That's pretty unbalanced as a gaming computer. Too much spent on CPU/Motherboard. Not enough on GPU.
But the computer isn't going to blow up in some kind of incompatible way? And will still be pretty decent, and will work even better say 6-12months if i buy some DX11 thing?
you really need to get a better video card for that rig. the GTS 250 really isn't that great of a card. It's kind of like building a tank, but using a pellet gun as the main weapon.
That's pretty unbalanced as a gaming computer. Too much spent on CPU/Motherboard. Not enough on GPU.
But the computer isn't going to blow up in some kind of incompatible way? And will still be pretty decent, and will work even better say 6-12months if i buy some DX11 thing?
you really need to get a better video card for that rig. the GTS 250 really isn't that great of a card. It's kind of like building a tank, but using a pellet gun as the main weapon.
I can live with that. So under the assumption that I'm buying a good video card soon/later on, this rig is sound?
That's pretty unbalanced as a gaming computer. Too much spent on CPU/Motherboard. Not enough on GPU.
But the computer isn't going to blow up in some kind of incompatible way? And will still be pretty decent, and will work even better say 6-12months if i buy some DX11 thing?
Ah, you already have the 250, I'm guessing.
Just one thought, if you think you might want to do two cards then that PSU probably won't cut it (if they are high end). If not then that motherboard is more expensive than it needs to be.
lowlylowlycook on
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So, I'm looking to buy a new computer and Techreports econobox looks about right for a guy like me.
I do however feel a little uncomfortable buying AMD, as I never have before. I'd much rather prefer an intel processor. If I wanted to make that change from the initial build to an i5, would I only need to change the processor and motherboard, or does the GPU need to be changed as well?
Oh, very cool. Uh, so if I'm upping the CPU and GPU, should I also up the PSU?
Would a 380w PSU be good enough for an i5 and a 5770? Or would it be better to go for more, like a 500w?
It should be fine. If you want to leave room for a future upgrade then you might want a 500w PSU. That could be a good idea because that i5 should last a long time as a gaming CPU.
lowlylowlycook on
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I'm interested in putting together a new gaming pc. My budget is round about 1k, but I can comfortably go higher if I would see economical performance improvement. After reading the awesome op, I quickly threw this together:
This of course leaves a motherboard. This will be my first time putting together my only pc, and I'm pretty ignorant of the finer points of compatabilites. Anything there glaringly wrong, or someone has a better suggestion? Thank you for any advice.
I'm interested in putting together a new gaming pc. My budget is round about 1k, but I can comfortably go higher if I would see economical performance improvement. After reading the awesome op, I quickly threw this together:
This of course leaves a motherboard. This will be my first time putting together my only pc, and I'm pretty ignorant of the finer points of compatabilites. Anything there glaringly wrong, or someone has a better suggestion? Thank you for any advice.
You'll need more power than that. Most good 500W PSUs or the Antec Sonata III case w/ PSU should work.
lowlylowlycook on
(Please do not gift. My game bank is already full.)
I'm interested in putting together a new gaming pc. My budget is round about 1k, but I can comfortably go higher if I would see economical performance improvement. After reading the awesome op, I quickly threw this together:
This of course leaves a motherboard. This will be my first time putting together my only pc, and I'm pretty ignorant of the finer points of compatabilites. Anything there glaringly wrong, or someone has a better suggestion? Thank you for any advice.
You'll need more power than that. Most good 500W PSUs or the Antec Sonata III case w/ PSU should work.
I'm interested in putting together a new gaming pc. My budget is round about 1k, but I can comfortably go higher if I would see economical performance improvement. After reading the awesome op, I quickly threw this together:
This of course leaves a motherboard. This will be my first time putting together my only pc, and I'm pretty ignorant of the finer points of compatabilites. Anything there glaringly wrong, or someone has a better suggestion? Thank you for any advice.
You'll need more power than that. Most good 500W PSUs or the Antec Sonata III case w/ PSU should work.
Reading up on P55 motherboards, the MSI GD65 seems to be pretty decent as well. It's a mid range board (not sure if it has more features than the Gigabyte). The people at bit-tech seemed to like it. They recommend it over the other midrange boards right now.
