Best Spec for a Gaming PC

[SuSHiNiNJA]

Hi, i'm brand new to this forum

i know some of you will concider me a geekchick for this question
but i just like to enjoy a good game on my spare time rather than get annoyed by my boyfriend so i wanted to buy a new gaming PC because mine is getting abit outdated, and i want to get a good outcome from the money i'll spend on the box, as well as to hope it will serve me for the next few years without the need of adding or replacing anything anymore.
so..

I recenetly got myself a new gaming PC, haven't ordered it yet, just made the build for it.
but i still have some questions about it as i was recommended on a few pointers that i might want to change so i had just a few primary questions that i wanted to ask you for.

My current spec that i am ordering is this :

MainBoard : Intel Sandusky 945PSNLK
CPU : Intel P-Dual 3GHz
Memory : 1GB DDR2 Geil Dual Kit.
Storage : two WD 250GB HDDs SATA II
GFX card : pcx7900GTX DDR3 512MB 256Bit card with imp clock speed (don't remember what speed exactly).
Sound Card : Creative X-Fi Fatality full bundle
CDROM : Dual Layer DVDRW
Case : Asus Vento 3600
WaterCooling system : ThermalTake Aquarius III (already had that on my priveous machine).
Mouse : mx518 Logitech
Monitor : Toshiba 32' plazma monitor.
-----------------------------------------------
this is the spec right now.
i had a few pointers that i wanted to ask
but first i would like to get some recommendations about the spec i have now,
is it any good or i should concider changing some hardware?

about the questions..
well, i know that AMD is an all-out-better machine than intel when it comes to gaming and gfx processing in general. but i know that it's very hard to pick a good amd + mainboard combo as they overheat quite much if you don't make the right choice, what you think i should go with?

2nd question is about the SLI techonlogy. not ashamed to say that at this subject i have no clue how SLI works and what exactly it does , only thing i can figure out (i think) is that it takes all the GPU usage from one card and balancing it out 50/50 between the two SLI-Ready cards that i'll be using.
in that case, what mainboard should i best pick and can i use the gfx card that i want to buy (pcx7900gtx) as SLI and if so then how exactly it will improve my gaming experience.

another question about the gfx card is what is the best chipset that goes now with the 7900 series and what's the best mainboad combo for that card.

that's about it i think.

feel free to send any recommendations and whatever else you might want to say. all your advices are welcome and thank you very much.

forgot to add a question about the watercooling
my last mainboard , Asus P4S800D , was burned because of the major overheating in the CPU area.
iwas using thermaltake AQuarius III on it and seemed to not just overheat, but totally burn my transistors on the CPU area, even the back of the MB was all brownblackish and crispy
i was told that i might have used too much thermal glue when i placed the waterblock on it.
im not sure it's true but that kinda makes me to be afraid to use that Aquarius III again on the new box ill get.
are there any other alternatives like a water cooled fan or something?
the reason i liked the aquarius is cuz it was silent 90% but it's hard to keep up with replacing water all the time when im not at home often and my PC is running, as well as spending tons of anti-freeze coolant on it. which btw never seemed to help.
are there are other alternatives for a good cooling on the CPU? even if it will make abit more noise.
maybe there's some good Case that can down the noise level abit?

thanks,
Alysia.

[saphalline]

i just like to enjoy a good game on my spare time rather than get annoyed by my boyfriendHahahahaaa! I think you'll fit right in here. ;) :p

Ok, first of all, I have to get on my soap box and talk about the plans that Intel has for Q3. You may have seen Intel's new Core Duo and Core Solo CPU's that have been appearing laptops lately, as well as the new Macs (like the Mac mini). These are all an appetizer for the desktop versions that Intel will be releasing in the next couple of months. These new CPU's are much cooler, use less energy, and beat the P4's and PD's in performance. My first suggestion is to wait for these new CPU's before making the plunge on a new Intel gaming system. Or go with AMD, as they just released their new CPU's/platform (Socket AM2).

