What operating system to use with a new rig?

[naz]

That all looks pretty decent to me mate. I had a very quick look at the Intel CPU online and it looks to be quite bloody good (If anything its possibly a bit of overkill, and you could probably save a hundred or so by going one level lower with the CPU, for example an i5 2500, and using the extra $ on the video card(s) - kind of depends on how CoD actually performs on release I guess). I don't think you need the Bluray if your only using the computer for the two flight sims obviously. You could transfer over your existing drives (but as mentioned before, a new DVD/cd drive is basically spare change now anyway). Your current sound Card is a definite keeper though, hang on to it and transfer it over to the new machine.

Regarding the Video cards, I have always steered away from crossfire. The only reason being is I always tend to see people in forums having problems with it in various games ... but I have never looked into it properly to have a real opinion I must admit: - it may well work perfectly fine for ROF, IL2 and CoD? Perhaps the other lads can advise you on that. As I sort of mentioned earlier, I tend to just whore myself out to the biggest strongest video card on the market at the time I upgrade so I have no idea on how the mid-range cards perform in practice. From the little I have read though, they seem generally capable of holding their own in many games.

I've also noticed a few similar threads to this on this very website, so perhaps you should have a look through those to get some more ideas.

In any event, like you said, you seem to now have a good starting point and can take it from there once the performance reports of CoD start getting revealed by us all next week.

PS: - You know, i actually thought about mentioning the usual heavy price tag for the "beast" when I typed the message out yesterday, but thought, ...nah, he'll enjoy the surprise of seeing the price tag on his own lol