Bamboo

Be happy to help you out Switch. How much are you looking to spend?

Low ball:

MB= $130
CPU= $175
RAM= $70 after rebates for 4 gigs
Video= skies the limit, baby
but that ATI 4850 for $165 or so would kick butt in ARMA. Lots of others to choose from like the 4870 or 9800+

and of course

thermal paste= $5.99

There are a ton more MBs to choose from in the $150 range with more features you might want.
Also, are you going to move up to Vista? Would be about $99.

Remember that the price on a lot of Intel CPUs is supposed to drop July 20th or shortly there after.

http://xtreview.com/addcomment-id-52...rice-drop.html

That e8400 for about $160 is looking really really good.

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Long Bow

I sorta figured that would happen. I just didn't buy into a PSU doing that. Glad you bought a decent one as it will work with a new build as well.

You have some options with a new/upgrade system. The new Nehalm systems coming this winter? will be a big deal and early tests are showing some large improvements over the core2duo's.

Bamboo touched on some of the basics. The current price for decent PCI-E cards is really low. The 9800GTX+ and the 4850 are both strong cards and not much $.

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Long Bow

Of topic, are you saying that the 4850 can't handle ArmA or that it has issues with ArmA?

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Bamboo

sorry, will fix my post
was supposed to say "would kick butt in ARMA"

Considering my 8800GTS 640mb does kind of OK (could be better) in ARMA with pretty much everything cranked up, and the 4850 runs up there with a 9800GTX, it should do awesome in ARMA.
I am still looking for a job after moving, but have been dropping hints to my wife (she's bringing home the bacon at the moment, and a pretty decent slab of it) that she should hook me up with an 4850.
If I still had a job I would have already have gotten a new card. But I am really trying to hold off till Sept./Oct. if I can. Really want to see how Nvidia responds to ATI and how Nvidia's new die shrink works out for them.

Edit:
Just noticed that there is a special with the ASUS 4850 in a combo deal with the p5q Pro motherboard. Both for $315 plus there is a $30 rebate on the GFX card.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...Size=10&page=1

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Long Bow

Funny how much difference one "t" makes. You had me scared that there was some flaw with ATi running ArmA

I'm really tempted to grab a 4850 to replace my GTS 640mb and then Crossfire it in the spring for cheap (all under wife approval of course)

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JAMerica

I've been having the same, potentially dangerous, thoughts myself.

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Jamerius (Feral Druid)

Buckets

I've been really tempted to replace my 2900XT with a 4850 as well but I'd better not. I imagine the mortgage company will be looking at how I spend my money when I try to buy a house next month and that probably wouldn't look too good. I'm also thinking about replacing the AMD 5600+ that I have right now with a Phenom. I'd probably get more out of a video card though. Its nice to see that AMD has closed the IPC gap between Phenom and Core2 in their most recent stepping. Shanghai should be interesting. I wonder if my motherboard would take one.

And about the PSU... I'm running a power hungry AM2 chip, a REALLY power hungry 2900XT and the rest of my system on a 650 watt BFG. Your Antec is a better PSU than mine so as long as you're not planning on going with Crossfire/SLI anytime soon, you should be OK.

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Switch

If i built a new system I'd be going 2x HD4950's with a potentially serious over clock on my cpu to boot. The new intel chips have shined when it comes to OCing flexibility... but I dont know if the ATI cards run better with ATI/AMD procs.

I was thinking about using the water cooling from the toms hardware sub $2000 system builder too -- though I really want to find some water cooling for the graphics as well... I'm sick of heat causing me to doubt my graphics set up.

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|TG|Switch

Better known as:
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That noob who ran over the mine.
That noob who TK'd me with a sniper rifle.
That noob who hit that APC at 300m with light AT! Our APC...

Bamboo

Before dropping $$ on 2 4850s, make sure you read up on the reviews and decide if a 4870 by itself would give you about the same, so your are more in your window for the PSU.

And I really doubt you need to go with water cooling as long as you have a good airflow case, unless you plan on like taking a e8400 over 3.7-4.0.
I have seen a lot of people do just fine with that on air and a good after market cooler like yours.

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Acreo Aeneas

Well according to some friends at school, a few of them are owners of E8400s and have told me that they've managed to go beyond 4 GHz on air cooling. This of course means one of those huge cooling towers. Probably a really cold room as well.

The ATI cards probably run better with a overclocked Intel core.

You could save yourself some money and buy one HD4850. Then a year or two later, you could upgrade that HD4850 to something better.

(BTW...is that a mistype: 4950?)

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