New build help - want to spend around $3000 - want silence with power for gaming

Hey my first post here!

I've been reading a lot here and can't seem to get EXACTLY the info that I want.
I'm coming into some money very soon and want to upgrade myself to bascially top of the line. First I'll list my ideas for hardware:

CPU: AMD X2 4800+

MB: Either MSI K8N Neo4 Platinum/SLI or Asus A8N-SLI Premium. I've read that the MSI is a little better for overclocking. I need to go with one of these (not a DFI) because I need the extra PCI slot for my analog modem.

RAM: This is one area I'm not really sure about. I want 2 GB. And I want something that has pretty decent timings.
Here's a list that I've found that seem to have decent timings. (I'm looking for advice in this area expecially!)
OCZ EL DDR PC-3200 Dual Channel Titanium
or
Corsair TWINX2048-3500LLPRO 2GB
Those are just 2 that I came across and thought might be good. I was RAM that will reach around 233Mhz with the lowest timings.

VID: 2x eVGA 7800 GTX's (maybe KO's) I haven't completely decided on these yet...but I like evga's warranty. I don't know how loud the coolers are on the KO cards. if they are too loud...then I guess I'd get the non KO's and use either good-quiet air coolers or get water coolers (I would want ones that cool RAM also such as: Danger Den NV-78SLI)

Sound: I am pretty sure I'd go with Creative X-Fi

HD: Gonna go with the common 2x WD Raptors in Raid 0 with additional 300-500 Gb Drive (not entirely sure which one...but it's not a major concern of mine.)

PSU: I need some help here too.... I'd like a PSU that has auto fan control....so when idling it will lower speeds to keep it silent or very quiet.....and when gaming it can ramp up louder as necessary.
maybe: OCZ PowerStream 600W or Enermax Noisetaker 600W ?

CASE: I think I'm pretty set on the Antec P-180... The reason for this is that (and maybe I should have mentioned this before) I'm looking for SILENCE.

I was wondering if the watercooling idea would help me to get rid of the noise. It seems logical to me that reducing down to 1 or 2 fans would greatly reduce the noise ....but I also know that the pump could add extra noise.
My other concern with water cooling is using it in the P-180. I know it should handle a single 120mm radiator just fine .....but would that be enough for an overclocked 4800+ and 2 overclocked GTX's ? I supposed I could try to get 2 Rads in it (one in front and one in back...or maybe one in back and one on top) ....but then I'm lost as to how that works with the pump? would I be able to use 2 lower powered pumps or how exactly does that work?
I guess a dual 120mm Rad would help that...but I don't really want to go hacking my P-180 to pieces to make that work.

So I can sacrifice a little overclocking to keep the PC silent or at least very quiet. (right now my PC is pretty darned quiet....except that my CPU and VID coolers are running at 12v and create a slight hum. (which noone else in my house but me seems to notice)

So Pleeeease help me to figure out this whole thing. Please let me know if I'm aiming too high with the overclock I'm talking about. Or if I should just stick with closer to stock speeds to get the quiet I'm looking for.
and would it be better to go with Air or water. I'm so lost and looking for advice here. as you can tell with my rambling.

Thanks in advance

jivetrky

to the forums that is one bad *** setup you got there

if you have ? about w/c go to the w/c section and ask there

Awsum set up... I would definitely go water cooling if I could afford to because its extremely quiet and offers a bit more of a headroom when OC'ing.

*Edit*
Welcome to the forums!

If you want REAL SILENCE, get the Lian LI PC-6070B and a Water Cooling Kit. The 6070B virtually silences everything. I cannot hear mine at all.

On ram you need to decide if you want 4x512 or 2x1GB

I would personally get a v2100 or v2000 (link) That thing muffles so much sound. The nice thing about the lian li cases is the the better ones have rubber padding things for your hard drives so that your HDs make way less noise. The v-series is also BTX layout wich is supposedly better for hear

You can then fit a 2 or 3 fan radiator in the top and if you want another radiator in fthe bottom base. You might try picking up one of the black ice Xflows as I believe they were meant for low power fans, the case also uses all 120mm fans and is soooooooo quite

The Dangerden SLI blocks are way overkill imo, but you can get them if you want, I would just get 2 maze 4s, you can also cool your north bridge if you want which might be good. Having a 2 or 3 fan radiator would make it so you could run really really quite 120s and still have a cool system. For pumps, get a swiftech MC655 and it will be alsmost silent, creating very little hum, also put foam under the pump to reduce the hum even further

the other option is to get an xp120 heatsink, but that wont be as cool or as quite as watercooling and wont quite your video card fans

For powersupplys OCZ makes some realy nice powersupplies

just something to consider, the X1800XTs come out on the 5th, so you could run 2 X1800Xts in Crossfire

You could try just buying a bunch of Panaflo Ultra-Quiet's and see if it works out. Probably not though. I think you could make it with air cooling if you just went with a single 7800GTX for now, and I don't think there is any reason to get 2 of them unless you plan on running above 1600x1200.

