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So I just spent a few hours researching and compiling a list for a new computer. My current computer is ancient and it's about time I got a new one for college and stuff anyways.
Intel® Core™ 2 Duo E8400
DDR2 4GB PC6400 DUAL LLK PATRIOT
WESTERN DIGITAL 320GB SERIAL ATA/300 16MB BUFFER
MSI P45 Neo-F Intel Socket 775 Motherboard MS7519-010
EVGA 9600GT 512MB PCI-Express Video Card
Thermaltake SopranoRS101 Computer Tower Case with 430W PSU
SONY 20x Internal Dual layer DVD-/+RW Drive
Thermaltake TR2 M21 RX Socket 775 Cooler
Total is around 600 dollars. Should I make any changes or cut out anything? Is 4gb ram too much? is 430W power supply enough? I'll be using my computer for gaming, work, video editing and photo editing.
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Q6600 beats the E8400 for video editing and photo editing I think. It's about 20 dollars more on newegg I think. If you're going to buy 4GBs of RAM make sure you have a 64bit version of Windows. 430W Power Supply should be fine.
What types of games are you planning on playing?
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Uhm I want to play cod 4 and 5, GTA 4, SC2 (duh), medieval total war 2 and Empire: total war.
edit: why do you need 64bit windows for 4gb ram?
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I would go for the E8500, which is a bit more expensive, but better at gaming. It beats out the Q6600 in gaming regard, but is worse at basically everything else. It also overclocks very well if that is your thing. Personally I would go for the HD4850 because it is cheap and a very powerful card. Basically my two bits.
EDIT: Vista 32bit only supports 3GB of RAM, if you put in 4 it will show up as 3. Also 64bit will run newer games better.
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The 9600GT should be fine for those games but I would suggest you just buy a ATi 4850 for a little bit more money. The 4850 is far better.
You need a 64bit version of windows because the 32bit only recognizes 2.5 or 3.25GBs or something. I don't remember the exact number.
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On February 11 2009 14:19 emperorchampion wrote:
I would go for the E8500, which is a bit more expensive, but better at gaming. It beats out the Q6600 in gaming regard, but is worse at basically everything else. It also overclocks very well if that is your thing. Personally I would go for the HD4850 because it is cheap and a very powerful card. Basically my two bits.
EDIT: Vista 32bit only supports 3GB of RAM, if you put in 4 it will show up as 3. Also 64bit will run newer games better.
Don't get the E8500. It's the exact same thing as the E8400 but they just changed the frequency a bit in the BIOS to make it run at 3.16GHz instead of 3.0GHz. You could just go straight into the BIOS after buying the E8400 and clocking it to the same exact speed and saving yourself some money. But I still suggest getting the Q6600 and just overclocking that to 3.0GHz (Anyone who is anyone does this with this CPU because it's a magnificent overclocker.)
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You actually can use more than 4 GB total on 32-bit Windows. I'd have to google for how, but I know it can be done with some sort of memory address tweak.
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On February 11 2009 14:48 Ingenol wrote:
You actually can use more than 4 GB total on 32-bit Windows. I'd have to google for how, but I know it can be done with some sort of memory address tweak.
No. Just no.
Back on topic-
430-w supply is enough for that rig. Pretty sure the rig doesn't even use 400w....
IMO gigabyte ep45-ds3l for mobo. Better performance for price. Also get some better/cheaper aftermarket cooler and downgrade the e8400. Get like the e5200 or something. You save like a hundred or so which can be put into a decent graphics card. Much much cheaper and with and aftermarket cooling solution would be easy to clock up to e8xxx levels. I recommend any cheap xigmatek.
Upgrade to HD Radeon 4850 for graphics. Total comes out to 600-700 range.
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On February 11 2009 14:48 Ingenol wrote:
You actually can use more than 4 GB total on 32-bit Windows. I'd have to google for how, but I know it can be done with some sort of memory address tweak.
Yes, it's called PAE, but there are 3 drawbacks of it. a) It's slightly slower, b) it makes each process using it consume a bit more RAM, and c) a single process still can't access more than 4 GB at once. This is due to the added overhead of the operating system creating a page table to map 4 GB of memory (the maximum 32bit apps can access) into different portions of your larger system RAM. No app can use more then 4 GB at once, but several apps can use different 4 GBs of RAM, so at least all of your RAM can be used with PAE (but a single 32bit process still can't).
But really, it's more like a crutch. Get a 64bit system 
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or you could build a phenom II system. i'd still take the e8400 over the e8500 but if you want to get a quad your definitely going to have to go AMD.
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The phenom II looks like a nice cpu for now, but it cannot support DDR3. The intel E and Q series can, as well as the core i7. If you DO plan on going for quad core and ddr3 try the core i7 920 it comes at 2.66ghz with a 1meg L2 and 8meg L3 cashe, the phenom II only comes with the 6mdg L3 cashe. But tbh the E8400 is going to be plenty of power for you. Oh, and as for a psu if you want to upgrade try this one here. It is 575W sli ready for 32$ I had one in my last build.
Edit: Another thing is that I can agree about the 9800GT, it is not as powerful as the 4850 and come at right about the same price.
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On February 11 2009 15:32 Fangster wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2009 14:48 Ingenol wrote:
You actually can use more than 4 GB total on 32-bit Windows. I'd have to google for how, but I know it can be done with some sort of memory address tweak. No. Just no. Back on topic- 430-w supply is enough for that rig. Pretty sure the rig doesn't even use 400w.... IMO gigabyte ep45-ds3l for mobo. Better performance for price. Also get some better/cheaper aftermarket cooler and downgrade the e8400. Get like the e5200 or something. You save like a hundred or so which can be put into a decent graphics card. Much much cheaper and with and aftermarket cooling solution would be easy to clock up to e8xxx levels. I recommend any cheap xigmatek. Upgrade to HD Radeon 4850 for graphics. Total comes out to 600-700 range.
http://home.comcast.net/~SupportCD/XPMyths.html
I was surprised when I learned this as well, but if you enable PAE you can in fact go beyond the 4GB system RAM limit imposed by default in 32-bit systems.
Granted, now that the 64-bit drivers are more robust, and that there are some drawbacks to PAE, there's probably no good reason not to go 64-bit.
Edit: whoops, didn't see someone else had already posted about it. :D
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EPT![[image loading]](http://img261.imageshack.us/img261/287/1233826773975ws7.png)
