New computer questions.

About ready to upgrade but have some questions before i fork over the big bucks.

For Vista whats the difference between 32bit and 64bit?

And is Asus or Leadtek good for an 8800gts 640? Or better stick to more expensive BFG/Evga?

And anyone recommend a nice tower? I want big (Black color) with a clear panel with inside lit up but without over doing with all the lights and price.

Had my eye on the Apevia X-navigator Black with 500watts power supply.

I'm not rich and had to save up for this.

Well, how much are you looking to spend? Is this just an upgrade, or a whole new rig? What do you have now if it is just an upgrade? 

look man, 1st vista 64bit can handle alot more ram and requires a 64bit processor. if ur a gamer stick with the 32 bit, cause there is more support for the 32bit. 2nd  u better stick with EVGA and bfg, cause they r the best companies with lifetime warranty, 3rd dont get the 640GTS get the 320GTS if ur gonna game on resolutions like 1600x1200 no more.

1 more thing, get the evga acs3 ko GTS cause it has more heatsinks; almost like the 8800ultra and it has around 80 mhz overclock in core plus 100 overclock in memory.

Vista is gonna kill your FPS...   so don't do 32 or 64 bit.  Load XP pro and get what you paid for out of the rest of your PC-

I personally went with the Antec 900 case.  Probably the best breathing case available with 4 stock 120mm-200mm fans.  I actually wish I had waited for the Antec P182 case, which doesn't have a window, but is pretty much the best case available.  I'd trade any day and just run an additional case fan

I tend to like eVGA and BFG, but matching brands on your Motherboard and GPU can benefit performance in some cases.

Anyways...   love to help more but I gotta go play games til I passout now, gnite

Getting whole new pc. e6700 with 2gigs ram 800mhz, 2x 500gig Hd's The mb i picked as SLI, can hold 8gigs of ram, can take quad core, ect.. (thinking of future) And Vista Premium would just be installed i wouldn't have the cd's for it.

And thought the 8800gts 640 would be best with my new 22" lcd 1680x1050 resolution.

Anyway computer adds up to 2000 Canadian right now. Kinda steep.

Get A GTX seems u got aloota cash.r3351925

No i don't. What i have i saved up so reducing the cost of new computer would help.

Getting whole new pc. e6700 with 2gigs ram 800mhz, 2x 500gig Hd's The mb i picked as SLI, can hold 8gigs of ram, can take quad core, ect.. (thinking of future) And Vista Premium would just be installed i wouldn't have the cd's for it.

And thought the 8800gts 640 would be best with my new 22" lcd 1680x1050 resolution.

Anyway computer adds up to 2000 Canadian right now. Kinda steep.Sleepyz

2x500MB of space? I highly doubt you need that much storage on your computer. You could likely save a hell of a lot of money by halving that space to a 2x250GB drive configuration. Unless you're a video editor or a professional musician/graphic artist, you won't need that much space - and even then you'd be much better served with a RAID 1 setup. The E6700 isn't a bad processor either, but the E6600 has the same amount of cache and only 260MHz less speed and save you over $100 CAD.

The 640MB 8800GTS does seem like a better choice though - texture-heavy games are becoming more and more predominant, so more Video RAM is likely going to be the best way to go. Still, if your budget does get stretched thin, the 320MB 8800GTS certainly isn't terrible.

For the case, I'm not a fan of the X-Navigator - only for aesthetic reasons though, so if you like the case, go for it. The cooling in there isn't terrible or anything. That power supply probably needs to be replaced - if it's the one that came with the case, you want a new, quality unit. Corsair, PC Power & Cooling, Seasonic, Enermax, Enhance, OCZ, Topower and Silverstone all offer high-quality units in the 500-650w range, which definitely warrant your attention for powering a rig like yours. Many of those units are easily efficient enough to run an SLI setup with two 8800GTS cards, which will even take care of your worries for the future of your setup.

Damn this computer stuff gives me a headache.

Whats Raid 1 HD? Noob at this stuff. See any on this? http://www.microbytes.com/computer/ordinateur/index.php?cPath=2050200

Reason I was going so big for HD is I have a 3 1/2 yrs old computer with a 120gig hd and an 80gig hd and always fighting for disk space.

For tower not really sure, Wanted pretty Black one with a clear side but how am I supposed to know if its big enough for those Big 8800 cards? Also one that comes with fans and doesn't make too much noise. Any suggestions?

600W power ATX ultra X-finity black a good power supply?

And Would I really see a difference between E6600 and E6700 because the difference in cash is pretty big.

Would really like a computer that can kick ass for 2+years with most games at max settings like crysis. I don't mind adding another 8800 gts640 in 2years for sli when the price will be much lower. And mB i picked is very upgradable http://www.microbytes.com/computer/ordinateur/product_info.php?cPath=2012004&products_id=25531

Hehehe lots of questions, Anyway have time, waiting to see what ATI is releasing this month for videocards so will probably wait a month or 2 before taking the pludge into new computer nightmare.

raid 1 is 2 hard disks acting as 1 hard disk the have exactly the same data its called mirroring (redundancy), if 1 fails the other keeps ur data and continue running. raid 1 is 2 hard disks.

raid 0 is 2 hard disks acting as 2 but the data is stripped between them, and they appear as 1 hard disk to the system. they have double the speed and double the capacity.

raid 1: 80gb hd + 80gb hd = 80gb.

raid 2: 80gb hd + 80gb hd = 160gb double the speed.

Whats Raid 1 HD? Noob at this stuff. See any on this? http://www.microbytes.com/computer/ordinateur/index.php?cPath=2050200

Sleepyz

Firstly don't buy from Microbytes, their prices are too high. Order your stuff from http://www.directcanada.com/. Best prices in Canada, 6% tax if you don't live in BC, free shipping on orders over 300$.

