Sylvainp Posted October 4, 2007 Share Posted October 4, 2007 Hi all, I did a bit on my research to build my new PC. This is going to be my second PC build. Here is what i'm planned to buy, any comments, suggestion or recommendation for any parts in my build will be very appreciated ! - Intel Quad core Q6600 - Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme - 120mm FAN (Probably Scynthe E or F model depends on noise) - 680i or a P35 chipset motherboard,can't decide yet ! - 2 GB Corsair Dominator 8500 C5D - XFX 8800 Ultra - CoolerMaster Cosmos 1000 - Ultra X3 1000 - Creative X-fi Fatality FPS(have already) - Raptor 150 Gig - WD SATA II 500 (WD5000AAKS) - Plextor PX-716A(have already) - Another DVD-ROM - Klipsch Promedia 5.1 Ultra (have already) - Viewsonic VP2030B (have already) Now I want to OC this baby by raising the CPU to 3.0 Ghz or more. This is where i'm a bit confused now will the memory speed rating. I'm not sure but I think that the Q6600 is running at a FSB of 266 x 9 = 2394 I was checking the Corsair Dominator 8500 2GB or maybe the 4 GB kit is it overkill ? What 8500 mean ? 8500/8 = 1062.5 / 4 = 262.5 FSB ? According to the specs of these memory they will run at 5-5-5-15 at FSB 266 So it actually at the same speed as the Q6600 FSB of 266 mhz right ? So now how will I OC the memory and the CPU ? At what timing these memory will be to get the Q6600 at 3.0Ghz or more ? i also ask myself if I will go in SLI later but this is a major question because if I want to go with 2 8800 GTX later then I need to go with a 680I chipset. But if I stick to use only one 8800 GTX then I can also go with a P35 chipset. I have an 19" LCD monitor and it native resolution is 1600 x 1200 so i'm planning to play all my games in that resolution with all the graphics settings to MAX details (World in Conflict, Guild wars, GTR 2). Will I benefit from SLI in that resolution ? Is the P35 chipset better than the 680i ? Is their any other Corsair memory model I should consider to check for what I want to do with my PC ? Thanks alot to all people to help me out on my new PC build ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DerekT Posted October 4, 2007 Share Posted October 4, 2007 I'm not sure but I think that the Q6600 is running at a FSB of 266 x 9 = 2394CorrectI was checking the Corsair Dominator 8500 2GB or maybe the 4 GB kit is it overkill ? What 8500 mean ? 8500/8 = 1062.5 / 4 = 262.5 FSB ?Almost Correct. Rated RAM speed is 2 times real / base RAM speed. Hence the term Double Data Rate (applies for DDR, DDR2, and DDR3.) PC-6400 is rated at 800mhz, hence it runs at 400mhz. PC-8500 is rated at 1066mhz, hence it runs at 533mhz. According to the specs of these memory they will run at 5-5-5-15 at FSB 266. So it actually at the same speed as the Q6600 FSB of 266 mhz right ?All Current Conroe processors run 266.5MHz x 4 = 1066MHz Front Side Bus (FSB). What makes this a little confusing is both the 266.5 part and the 1066 part are known to us as the Front Side Bus (FSB). In BIOS, the option you change to overclock (or underclock), is called the External Clock. The External Clock is adjustable in 1MHz increments, so 266.5 is now rounded off to 267MHz. Processor Core Speed is determined by the External Clock x the CPU Multiplier. In the case of the Q6600, it is 267 x 9 = 2403MHz = 2.4GHz. You can flip this equation around and determine the multi used for other processors. Say you’re wondering what multi the Q6600 uses. It is a 2.4GHz, 1066FSB processor. You know that 2.4GHz = 2400MHz and that 1066 / 4 = 266.5 (rounded off = 267). So if you divide 2400 / 267 = 6.966, that rounded off = 9. So a EQ600 runs 267 x 9 = 2400MHz. Let us take PC6400 DDR2 800MHz memory. There are two ways to figure out the actual rated memory speed in MHz. You can take the PC6400 number and divide by 16, 6400 / 16 = 400. Or you can take the DDR2 800 number and divide by 2, 800 / 2 = 400. DDR = Double Data Rate, two pieces of data transfer twice per cycle/strobe, so 400 x 2 = 800. But the memory really is rated to run 400MHz. This applies to all DDR memory, DDR1 as well as DDR2; the math is exactly the same. So we have a 267MHz FSB processor, but the memory