New PC Questions

[gordonbombay1]

I just finished college and am getting a new desktop to replace the laptop I brought back and forth to school. I didn't feel like putting the whole thing together myself, so I configured one on ibuypower.com, which I plan to swap parts in and out of in the future (3+ yeas from now with what I've got in this beast).

My first question is if it matters at all that I went with a AMD CPU and a nVidia card? It's been a while since I've dealt with computer hardware, I'm assuming its still okay to mix and match companies even though AMD owns ATI now.

My second question is whether or not I need to "break the computer in"? My buddy told me I shouldn't be testing out how well I run Crysis on day 1. If true, how should I go about breaking the computer in?

My third question is how much of the 750watt power supply should I expect to use, given my build?


Case ( [New !!!] Zalman GS1000 Full Tower Gaming Case w/420W Power Supply Black )
Case Lighting ( None )
Power Supply ( [$30 OFF Mail-In Rebate] 750 Watt -- Thermaltake Toughpower W0117RU Power Supply Quad SLI Ready )
Processor ( [== Quad Core ==] AMD Phenom™ II X4 940 Black Edition Quad-Core CPU w/ HyperTransport Technology )
Processor Cooling ( [$10 OFF Mail-In Rebate] Thermaltake V1 CPU Cooling Fan System Kit Silent & Overclocking Proof = Maximum cooling efficiency for quietness and performance )
Motherboard ( Asus M3A78-CM AMD 780V/SB700 Chipset w/Integrated ATI video, 8-channels, Gb LAN, S-ATA Raid, USB 2.0, Single PCI-E MB )
Memory ( 4 GB [2 GB X2] DDR2-1066 PC2 8500 Memory Module Corsair Dominator )
Video Card ( [$60 OFF Mail-In Rebate] NVIDIA GeForce GTX 285 2GB w/DVI + TV Out Video )
Video Card Brand ( === High Performance === eVGA Brand Video Card Powered by NVIDIA )
Free Game for ATI Video Card ( [Free Game] - Stormrise Free with purchase of ATI Radeon HD Video Card )
Hard Drive ( 1 TB HARD DRIVE [Serial-ATA-II, 3Gb, 7200 RPM, 16M Cache] )

$1400 shipped

thanks for any help!

 

[aford10]

Yes, it's fine to mix manufacturers parts, as long as the board will support what you are looking to add.

You don't need to 'break in' the pc. You can run full settings from the start.

At peak, you will use ~400w

 

[mindless728]

you won't need a GTX285 with 2GB of memory, step back to the 1GB (unless running 2x30" monitors, then you would still need a lot more horsepower)