My Laptop is 3 years old and sucks

[Aerox]

Ok, I think I'm finally ready to go through with this.  I talked to my dad and I guess Newegg is having a big sitewide sale tomorrow.  Of course, that is the one day this month that I'm out of the office and in a facility doing a project.  I should have internet access, so hopefully I'll be able to buy everything.  Knowing my luck, it will all be sold out...

Final question! 
The case Caf recommended is now listed as deactivated.  Assuming it's not back by tomorrow, other case recs please?  This case is on sale tomorrow, will it work?  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as..._-11146025

You guys are awesome.  Thanks for dealing with my obnoxious questions.

[copulatingduck]

Looks fine to me. GL with ur new rig. 8)

[Versus]

oh god, don't cheap out on a case.

[copulatingduck]

oh god, don't cheap out on a case.

lul. I think what Mr. My-daddy-has-mad-moneybags is trying to say is to get something nice, but honestly, the case isn't that important. If I were to suggest something, I'd say go with a Lian-Li, but the case you suggested works just fine.

[Aerox]

So I said this was the end, but I totally lied.  I talked to IdiotwithGun (I think that was his name) in the IRC today, I guess he runs his school's LAN club, and he had a bunch of different recommendations.

He recommended a Quad Core (Q6600 Kentsfield 2.4GHz 2 x 4MB L2 Cache LGA 775) processor instead of the Dual (Duo E8500 Wolfdale 3.16GHz 6MB L2 Cache LGA 775 65W) that was originally recommended - they're the same price and the Quad seems nicer to me (although I know nothing so w/e).

Apparently the RAM that was originally recommended here (RAM) is designed for systems that use liquid cooling.  Mine will not.  Instead it looks like I'm going to go with this x2 for 4 gigs.

After talking to a number of people, I probably don't need a sound card right at this moment.  I'm going to go with onboard sound for now and add that later if I decide I need it.

His only other recommendation was about HDs, and I'm not really sure what the correct answer here is.  Caf originally recommended putting Windows on it's own HD, and then using 3 HDs in Raid 5 for my main drive.  Guns recommended a mirrored raid on the small HD for windows by itself, and then just a single big drive for everything else non-raided.  Guns' idea seems cheaper, and he said that having Windows mirrored speeds things up a ton for him.  I know I'm not really going to be using a ton of space, so having a single hard drive for all my games and stuff will likely be fine (and I can add another if I need it later I suppose.)  I don't really know all the intricacies of RAID though, so thoughts here would be appreciated.

The original DVD burner drive was sold out, so I'm just gonna go with this - DVD Burner

Finally, I'm starting to hear a lot of recommendations against Vista, and now I don't know what to do in terms of OS.  I'm still leaning towards 64 bit Vista, especially now since I have 4GB of RAM in the thing, but I want to see if anyone else has Vista horror stories before I decide.

oh god, don't cheap out on a case.

Can you recommend one that won't break the bank?  Some of the other ones I've been looking at have been around $300-$400, and that seems really excessive.  I liked the one originally recommended here, but it's sold out.  What do you see the problems being with the one I have up now?  I'm concerned that whatever I get for some reason or another won't hold this stuff properly and I'll be screwed.  I'm trying to only buy stuff that has good ratings on NewEgg.

So, for anyone who is still reading this or cares, this is what the parts list looks like now (I'm also still deciding between keyboards but that is mostly unimportant.)

Motherboard
Processor
RAM
Graphics Card
Power Supply
Case??
Windows RAID Drives/Windows Drive?
Main HD/RAIDED Main HDs?
DVD Burner
Monitor
Headphones
Keyboard

Again, sorry to be spamming the forums with this, but it seems like every time I think I have it figured out I find out I'm doing it all wrong.  Who wants to be the one to point out where I've fucked up in this one? 

With everything listed, including shipping and rebates, I'm at $1704 (That's going with the HD thing recommended by Guns.  With Caf's it goes up to around $1800.  That doesn't include whatever I have to pay for Vista.  If this case is going to work fine, I'm hesitant to get a more expensive one, but if there will be problems with it I'm willing to spend a little more.

[Versus]

$100-120 for a good case? My whole tower was ~$2100, and I spent $200 on a nice full tower.

edit: do you want a midtower or full tower?

edit: get that Logitech keyboard, G-series ftw.

