Veteran OC Forum Wh0re needs good advice

Hello all… Apologies, as It’s been a very long time since I have posted. I hope to see some familiar face like hippro etc =]. I have long since parted out and sold the rig in my sig and have basically been using my work Lenovo x61 tablet pc for my daily needs (lame but sufficient for daily tasks). However I am looking to get back into the gaming and extreme over clocking scene and thought to look on my favorite form for advice.
To summarize basically I’m looking for:

• $2000-$2500 USD Budget
• I don’t think there is a need for SLI at this time (I mostly play EvE… I am VasiliVonHolst if any of you play and care, you may have heard of me from the carebear killing movie here: http://myeve.eve-online.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadID=708473 )
• I love extreme voltage mods and soldering, no problems here.
• Also lover alternative cooling methods such as water cooling and phase change if the performance results warrant the price (will increase budget if necessary).
• I have a dedicated multi TB RAID server for storage so ~80GB on the local PC should be fine. I want the FASTEST HDD speeds possible (within price reason). Should I be looking SSD RAID 0 or conventional?

Thanks in advance for any advise. I really appreciate it! Im sure you have all been in my shoes and know how it feels to walk away and come back to the extreme over clocking scene!
-oRIDDERo

Would you be more interested in getting a less expensive system such as an Intel LGA 775 based rig or AMD AM2+ Phenom II rig, or a more expensive Intel Core i7 rig? The Core i7 will give you the best performance, but if you're into "extreme overclocking" I would think you would have a lot more fun getting a cheaper, but still excellent system and using the leftovers to buy some sweet water cooling supplies, or maybe even phase.

Going for Core i7 forces you to drop a bank on getting an X58 board and DDR3 memory. You can save hundreds by getting a Core 2 Quad with DDR2. That's money that could go toward a sexy GPU or good cooling. I'm sure someone will give you a lot of great reasons for getting Core i7. There really are no downsides to getting it, other than cost. I just think that based on what you've said, you'll have more fun investing the money in graphics for your gaming or cooling for your overclocking.

As for storage, you'll have to do your research. If size doesn't matter you could definitely get at least one really fast SSD, and probably two, for the price of one 300GB velociraptor. The problem is the speeds and quality of those SSD's vary a lot. Some are outstanding and some aren't much better than platter drives. You'll have to check some reviews and see whats good. Two SSD's in RAID would be awesome if you got half decent ones.

For quick reference, you would probably be looking at these prices:

Core i7 940 2.93GHz ~ $560
X58 mainboard ~ $200
3x2GB DDR3 ~ $150

Core 2 Quad QX9650 ~$330
P45 mainboard ~ $120
2x4GB DDR2~ $100

That's almost $400 more for the Core i7. Of course you could get the slower Core i7 and save a chunk of change, but then again you could get a less expensive LGA 775 quad as well. Either way, that extra money would go a long way toward phase cooling or SSD's.

If you are looking into the extreme cooling side of overclocking than a Phenom II might be right up your alley.

If not than an i7 would be best performance.

c2q is most fun/$


EDIT: Also the 920 i7s have been on sale for a little over 200 at microcenter...


With that budget.

i7, 940, 3GB tri channel ddr3-2000 (maybe 6 if price is good), an nVidia 295 and a great WC set up.

Storage 2 WD 640GB dual platters in raid0 for price/performance... 2 MTron or Intel SSDs on an Areca raid controller if you have the money.

I just saw this today.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/01/26/amds-phenom-ii-pushed-to-6-5ghz-3dmark-record-demolished/

If you're really into extreme overclocking, the Phenom II X4 might be a good option. According to this site, 6.5GHz is possible with the right cooling. A Core 2 Quad might be able to hit that speed as well, I'm not sure. I'm pretty positive that nobody has hit that speed with a Core i7 yet, at least not that I've seen. Regardless, the AMD Quads are less expensive than the Intel quads and they seem to have the same, if not more, overclocking headroom.

juane414 said:

I just saw this today.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/01/26/amds-phenom-ii-pushed-to-6-5ghz-3dmark-record-demolished/

If you're really into extreme overclocking, the Phenom II X4 might be a good option. According to this site, 6.5GHz is possible with the right cooling. A Core 2 Quad might be able to hit that speed as well, I'm not sure. I'm pretty positive that nobody has hit that speed with a Core i7 yet, at least not that I've seen. Regardless, the AMD Quads are less expensive than the Intel quads and they seem to have the same, if not more, overclocking headroom.

Click to expand...

I was at that event. It was amazingly cool, they used $5000 of liquid helium, and $1000's in liquid nitrogen so it's kinda outside the normal realm of cooling.

Conumdrum said:

I was at that event. It was amazingly cool, they used $5000 of liquid helium, and $1000's in liquid nitrogen so it's kinda outside the normal realm of cooling.

Click to expand...

Well, yes. But getting 4.5GHz or 5.0GHz might still be feasible with phase cooling.

just cause PII can oc higher then a Core 2 doesnt make it faster... PII is still sligthly behind Core 2 clock per clock... putting a PII vs i7, well i7 would eat it for lunch...

Nobody said that the Phenom II is faster than either the Core 2 or Core i7. If you're looking for raw speed then Intel is the way to go. But if you're looking for something with a lot of overclocking potential that isn't very expensive, and you want to have a fun time with it then Phenom II or Core 2 would be the way to go. Speed isn't everything for me. Personally I would choose to spend the money on awesome cooling and get a cheap CPU.