1st post .. new to silent PC's.

The last system(s) that I built were core duo's so it been a while. I'm not up to speed about the latest and greatest.
What do I gain/lose by using a 775 quad CPU over a 1055 CPU? (using a i5 series)

Looking for suggestions for a CPU/MB for the following application(s) (in no particular order)

- doesn't need to be latest and greatest but solid with good features
- Linux supported (possible dual boot with MS server or virtual machine)
- Virtual machine
- kid's gaming (BioWare's Star Wars)
- mini-ATX (probably using a LIAN-LI PC-Q08B case)
- data storage (and backup)
- music storage and playback
- movies to Plasma (1080 - HDMI out - either on board (preferred) or video card)
- standard apps (web/MS office)
- support for SSD boot drive & 2 data drives (for now) (I have a NAS box as well) will add Blue Ray drive
- price for the MB in the 100$ to 150$ range (if possible)

Possibly this isn't a very demanding requirement list - but then I don't know.

Thanks for taking the time to answer.

The 1155 CPUs are two generations newer than the 775 CPUs - there was 1156 inbetween. Ivy Bridge, the next step after the Sandy Bridge CPUs, will also be S1155 so you have a little more room to expand down the track should you desire to in the next couple of years.

You can pick up a socket 1155 mini-ITX board in the price range you specify - Gigabyte and Asus have a couple.

The 1155 CPUs have onboard graphics; the 775s do not. 1155 CPUs have much lower power usage per performance point.

Today current Sandy Bridge CPUs are much more capable and efficient than two gens LGA 775, a i3 2100 is faster than Q8400, so my suggestion is to build around Sandy bridge, depending on your needs. i5 2500k is atm the best bang for gaming, really good cpu that allows overclocking, at $200 there is nothing that can compete with it. That said, the i3 are also very good cpus for the money, specially since you are not building a pure gaming pc. Depending on your CPU needs, there is also the Sandy Bridge Pentiums and Celerons that will be cheaper, and still very capable cpus. Check the CPUs for whatever VM you will be doing, as not all are capable of doing everything, some have limitation due to design and hardware.

I would check i3 2100, its a $99 cpu if you have a microcenter near you, or $120 online, comes with intel HD2000 and i3 2105 comes with intels HD3000 (so is the i5 2500K), im not familiar with BioWare's Star Wars, so idk if you do need a dedicated GPU, my guess is you do, but im not sure. The Q08 can fit almost any dedicated GPU, maybe would help a little more info about the games you kids play in terms of specs, to decided into a dedicated GPU. The Q11 is also an option, similar to the Q08 but smaller (sort of speak) only a single 140mm cools the pc, it can still fit 2x 3.5 hdds on the bottom and has a optical drive on the top, you could probably fit the ssd below the hdds. Check this two threads for ideas into what you might be getting into, Mini ITX H67 Silent Gaming System and mATX mobo in Lian Li Q11 mini-ITX build (careful with this one, as he used a special micro ATX mobo to allow the placement of the HR02 and the Shamman).

On the mobo, there are lots of options, i would consider any H67 mobo (maybe even H61 but be careful here as not all have Sata III, HDMI, and PCIe 16x, in case you will use a dedicated GPU), when im not OCing, my personal preference is Intel mobos out of bieng the most efficient, but they also the least tweakable, Intel DH67CFB3 could be an option, so are many others Asus, MSI, AsRock, Gigabyte, etc, pair it with i3 2100 + Crucial M4 and you will end up with very capable mini itx pc.

One thing to be careful of is even though the K CPUs are very good (I have a 2500K myself) they lack many of the new instruction sets Intel added, including one that is for VMs. It's probably worth going with a normal CPU for you to have those. Unfortunately, that means that the fastest CPU you can get with the faster included graphics is the i3-2125. You might want to go with an i5-2500(normal, non-K) and spring for a dedicated GPU, which will kick the snot out of even the faster onboard graphics. However, do note that I'm playing Starcraft II on my 2500K using the onboard graphics, and it performs well enough to have a lot of fun with and looks nice.

I would say don't even think about using a 775 CPU, quad or not - I'd trust an i3-2120/2125 to be better, in the real world, than a quad 775 for most tasks. Why are you focused on quad core? Not that they're not nice to have, in abstract, but not much makes use of that many threads these days. It looks odd juxtaposed with your "doesn't need to be the latest and greatest".

Welcome to SPCR!

I'd stay away from the older gen products - probably little or no cost savings to be found there and you lose on performance and features. Stick with a SandyBridge CPU.

Virtualization: Take a look at Intel's info on virtualization and see if you need VT-x and/or VT-d capability. You can use the advanced search tool on ARK to see which cpu's support which instruction sets.

Gaming: Tom's Hardware benchmarked Star Wars: The Old Republic. The game will use all the cores your CPU has, so there is a benefit to 4 cores over 2. That said, you could get away with a dual core i3 @3GHz. But, whatever CPU you get, you'll want a discrete graphics card. How big of a card will be determined by your screen rez (using the 1080P plasma for gaming?) and how high you want to set the detail level and AA. At 1080p, the low end is an HD6770 (~$120) or equivalent, high detail and AA brings you to the HD6950 ($240-260) or GTX560Ti 448 ($280-300).