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[bullseye0105]

Hi! New to the board here.

I am looking to buy a new desktop in the next month or so to replace my aging P4 3.0Ghz. Here is the setup I'm considering. Feel free to comment on any part of it, any input would be greatly appreciated. I am also interested in knowing if I'm making the right CPU choice as I was also considering the sandy bridge CPU lineup...

I will probably not be doing any overclocking with the CPU

I've selected radeon 6970 as my GPU but I will most probably be buying the 6990 or nvidia 595gtx instead, if they can be release anytime soon...

Intel Core i7 950 Quad Core Processor LGA1366 3.06GHZ Bloomfield 8MB LGA1366 4.8GT/S

Corsair Cooling Hydro Series H70 High Performance CPU Cooler System LGA775 1366 1156 AM2 AM3

ASUS P6X58D-E X58 ATX LGA1366 3PCI-E16 PCI-E1 2PCI CrossFire SLI USB3.0 SATA 6GB/S Motherboard

Corsair XMS3 Dominator CMP12GX3M3A1600C9 12GB DDR3 3X4GB DDR3-1600 CL 9-9-9-24 Core i7 Memory Kit

AMD Radeon HD 6970 880MHZ 2GB 5.5GHZ GDDR5 PCI-E 2 X DVI HDMI 2 X Mini Display Port

Cooler Master Haf 932 Full Tower EATX Case 6X5.25 1X3.5 5X3.5INT No PSU USB eSATA 1394 Audio - Black

Corsair HX1000W CMPSU-1000HX 1000W ATX 20/24PIN ATX 80A 12V Afc Modular Power Supply W/ 140MM Fan

Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB SATA3 6GB/S 7200RPM 64MB Cache 3.5IN Dual Proc Hard Drive OEM

OCZ Vertex 2 Extended Sandforce 120GB 2.5IN SATA2 Solid State Disk Flash Drive SSD

LG GH24LS50 24X Super Multi Lightscribe SATA DVD Writer OEM Black

1 x Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-FI Titanium 7.1 Channel 24-BIT PCI-E Sound Card Retail

 

[michaelah500]

Noctua NH-D14 > H70.

 

[SieB]

Corsair Cooling Hydro Series H70

Like MichaleH said NH D14 > H70. Same price lower temps.

Corsair XMS3 Dominator CMP12GX3M3A1600C9 12GB

I would get 6gb of RAM at the most, unless you do a lot of Photoshop, 3d modeling or visualization work. For normal use you will most likely never use more than 4, for normal use and between a little and a lot of Photoshop work 6-8gb but you will never use any where near 12.

Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB

The Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB is cheaper at £40.

1 x Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-FI Titanium 7.1 Channel 24-BIT PCI-E Sound Card

Unless you are using some expensive speakers/monitor speakers I would stick to the on board sound.

Apart from that it looks good

If you can wait until the replacement P67 motherboards are released go for Sandy Bridge build.

 

[bullseye0105]

Thanks i will look into your suggested cpu cooler

As for the ram I intend to do some hd video editing, and anyway ram is quite affordable these days...

 

[T.A.K]

I really hate the NH-D14 love on these forums. It is ugly and huge with a cooling preformance only a few degrees below thw H70.

I would say both are good coolers. The H70 just has loud fans that you can switch if you like.

I like the D14 more than any other cooler for MY needs. Others may not like how it falls on its ass in looks or size.

 

[ShortAlieN]

For the price the noctua is much better. the corsair coolers work, but i would not go much past that. get the audio card. even a cheap audio card is better than the on-board audio. especially if you are doing HD video editing. That's just my 2 cents on the matter.

 

[ciksas]

Onboard audio is good enough for normal use unless you have some very expensive hifi setup you won’t hear any significant difference. SATA3 HDD are ripoff(get a samsung f3), get a noctua or some quitter fans. This is going to be a gaming rig?

 

[bullseye0105]

Onboard audio is good enough for normal use unless you have some very expensive hifi setup you won’t hear any significant difference. SATA3 HDD are ripoff(get a samsung f3), get a noctua or some quitter fans. This is going to be a gaming rig?

gaming, photoshop and video editing

why are you saying sata3 are a ripoff?

 

[michaelah500]

gaming, photoshop and video editing

why are you saying sata3 are a ripoff?

SATA3 is 6Gbps...the maximum read/write speed of a mechanical HDD is usually somewhere around the 250MB/sec mark. No point at all.

 

[FunkyMonkey90]

If your not planning on ocing the h70 will be fine.. And I'd rather have 6gb decent RAM thn cheaper 12gb

 

[adamjamesroe]

Hi! New to the board here.

I am looking to buy a new desktop........ I've selected radeon 6970 as my GPU

GTX 570= Better than HD 6970

GTX 570 SLI='Proably similar price to GTX 590 but will most likely be better.

 

[mrDMxtreme]

GTX 570= Better than HD 6970

GTX 570 SLI='Proably similar price to GTX 590 but will most likely be better.

Agreed, go for the green team

for now. You will most likely be happier.

As I see it the only way to justify an AMD GPU right now is either:1) ur a fanboy, which is ok or 2) ur building an all AMD build and wanna keep it that way (which ur not)

-all this is opinion btw-

 

[Ya93sin]

gaming, photoshop and video editing

why are you saying sata3 are a ripoff?

3 Gbps= 375 MBps

So unless you are getting near that point, you don't actually need SATA-III

 

[cbiltsouris]

the 590 has to 580 chips on it I doubt that it will be beaten by two 570s, only 2 580s would have a chance imo acutally better

 

[Jamsand]

GTX 570= Better than HD 6970

GTX 570 SLI='Proably similar price to GTX 590 but will most likely be better

Agreed I'm a radeon fan boy when it came to comparing the 5k series to the 200 and 400's but the 6k series is amd's 400 on flipside nvidia's 500 series seems to be them gettin their sh*t together lol

silver arrow = d-14 if you want slightly different colour scheme

it beats it in the lower end of the temp spectrum for cooling since you said your not OC'ing also mixed reviews some say it is quieter others say slightly louded you'll notice neither though

I'd be compelled to say go get a pci sound card there is notable difference and I'm assuming if your editting your going to want accuracy

look into m-audio's soundcard, I'm currently using the 24-96

creative over asus for soundcards though asus from what i hear always seem more headphone orientated