8xxx nvidia cards are DX10 and 9xxx cards are DX10.1 ? I dont remember the DX10 version number but they are better in that regard)

Digit two represents how much "horsepower" the card has. x8xx has more power than x6xx cards. The 8800 has more muscle than the 9600, even if the 9600 might have a couple more directX tricks it can perform. (dont make this comparison if the cards are several generations apart, -- I can't say that a 7900 is faster than the 9600)

Digits three and four generally indicate some variant of the card, check for RAM differences, clock speed, etc. Sometimes they come out with a better card and call it a xx50 because they didn't feel it was a full unit faster -- ATI loves doing this.

Hope that gives you a general idea on understanding the card model numbers -- as always there are exceptions to the rules so I always look for benchmarks and reviews before buying.

Thanks guys! Well, yes, seems I'm hearing that an 8800GT is somewhat better in some way (Red's way of describing it makes sense), so my confusion was/is that a single 8800GT sells for more than a single 9600GT, but when I see the higher number (9600) it makes me think that card is newer/better as it is higher number. Odd though.

My option may be to go with a single 8800GT and wait for them to go on sale later, to complete an SLI setup, but I want to go with SLI right away, hence two 9600GT. (maybe a third at some point, since this mobo is set for 3 cards in SLI)

I've totaled up the list, with tax, I'm gonna be forking out about $1600 (tomorrow hopefully). I had a $100 500Gb drive on the list, but wife told me to keep our current two 80Gb drives and buy the $229 Acer 22" widescreen LCD instead. She doesn't like my anchor of a 21" Compaq P1100 flat screen CRT.

So, 2.4Ghz Quad core, EVGA 780i mobo, 4Gb Mushkin DDR2 RAM, Windows Vista Premium 64 bit, Acer 22" widescreen, and a DVD-RW drive as I've not yet bought one yet!

I do believe you can easily overclock that cpu to 3 Ghz with just decent air cooling.

http://promotions.newegg.com/NEemail/Ma ... -Moredeals

Newegg is having a sale

Just finished putting it all together this week.

Here's the break down:

2.4Ghz Quad Q6600 CPU
4Gb OCZ Platinum RAM
Samsung 250Gb SATA HDD (plus my two previous 80Gb drives)
Two GeForce 9600GT Superclocked vid cards, running SLI
Windows Vista Premium 64
Asus P5N-T Deluxe motherboard
LG DVD-RW SATA
Ultra X2 750W PSU, nice chrome plated one
Enermax Uber Chakra case
Acer 22" widescreen LCD monitor

Couldn't keep the water cooling setup, due to how the CPU/motherboard is, as the cooling block would not mount the way it should

Suprised you went Vista... 64 nonetheless!
I've been using Vista business 32 since it initially came out and even though I'm mostly used to it, I still don't care for it.
Other than it's groovy visual effects, it still annoys me to have to dig further for things that used only take a couple of clicks in XP.
I just bought a new Dell laptop and had to work with our sales guy to find one with XP pro on it.

Yup, well, thought I'd go with what will have longer support with MS for now. I hesitated, and still getting used to its quirks. Quake 3 won't install on it!

Not bad so far though. Gonna save aside $100 to add 4Gb more RAM soon too, just to max it out.