An appropriate Nvidia choice.

Hey everyone. I'm looking to build a new desktop PC, considering all I have right now is my Vaio laptop. So far I've figured everything out except for the video card. Now, my system is based around the Intel i7 CPU, and I've been told that Nvidia works best with Intel. With that in mind, with a video card budget of ~$300-400, which video card(s) would you recommend? My prospective system specs are as follows:

CPU: Intel i7-920 Bloomfield

MB: ASUS P6X58D

RAM: Corsair Dominator 6GB (3 x 2GB)

PSU: Corsair CMPSU-750TX 750W

HD: x2 150GB WD Raptor drives

Extra HD: WD 640GB 7200RPM

Speakers: Logitech X-540 70W 5.1

Case: XClio Windtunnel Advanced

CPU fan: Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro

Keyboard: Logitech G15 Gaming Keyboard

Monitor: Asus 24" 2ms HDMI Widescreen LCD

Approximate total w/o video card: $2,100

Also, if any of you have suggestions on changes to the system outside of the video card setup, please don't be afraid to speak up. If I'm going to spend this much on a system, I'd prefer it be as fast as possible for the budget I've set. Thank you so much in advance for the help!

for that price,

MY GTX260 Super OC out powers a GTX285 and its about your price range

I don't know that nVidia cards work better with Intel CPUs than ATI cards; that has more to do with the northbridge chipset, which in your case is Intel, so there shouldn't be any problems there (possible driver issues if it were an nVidia chipset with an ATI card).

With that in mind, for the pricerange set, if you want an nVidia card, I would go with a GTX285.
While an overclocked GTX260 might be able to outperform a stock GTX285, consider what would happen when you similarly overclock that GTX285. :twisted:
Here's a good one:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814127428

That being said, if it were my money, in the tech market right now I would not buy an nVidia card. Since the ATI Radeon 5000 series will outperform the nVidia GTX200 series, I would not buy an nVidia again until they come out with the 300 series. What I would get right now for that price range is a Radeon 5870. This one, to be specific:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814150476

As for the rest of your system, there are a few recommendation I would make towards that.

MBB:
Good board, not much to say there. ;)

CPU:
Great CPU, I would just say that if you have a Micro Center near you, you can get it for $200 instead. (I think they limit those to in-store now, though I could be wrong.)

RAM:
Good, but there are better. Specifically, the RAM you have selected has a CAS latency of 8, which is good, but not great. And for $250, I would want great. Towards that end, I would recommend this set by Mushkin. Mushkin and Corsair are about equal on quality for their respective high-set stuff, and these sticks have a CAS latency of 6, with timings of 6-7-6-18, versus the Corsair's timing of 8-8-8-24. Trust me, you will see a difference.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820226050

PSU:
Good PSU. That's actually the one that I have. ;)

HDDs:
While the Raptors were king for a long time, and the Velociraptors were king for...ok, not actually very long...I really cannot recommend the Velociraptors anymore.
If you want the best in performance, get and SSD or two. Otherwise, normal HDDs have reached the Velociraptors, and in more than a few cases, surpassed them. Other than 15k SAS drives, Velociraptors do still have the fastest random seek times for platter HDDs, but in every other aspect, they are surpassed by drives such as the Samsung F3 1TB and WD Black 2TB.
My recommendation for a HDD would be the 1TB Samsung F3, for both price and performance. (and it's finally back in stock at Newegg!)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-185-_-Product
Review of the F3, among other things comparing it to the 300GB Velociraptor:
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/sto...3-1tb-review/1
Similarly for the 640GB WD; they were king for a while, but have since been surpassed both in performance and price.

If you do choose to spend more and go SSD, you can get a good 60GB one for ~$200-250, or 120GB for ~$400-500. I'm not quite up on the latest SSDs, but look for read speeds over 200MBps and write speeds over 150MBps.

EDIT:
The Crucial C300 series looks freakin sweet.

i honestly would hold off on getting an nvidia card until the gf 4xx series is out, the new models usually trigger the older ones to be priced lower.

i would agree with x88x. for the money now ATI has the market by the teeth, The new 4xx series that nvidia is touting is set to roughly match the 5870 for speed, at about double the price. Also, the ATI cards are using less power than Nvidia... Im not a fanboy for either side, i just want what makes my computer have the most bang for my buck.

Shouldn't that be the 3xx nVidia series? (not 4xx)

lol.... either or... they are working on the 400 series last time i checked.... i could be wrong tho! :D

The GTX480/GTX470 is being released in 13 days. March 26th.

They might have started development on the GT400 chip already, but if they have, it's nowhere near release. Also, it would be rather odd for them to skip a number series.

Last I heard, the GT300 chip was slated for release sometime Q4-09 or Q1-10...obviously the former didn't happen, so... Granted this is fairly old, but it's the best I could find:
http://www.planet3dnow.de/vbulletin/...1&d=1225703758

EDIT:
...ignore that...looks like I missed all the stuff about this...hmmm. I can't seem to find any information yet about what the GTX480/70 are though... :(

EDIT2:
...and, I spoke too soon again.. :facepalm:
Turns out they switched chip names on me, and Fermi is the GF100, not the GT300... I guess they did finally decide to work on improving their chips instead of just making them bigger. :D
http://www.dailytech.com/NVIDIA+Name...ticle17584.htm

Okay, here's my take on your suggestion:


HDDs - save yourelf the money, I have a velociraptor and while it's great, I'd much prefer a better GPU or faster CPU
CPU - spend the money you save on the HDDs on a faster one, or spend extra on the GPU
GPU - Radeon 5850
PSU - Great, you could probably save 100-200 watts on a single GPU system (especially if you limit your HDD plans), but it'll give you more overhead
Cooler - I have a similar one and all I can say is it's incredible considering how little it cost! I occasionally see my CPU hit 38 degrees, never anything more
Monitor - Good choice considering your budget