Decent Gaming rig

[habbilisimo]

Guys;

About to place an order for this custom built system.

The tech at the local shop we go through has recommended this
I want xHD Capabilities to go with my Sharp 45" LCD TV, 1920 x 1080i.
I also want it to function as a HTPC as well.

AMD Athlon 64bit X2 Dual Core 4800 $950
DFI LP UT NF4 SLI-DR VENUS S939 $439
2x 512MB XFX 7900GTX Extreme Graphics cards $845 x 2
1 x BFG Physxs Card $489
2 x W.D. 8M SATA 250gig HDD $125 x 2
2 x 2GB Corsair DDR400 RAM $265 x 2
1x 16x Lite-on DVD DL $99
1 x Sound Blaster X-Fi Elite PRO $799
1 x Thermal take Mozart Case with Media LAB VC4001SNS $499
1 x HD TV TUNER $99
1 x MS “Elite” Bluetooth Keyboard & Mouse $168

All prices are in AUS $.

I have a high end surround sound built into the theatre room already.

Any advice, additions suggestions please let me know.

 

[sandmannight]

Decent...hahaha....Try top of the line 8)

 

[smedlin]

Why not get some raptors? If not, atlease get a hard drive with 16M cache

 

[clue69less]

AMD Athlon 64bit X2 Dual Core 4800 $950
DFI LP UT NF4 SLI-DR VENUS S939 $439
2x 512MB XFX 7900GTX Extreme Graphics cards $845 x 2
1 x BFG Physxs Card $489
Any advice, additions suggestions please let me know.

Are you planning to overclock? If not, then you might find a different mobo to be more user-friendly. If you are going to OC, then I'd go for 500MHz RAM. Why the Physix card? If you don't need it for gaming, you might be better off spending those bucks on huge hard drives instead because it's easy to fill drives fast by recording TV, especially if you record in HD. I don't see a power supply listed? Driving all that stuff, you might want to go with a monster like the PCP&C 1KW. Those 7900GTX's will flatten most "large" units.

 

[smedlin]

Those 7900GTX's will flatten most "large" units.

I've got two 7900GTX's....using a TT 550W ps. Powers it like a champ.

 

[only_me]

AMD Athlon 64bit X2 Dual Core 4800 $950
DFI LP UT NF4 SLI-DR VENUS S939 $439
2x 512MB XFX 7900GTX Extreme Graphics cards $845 x 2
1 x BFG Physxs Card $489
2 x W.D. 8M SATA 250gig HDD $125 x 2
2 x 2GB Corsair DDR400 RAM $265 x 2
1x 16x Lite-on DVD DL $99
1 x Sound Blaster X-Fi Elite PRO $799
1 x Thermal take Mozart Case with Media LAB VC4001SNS $499
1 x HD TV TUNER $99
1 x MS “Elite” Bluetooth Keyboard & Mouse $168

Change the cpu for an opty 170 or 175, you will be able to overclock to fx-60 levels for a lot less, and change the hard drives to ones with 16m cache.

 

[clue69less]

Those 7900GTX's will flatten most "large" units.

I've got two 7900GTX's....using a TT 550W ps. Powers it like a champ.

It would be interesting to measure the current draw vs. time for your two boards. One mobo engineer I talked to said that he thinks that 7900GTX's made recently have a more punishing startup power demand than the first ones he looked at. How long have you had your two? Weird how your 550watt PS can run two but my 620 couldn't run even one. Not all watts are equal.

 

[smedlin]

Those 7900GTX's will flatten most "large" units.

I've got two 7900GTX's....using a TT 550W ps. Powers it like a champ.

It would be interesting to measure the current draw vs. time for your two boards. One mobo engineer I talked to said that he thinks that 7900GTX's made recently have a more punishing startup power demand than the first ones he looked at. How long have you had your two? Weird how your 550watt PS can run two but my 620 couldn't run even one. Not all watts are equal.

Hmm..I guess I've had them about 2 months now. I built my rig right when they came out on the market.

I've got a thermaltake 550W truepower psu. As far as I know, I've never hd a problem with it (I'm even oc'd 10%).

After I did some slight over clocking, I ran 3dmark06 4 times in a row, back to back, with asus prob going at the same time, checking the temps and volts. It had no problems.

The ONLY time I've raised an eyebrow is while playing FEAR. Every once in awhile, my rig would simply power down. However, I found out I was not using the some of the latest drivers, updated those, and never had a problem again. So I'm pretty sure it was not the power supply.

However, having said that...thermaltake and FPS make a dedicated gpu power supply. If I ever find one on the market, I'll probalby pick on up.

 

[yourmothersanastronaut]

If you're going for a home theatre PC, avoid the high-RPM Raptor and SCSI drives. Get some higher-capacity 16MB cache drives instead. HD recorded movies take up a lot of space, so you may want some extra capacity drives, maybe two 400 or 500 GBs.

 

[waylander]

I have to ask whether this is a joke or not... as a gaming rig that is excellent but as a HTPC... wtf.

It looks like you just went out and tried to find the most expensive products and put them together as a joke to make the rest of us feel silly.

That thing will sound like a jet engine in your living room so if you're serious and you have that much cash to burn then invest $500 on a water cooling system.

 

[ajmueller]

I have to ask whether this is a joke or not... as a gaming rig that is excellent but as a HTPC... wtf.

It looks like you just went out and tried to find the most expensive products and put them together as a joke to make the rest of us feel silly.

That thing will sound like a jet engine in your living room so if you're serious and you have that much cash to burn then invest $500 on a water cooling system.

I agree. I say drop the PhysX card (maybe even the second 7900 GTX) and get a good water cooling system. I don't have any experience with water cooling, so I can't recommend one system over another.

I recommend dropping the second 7900 GTX for two reasons:
1) save a LOT of money
2) it doesn't add a lot to performance.

Your current configuration minus the PhysX card and second video card will run any current game at max res. Plus with water cooling you could overclock the one 7900 and get even better framerates. You'll want to get a new DX10 card when they come out next year anyways...

 

[clue69less]

However, having said that...thermaltake and FPS make a dedicated gpu power supply. If I ever find one on the market, I'll probalby pick on up.

Thanks for the specifics. BTW, I had considered a GPU specific PS also. It could come to that.