Where to buy?? and more...

[ShockG]

:Blush:

Bah here's the thing (the good news), you may not even have to wait till Christmas.
nVidia has or will have an nForce 590SLI Intel motherboard, which will do nicely with a Core2 CPU. That also stands true for an AM2 platform.
However the chipset may not be what concerns you the most. It may be the integration of that chipset into a great mobo. Just like there are many NF4 SLI boards out there, not many are better than the DFI SLI-DR Venus or Expert boards. (Add Asus AN32 SLI to the mix and maybe Abit AN8 Fatality)

I for one will hold out for a 590 board and Conroe 2.66GHz CPU which will release next month (heard 26th July). DFI is always late so it'll be nother month before they have a board, but it may be worth waiting for...

How ever long you wait now, won't be comparable to the royal ass kicking that FX60 will get when the COre2 releases. Right now Core2 2.66GHz is quicker than FX64 (FX60 @ 3GHz would be FX64 I assume).
No mount of overclocking will change that (unless of course you can get your CPU to run 4GHz or so, but then Core2 at 2.9GHz would still be faster )

If you couldn't care about DFI, then grab the Asus board you can buy right now for about R1,750, which supports CrossFire and has 3xPCI-e 16X slots based on the 975X Bad Axe chipset. It'll prolly overclock like crazy (like the last 440BX board intel released in the days of the P2) and give you ample leg room for upgrades.

Patience!

 

[pupa]

:Blush:

then grab the Asus board you can buy right now for about R1,750, which supports CrossFire and has 3xPCI-e 16X slots based on the 975X Bad Axe chipset. It'll prolly overclock like crazy (like the last 440BX board intel released in the days of the P2) and give you ample leg room for upgrades.

Patience!

975X Bad Axe chipset? Its yet to be confirmed by asus that they can run the core2 chips on it, thats the only hold. The E revision of the board maybe could, but is not yet confirmed unless you know something I don't. That's why I am waiting in Angs to hear whats Up. I worry a bit about crossfire as this ATI-AMD merger can only spell problems for the future. My bet is to wait for the Asus 590SLI board to come soon with Quad SLI 7950's and Phys x card. Yummy. Will have to sell my Mercedes SLI first!

 

[ShockG]

Well, it seems to be working for those who have the core chips, but I could be wrong. 0302+ can run Core2 and I think most of these are 0303/04

Quad SLI is arguably the most dissapointing non event next to the PhysX card.

nVidia is getting rid of 90nm parts and the quickest way to do it (clear room for smaller process NV5X) is to have you pay for it.
Think about it? No matter how fast 7950GX2 is, it wont do DX10. And I can put my liver up for it that when GF8 releases, you won't be able to read about GF7 anything, anywhere on their front page. The multi GPU card that is as long as a V5 6000 VSA-100 will sieze to be a priority entirely.

Even driver development will stop focusing on your card and move on to the DX10 parts. They'll release tech demos for DX10 and encourage developers to use their latest spiffy NV only DX10 feature. So you will be left looking like the Before picture.

I know this because I was always late buying GFX cards prior to GF4 and it hurt how you became so yesterday when their new products came.
Worst of all, that graph they leaked* or ather gave out to the public showing 7950GX2 Vs 7900GTX, will turn around and haunt you. As you will be the 7900GTX against a mightier than ever GeForce8 TX/Ultra or whatever they may call it.

Quad SLI right now scores 9.5K on an FX60 in 3DM06, but wait, that's at 1024x768. At 1280x1024 it's at 8.5K That is easy to achieve with 2x7900GT at less than a third of the price.

It's at 12K in 05 on the same system. You can do 12K in 05 using 1 7900GT o 1 X1900 or X1800XT possibly.

HI-res gamming. Yeah sure lets assume your game supports the 2Kx1.5K screen size, but does your display? 24" will give you 1920x1360 or somethig along the lines. 32" will get you there, but now how many can afford a 32" LCD :/

PhysX

As we discovered earlier, Ageia’s flagship demonstration of PhysX technology, CellFactor, can be played without an Ageia PhysX card, simply by adding ‘EnablePhysX=false’ to the command line. This ludicrously simple and massively embarrassing (for Ageia) hack was discovered by a regular posted over at [H]ardForum and posted at Blue's News.

We’ve had it running, done the benchmarks and it’s a fair cop. You can run Cell Factor with all the exploding boxes and massive number of objects flying through the air without a hit on the framerate. You’ll be missing out on key PhysX features, but in terms of the way the game plays, these are of debatable importance

{Takumi's post}

Source

 

[ID10T]

OK but you know what, i don't care if the newer CPU's are going to kick my (donkey) in the future. I just want something that's going to be able to play the new games for 1 year maybe 2. then I'll upgrade again. I saw that the reviews are out for the 7950X2 but i don't want that, the card that i want should be OK, and if things get tough then i add a second one.

At the moment I can afford that setup... It would be nice to save some cash though - so wait for 1 - 2 months you say??

(I get the urge to get the best ever everything but where is that going to get me -nowhere- cos there's always better.)

 

[pupa]

Intel and Nvidia is releasing new models so quick now that the high end stuff available this year end will be main stream early next year! That would give You a long upgrade path for future. Look at the 7900 prices, can be had for 2000+ and was just released? Never happened before!

 

[Ap0c]

Yea, I recon 2x7900GT's will be a good buy...but it all depends on 1 big thing, which nobody mentions. Resolution. If you are running a 17" and will run @ 1024x768 or 1280x1024 etc, then there is no need for a hardcore graphics card.

Only reason I have my 'high-end' graphics card, is so I can run @ 1680x1050. Before running off, check what kinda res you are going to run, it makes a big diff with the budget.

my 2c.

 

[pupa]

Yea, I recon 2x7900GT's will be a good buy...but it all depends on 1 big thing, which nobody mentions. Resolution. If you are running a 17" and will run @ 1024x768 or 1280x1024 etc, then there is no need for a hardcore graphics card.

Only reason I have my 'high-end' graphics card, is so I can run @ 1680x1050. Before running off, check what kinda res you are going to run, it makes a big diff with the budget.

my 2c.

Well as I said future HD TV and DVD as well as future computer games will require it. So I plan to have a long and wieldy upgrade path for that future home made entertainment system!

 

[4nT1_8unNy]

Has anyone used Sybaritic 'cause their site looks like a warez site? Their prices look good but i would like to know more about them before I actually used them.