is rated to run much faster, 400MHz. The solution is to select a memory ratio to speed up the memory in relation to the processor. With current BIOS revisions we have three real options in memory ratios, 1:1, 4:5, and 2:3. Maybe it helps to think of them as below:1:1 = 4:4 4:5 = 4:5 2:3 = 4:6 The slowest we can run the memory on a Core2 is 1:1, the other two ratios run the memory faster than the External Clock. To run PC6400 DDR2 800 at its rated speed when not overclocking you select the 2:3 ratio:267 / 2 = 133.50 x 3 = 400.50MHz memory speed The second available option is the 4:5 ratio: 267 / 4 = 66.75 x 5 = 333.75MHz memory speed The third available option is the 1:1 ratio:267 / 1 = 267 x 1 = 267MHz memory speed i also ask myself if I will go in SLI later but this is a major question because if I want to go with 2 8800 GTX later then I need to go with a 680I chipset. But if I stick to use only one 8800 GTX then I can also go with a P35 chipset.[/Quote] P35 runs a LOT cooler than 680i boards. P35 and X38 provide support for DDR3 memory (on P35 it is optional, on X38 DDR3 is mandatory). It can also hit high FSB speeds with less voltage tweaking compared to other chipsets. P35 natively supports upcoming Penryn CPUs. 6 SATA ports but NO PATA ports are available. P35 supports asymmetrical Crossfire with one 16x + one 4x video cards. P35 cannot do SLI. The upcoming X38 chipset will support x16 + x16 video, but will run as hot as the nVidia 680i. 680i provides a far more of PCI-E lanes (46 lanes) than P35 (22 lanes) and it can totally unlink the memory bus from the system FSB. This is is a great feature for those who want to eliminate memory bottlenecks from their overclocking efforts. The downside of all this performance is that the i680 runs very hot (both north and south bridge - MCP/SPP). When running at standard clocks, these chips can easily reach 60C and this is pretty high with stock passive cooling IF you are running a CPU fan that blows air toward the motherboard. If overclocking or using a 'tower' or liquid CPU cooler, active cooling is an absolute MUST (IMHO). 680i supports only symmetrical SLI with two x16 video cards. The 680i does NOT natively support the upcoming Penryn CPUs. I have an 19" LCD monitor and it native resolution is 1600 x 1200 so i'm planning to play all my games in that resolution with all the graphics settings to MAX details (World in Conflict, Guild wars, GTR 2). Will I benefit from SLI in that resolution ? I run an BFG 8800GTX OC with 610/2000 (slight overclock) and there is no game that I can't run. This includes the upcoming DX10 game, Crysis due in November. I have friends who are involved in the creation of this game (in EA Games Vancouver) and they assure me that my 24" Flat Panel and 1920 X 1600 will be fine with an 8800GTX. Is the P35 chipset better than the 680i ? Is their any other Corsair memory model I should consider to check for what I want to do with my PC ? I personally would go with the P35 and an ASUS P5K-E mainboard. There are just fewer issues and the chipset is newer with a greater FSB overclock and support of the newer CPUs. If you purchase a 680i with a view to an overclock, then you would do well with (in my opinion) the ASUS Striker and some extra cooling for the bridge chips. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sylvainp Posted October 4, 2007 Author Share Posted October 4, 2007 Wow ! thanks for all the info ! I will have to read it twice ! I was thinking about the Asus P5K Premium because i really think that finally a single 8800 GTX should be enough. I was planning to buy the Corsair Dominator 8500C5 2GB and I was wondering if these memory come with the FAN ? Also am i better to buy the Dominator 8500C5 of the 6400C4 ? Is 4GB of memory overkill ? Thanks ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DerekT Posted October 4, 2007 Share Posted October 4, 2007 Wow ! thanks for all the info ! I will have to read it twice ! I was thinking about the Asus P5K Premium because i really think that finally a single 8800 GTX should be enough. I was planning to buy the Corsair Dominator 8500C5 2GB and I was wondering if these memory come with the FAN ? Also