New PC time

gti138

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Adelaide, Australia
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I've been hanging onto the old desktop box for what seems years - Athlon XP 2600+ based system.

Anyhow it's time for me to go out and build a new PC - despite working in IT I haven't kept in touch with what's the goods in the retail PC market for a while..

What I'm looking at the moment is the following:

Intel Core 2 Quad Q9450
Asus P5Q Pro Mainboard
Gskill 2x2GB kit DDR2 1066
2x Samsung 640GB HD642JJ HDD's (running in RAID 1)
Gigabyte 9600GT 512Mb
Pioneer SATA DVD/RW

all wrapped up in a Thermaltake Matrix case w/- 430 watt PSU

I'm not a huge gameplayer (still play GP4 with the 2007 season update on it though) so blistering graphics arent a huge priority - I will be doing some video editing though

Any thoughts on the above? If all goes to plan I'm going to head out and get it all in a day or so.

My budget is around A$1100 for the box....
 
I'd get a Higher wattage PSU 550+
 
I'd get a really good PSU @450 Watts...
And right now, if if you are an ATI Hater, you gotta go for a 4850... or 4870.
 
Replace the Samsung 640GB HDDs with Western Digital 640GB HDDs (they're just as fast as my Raptor). And like Buba said, ditch the 9600GT and get a 4850.
 
The Samsung & WD HDDs are both two platter drives so there shouldn't be a great difference.
A 550 watt PSU is overkill 400 watt is more than enough (i'd recommend corsair) and i agree on the 4850.

I've build myself something similar (Q9450/8800GT) 2 month ago to replace my AMD64 3200+/7800GT system and sometimes i'm still surprised how much faster it is. You'll have fun doing video editing with it.
 
ditch the 9600gt, samsung crap hdd and the puny 430w PSU

instead.. get the Hd4850+Seagate hdd and a 500+W PSU
 
Sounds like a good built, the Q9450 is blazing fast. I wish I can afford it too, I just ordered the older gen Q6600. Anyways, since your motherboard supports Crossfire but not SLI, I would suggest the HD4850 too. If that's a bit too expensive, at least get the HD3870 so you can add another one in Crossfire if you decide to play more games.
 
ditch the ..... the puny 430w PSU

Why? The whole computer will draw no more than 200 Watts. Ever.

EDIT: However, don't get a crap Thermalfake PSU.... get a seasonic or corsair or antec (all rebadged seasonics)
 
Why? The whole computer will draw no more than 200 Watts. Ever.

EDIT: However, don't get a crap Thermalfake PSU.... get a seasonic or corsair or antec (all rebadged seasonics)

why? because when you add in another gfx card or more hdds in the future, you won't have to worry about buying another psu.

A good 500+W psu isnt expensive anymore, so why not spend a few more bucks and get a good, solid psu?
 
Why? The whole computer will draw no more than 200 Watts. Ever.

I hate oversized PSUs but 200 watt is too low.
My PC uses ~130 watt idling and ~250 watt while running 3dmark06 (Q9450/8800GT/2xHDD/7xCasefan/DVB-C card/DVD-RW)

Don't get a PSU that comes with the case, those are 99% crap. Seasonic, Corsair,Tagan are all ok imho just stay away from BeQuiet they all die because of crappy fans.
 
Just to be on the safe side you should get a 450-500Watt PSU. any of the manufacturers fluke667 said are very nice. Also i agree...ditch the 9600 and get yourself a 4850. In any other aspect it is very nice!!!
 
Thanks guys - I'll probably get the new PSU after SWMBO gets over the shock of me actually buying a new pc - (give it a few weeks)

I'll look at the ATI card - but I'd almost guarantee there's no chance of me running dual's in the future as I just don't play that many games.

At the moment my focus is on a good CPU and RAM so I can do video editing etc. I think the Q9450 fits the bill there :)

Should go pick up all the bits tomorrow or thursday (when I can get down to the store)

I'm going with the Matrix case as it's one of the least "wanky" looking cases I could see. I don't want windows, cold cathodes etc I just want something to hold the bits together effectively.

One last Q - Vista Ultimate x64 or x32? I'm leaning towards x64 but am thinking I could even dual-boot both - seems like an unnecessary PITA though!
 
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About PSU power, remember that PSU's dont have 100% efficiency, so a 500w PSU is never going to supply 500w to the system. I'd say just get a 500w from a quality maker and you are set for a while.

And definately get a ATI 4850 card, cheap, fast and with sound over HDMI, great for a 2nd monitor with HDMI or a LCD HDTV.
 
Efficiency isn't how much it gives, but how much it gives relative to power drawn. However, it is true that low-end manufacturers overrate their power. For instance, a cheap 600w PSU may struggle to provide half or three-quarters of its rated output.

Corsair, Enermax, OCZ, Seasonic (who make Corsair), PC Power & Cooling, all make good stable units. I'm a bit partial to Enermax. I've got one and it's a right old war horse. If you'll give us a price figure to work around, we'll help pick a good PSU.
 
I can vouch for SeaSonics reliability. One of my friends had a 420w that he bought in 2003 and up until a week ago was using it to run 7 hard drives, an E6300 and an 8800GTS 320m.
 
I thought Vista Ultimate came with two discs, one 32-bit and the other 64-bit. Maybe that's on the retail version. Either way the key works with both versions.
 
Other than a few server OS's, 32-bit operating systems have no way of using more than 2gigs. It is an architectural limit that prevents it from reading memory addresses above a certain range. There are a few tricks you can do to have 3gigs show up in your system properties (PAE, /3G, etc.), but it still won't actually use more than 2gigs.

The retail packaging of Vista Ultimate is supposed to have both 32-bit and 64-bit discs, if you buy any of the other versions and want x64 you can go here and have a disc sent to you for shipping costs (mine was $10 in US).

Also, here's my $.02 as far as a good PSU is concerned: <3 Antec
 
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