Anyone have any thoughts on Asus vs MSI vs Gigabyte?
Reading up on P55 motherboards, the MSI GD65 seems to be pretty decent as well. It's a mid range board (not sure if it has more features than the Gigabyte). The people at bit-tech seemed to like it. They recommend it over the other midrange boards right now.
Anyone have any thoughts on Asus vs MSI vs Gigabyte?
I've not been a fan of MSI lately. The last two boards I bought from them (granted, a few years back; socket 939 stuff) both had problems. One had the chipset fan die. When I made a support call, they wound up sending me the wrong fan. I called again, then they sent me the right fan, but it died two weeks later.
The second board (which I ordered before the first one had problems) was DOA, and the replacement I got from NewEgg never had functioning front-side USB or headphone jacks. Yes, they were connected properly and worked when I installed a different motherboard. The Firewire never worked, either. And then the MSI video card my fiancee was using had the fan crap out on it after only a few months.
MSI strikes me as the new ECS/Elitegroup. They seem to have decent enough features, but the construction quality is awful.
Personally, I swear by Gigabyte these days. Never once had a problem with any of their hardware. Asus? Eh, bad experiences about a decade ago. I still have this mental image of all Asus products being the PC equivalent of a Honda Civic with yellow paint, wing spoilers, a half-assed body kit, and a few "turbo" and "Type-R" stickers on it. Whether that's justified or not, I'll leave to you.
I'm just going to throw this out there. You guys can order the cards from Amazon even if there out of stock and Amazon will send them to you when they get them. Amazon also has free shipping on a lot of them as well.
I'm also noticeing that Amazon's prices seem to be a little lower.
Okay, I have all of the parts of my computer, except the fucking graphics card.
What should I get if my budget is ~$200, and I cannot fucking get the 5850?
Then go with a 5770 for awhile. You can then Crossfire it and get good performance or just upgrade to a 5790 when they come out or similar because the 57*0 X2s should be out by then as well.
Amazon is also selling these cheaper than Newegg with free shipping as well.
Until they make huge headway in efficiency gains, Crossfire/SLI is never going to be a viable upgrade path. It's expensive, noisy, hot, and sucks down power. That shit is purely for the system-specs-in-my-forum-sig crowd.
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SteevLWhat can I do for you?Registered Userregular
edited October 2009
All right, my old PC here at my girlfriend's finally died, and I've been looking at building a new one. I already have Windows 7 on order, and I'll be making use of my old monitor and mouse. Everything else is pretty much getting replaced.
I'm fairly certain I am overspending here, and I know I can bring the price down a little bit with some combos that apply to these items. I'm definitely leaning on replacing the motherboard with the Gigabyte microATX mobo mentioned a few posts back, although I've never worked with one of those before. I'm assuming it'd work fine in that case.
For what it's worth, I still run at 1280x1024 resolution and I am happy with that (ignorance is bliss?). Also, I'm not sure about the power supply, but I definitely prefer modular, and I really liked the modular Corsair PSUs I've bought in the past.
The PC I'm replacing is the first one I ever built almost 6 years ago, and picking out all this stuff felt even more difficult than back then.
All right, my old PC here at my girlfriend's finally died, and I've been looking at building a new one. I already have Windows 7 on order, and I'll be making use of my old monitor and mouse. Everything else is pretty much getting replaced.
I'm fairly certain I am overspending here, and I know I can bring the price down a little bit with some combos that apply to these items. I'm definitely leaning on replacing the motherboard with the Gigabyte microATX mobo mentioned a few posts back, although I've never worked with one of those before. I'm assuming it'd work fine in that case.
For what it's worth, I still run at 1280x1024 resolution and I am happy with that (ignorance is bliss?). Also, I'm not sure about the power supply, but I definitely prefer modular, and I really liked the modular Corsair PSUs I've bought in the past.
The PC I'm replacing is the first one I ever built almost 6 years ago, and picking out all this stuff felt even more difficult than back then.