am i better to buy the Dominator 8500C5 of the 6400C4 ? Is 4GB of memory overkill ? Thanks ! If you are going with 4GB, then I would go for the 4GB of 8500C5. With a fan the model is 8500C5DF. With 8500C5's you will be able to make 6400 speeds with 4GB. The P5K Premium is a bit overkill since the P35 chipset runs so cool, but it is a good board all around. You will need a 64bit Operating System such as VISTA 64 to access the entire 4GB for program and OS use. Otherwise, I would go with 2GB and personally I find 2GB just fine at this time. When the Intel Nehalem comes out and DDR3 is finally robust in the timings and VISTA 64 is fully hardware stable, then I will move to 4GB or 8GB. At this time, it is my opinion that 2GB and a 32 bit OS is enough. You would do fine with 2 X 6400C4: http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=85025-30 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sylvainp Posted October 4, 2007 Author Share Posted October 4, 2007 I have read that Corsair memory (Dominator or HDX) can intefere with some CPU heatsink. With an Asus P5K Premium, Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme Heat sink and the Corsair Dominator 8500C5D or the 6400C4 HDX will it clear and fit with this setup ? Can i also put the Corsair airflow fan ? Will everything clear ? Im also pretty sure that with the Coolermaster Cosmos 1000 I should also have clearance for the Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme in the case... Thanks again you have been very helpful and I really appreciated ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DerekT Posted October 4, 2007 Share Posted October 4, 2007 With an Asus P5K Premium, Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme Heat sink and the Corsair Dominator 8500C5D or the 6400C4 HDX will it clear and fit with this setup ? Can i also put the Corsair airflow fan ? Will everything clear ? http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e269/Ropey123/1-1.jpg It's tight but it does fit. Note the gaps between the fans and the heatsink. If you tape over the gaps and seal them you will increase airflow and air pressure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sylvainp Posted October 5, 2007 Author Share Posted October 5, 2007 Between these Corsair memory which one is better to use with the Intel Q6600 Quad core to overclock with only air cooling using a Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme heatsink ? Twin2X2048-6400C3DF (Dominator) TWIN2X2048-8500C5D (Dominator) TWIN2X2048-6400C4DHX I think that with the Q6600 I can reach 3.0 GHz easily by using the 9 x 333 FSB = 2997 Mhz or can I get higher with only air cooling ? I think that the lower latency the better so maybe I will get better performance by using the Twin2X2048-6400C3DF over the other 2 at this FSB settings right ? But they seems to be expensive ! Is it better to use 1:1 ratio to get better performance ? A few days ago I was thinking about buying the TWIN2X2048-8500C5D 5-5-5-15 (Dominator) but maybe the TWIN2X2048-6400C4DHX is a better choice because of the lower latency 4-4-4-12 ? Since the 6400 are DDR800 can I lower the latency timing if I only use them at DDR667 ? To be honest i'm a bit still confused.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DerekT Posted October 5, 2007 Share Posted October 5, 2007 I am working on a Quad Core (L627A950) as I write this. It is being tested for stability with Quad Prime95. I am running it at 3.4Ghz. With the Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme Heat sink and the Corsair Dominator 8500C5D. I would advise you to use the Corsair 8500C5 modules. They are very good and have a great headroom. Currently I am running them at 4-4-4-10 with 850Mhz. The 8500's (version 1.xxx) will reach lower latencies at 800Mhz than the 6400's and will reach a far higher throughput than the 6400's. http://i41.photobucket.com/albums/e269/Ropey123/Test2.jpg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sylvainp Posted October 5, 2007 Author Share Posted October 5, 2007 I will get 2 GB of Corsair 8500 C5D with the aeroflow fan unit. I was thinking about buying 4 Gb and use Windows Vista Ultimate Edition in 32 bits. But I have read that Vista 32 bits will only get about 3.2 GB of my memory to use. And I don't think that using Vista 64 bits is the way to go for normal PC use and for gaming. