Help with DVI and SLi

[wtk pro l]

yea thats what i was looking at also. the l2 cache is a pretty big difference. anyways i guess ill just go ahead and ask the rest of the pc. what graphics card would be good? considering i will be running alot of games and photoshop. money isnt tight, i just want a good bang for your buck. im trying to stay <$300 for the graphics card. but if a better card means going to 350 im for it. im sorry im asking so much questions, but im gonna have this pc all through high school (four years), so i want to make sure im gonna get a nice pc with upgradable parts.

btw the way you guys are so helpful. much better than the other forum i was looking at.

 

[Trifid]

This is what I have (Mine is made by BFG though) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814130256

This card plays anything I throw at it on high settings, and is very good value for money.

 

[wtk pro l]

yea that whats im gonna get.

this is what i got:

CPU: AMD Athlon 3700+

Graphics Card: 7800GT

Mobo: DFI LanParty UT nf4

 

[FghtinIrshNvrDi]

perfect. That's a great performance for the dollar setup. Even if I had crazy amounts of money, I think that's what I'd build right now.

Ryan

 

[wtk pro l]

good, just one question. do you think it would be a loss not to get a SLi mobo? or really do you think that it will be a necessary to have one in two years to run certain games?'

any RAM recomindations? i know nothing about RAM, as there are so many different kinds? i think i wanna go 2 gb with two sticks, not four. what would be good with my mobo?

 

[wtk pro l]

is corsiar a good brand? ok well i kinda making this a weird type of thread, anyways i was thinking about getting two SATA hds. and putting the same OS (xp pro) on there and have one with all my games and the other with word docs and stuff.

also is there anyway to save/open anything the hard drive you arent using.
ex. im on hd#1 typing a word doc. but this is my games hd so i want to save it to hd#2. is there anyway to do this without saving to floppy and rebooting to hd#2? is this even a good idea?

btw sorry for all the posts, kinda confusing.

 

[Trifid]

With ram the question is, are you overclocking? If so, OCZ platinum rev. 2 is great, along with teh very expensive G. skill. If not, go with value ram, that is PC3200. 2x 1gb sticks is better as you said, as you can run them at 1t.

If you get 2hdd run them in a RAID configuration, but from what you described, get a single harddrive and partition it. One 10gb one for the OS, and only that, and the rest for games pics, movies, docs ect.

And yes, both hdd will be spinning at the same time, so you don't need to re-boot or anything.

That set-up looks good. Consider an X2 though.

 

[wtk pro l]

ok, i guess ill have to do some research and find out what RAID is. but if i partition my hd, will it have any affect on the seek time or quality or anything? thanks

o and what is an X2? lol. is it a case?

::EDIT:: just checked out RAID and it appear i have to have the right hardware, and also certain software. how would i be able to set up RAID. lets take for example, i have 2 70gb hds and they are set up in RAID, will the OS recognize there are two 70gb or just one 140gb. i hope you dont think i am just using this forum for answers, i am also researching myself. its just that some of this stuff if confusing. thanks

 

[Trifid]

It will be one 140gb hdd.

An X2 is a processor, it has two cores on a single die, and will improve the performance of the PC.

Just a little warning, RAID1 will double the chances of losing your work, if one hdd goes, you lose all the data on it.

I currently have a partition on my hdd, one for OS and another for the rest. This means that I don't clutter up C, so it will have slightly faster boot times.

 

[wtk pro l]

ok i think im gonna get a 300gb SATA drive and partition like 10gb for the OS like you said. so on the windows set up screen i just make a partition for 10 gigs and install windows on that. then will i have 290 gigs to do whatever i want on it. thanks