Btw, I'd save the $400 difference between the 4800+ and 4400+ if I were you. Of course, I'm not you, and maybe this PC is built to partly to impress others, but I don't think you'd see any difference between the two. Overclocked, I don't think there would be any difference at all.

What monitor do you have? Maybe consider upgrading the Z-5300's to Z-5500's or some Klipsch's? A new chair? I think the $400 difference between the 4400 and 4800 could be better spent.

For ram, go with Crucial Ballistix 2x1GB ram. It can get up to 300fsb with about 2.9v usually.

The eVGA heatsinks and fans aren't too loud, you can always switch them out for a simple aftermarket coolers on them, it'll cool them better and also be quieter.

I'd say with go with the OCZ Powerstream 520W for $120 or the PCP&C 510 for $190. Maybe go for the PCP&C if you want more stability and stuff, but if you get over your budget, the OCZ P520 should do fine.

Yeah, the MSI would be better at OCing, but then the ASUS is more stable and silent too. MSI's tend to have off and on problems with their boards.

Antec P180 isnt as roomy as those Lian Li Cases but it runs very cool and silences nearly anything

Antec P180 isnt as roomy as those Lian Li Cases but it runs very cool and silences nearly anything. Has rubber grommets for hard drives and a special layered design that works pretty well lots of innovative features.. I've got one and I really like it. But I would suggest checking out endpcnoise.com and see there all black version. IMHO it's much better looking. They also have a bunch of good products to help cooling without noise

I would recommend a v2000 or similar Lian Li case if you are looking for silence. Also, watercooling is definitely the way to go in your situation. I would get the 4400+ instead of the 4800+ because they will overclock to similar speeds, but if you are really going for top of the line I understand wanting the fastest processor. I would wait for definitive results and then choose between the 7800GTX and the X1800XT.

Harddisks can be an important factor when it comes to noise reduction.

The raptors are loud. 2x seagate sata in raid isnt

wow.....I've been away since my post...thanks for the replys....

TheGreySpectre: AS far as RAM config. I thought that I had read that 2x1GB is better. But I also notice that 1GB sticks don't seem to offer as good of timings as 512MBs....So I guess I don't really know. Since I will (probably) only be overclocking to about 233Mhz FSB...I don't think I'll need RAM that will reach much higher than that. I am interested in having low timings at the 233 Mhz mark....that is why I was interested in that Corsair TWINX2048-3500LLPRO....because from what I read I think it is supposed to do like 2-3-2-6-1T @ 233 Mhz. I MIGHT try to OC the 4800+ to 3Ghz if I can with water. But I'm not sure if that is feasible with my main issue of silence. (I just want too much of both worlds!) ...In which case I will need different RAM (Maybe the Ballistix sticks)
So I guess I could use some input on the RAM config also (4x512 or 2x1)

The main reason I was looking at the dangerden SLI blocks is that they also cool the RAM. Which to me is important. I think that not cooling the RAM would limit the ceiling on overclocking. I used to have a 9600XT and after putting RAMsinks on it I was able to squeeze another 50 Mhz out of them. Which isn't huge, but when you look at water cooling them instead of a small block of copper/air it will cool them far more. So, to me, I think the full card coolers are worth it.