As for AMD CPU's overheating, I'm not really sure where you heard that. It's true that the top AMD and Intel CPU's are similar in heat dissipation, but the lower speed AMD CPU's produce much less heat than similar Intel CPU's. Usually when a rumour is going around about a CPU that tends to overheat, the problem is with the overall system cooling or an installation error. CPU's don't overheat by themselves using the stock cooler. Something else has to cause it. This can happen to any CPU, from a Pentium D to an Athlon64 to a PPC G5. If you don't keep the system cool, the CPU can't keep itself cool.

Yes, NVidia's SLI technology and ATI's CrossFire technology both use two vid cards to increase graphical power. The rendering load is shared by both vid cards in a variety of ways, such as top-half/bottom-half or tile-based or whatever. While SLI and CrossFire differ in a number of technical ways, the end result is the same - you need two identical vid cards for the most efficient increase in graphical power. The way you get there is up to you, but keep in mind that both technologies are expensive to say the least. One high-end vid card is expensive enough, but two!? You can easily drop over $1000 USD just on the vid cards, which is amusing considering I can configure an entire budget gaming system for that price. Taking advantage of this is up to you, but being prepared for it (by buying an SLI or CrossFire capable mobo) is relatively cheap. $50-75 more on a mobo is all it takes...

There's not really a best chipset for a vid card as much as there's a best chipset for an overall CPU platform. However, I will say that pairing an ATI vid card with an SLI mobo, or pairing an NVidia vid card with a CrossFire mobo, are both silly things to do. ;) In terms of what's hot right now on Intel's side of things, the i975X chipset takes the cake. Impressive specs, all-out features, and a price tag to match make the i975X the supreme ruler of Intel land. Now that also means this will change once the Core CPU's are released, but it holds the crown for the time being. AMD's new platform move to DDR2 support means that a new wave of NVidia chipsets was also released. The new NForce 590 SLI is half of the latest high-end offering for AMD CPU's, while ATI's CrossFire XPress 3200 is the other half. (Who would have thought that NVidia and ATI would be fighting two wars? :p) Both chipsets offer some impressive features and represent the best of AMD's new platform.

The top GPU right now is NVidia's GeForce 7900 GTX, and the top VPU right now is ATI's Radeon X1900 XTX. (I've always wondered if ATI meant to have 3 X's in there...) But that's not to say that the next step down isn't worth it. The GeForce 7900 GT and Radeon X1900 XT are also quite powerful with slightly lower price tags. And the slightly lower price tags might be worth it for anyone considering SLI or CrossFire...

If you were using that water-cooling kit for your last system, then I'd say the mobo turned crispy on you because of inadequate system cooling. The CPU was cooled by external means, but the rest of the system also produces an appreciable amount of heat. If you aren't moving cool air into your case and exhausting hot air, then your mobo and vid card and hard drive and PSU are all going to burn themselves up. Water-cooling is nice for the silence and OC'ing potential, but you still need a fan or two for other components in your case. Those Asus Vento 3600 cases have a lot of cooling potential, so that's good. You just have to round out the package with a high quality PSU, a couple quiet 80mm fans up front, and maybe some more help (http://www.xoxide.com/sounabmat.html) with sound dampening. :cool: I'd recommend using your water-cooling kit at first to see if it works for you, but if not, the best CPU HSF units in terms of both cooling performance and silence are going to be Zalman units (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835118221) (and look! it matches your Fatal1ty X-Fi! :D).

The current specs for your system could use some tweaking, but I'm sure I've given you plenty to think about already! :rolleyes: You need to finalize your platform and overall cooling strategy before we can nit-pick about part numbers, so I'll leave that for later. In the mean time, if you're serious about an all-out gaming machine, look around some more at Xoxide (www.xoxide.com) and do some research on the Logitech G5 mouse. ;) Happy hunting...