Reason I was going so big for HD is I have a 3 1/2 yrs old computer with a 120gig hd and an 80gig hd and always fighting for disk space.

Sleepyz

Get one 500Gb first and wait for prices to drop until you get a second one.

For tower not really sure, Wanted pretty Black one with a clear side but how am I supposed to know if its big enough for those Big 8800 cards? Also one that comes with fans and doesn't make too much noise. Any suggestions?

Sleepyz

Search for one that is roomy (length of 19+ inches), that doesn't include a PSU and has place for at least 2 120mm fans. Me i'll be getting a cheap Coolermaster Elite for 40$.

600W power ATX ultra X-finity black a good power supply?

Sleepyz

No, it sucks. Get a Seasonic or Corsair. The investment is worth it, if you don't want to take the risk of having a cheap PSU burn and fry your components.

And Would I really see a difference between E6600 and E6700 because the difference in cash is pretty big.

Sleepyz

Wait until July or August, and you'll be able to buy a Q6600 (quad core 2.4 Ghz) or a E6850 (dual core 3.0 Ghz) for 300$ CDN.

Didn't have direct canada in my list of canadian mail order places but checked and prices are pretty close to Microbytes. Reason I picked microbytes is its close to me and they assemble and install everything and if i have a problem don't have to deal with shipping just bring it right to the store. Not to mention I build my own pc a long time ago (Celeron) and was nothing but problems whole time i had it. This PC is best i ever had and bought it pre-build at futureshop hehehe. Did change videocard and power supply over a year ago on it.

For video cards Microbytes is kinda steep. I'd probably order that from tiger direct or something.

Will check case and power supplies you mentioned. Thanks.

[QUOTE="Sleepyz"]

Getting whole new pc. e6700 with 2gigs ram 800mhz, 2x 500gig Hd's The mb i picked as SLI, can hold 8gigs of ram, can take quad core, ect.. (thinking of future) And Vista Premium would just be installed i wouldn't have the cd's for it.

And thought the 8800gts 640 would be best with my new 22" lcd 1680x1050 resolution.

Anyway computer adds up to 2000 Canadian right now. Kinda steep.RayvinAzn

2x500MB of space? I highly doubt you need that much storage on your computer. You could likely save a hell of a lot of money by halving that space to a 2x250GB drive configuration. Unless you're a video editor or a professional musician/graphic artist, you won't need that much space - and even then you'd be much better served with a RAID 1 setup. The E6700 isn't a bad processor either, but the E6600 has the same amount of cache and only 260MHz less speed and save you over $100 CAD.

The 640MB 8800GTS does seem like a better choice though - texture-heavy games are becoming more and more predominant, so more Video RAM is likely going to be the best way to go. Still, if your budget does get stretched thin, the 320MB 8800GTS certainly isn't terrible.

For the case, I'm not a fan of the X-Navigator - only for aesthetic reasons though, so if you like the case, go for it. The cooling in there isn't terrible or anything. That power supply probably needs to be replaced - if it's the one that came with the case, you want a new, quality unit. Corsair, PC Power & Cooling, Seasonic, Enermax, Enhance, OCZ, Topower and Silverstone all offer high-quality units in the 500-650w range, which definitely warrant your attention for powering a rig like yours. Many of those units are easily efficient enough to run an SLI setup with two 8800GTS cards, which will even take care of your worries for the future of your setup.

listen to him, he helped me buy the parts for my new computer. :D

If you want to save money, the E6600 is the way to go (as people previously said), it isn't bad or anything, in fact it's exactly the same as the E6700 except the 260Mhz...which the E6600 can easily be overclocked to. Think of the difference between the E6600 and E6700 this way... for the few hours it'll take you to learn and overclock the E6600 by 260Mhz, youll be paid the equivalent price difference ($100) for that job, cool huh. And i'd also say:

a) 1Tb (2x500Gb) is too much, think about it, a regular game these days is about 5gb... so you're planning on having~ 100 games + 100,000 songs + 400 movies + XP on your hard drives... because that's roughly how much you could fit (bit over the top?, That's assuming you're not a graphics designer)  So id say stick with 500gb and you'll have more than enough.

b) Good decision waiting till May for GPU price drops and when they do happen, I'd say your 22" Monitor would enjoy the 8800GTS 640mb (maybe overclocked) more than the 320mb version, because higher resolutions require more vRAM.

Hope that helps, even though i basically just repeated what was said...just goes to show that great minds think alike. 

Vista is gonna kill your FPS...   so don't do 32 or 64 bit.  Load XP pro and get what you paid for out of the rest of your PC-

250Ridah

Which is why I max out every game I have at smooth framerates with my 8800GTS and Vista. I recommend 32bit Vista if you're getting a whole new computer.

So you guys helped with how I'm doing this. Thanks. Alot of stuff is decided now.

Took a long time but finally found a tower that made me say wow that sec i saw it. Kinda expensive but really like it. http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2477938

Will go with the 8800gts 640 unless ATI releases something alot better very soon. Vista 32bit, (1) 500gig Hd can always add 2nd later on. E6600 seems like more than enough for me. Probably this for power supply, still checking. http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2974309&Sku=ULT31848%20K

2 things still working on. Ram and Motherboard.

This good? http://www.microbytes.com/computer/ordinateur/product_info.php?products_id=25531 I know alot of people have the 680i version but it cost so much.

For ram. http://www.microbytes.com/computer/ordinateur/product_info.php?cPath=2032000&products_id=23470

Or see anything really good in that list for a nice cheap price? http://www.microbytes.com/computer/ordinateur/index.php?cPath=2032000&sort=4a&page=1

Anyway now that i know more what i want will start shopping around for cheapest places to buy.