I would run something much faster than the 8800GT unless you really want to be period correct. The SSD will be nice if you can trim it. I'd look to dual boot a more modern OS for maintenance, etc.

There's no point in having more than 4GB RAM on WinXP 32-bit unless you're planning to dual boot with a later OS.

I'd switch out the Audigy2 ZS for an X-Fi since it supports EAX5. Not many games use that, but it might come in handy for some of the later XP titles like Bioshock and Mass Effect.

That's close to what I was running at that time, except I had the Xeon version of the Q6600, and SLI'd 8800 GT.

For the time it ran things great, but it used a ton of power and put out a lot of heat. The SLI configuration was flaky in some games. For example, the original Mass Effect ran fine, but if you were in the council chamber on the citadel, frame rates would drop to single digits. SLI disabled? It ran fine.

If you already have the parts, or really have the desire for a 2008 PC, then go for it. But I still recommend 2nd or 3rd Gen i5s. Joestar's PC#4 is at that sweet spot for final supported XP hardware. The 650/750Ti were more mainstream cards that didn't use a ton of power but are more than fast enough for any XP title at 1080P. I had and am not a fan of the 400/500 series GeForces, those were Kepler and again were very power-hungry. Sound Blaster X-Fis are plentiful and inexpensive. Just be sure to get a real one and not an OEM card that says X-Fi but doesn't have a real X-Fi chip.

In 2008, Vista was already out but many people stayed on XP. If you moved to 2009 then Windows 7 is out, but many people still stuck to XP.

If your aim is more to build a "high end XP gaming PC" than a "2008 era gaming PC" then I agree with ptr1ck that a faster video card would be beneficial. The Radeon 5870, 5850, 5770, 5750 are all very fast and very compatible with Windows XP games (1600x1200 with 4xAA at >60fps kind of fast, for most games).

Windows XP 32-bit won't benefit at all from more than 4GB memory. It looks to me like your motherboard uses DDR2 memory and I recall the largest common stick of DDR2 is 2GB. You might as well just use two sticks of 2GB in dual channel.

bZbZbZ wrote on 2022-05-30, 16:39:

If your aim is more to build a "high end XP gaming PC" than a "2008 era gaming PC" then I agree with ptr1ck that a faster video card would be beneficial. The Radeon 5870, 5850, 5770, 5750 are all very fast and very compatible with Windows XP games (1600x1200 with 4xAA at >60fps kind of fast, for most games).

Windows XP 32-bit won't benefit at all from more than 4GB memory. It looks to me like your motherboard uses DDR2 memory and I recall the largest common stick of DDR2 is 2GB. You might as well just use two sticks of 2GB in dual channel.

I think I'll follow your advice and create a PC high end XP Gaming PC. Currently I'm negotiating for a Radeon 5870, an I7 930 and an ASUS P6TD Deluxe and I reckon I could get them for a good price 😀

bZbZbZ wrote on 2022-05-30, 16:39:

If your aim is more to build a "high end XP gaming PC" than a "2008 era gaming PC" then I agree with ptr1ck that a faster video card would be beneficial. The Radeon 5870, 5850, 5770, 5750 are all very fast and very compatible with Windows XP games (1600x1200 with 4xAA at >60fps kind of fast, for most games).

Windows XP 32-bit won't benefit at all from more than 4GB memory. It looks to me like your motherboard uses DDR2 memory and I recall the largest common stick of DDR2 is 2GB. You might as well just use two sticks of 2GB in dual channel.

There are 4GB non buffered DDR2 sticks, but they're exceedingly hard to come by.

Let alone expect them to work from the get go.

For 2008 I'd look for a GTX260. It released I think in 2008 Q2, so period correct and late XP games will be grateful for it's power over the 8800GT. I also support getting an X-fi.

I've got a 460 and a 760 on hand for when I manage to piece together my OP XP build. I'll probably roll with the 760.

bZbZbZ wrote on 2022-05-30, 16:39:

Windows XP 32-bit won't benefit at all from more than 4GB memory. It looks to me like your motherboard uses DDR2 memory and I recall the largest common stick of DDR2 is 2GB. You might as well just use two sticks of 2GB in dual channel.

Why does someone always need to point out this erroneous fact. 4x2GB was available then, and a PAE extended machine could use the extra memory, for maybe a ram drive and/or Swap. The extra memory has "narrow" purpose but certainly it's wrong to say no benefit at all?

Then again, why do I have to point out each time the ram above ~3.25 is usable?

Because PAE is disabled by default in XP-32 and most people don't mess with that.

bassix6 wrote on 2022-05-31, 11:12:

bZbZbZ wrote on 2022-05-30, 16:39:

If your aim is more to build a "high end XP gaming PC" than a "2008 era gaming PC" then I agree with ptr1ck that a faster video card would be beneficial. The Radeon 5870, 5850, 5770, 5750 are all very fast and very compatible with Windows XP games (1600x1200 with 4xAA at >60fps kind of fast, for most games).

Windows XP 32-bit won't benefit at all from more than 4GB memory. It looks to me like your motherboard uses DDR2 memory and I recall the largest common stick of DDR2 is 2GB. You might as well just use two sticks of 2GB in dual channel.