[Aerox]

edit: do you want a midtower or full tower?

I want whatever will fit all my stuff and won't break.  I'm also planning on putting it in a cabinet under my desk which is pretty big (It will at least fit the one I currently have picked out now), although I could put it elsewhere if I absolutely had to. 

[ToiletDuck]

how about my case? coolermaster cm690, big performance for a small price. also, guarantees a nd. ???

[Versus]

I like fulltowers...my midtower computer was really, really cramped...my 7800 GTX barely fit in it.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLis...hermaltake

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLis...r%20Master

[Aerox]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLis...hermaltake

Hmm, this doesn't look too bad after the rebate...although that review about it shorting everything out worries me.

[ToiletDuck]

!
!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!

DO IT.

this case fits all my stuff fine, including the huge scythe ninja heatsink :o

PS don't bother with a case that comes with a powersupply...

[Aerox]

DO IT.

That looks right up my alley.  I think I will.

Also, anyone have comments on the quad core vs the dual for the same price, or the hard drive thing above?

[CaffeinePowered]

You DONT need a quad core, no games now, or in 3 - 5 years are really truely going to take advantage of it. Games NOW are just starting to take advantage of dual cores. Two 3.something cores will curb-stomp four 2.something cores at gaming, general computing will be the other way around, but don't expect any sort of performance increase.

[Aerox]

You DONT need a quad core, no games now, or in 3 - 5 years are really truely going to take advantage of it. Games NOW are just starting to take advantage of dual cores. Two 3.something cores will curb-stomp four 2.something cores at gaming, general computing will be the other way around, but don't expect any sort of performance increase.

Ah, I guess I'll go with the dual then.  And of course now the RAM I was going to buy is sold out again.  This is ridiculous.

[copulatingduck]

Yea, what caff said. Quad core is nice, but it's under-utilized right now. Also, for TF2 in particular (though I'm sure it's this way with many other games, including source games as well), the game only utilizes a single core. So, the faster a core you have, the better. A bit of a fail on valve's part not implementing multi-core support properly in TF2, but hey, you have to take these kinds of things into account when building a system. :-\

Honestly, I don't know enough about raid to really make a judgment call on what you should do for drives. Though if you wanted your windows to really fly, you'd *obviously* drop the extra monies for a smallish SSD for windows and gaming and raid your data on 2 additional sata drives.

[Mission Difficult]

I think a RAID5 is overkill for what you want. A standard mirror or even an automated backup to an external would be fine.

[Aerox]

I bought it!  Thanks for all your help guys

Item List:

1 x ($139.99) MB ASUS P5Q PRO 775 P45 RT - Retail
$139.99

1 x ($189.99) CPU INTEL|C2D E8500 3.16G 775 45N R - Retail
$189.99

2 x ($85.99) MEM 1Gx2|OCZ OCZ2RPR12002GK R - Retail
$171.98

1 x ($299.99) VGA ASUS ENGTX260 TOP/HTDP/896M RT - Retail
$299.99

1 x ($129.99) PSU SILVERSTONE|SST-ST65ZF 650W RT - Retail
$129.99

1 x ($84.99) CASE CM|RC-690-KKN1-GP BK RT - Retail
$84.99

2 x ($64.99) HD 320G|WD 7K 16M SATA2 WD3200AAKS - OEM
$129.98

1 x ($37.99) HD 80G|WD 7K 8M SATA2 WD800AAJS % - OEM
$37.99

1 x ($58.99) KB LOGITECH|967929-0403 G11 GAMEING - Retail
$58.99

1 x ($399.99) MNTR LG|LCD 24" 2MS W2452T-TF RT - Retail
$399.99

1 x ($24.99) HEADPHONES SENNHEISER HD202-RTL - Retail
$24.99

1 x ($23.99) DVD BURN LITE-ON|iHAS120-04 20X % - OEM
$23.99


Total Amount:
$1891.15

[Surf314]

Wow that baby is going to be sweet.

[CaffeinePowered]

Nice, well the box came out to about $1500, very nice

[ToiletDuck]

very nice

you're set for a while ;D and even still, if you do need an upgrade in the future, it'll probably only be the video card.