Iv got no major issues, just have some basic questions:
would the 4870X2 be able to reach its full 'potential' with the rest of the system? - I really dont know about these things - but is that gpu overkill for the rest of the system? take in mind it is displaying onto a 24'' monitor.
And would that psu be able to handle if I decided to O'clock in the future (no need to now)
No problems there really, I've used a Q9550 with two 4870X2s for ages, it's quite a powerful CPU. Arguably you'd get a little more use if you overclcked it a bit. That PSU will handle an overclock, it's pretty much an identical system to mine a couple of years back, I ran a 4870X2, a Q9550 overclocked to 3.65Ghz, 4GB of Corsair Dominator 1066 and a Corsair HX 520W PSU, and two hard drives.(Not joking, that was my actual setup, you have good taste :P)
haha im pretty sure it was u who gave me the advice when i was building it about a year ago ;). iv just taken advantage of some good deals recently and upgraded from a Q6600 to the Q9650 and from a 4850 to the 4870X2.
this Sapphire 4870X2 runs ridiculously hot tho, comes with pretty crap stock cooling and im having diffuclty coming up with a aftermarket solution for it. i live in South Africa and computer hardware costs a fortune here, difficult to find the parts u want as well.
I was toying with the idea of putting in another Dominator DDR2 2x2gigs kit, u think i would see any major benefit from that? I mean a benefit that would justify the expence? (pretty expensive) i donno if it would do all that much to be honest?
The Sapphire HD4870X2 uses the standard cooler. I also have a Sapphire 4870X2 the same, it runs fine. If you got one second hand you can try blowing the dust out of it. If it's new, then if it runs too hot the problem is with your case cooling. Remember the 4870X2s are designed to run between 80 and 90ºC, their fan speeds adjust automatically to keep within that range, so that they can be quiet, but not too hot. 90ºC, despite what you hear, is fine for ATI graphics cards, mine are both more than 2 years old and have been running at those temperatures their entire life.
As for extra RAM, do you run out? If you don't, then there's not much point :P
Then that card is definitely not running too hot, it runs well below 90ºC when gaming. the back plate just gets incredibly hot to the touch.
What cooler would you recommend to overclock the Q9650 with?
The backplate does get hot, as that's attached to the auxiliary heatsink. The cooler for the 4870X2 is in two parts, the GPUs are cooled by large copper blocks which the fan blows air over. The voltage regulators, memory and PLX controller are cooled by the black shroud which runs all over the card - the small heatsink visible at the side of the card (a large array of small black cylinders) is responsible for cooling that, as well as the backplate.
As for the Q9650, a tower cooler by any of Noctua, Tuniq, Thermalright or Prolimatech will do nicely.
