My first attempt, any advice?

Hi everyone, first post here. I am planning on building my first pc and I have come up with what I think is a good starting combination. I will use the computer for moderate gaming, a lot of programming and general use. I want it be great for entertainment. I also want it to be fast and quiet (often a paradox I know). There may be some things I have chosen I don't need now but I would like a powerful computer. I have included two motherboards because I would love to hear advice on which seems best. Thanks for any help you can give.

Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 LGA775 'Wolfdale' 3.16GHz (1333FSB)
Asus Rampage Formula Intel X48 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
Asus P5E3 Premium/Wifi@N Intel X48 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR3 Motherboard
Corsair 4GB DDR3 DHX 1600C7DHX Twin3X (2x2GB) (TWIN3X4096-1600C7DHX)
Asus GeForce EN8800 GT 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) x2
Western Digital VelociRaptor 300GB 10000RPM SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (WD3000GLFS)
LG GGW-H20L Blu-Ray Rewriter & HD-DVD ROM Serial ATA Drive
Asus Xonar D2X 7.1 PCI-Express Sound Card
Enermax Infiniti 720W EIN720AWT ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU
Lian Li PC-A71B Aluminium Tower Case

no point in the x48 mobo unless you are doing xfire, and even then a p45 can get the job done with only a minor performance hit for less. Switch that out to a p45 or p43.

At this point ddr3 really isn't going to give you much extra performance, just get a ddr2 board and put the extra money towards a better graphics card (probably a 4870 or a 4870x2)

Also i would consider getting a wd 640 gb for 75$. It wont make a big difference in performance and has more then double the storage for half the price

+1 with Zyntak09 on all accounts. I'd even consider going with a CM 690 case and save over $100!!! It's a solid case and designed quite well.
$77.24 shipped!!
Cooler Master 690 without Power Supply - RC-690-KKN1-GP
Newegg's link that has alot more information than the Buy.com link does.

Personally I like the Corsair 750tx over the Enermax PSU. It has 60A on the 12v rail and has 4 x 6+2pin PCI-e power connectors, so you will be able to Xfire/SLI just about any combination you see fit!! 5 yr. warranty helps too!
$102 (with "esave15" promo code) - $20 MIR = $82!!! Hard to beat that at this prcie point!!
CORSAIR CMPSU-750TX 750W ATX12V / EPS12V SLI Ready CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS Certified Active PFC Power Supply - Retail
I'd stick with a good p45 mobo, like Zyntak09 suggested. The Gigabytes Ultra Durable ones are quite nice too!! The DDR3 being better than DDR2 is really just a marketing scam right now. There is about a 1-3% performance difference between the two types. This will probably change as DDR3 matures, but why spend a butt load of $ on DDR3 when DDR2 will do the job and do it for alot less??

+1 on the WD 640 gb AAKS HD that Kyeana suggested. The performance difference isn't much and you get 2x the space and 1/2 the price!!

Wow, thanks for all the great advice guys. As you could see I am completely new to the idea of building a pc and to have such expert advice is incredibly beneficial. Thats really interesting about the DDR3, I will definitely go with DDR2 then. I guess I was looking at the 8800GT's because I read they were very quiet and I would love a quiet system. I know very little about graphics cards though so your input is great. I was looking at the 8500 because I wasn't sure if it was worth it to go quad now. I'll come up with a new setup based on your recommendations and post it back here later. Thanks again for the replies everyone. I'm unsure about overclocking, I don't plan to but then it seems such an interesting thing to do I might find I want to later.

Okay so this is my revised plan

Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 LGA775 'Wolfdale' 3.16GHz (1333FSB)
Asus P5Q-E Intel P45 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
OCZ 4GB (2x2GB) PC2-8500C5 1066MHz Reaper HPC Edition Dual Channel DDR2
Corsair HX 620W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU
Swiftech H2O-220 Apex Ultra Watercooling Kit
Asus ATI Radeon HD 4850 1024MB GDDR3 x2
Or
BFG GeForce GTX 280 H2OC 1024MB GDDR3
Or
Gainward ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2 2048MB GDDR5
Western Digital VelociRaptor 300GB 10000RPM SATA-II 16MB Cache
LG GGW-H20L Blu-Ray Rewriter & HD-DVD ROM Serial ATA Drive



what do you guys think of this?I am still looking at cases, any recommendations for ones that strike a good balance between silence and cooling?Thanks again for all the great advice

the 280 and 4870x2 are the 2 best cards on the market right now (nvidia and ATI). If you aren't that into gaming then i would suggest getting a 4850 (ATI) or a GTX 260 or 9800 GT (Nvidia). It all depends on what resolution you would be gaming at, how high you want the graphics to be, what games you will be playing etc.

If you post a list of what games you might want to play, and what resolution you want to play them at, we can help figure out which card would be best suited for you

Thanks Kyeana, I will probably be using a 22" monitor so a native resolution of 1680x1050. I'm finding it hard to predict how much gaming I'll be doing. I'd probably pick up a few games like Unreal Tournament 3 for some fun but I've never played Crysis and know very little about gaming resolutions, AA etc. I like the look of Fable 2 but no sign of that for the pc. How much will a graphics card effect non-gaming entertainment? thanks again, I would be well & truly lost without such expert help.

any of those graphics cards (and many cards that are much cheaper) would let you watch movies etc on your computer without a hitch.

For a graphics card get an ATI 4850. This should be enough to handle most of your games, however maybe not at the highest settings. If you get that and decided that you want more GPU power then it is a simple task to get a second 4850 and put them together in crossfire for very good results.

Here is some good ram from that site:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/show [...] %20(2x2GB)

Or if you want to save some money you could get this
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/show [...] 00D2K2/4G)

The system is looking good!

If you aren't doing extreme overclocks, and want to save some money, then it would probably be worth it to just drop the water cooling all together and get some air cooling instead like this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] dt%20s1283
And the retention bracket for it
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835233019
However if you want to keep the water cooling by all means go for it, it will certainly keep your cpu cool!

As for the case i am still using the Antec 300, and love it. Its a solid case with good air flow and keeps things cool. If you wanted a full tower you could go with the Antec 900, or just search around on the site you are getting your stuff from and find a case that you like and is in your price range (make sure to check the reviews or google the case to make sure that there isn't any majors flaws with it and to get a general idea about the cooling it provides).

thanks again Kyeana & Proximon. Will an air cooler be louder than a watercooling kit?Is applying thermal paste something you do once when building or is it applied regularly?Will a quiet case consequently be poor at cooling?Out of curioisty what resolution do you guys game at?I'm just wondering what the best resolution to go with would be, mainly for general use but also gaming. Where I am in Ireland there is nowhere really for me to get a good first hand look at many monitors.

Applying quality thermal paste needs to be done only once, unless you remove the cooler. Arctic Silver's website has detailed and exact instructions regarding this, and you very much need to learn how to do it right. There is a precise amount to use and it is much smaller than you imagine.

It's possible to build a very quiet water cooling set up. I don't know if that kit is one. You should direct water cooling questions to the overclocking section. One of the forums over there has good tips and you can get better answers there than in this forum on water cooling.

There are two ways to look at quiet cases. One method is to build insulated cases with minimal fans. This results in poorer cooling.
The other method involves lots of 120 and 140mm fans spinning at lower volumes. This is a good cooling solution and also a decent noise solution.

Frostytech.com has many reviews on both effective coolers and quiet coolers.

Links in the parts list in my sig, as well as a few GPU recommendations. It's a good idea to shop for well cooled cards. Your system will support any single card you can throw at it.