I think I'll follow your advice and create a PC high end XP Gaming PC. Currently I'm negotiating for a Radeon 5870, an I7 930 and an ASUS P6TD Deluxe and I reckon I could get them for a good price 😀

Bought them all and some RAM for 50 euro's. Pretty happy with the deal.

Wow! 50€ is a steal. It'd be fair price for the HD5870 alone.

CwF wrote on 2022-05-31, 13:29:

bZbZbZ wrote on 2022-05-30, 16:39:

Windows XP 32-bit won't benefit at all from more than 4GB memory. It looks to me like your motherboard uses DDR2 memory and I recall the largest common stick of DDR2 is 2GB. You might as well just use two sticks of 2GB in dual channel.

Why does someone always need to point out this erroneous fact. 4x2GB was available then, and a PAE extended machine could use the extra memory, for maybe a ram drive and/or Swap. The extra memory has "narrow" purpose but certainly it's wrong to say no benefit at all?

Then again, why do I have to point out each time the ram above ~3.25 is usable?

Hey buddy... When I read the OP's post I tried to understand what their objective is, and my interpretation is that PAE isn't something they're looking for. Maybe you feel I misinterpreted the OP...?

If you want to build an XP retro gaming machine with four sticks of 2GB so you can use Physical Address Extension, you go right ahead. Maybe you should start a thread to show it off to us! You aren't being forced to point out what you know, it's your choice...

bassix6 wrote on 2022-05-31, 14:08:

bassix6 wrote on 2022-05-31, 11:12:

bZbZbZ wrote on 2022-05-30, 16:39:

If your aim is more to build a "high end XP gaming PC" than a "2008 era gaming PC" then I agree with ptr1ck that a faster video card would be beneficial. The Radeon 5870, 5850, 5770, 5750 are all very fast and very compatible with Windows XP games (1600x1200 with 4xAA at >60fps kind of fast, for most games).

Windows XP 32-bit won't benefit at all from more than 4GB memory. It looks to me like your motherboard uses DDR2 memory and I recall the largest common stick of DDR2 is 2GB. You might as well just use two sticks of 2GB in dual channel.

I think I'll follow your advice and create a PC high end XP Gaming PC. Currently I'm negotiating for a Radeon 5870, an I7 930 and an ASUS P6TD Deluxe and I reckon I could get them for a good price 😀

Bought them all and some RAM for 50 euro's. Pretty happy with the deal.

Awesome stuff! That's an amazing deal for those parts. That will be a high end XP Gaming PC alright!

bZbZbZ wrote on 2022-05-31, 20:28:

Hey buddy... When I read the OP's post I tried to understand what their objective is, and my interpretation is that PAE isn't something they're looking for. Maybe you feel I misinterpreted the OP...?

Yes. The OP includes 8GB on the spec sheet, so yes, it will be a nice rig. No reason to to reduce ram. I've never had PAE cause issue, it is contemporaneous to 2008 era, it happened, it works well. So, yes.

bassix6 wrote on 2022-05-29, 11:37:

Hi all, […]
Show full quote

Hi all,

After working on my Win 98SE build I realized that a fair share of games I'd like to play are more suitable for Windows XP. As I always wanted to create one I decided to try and build a PC that would be a high end one around 2007/2008. I decided I wanted to include the following parts for my rig. Would this be suitable for a high-end 2008 era build?

CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q9500 2.8 GHZ
Mainboard: Gigabyte GA-X48-DQ6
GPU: GeForce 8800 GT
RAM: 8 GB RAM
HDD: Samsung 870 EVO 250 GB andToshiba HDD P300 500GB
Sound Card: Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS
PSU: Seasonic G12 GC-550 PSU
DVD-drive: Spare LG DVD Drive

lots of power there. I wouldn't be able to resist having dual boot with W7 and/or a linux to take advantage of those cores and ram

I’d love to put a Quadro FX 5800 into a similar build, technically it meets the 2008 requirement (Nov 08) , it’s got 4gb vram which is ridiculous for that era, and the original list price was $3499 but can be found on EBay fairly cheap now.

BinaryDemon wrote on 2022-06-01, 07:37:

I’d love to put a Quadro FX 5800 into a similar build, technically it meets the 2008 requirement (Nov 08) , it’s got 4gb vram which is ridiculous for that era,...

Speaking of unusable memory, anyone actually get a 4GB vram Nvidia anything to work on XP32 ?
As a builder of high end machines at the time for things that could actually use it, I was changing favor to FireGL or whatever it was then, or a few years later. I know I've tried at least one Nvidia and failed at 4GB, maybe topping at 2 or so. I forget.. Since then an AMD at 4GB DOES work with the pro drivers, I built 3 and if I remember right use a 256 or 512MB aperture in pci enumeration space, and of course on a PAE kernel.

It works fine. It may reserve 256MB more from system memory in worst case vs. standard 512-1GB card.
Also, aside from above - keep VRAM and system RAM seperate, and you don't need more than 512MB of RAM to use 6GB+ of VRAM.