I think I have my new computer all priced out:

[Genocidicbunny]

My points exactly.

Your point, as I read it, was to actually get a better gfx card. He has a 8800 right now, which, even if its a low-end 8800GS, is still very decent. It would be more wasteful to buy a new gfx card instead of a more powerful cpu.

 

[Onionsoilder]

Isn't 8 gigs of ram overkill for the other components? You might get a CPU/GPU bottleneck. Even with Vista, 2 gigs is enough for most users (especially relative to your other components), and 3 or 4 is plenty.

The reason I'm going for 8 GB is because I plan on this being a mid to high-end computer capable of playing games like Fallout 3 and Age of Conan. I have 4 GB now and still run into Memory Allocation Errors at times, so 2 certainly won't be enough.

With the PSU, and the Corsair/PC Power & Cooling ones, they're the same price? Unless you mean before the main-in rebate, but I plan on doing that anyway.

As far as the bottleneck your talking about, I seem to be missing what the problem is. On Newegg a good 80% of the reviews report running with 8 GB no problem. I do see what you mean about a Quad-Core being better, they seem a bit pricey now, I'd rather wait until the technology developed more and they come out with better, cheaper ones, then just upgrade then.

 

[GoodGame]

Note, if you aren't running Vista currently, you don't even actually have 4GB, but whatever your your Control Panel->System/general says you have. The 4GB should actually appear around 3 to 3.5 GB.

 

[Genocidicbunny]

The reason I'm going for 8 GB is because I plan on this being a mid to high-end computer capable of playing games like Fallout 3 and Age of Conan. I have 4 GB now and still run into Memory Allocation Errors at times, so 2 certainly won't be enough.

With the PSU, and the Corsair/PC Power & Cooling ones, they're the same price? Unless you mean before the main-in rebate, but I plan on doing that anyway.

As far as the bottleneck your talking about, I seem to be missing what the problem is. On Newegg a good 80% of the reviews report running with 8 GB no problem. I do see what you mean about a Quad-Core being better, they seem a bit pricey now, I'd rather wait until the technology developed more and they come out with better, cheaper ones, then just upgrade then.

The problem is, the cpu that you picked out is last generation. You wanna get something newer. The AMD quad-cores are very reasonably priced for being quad cores ( C2Q Q9550 is 320$! Compare that to 160$ for the Phenom 9850 Black Edition)

As for the memory: The great thing about it is that its the easiest part to upgrade. So once you start running out constantly, its easy to get another kit and stick it in.

 

[Onionsoilder]

What's wrong with last-gen? Yeah, it's not the best, but it's still really good and a helluva lot cheaper.

 

[Genocidicbunny]

Its just a future-proofing method. You can either spend the full amount now, or pay half now for an older cpu, and the other half later for what will by then be an older cpu as well. In the end, you'll be paying the same, but get less net performance.

In reality though, it just depends on what you want to do. And really, its your choice.

 

[lutzj]

stickciv makes a good point. Future-proofing is ALWAYS a good idea, as it will save you loads of money down the road. I'd go AMD because their procs are cheap (albeit relatively weak) and Phenom II will support the currently used socket, AM2+.

 

[GenMarshall]

No cooling towers?

(Though that is what I would need to cool an overheated laptop)