[nearmiss]

No problems mate, and sorry if I sometimes come across as egotistical or arrogant -- I simply don't have time to argue with the 10,000 internet trolls who all think they know better than me. (my vista rant was obviously directed at Gentlekiller who didn't even bother explaining his stance he just announced one and disappeared) I'm a results oriented kinda guy -- less fluff, more substance.

Of the video cards you linked to the 8800GTS 512mb is the better, as the GTS512 is the "new" GTS series based on the revised g92 core the same as the 8800GT (which is also the revised version). It has higher clock speeds and slightly more cores/texunits. A friend bought 2 for SLI and regrets it only because one was more than enough. He decided to keep the SLI for now in the hope more games come out that use them, but my 8800GT setup runs all the games we play at nearly identical speeds (we both have Q6600 clocked at 3.2 as well, same OS, same game settings, hell I set his entire system up to match mine because that is what he asked for).

The Acer sounds defective. Sorry about that it does happen to every brand no matter how good. Never happened to me so far though and we're still using the 3 we've purchased over the years in our home, and friends who have bought the same on my recommendation are still using them without a problem. Fingers crossed.

PS: Good memory.

PSS: SHVAK actually the cooling system on your card is probably less effective than the "wrap around" ones. The wrap around ones are hiding a very effective cooling system that channels air across a large surface area heatsink and out, cooling the memory AND the cpu together as a unit. VERY effective and a much more quiet fan. This is why they went with it as the reference design. Here is the system I am referring to: http://www.ncalcomputers.com/catalog2/i ... 800_gt.jpg

My wife has that one. Here is mine -- but i took off the fan shroud

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814127329

I remember when guys came over to the house and saw my system 5+years ago, They laughed at my big fan placed and aimed to cool my computer. Those were the GeForce2 and 3 days when I actually placed a 110VAC fan facing into the open case of my computer to keep it cooler. It was a 4" fan used in electronic power supplies. I've still got the big blowing baby in my parts box. Maybe, I'll have to resort to it again someday. LOL

I bought the ANTEC 900 case for this new system, since my old case only had 2 small fans. The ALtec case has fans out the wazoo and is setup to accept a couple more. THe case is the same size as my old one, and the fans have blue LEDS facing into each fan 90 degrees apart.

http://www.antec.com/productImage.php?P ... SetZone=en

When someone walks into the room at night when I'm done with this puppy they'll think they're in a disco. LOL