Help Judge build a computer

[BNU-Judge]

So after much thinking I decided to build a computer, so for the last couple of days I've been reading up on computers. So my computer components are listed below with a link to the site where I plan to buy it from. It'll be much appreciated if you guys can help me out, like whether their compatible, if they're better parts you would recommend etc.

For the motherboard I plan on getting the EVGA X58 SLI Classified

For the CPU I plan to get on getting the Intel Core i7 920 2.66GHz
I really wanted to get the Intel Core i7 975 Extreme Edition but after looking up stories about people overclocking their cpu, I rather not pay an extra $700 and just overclock myself and hopefully with your guys help.

For the computer case I plan on getting the SILVERSTONE RAVEN RV01

For the power supply might have over done a bit but I wanted to be on the safe side so I went with Rosewill RBR1000-M 1000W

For the memory I plan on getting CORSAIR XMS3 12GB (6 x 2GB)

And I'll top it off with Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium SP1
BTW is there any difference between Vista Home Premium and Vista Ultimate??
Also heard that comps won't read anymore than 4GB of memory??

For the CD/DVD Drive I plan on getting something simple like LITE-ON Black 18X DVD-ROM 48X CD-ROM SATA DVD-ROM Drive
I don't really make copies of any CD's plus after being Iraq, I got over 500 GB's of Movies on a external hard drive, no need for blue ray at least for now.

For the hard drive thinking at getting the Western Digital VelociRaptor 300GB

For the Video card really considering the EVGA CO-OP Hydro Copper GeForce GTX 295
If need be I might scale down to a Hydro Copper GTX 285 or 280 to save some money.

The biggest problem I have so far it a cooling system, I  don't want fans, but with water cooling systems, I'm not sure where to start, I know that I want it internal. I dont like those cooling systems that stick out. Really looking for recommendations you guys would suggest.
BTW same with a heatsink, don't which one to get.

Not sure if I'm going to get Killer Xeno Pro
maybe at a later point in time I'll get it.

Really wanted to get a sound card but I don't know which sound card to go with, wanted to get from Creative Sound Blaster but I heard negative replys from people about it failing soon after obtaining it, any recommendations would be great.


atm don't know the size monitor i want, same with a keyboard, probably a Logitech G15 or G11, as for mouse either a G9 or G5.

Don't think I missed any computer part, so any advise would be helpful.

[John]

Honestly, it all looks pretty good.

As far as cooling systems go, are you worried about noise? Noctua are probably some of the best fans around.

http://www.noctua.at/main.php?show=start

http://www.noctua.at/main.php?show=productview&products_id=24&lng=en - Heatsink
http://www.noctua.at/main.php?show=productview&products_id=12&lng=en - 120mm Fans
http://www.noctua.at/main.php?show=productview&products_id=9&lng=en - 80mm Fans

They always have fan controller plugs (3pin), so if you don't have that many fan controllers on the motherboard, you may have to use a 3 pin to molex converter.

I'd also recommend using http://www.noctua.at/main.php?show=productview&products_id=13&lng=en as a thermal compound. I've found it keeps a few degrees cooler than artic silver.


The PSU you selected from Rosewill is one of the lower end PSU's. I'd probably go with something from PC Power & Cooling instead: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817703022

Hard Drives now a days are out there that greatly outdo the Velociraptors. I'd probably go with a cheaper samsung drive, with better Cache, and more reliability. I've found the last 2 generations of Raptors have been steadily more and more unreliable.

Do you REALLY need that motherboard? Its fantastic, but really not necessary. Are you playing on doing 3 way SLI? What are you expecting to play on this computer?

[Scott]

Since I've got a number of distinct criticisms, I'm going to make multiple posts for easier replying...

Unless things change pretty dramatically in the future, I don't think I'd ever consider buying a mobo from anyone other than Asus. The motherboard is something you can't afford to smurf around with; it's the circulatory system of the computer, and if it breaks, you'll probably never even figure out what went wrong. Asus uses high quality parts on all of their motherboards, which is something no other manufacturer can claim.

The mobo you picked might actually be good, but EVGA doesn't have any reputation for building them. You won't find any Asus motherboard of the caliber of that particular one (2 triple channel ram buses, 3-way sli, etc), but the chances are that those things will not ever be a bottleneck in the life of your computer anyways.

[Scott]

BTW is there any difference between Vista Home Premium and Vista Ultimate??

Why are you buying Windows? Just download it from isohunt.

Also heard that comps won't read anymore than 4GB of memory??

2^32 bytes = 4GB. In other words, you need 64-bit windows to use more than 4GB of ram (actually, it's 3GB, for reasons that don't matter).

[Scott]

You've over-rated your computer's power needs by a very wide margin, and that PSU is worthless. The one John linked is actually not much better.

You're better off going with a PSU with a lower rating. It doesn't really matter how much power your components are rated for, the bottom line is that the power going in to your computer is all going to turn in to heat. 350W is 20BTUs/minute, and that's more than anything short of an obscene liquid cooling system is going to be able to dissipate. Components are rated for peak energy use, not continuous. Hard drives use no power once they've finished spinning up, and CPUs use half of what they're rated for on average (even under full load) - the same is true of graphics cards (they're just floating point processors).

