Another "Help me choose a new system" post!

[SciFiFan]

OK -- I need a bit of help choosing a new system, as always. Looking to build either of the following using parts purchased from Monarchcomputer.com. The common parts will be:

Thermaltake 600W power supply
Athlon 64 FX-60 Dual Core
2 Gig Corsair TWINX2048 3200C2PRO RAM
WD 150gig Raptor 10K Harddrive
Standard DVDRW and CDRW drives

Now, my choices are in the motherboard and videocard depts. I can either go with:

A8N32-SLI Deluxe nForce4 SLI
TWO eVGA 7800GTX 256MB

OR

ASUS A8R-MVP Crossfire
ONE Connect3D X1900XT 512MB and
ONE Connect3D X1900XTX 512MB

Price is roughly the same, give or take about $200 for the Crossfire setup and perhaps limited availability. Thanks in advance for any suggestions!!

SciFiFan

 

[SciFiFan]

Forgot to mention that the system will be used primarily to play graphic-intensive upcoming games such as Elder Scrolls Oblivion. Thanks!

 

[a1ien]

prozac is right about how the two X1900's will kill two 7800GTX's. However, you may want to read about the Asus A8R - MVP:

Here's a review:
http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2617

If you do decide to go the Crossfire route. Asus just released it's A8R32 - MVP and a few other companies are soon to follow with motherboards based on the Socket 939 and the ATI RD580 chip.

http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2703

Although there won't be an enormous amount of choices among motherboards supporting both the ATI RD580 chip and Socket 939 since it seems like quite a few companies are skipping the Socket939 and waiting for the AM2 to be released.

All your other specs seem top tier, nice job. 8)

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I hope this helps.

 

[SciFiFan]

Thanks for the responses so far!

Actually, I had read that article by Anandtech, but wasn't quite clear of the difference between the A8R and the A8R32, except where overclocking was concerned. I haven't had much success in that area and, so, wasn't planning on overclocking anyway.

Sounds like the X1900's are the way to go for now. I had thought about waiting; however, if you wait for one thing, you end up waiting forever. And, with my current PC (which hasn't been upgraded in years), I think I've waited long enough and am justified in spending what I will with this. 😀