PC Building, Advice Needed.

[starcraft.man]

Hey there folks. My old rig doesn't cut it any more (surprisingly it lasted me 5 years with only a graphics card upgrade ) for gaming, so I'm building a new one. I've had lots of problems with OEMs/Manufacturers (I should have learned my lesson a while ago) and with my last issue with Dell I give up. So I'm building it up from nadda, that way I know I won't get screwed. I got a large budget (I don't buy often at all) and really wanna get the best I can for my needs. I need a bit of help on some parts though I'm not an expert on all of this, rest I know so please comment with any thoughts/suggestions, especially with anything to do with compatibility with Ubuntu.

Just a few notes on the top, concerning the box as a whole. Motherboard (if you suggest another) has to have the following: SATA 3.0 support, integrated sound, GBLAN, 1394, PCI-E16, at least 2PCI slots. It doesn't have to have SLI or CrossFire, and I am trying to avoid nforce due to issues I've heard of (and even had trouble on my Dell with nforce before it went DOA). Now on with list, feel free to suggest things that are better or comment on issues. Oh and anything in blue I'm not very certain on.

CPU:Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Quad Core Processor LGA775 Kentsfield 2.40GHZ 1066FSB 8MB

Motherboard: ASUS P5KC ATX LGA775 P35 DDR3 DDR2 1333FSB 2PCI-E16 PCI-E1 3PCI SATA2 Sound GBLAN 1394 Motherboard

CPU Heatsinks: Zalman CNPS9500 LED Copper CPU Heat Sink 92MM Fan 1350-2600RPM 18-27.5DBA W/ Blue LED

RAM: Patriot Extreme Performance 4GB 4X1GB PC2-8500 DDR2-1066 CL5-5-5-9 Dual Channel Memory Kit

Video Card: 8800 GTX/Ultra (still looking at reviews for model/makes, I'll figure this one out on my own I think)

Case: Antec Nine Hundred Mid Tower Gamer Case 900 ATX 9 Drive Bay No PS Top USB2.0 1394 Audio

Power Supply: Silverstone Strider ST1000 1000W Modular Power Supply ATX 20/24PIN 135MM Fan High Efficiency Black

Sound Card: None. Less someone really thinks I need one, the mobos integrated sound seems good enough for me.

HDD: 2X Western Digital SE16 500GB SATA2 7200RPM 16MB Cache 8.9MS NCQ Hard Drive

DVD Drives: 2X Samsung SH-S203B Black SATA DVD+RW 20X8X16 DVD-RW 20X6X16 DL 18X/12X INT DVD Writer

Floppy: Sony Black 1.44MB 3.5IN Floppy Drive

Speakers: Klipsch Promedia 2.1 THX Computer Speaker System 160W RMS

Screen: Samsung SyncMaster 226BW 22IN Widescreen LCD Black 1680X1050 3000:1 2MS VGA DVI-D HDCP
(ya, I know it has evil HDCP... like my card. I will be of course not using either's "protection". I found an awesome price though and it is really awesome.)

Keyboard and Mice: Got that covered already.

That's my parts fetching list, feel free to critique. My biggest worry is what's in blue. The compatibility between the Motherboard, Case and PS. I've had trouble with my last two rigs in this respect and I know these are important, I definitely want a case with lots of space (hate being squished between cables and cards).

One bonus thing I'd like to know about is hard drives. Is a raptor from WD really worth the price their charging? The performance increase doesn't seem that much, I'm leaning more toward getting a regular single platter drive from my OS and main files. Oh and one more bonus question, reviews of the 500 GB class drives seems fairly split between Hitachi Deskstar, Seagate Baracudas and WD, do you guys have a preference? Most people I know personally swear by WD, so I was thinking of going with that.

Edited: Q6600 instead.

[Frak]

Looks good, exept, I would use a water cooler instead of a copper sync. Lets you pull more fps without overheating.

[igknighted]

Go with the Q6600, the performance difference is very minimal, but the 6600 is a LOT cheaper last I checked. Look in the "I'm building a CPU" thread from yesterday for a benchmark comparison. Also, I am a big fan of the nForce 680i chipset for the intel chips, so you might want to look at those if the mobo isn't set in stone yet.

Finally, instead of the raptor, why not buy two HD's and run a raid0 array with data striping. It would boost speed more than a raptor at (probably) a lower price. You could get more disks and use raid5 for redundancy as well, but for a desktop that might be over the top.

[Ralob]

personally, I would stick with seagate for the HD just because of their 5 year warranty. Plus they are putting out their .11 drives shortly. but if performance is worth the price difference then go for the raptor. but to me, it just seems unnecessary.

[starcraft.man]

Looks good, except, I would use a water cooler instead of a copper sync. Lets you pull more fps without overheating.

Got one you'd recommend? Picked the Zalman cuz it seemed to get some of the highest scores in review sites I was visiting.

[starcraft.man]

Go with the Q6600, the performance difference is very minimal, but the 6600 is a LOT cheaper last I checked. Look in the "I'm building a CPU" thread from yesterday for a benchmark comparison. Also, I am a big fan of the nForce 680i chipset for the intel chips, so you might want to look at those if the mobo isn't set in stone yet.

Finally, instead of the raptor, why not buy two HD's and run a raid0 array with data striping. It would boost speed more than a raptor at (probably) a lower price. You could get more disks and use raid5 for redundancy as well, but for a desktop that might be over the top.

Ya, your right on Q6600 guess was looking a bit too high. The extra .26 won't do much.

Is RAID hard to set up, and how well will that work with Ubuntu? I did see quite a bit about striping, and it did seem to be a good solution... *goes off to look into it*

[Frak]

Got one you'd recommend? Picked the Zalman cuz it seemed to get some of the highest scores in review sites I was visiting.

I recommend the CoolIT Freezone CPU Cooler from coolitsystems.com.
Its about $300, but its very efficient.

[Frak]

Ya, your right on Q6600 guess was looking a bit too high. The extra .26 won't do much.

Is RAID hard to set up, and how well will that work with Ubuntu? I did see quite a bit about striping, and it did seem to be a good solution... *goes off to look into it*

IMHO, get a hardware controlled RAID, and get a Motherboard with a BIOS that supports control through the BIOS. Some nVidia chipsets can do it.

[starcraft.man]

I recommend the CoolIT Freezone CPU Cooler from coolitsystems.com.
Its about $300, but its very efficient.

Geez, a bit pricey.... I thought that the Q6600 was kinda cool anyway, I'll look around >.>.

IMHO, get a hardware controlled RAID, and get a Motherboard with a BIOS that supports control through the BIOS. Some nVidia chipsets can do it.

Hmmm, wasn't really looking into that on the mobos, I'll have to go check some over.

[Sayers]

Looks good, exept, I would use a water cooler instead of a copper sync. Lets you pull more fps without overheating.

Water cooling is a fad. It may be popular against the "pseudo-nerds" it's really over rated.