Motherboard suggestions for build virgin

[mhawk05]

Hey everyone, thanks in advance for the help.

I am getting ready to start my first build. I use my PC mostly for media (TV, music), games, and a little bit of work.

I am planning on putting in a Q6600, 2gb 1033 RAM, a couple SATA drives, a DVD RW, a tv tuner, wireless network card, and fan controller in.

When funds become available in the future I will be putting an 8800 VC in. I dont really care about a graphics card at the moment (will prob just go buy something cheap for the time being, or use an old card).

I can find my way around most of the components just fine I just dont know a thing about motherboards. Could anyone help me out with some suggestions?

 

[chookman]

GA-P35-DS3L for non raid
GA-P35-DS3R for raid

Id suggest not getting "1033" RAM which im sure you mean 1066mhz... just get a good 800mhz set

 

[akhilles]

Depending on what games you play, wait about a month more for 8800GT 256MB which is faster than 8800GTS & MAYBE cheaper.

Do you overclock? Is it MATX or ATX?

 

[mhawk05]

GA-P35-DS3L for non raid
GA-P35-DS3R for raid

Id suggest not getting "1033" RAM which im sure you mean 1066mhz... just get a good 800mhz set

I was under the impression that you should try to match your bus and memory speeds.

 

[mhawk05]

akhilles,

I will keep an eye out for that. I will be using ATX and I will prob try some overclocking at some point in the future.

 

[chookman]

I was under the impression that you should try to match your bus and memory speeds.

This is the case but you are matching it with the wrong number. 1066 is FSB of the Q6600... Intel's architechure makes 1066 by what they call "quad pump" you might have heard of it, so this 1066 is divided by 4 = 267mhz. Then with DDR2 if we take a DDR2-533 part. The memory clock is 133mhz this is then doubled as its ddr 2... to give 266mhz that matches the FSB of the CPU.

Most people that say 1:1 FSB:CPU ratio is best which is synchronous, read/writes occur at the same frequency. Im not sure of much proof that this is better performance wise, however, with the C2D it has been found more than once to be the best way to overclock the CPU to greater heights.

Currently with the price difference between 1066 and 800 its not really worth it, especially if you are looking at an overclock of 1:1 with Q6600 one of the more common OC's is 3.2ghz (1600FSB at 8 multiplier) which has the cpu clock and ram at 400 a piece.

From benchmarks ive seen the only improvement in 1066 compared to 800 is in synthetic memory tests, all other tests dont really give any real world benefits.

 

[mhawk05]

Thanks alot Chookman. That will save some $$.