I recommend this 600W Rosewill PSU. I like that one because it won't generate a rats nest of power wires in your case. That's very much more than you'll actually need even if you get 3 graphics cards and use 12GB of ram. If you insist on getting a high power rating, despite my assurance that you that you don't need it, you could get this 850W Rosewill PSU.

[Bnu-Sorceress]

and by Sorc he means John. Just to clear that up

[Scott]

All Lite-On drives seem to be excellent. They have open-source firmware, so the Lite-On drive I bought 5 years ago can do everything the one you picked out can (it's only 8x, though, and I paid $250 for it back then).

The RAM is fine.

The graphics card you picked is obscene; don't waste your money on that one, and don't buy your graphics card from that site. Newegg or zipzoomfly are the only ones I trust. Since your mobo supports SLI, why not get 2 SLI-capable 9000-series cards? That would be almost as good as the card you've picked, and cost a fraction of the price.

I'm not a fan of that hard drive. For $200, the drive should be over 1TB.

[Scott]

The i7 is a fine line of CPUs, but you've made a huge mistake by picking that one. You plan to spend $400-something on a motherboard that's all about balls to the wall performance, $700-something on a graphics card that rivals anything we'd ever thought was possible even two years ago, and the CPU you picked won't even be able to keep up.

Clock speed is more important than number of cores. More cores let you multi-task more effectively, but they won't speed you up at all! Higher clock speed means faster, period. Unfortunately, the cheapest i7 I can recommend costs more than my entire computer did, so I can't recommend any i7. If you're willing to rethink your whole system, check out the AMD Phenom2s. They're built on the same 45nm technology, and they're much cheaper. The drawback is you need to pick a new motherboard.

[Scott]

Don't get that case. Aside from it being pretty ugly, it doesn't seem to have any serious consideration for heat dissipation. It has fans, but their placement is not well thought out.

I got this Rosewill case, and it's superior to your case for a number of reasons. Here's a few that come to mind:

• Price. A case is just a metal box. There's no reason to spend $200 on one.
• It comes with fans already installed. Not those dinky 90mm fans with open bearings that turn in to noisemakers after 3 months, but high quality, large fans. They don't make a peep, and they won't start doing so any time soon.
• Dust screens. There's nothing I hate more than cleaning dust out of my computer. This case catches the dust before it ever gets in to the case.
• The case is designed to bring cool air from the side directly on to the CPU. Keeping a high end CPU cool is difficult without liquid cooling, and this is one of the few cases I've seen that can do it effectively.
• Installation is a breeze. I normally don't recommend getting a case with these quick-install tabs because they aren't secure, and a rattling harddrive can become a broken harddrive very quickly, but this one is built to last.
• It comes with an accessory case that fits right in the drive bay. Very convenient for storing extra screws, cables, etc.

[Scott]

You definitely don't need that Killer Xeno Pro, since any motherboard already has all of the things on that card.

Why do you want a sound card? Unless you're going to be seriously mixing your own music, or you require some special input that you can only get on a sound card, there's no reason to get one. The integrated sound card in your motherboard is perfectly capable of playing sound.

Overall, I'd say you did a pretty good job of matching up compatible parts, but your budget is alarmingly high. Remember that no matter what you buy, it's going to be obsolete in 2 years. It's better to spend less money now and save your cash for an upgrade in a year or two. For example, if you decide to go with the i7 you picked out, you could get the best i7 available today for the same price in 2 years. The price of both combined would still be less than if you spent $1000 on the high end one today.

[Scott]

Don't forget to buy thermal compund! Scrape the stuff that comes on the cpu off, it's usually pretty poor compound. Be careful though, you can damage the CPU if you're not.

For reference, here's what I picked out to build my computer:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811147038 case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103471 AMD Phenom II 940 X4 (3GHz, 4 cores)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131367 Asus M4N72-E (doesn't have DDR3, but RAM wasn't a bottleneck in my case)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127398 MSI 9400 GT (doesn't support SLI, despite reviewers saying they're using it in SLI; it has no bridge connector)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182044 Rosewill 500W PSU (fewew power cables means less mess)

[John]

The fans I pointed to were fantastic camel, and the thermal compound is also nice.

I found a motherboard half the cost with the same specs from Gigabyte, eVGA is ok, but nothing special. Asus and Gigabyte are the only two companies I'll buy a motherboard from now

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128362

[Scott]

I didn't mean to make any jabs at the fans you linked to, John. I meant that the fans that normally come pre-installed in cases are smurf. Rosewill is guilty too, but the particular case I'm referring to is excellent.

[John]

I didn't mean to make any jabs at the fans you linked to, John. I meant that the fans that normally come pre-installed in cases are smurf. Rosewill is guilty too, but the particular case I'm referring to is excellent.

Im slowly replacing all fans with those. They seem to be much quieter, and keep my case nice and cool. Plus they don't have lights so I can actually sleep with the PC on.

[John]

Found a nice video card for a good price.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102809

Thats basically 2 video cards in one. Crossfired together. Given a crossfire board, you could essentially put two of these badboys crossfired for quadfire. :-P