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DerekT Posted October 5, 2007 Share Posted October 5, 2007 You will also very likely have issues with all four DRAM banks populated. You will lose tight timings and DRAM throughput. Very likely you would have to drop the 8500's to 6400 speed to maintain stability with all four dram banks populated. As it stands, it is far better to run with 2GB and await system board optimizations with 4GB. It's coming but very likely will be with 2 X 2048MB, not 4 X 1024MB. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sylvainp Posted October 6, 2007 Author Share Posted October 6, 2007 I will go with the Corsair 8500 C5D to fit with one of these boards. After reading and reading severals hours on different motherboards and If I decide that later I will go SLI with 2 8800 Ultra then I need to get a 680i chipset. So here are the motherboards in my list: - Asus Stiker Extreme (I prefer this one) - EVGA 680i LT And if I stick with only one 8800 Ultra then these 2 motherboards are on my list Asus Blitz Formula (Will it work with Ultra 120 Extreme ?) Asus P5K Premium Is it worth to go in SLI if I will play my games in 1600 x 1200 resolution ? From this question which I have a hard time to decide then I will narrow down my list of motherboard to 2. So I ask again Is it worth to go in SLI if I will play my games in 1600 x 1200 resolution ? Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FredJ Posted October 6, 2007 Share Posted October 6, 2007 No, SLI is not worth it unless youre using much higher resolutions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DerekT Posted October 6, 2007 Share Posted October 6, 2007 I run all my games in 1920 X 1200 (if the game's internal rendering will go that high, and some do not) and the 8800GTX handles it all. Company of Heroes, Overlord, BF2, Dark Messiah, etc. P5K-Premium is overkill in my opinion. A P5K-Deluxe is more than enough and I find that the P5K-E is, for the price, the sweet spot. The only difference is a smaller cooler on PWM and a second Ethernet port. The P5K Premium has coolers that would be far better suited to the i965 chipset rather than the cool running P35 chipset. The i965 iteration of the Blitz was the Commando and was not a greater overclock board. I wonder the same thing about the Blitz vs P5K-E. SLi is a lost deal unless you have a very large screen ie. 2048 X 1536, etc. The problem with going to SLi is that the power of SLi is lost in every new iteration of graphics hardware. Two X 7900GTX 512 were easily beaten out by 8800GTX and 2 X 8800GTX will, no doubt, be beaten out by 8900GTX. You end up with hardware that cost a great amount that is obsolete and lacking in power. This happens quickly since hardware is often released quickly. At this time, Nvidia is holding back on the 8900 series since ATi has not released any real competition. The Nvidia 680i Striker is not as good an overclocker as P35 although it is the best of the 680i chipset implimentations. It runs very hot and has quite a few more issues attached to it. Not only is the P35 newer, it is guaranteed to work with Penryn CPUs. 680i has, in my opinion, far more cons than pros. For pros, it has the ability to disconnect the CPU and DRAM concurrent interface, and has SLi which for some people with very large display outputs can be helpful. When 9800 is released, 2048 will be accessible by a single card solution though, so even these people will not need a dual card solution. Good questions, good research and you will in the final analysis, find what works for you. Keep in mind that my view is simply that, a view, no more, no less. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sylvainp Posted October 6, 2007 Author Share Posted October 6, 2007 Really appreciated all your feedback.... All come back soon with question about overclocking properly that litle baby ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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