Newbie to overclocking; need help with i7 920.

[earwicker7]

Sweet pics.

 

[Sean W.]

here you go man, this computer would laugh at anything you throw at it:

Core i7 950 proocessor, one of Asus's top motherboards, Cooler master HAF X flag ship case, two(2) MSI GTX480's with highperformance silent heatsinks for quite operation, cool temperatures and head room for a nice overclock. arguably the best air cooler on the market. i have the HAF X and it is a great case to water cool with, i have my processor and graphics card water cooled, plenty of space, if you wan to go this route, get a radiator with low FPI and low speed fans for absolute silent operation. this computer would be a beast of a rig and will serve you for a long time... so here it is.

Case: $200
COOLER MASTER HAF X
Newegg.com - COOLER MASTER HAF X RC-942-KKN1 Black Steel/ Plastic ATX Full Tower Computer Case

Mother Board & CPU: $574
ASUS P6X58D Premium + Intel Core i7-950
Newegg.com - Computer Parts, PC Components, Laptop Computers, LED LCD TV, Digital Cameras and more!

Grapics Card(s): $980
X2 MSI N480GTX Twin Frozr II GeForce GTX 480
Newegg.com - MSI N480GTX Twin Frozr II GeForce GTX 480 (Fermi) 1536MB 384-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card

Memory: $155
G.SKILL PI Series 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600
Newegg.com - G.SKILL PI Series 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL7T-6GBPI

Power Supply: $300
CORSAIR Professional Series AX1200
Newegg.com - CORSAIR Professional Series AX1200 1200W ATX12V v2.31 / EPS12V v2.92 SLI Certified 80 PLUS GOLD Certified Modular Active PFC Power Supply

SSD: $255
Corsair P128 CMFSSD-128GB
Newegg.com - Corsair P128 CMFSSD-128GBG2D 2.5" 128GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

HDD: $90
Western Digital Caviar Black WD1002FAEX 1TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache
Newegg.com - Western Digital Caviar Black WD1002FAEX 1TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

DVD Burner: $20
Newegg.com - LG Black 24X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 16X DVD+R DL 24X DVD-R 6X DVD-RW 12X DVD-RAM 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-R 32X CD-RW 48X CD-ROM SATA DVD Burner - Bulk - CD / DVD Burners

CPU Cooler: $90
Noctua NH-D14
Newegg.com - Noctua NH-D14 120mm & 140mm SSO CPU Cooler

200mm fan: $22
COOLER MASTER Megaflow
Newegg.com - COOLER MASTER Megaflow 200 R4-LUS-07AR-GP 200mm Red LED Case Fan


Total: $2686 before shipping

 

[Slaymate]

The memory Sean picked have large heatspreaders which will interfere with the heatsink he picked. This is a better choice.
Newegg.com - Mushkin Enhanced Blackline 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Triple Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model 998679

And this is a better deal on a SSD.
Newegg.com - OCZ Agility 2 OCZSSD2-2AGTE120G 2.5" 120GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

 

[earwicker7]

So if I'm going bleeding edge, shouldn't I be going with stuff like this Newegg.com - ASUS ARES/2DIS/4GD5 Radeon HD 5870 X2 4GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.1 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card and 12GB RAM instead of 6GB? Or do you guys think that's like putting a 12-cylinder Twin Turbo in a Honda Civic?

 

[Slaymate]

The 5870 X2 isn't worth the cash, (2) GTX 480's will spank it. If you want to go ATI then you should look at a single 5870 or a 5970, if you want to go all out then look at (2) 5970's.

If your going to overclock then you should go with 6GB(3x2GB), as using all the memory slots stresses the memory controller a lot and it will limit your speed. If your not going to overclock then 12GB is OK but most users really don't need 12GB.

 

[CalcProgrammer1]

The 5970 is essentially a 5870 X2 anyways, it is 2 Cypress GPU's just like the 5870 (the 5870 is one Cypress GPU) but they are clocked less than the 5870. This is easily solved by overclocking and with that a 5970 is essentially 2 5870's. I have one 5870 and it's an awesome card even by itself.

 

[earwicker7]

So the 5870x2 is essentially just a "pre-overclocked" version of the 5970?

 

[Sean W.]

So the 5870x2 is essentially just a "pre-overclocked" version of the 5970?

the 5870 X2 is a marketing stunt be Asus... its saying look at what we can do, look how massive and intimidating this thing is, i mean it comes in a lock combination aluminium brief case with a freaking mouse.

with that said, im not impressed... first of all, it is a triple slot card, which is down right silly... second of all, there arent any water blocks for that card. thirdly, its heavier then my entire head, it weighs over 5 pounds, that is going to stress your motherboard and potentilly cause problems. 4th, they dont crossfire very well, but i think thats been fixed since ive researched about this card. and finally, it uses a but load of power, i believe one(1) 8 pin and two(2) 6 pin PCI express power cables just to power this beast. with all that said i would do some unmentionable things to get this card... hehe.

but, yes... it is basically a glorified 5970.

and meh, sue me for the CPU cooler and ram height problem :/ my bad, but i should know better. on the other hand, ive never had a high end air cooler, i went from stock to water cooling haha...

i was going to go with dual 5970's for your build which is the beastliest things you can get right now, but thats expensive as ****, i didnt know what you ment when you said dont hold back haha

 

[earwicker7]

the 5870 X2 is a marketing stunt be Asus... its saying look at what we can do, look how massive and intimidating this thing is, i mean it comes in a lock combination aluminium brief case with a freaking mouse.

with that said, im not impressed... first of all, it is a triple slot card, which is down right silly... second of all, there arent any water blocks for that card. thirdly, its heavier then my entire head, it weighs over 5 pounds, that is going to stress your motherboard and potentilly cause problems. 4th, they dont crossfire very well, but i think thats been fixed since ive researched about this card. and finally, it uses a but load of power, i believe one(1) 8 pin and two(2) 6 pin PCI express power cables just to power this beast. with all that said i would do some unmentionable things to get this card... hehe.

but, yes... it is basically a glorified 5970.

and meh, sue me for the CPU cooler and ram height problem :/ my bad, but i should know better. on the other hand, ive never had a high end air cooler, i went from stock to water cooling haha...

i was going to go with dual 5970's for your build which is the beastliest things you can get right now, but thats expensive as ****, i didnt know what you ment when you said dont hold back haha

I'm already leaning with dual 5970s lol. Usually when I say don't hold back, it means I won't blink at $4-5k. And, unless someone can tell me that water cooling will be noisier, I'd like to go that route.

 

[Slaymate]

And, unless someone can tell me that water cooling will be noisier, I'd like to go that route.

You can make a quiet watercooling system no problem, you just use low speed fans. You end up sacrificing some performance for low noise but that's how it goes whether your water-cooling or air-cooling. I recommend buying a good fan controller, with fans capable of Hi speeds, so you can adjust the noise level for the task at hand.