Just finished setting up my new Rig, looking for some fun things to do with it now since i've been on a 6 year old computer...

Went from a P4 Northwood 2.26Ghz to a Core 2 Quad 6600... 512 Rambus to 2 Gig of DDR2 (might go to 4) EIDE to SATA 3gbps. Haven't run a memtest yet, prob will tonight, do some 3dmark, etc..

Newer games i've got sitting around:
HL2, i'll prob get portal and all those now too
Farcry (never played it, but got the free version downloaded)
Company of Heroes (came with new vid card)

Anything else I should play around with? I wanna see what this system will do..

Nice rig, I'd probably try this one...

3370_0.png

That'* a good suggestion... but definitely upgrade to 4GB RAM before trying to run this.

CSS is always good, if a little old.
post your 3dmark scores.

aquamark
untitled3.jpg

3dmark05
3dmarkgraph.jpg

3dMark06 - 10530



Everything clocked normally, setup to manufacturer'* specs. From what I've read, a Q6600 is a bottleneck @ 2.4ghz, and after overclocking i'd be around the 13k scores there.

But i've got the Intel HSF so i'm not gonna do any OC'ing quite yet... I can run about any game @ high settings at my resolutions, save, Crysis.

I just built a new desktop in late December. Same processor, 8800GT KO graphics, 6gb of ram. That will run crysis all settings on high at an average of 30-32 fps.

As for testing new things... with that processor just run a bunch of stuff all at once and notice the lack of slowing down

I'm loving the quad core so far. My ol' P4 system wouldn't like anymore than 10 tabs in firefox, or some HUUUUGE pic threads on other sites I go to.

Now the only way I've slowed it down is opening iTunes. I've disabled indexing on all XML files, and told it to ignore the iTunes files, but I may have to have it stop indexing all music all together. Anyone else had this issue? I'm using onboard sound on my Gigabyte P35 DS3R mobo..

As for Crysis, it sounds tempting, if nothing else for the eye candy. My monitor ATM is 1024x768, so anything will run good! In a few months I'll prob pickup a larger one and make it my primary.

EDIT: I'm looking at doing a lil more with it, perhaps throw another 2 gigs at it, However I got the 32bit Vista, so I could only use around 3.5 of a total of 4. I could get 64bit, and then have a full 4 gigs, and some more future compatability, but I don't want to pay another $130 or so for the 64 Bit operating system.

BTW Microcenter is the bomb diggity. My Q6600 was $200 there instore. Newegg has it between 250 and 270 daily.

whats the bus speed on it? Personally I'd go with 1333 and then take a 6600 and O.C. it to around 3 at least. then you've got something worth having.

Also, what were your specific choices for HD, Video, Memory and MB?

HELL YEAH! Andrew you think of the weirdest crap.

If you're into hardcore strategy check out Sins of a Solar Empire.

Otherwise the gaming market is in a temporary slump. Everything that I've seen released in the past 3 months is a sequel to a previous game or just copies the same style of gameplay that has been rehashed countless times. I played Crysis once through and havn't touched it since.

Spore is something to look forward to. Starcraft II is a new one coming out, but I ONLY recommend it if you are a big fan of the first one and like RTS'*. Otherwise most games out there might be fun for a little bit, but after a week it won't be a memorable experience.

BUT...you said you never played HL2 and have it. Play that, its top notch!
Also if you're looking for a great multiplayer shooter go with Team Fortress 2.