So I think I'm still unsure if what I want is do-able .....can I overclock the 4800+ to FX-57 speeds (with all the other components) and still maintain silence?

well,
take away my monitor and several others, you can build a dual core system like mine for around 3,200$

The dual core runs extremely hot - water cooling a must
and i've had it to freeze up a couple times

i'm doing the torture test now as i type set to 10 priority
xp shows 2 cpu's
screen shot here...
http://www.carolina-customs.com/snap-02.jpg

and adobe photoshop has always been a big cpu and memory hog

i opened adobe while doing this torture test and seen the second core jump to 74% for a sec

adobe opened like nothing was running
instantly

you can look at my complete setup here for an idea of a system like mine
http://www.carolina-customs.com/my-new-box/

~RD

Yuriman: about the video cards.... I do want SLI ....maybe partially to impress my friends....but more to impress myself. I've never before been able to buy a new, top of the line, system...and since I'm getting some money I want to do it....because afterwards the money will be spent and I'll be back in the catergory of unable to afford things. So I'm kind of looking for this machine to last me a year or two...I figure if I splurge on a good Dual Core CPU (which will become more utilized as time goes on and software evolves) and SLI...which will be able to handle graphics for a while. I actually won't be running even at 1600X1200 ....because I will probably be buying a 19" Hyundai ImageQuest L90D+ LCD This has a native resolution of 1280X1024 ...I know at this resolution I'm not using SLI to it's full potential....but it will still benefit at this resolution....and as time goes on and games get more intense it will help even more.

I have considered going with the 4400+ instead of the 4800+ ....as of right now I'm planning on the 4800+ simply because I want the fastest (or at least the fastest Dual core)...and the 4400+ would require a 27% overclock...putting it over 300 Mhz FSB.which seems, to me, to be pretty grand...and maybe not even possible (From a review I read showing it only reaching 2.7Ghz....whereas the 4800+ I've seen reaching 3.0Ghz)

I guess it all comes down to my budget...we'll see.

Nickdeveau: Would you say that there is room in the P-180 for a watercooling setup? I had wondered if it could fit maybe 2 Single 120mm Radiators in it. (2 seperate single 120mm Rads, not a single dual 120mm)

I was most interested in the P-180 for it's soundproofing abilities. That is why I chose it over a LianLi or any other (they are made of aluminum which wouldn't mask sound quite as well as the P-180's Steel Chassis....in addition to all the other features of the P-180...
...BUT if it won't fit a W/C setup....then it won't do me any good.

Sjaak: Yeah I've thought of the fact that the Raptors will add a little extra noise....but I think that is one concession that I would make...because the performance increase is well worth it to me.
I would think that inside of a P-180, which has 3 layers to the outside of it, and the silicone grommets it comes with for drive mounting...that it should block the noise of the drives. At least I hope so.

Dang, I wish I had $3000 to spend on a gaming rig...Anyhow, that is one sweet setup, and I think you should be alright, but I would go with some aftermarket cooling for your CPU/GPU.

BaconTheory said:

Dang, I wish I had $3000 to spend on a gaming rig...Anyhow, that is one sweet setup, and I think you should be alright, but I would go with some aftermarket cooling for your CPU/GPU.

Click to expand...

Yeah...I will be coming into some money...otherwise I'm in the same boat....I'd never be able to afford it normally.

And I'll definitely go with aftermarket cooling.....I think I'm set on using Watercooling...because I'm interested in making it scream in performance but whisper in silence

....Plus I will get a little money out of the current rig I have (in the signature)
only I will be keeping the Speaker setup.

-------------------
That's brings up another good question....what's your guys opinion on what price I could sell my current rig?

HD: Gonna go with the common 2x WD Raptors in Raid 0 with additional 300-500 Gb Drive (not entirely sure which one...but it's not a major concern of mine.)

Click to expand...

500g are too much $$ for the size increase - i beleive the best $ vs g ratio is the 300g drive (can get em for sub $200) get 2 of those for cheaper then a single 500g and you get more room in the end.

It looks to me like you could fit a Watercooling setup in the P-180, you can really fit watercooling in almost any reasonably sized case, however with a bigger case you can put better watercoolin with things like a bigger radiator

and you would be suprised how quite the Lian LI cases are even with the fact that they are aluminum, also the extra room that the v2000 has is nice because you can you can put a 3 fan radiator in which Im not sure you could fit in a P-180 and also you wil l never run out of hard drive space. Its just me but I would get the Lian Li, I think they're just as quite as the P-180 except I like the case layout better and I think you can fit a bigger radiator in them

for your watercooling go for a strom waterblock, 2x maze4 gpublocks a Black Ice Xtreme III radiator, and swiftech MC655 pump and .5in inner diameter tubing and you will be good to go.

and unless your buying your system tommarow I would wait and look at how 2 X1800XTs compares to 2 7800GTXs