I would suggest going with the microATX board CPU combo and switching to this G.Skill ram because there have been problems with those boards with Crucial memory not working properly or not at all.
Until they make huge headway in efficiency gains, Crossfire/SLI is never going to be a viable upgrade path. It's expensive, noisy, hot, and sucks down power. That shit is purely for the system-specs-in-my-forum-sig crowd.
Reading up on P55 motherboards, the MSI GD65 seems to be pretty decent as well. It's a mid range board (not sure if it has more features than the Gigabyte). The people at bit-tech seemed to like it. They recommend it over the other midrange boards right now.
Anyone have any thoughts on Asus vs MSI vs Gigabyte?
I've not been a fan of MSI lately. The last two boards I bought from them (granted, a few years back; socket 939 stuff) both had problems. One had the chipset fan die. When I made a support call, they wound up sending me the wrong fan. I called again, then they sent me the right fan, but it died two weeks later.
The second board (which I ordered before the first one had problems) was DOA, and the replacement I got from NewEgg never had functioning front-side USB or headphone jacks. Yes, they were connected properly and worked when I installed a different motherboard. The Firewire never worked, either. And then the MSI video card my fiancee was using had the fan crap out on it after only a few months.
MSI strikes me as the new ECS/Elitegroup. They seem to have decent enough features, but the construction quality is awful.
Personally, I swear by Gigabyte these days. Never once had a problem with any of their hardware. Asus? Eh, bad experiences about a decade ago. I still have this mental image of all Asus products being the PC equivalent of a Honda Civic with yellow paint, wing spoilers, a half-assed body kit, and a few "turbo" and "Type-R" stickers on it. Whether that's justified or not, I'll leave to you.
Good to know. I have a pretty solid Asus board, but that's from back in the s939 days (and admittedly, it did replace a fried Asus whose fan died.)
If you think Gigabyte is the manufacturer to go with, then the mid-range Giga it is! Thanks for the tips.
So it's time to order my PSU, and of course the one I had chosen is...gone. I have no idea why, but the OCZ StealthXStream 400W is either out of stock or not listed at all on most retailers now. The 5-600W versions are here and there, but they're too pricey. £70 is too much to drop on the PSU.
So I need a recommendation on a good PSU for this system:
Athlon II x3 435
ATi 4770 (Or less, like a 4670, depends)
1 HDD
etc
Thinking a Corsair 450W, or possibly something by Antec (The 'Basiq' range is probably too basic for this, though?); basically I don't really want to be going much over £50 on this; I'll be sticking to one GPU and it won't be going much higher than anything like a 48xx in the forseeable future.
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TrippyJingMoses supposes his toeses are roses.But Moses supposes erroneously.Registered Userregular
edited October 2009
I have an IDE x4 DVD burner. I also have a USB external x8 slim DVD burner. Is there in point in shelling out $30 for a SATA x22/x24 DVD burner?
Until they make huge headway in efficiency gains, Crossfire/SLI is never going to be a viable upgrade path. It's expensive, noisy, hot, and sucks down power. That shit is purely for the system-specs-in-my-forum-sig crowd.
Fact remains that we had issues with four out of ten titles. And that poses a concern in my book. If CrossfireX with three cards works, it works perfectly nicely, kicking your gaming rig into the very high-end.
...or that the 5770s your recommended run $180-200 each. Durandal has a $200 budget, and you're linking tests where a single $400 card is only slightly out-performed by a $600 set of cards in CrossfireX3. And it's all academic, anyway, because they're running at 1920x1200 with 8x FSAA - which virtually no one does - and still getting more frames than anyone's monitor is refreshing at.
I mean, I see your point that at the 5770's price range, if you're willing to spend $600 on video cards, probably an extra $100 premium on a motherboard, and shell out $200 for a PSU, running 3 5770s in Crossfire looks pretty viable for getting ZOMG the best.
It's still firmly in the realm of e-wankery, though, and like the polar opposite end of the spectrum from what Durandal's looking to spend. He might as well run RAID-0 in that setup, too, for all the good that extra cash does.
s3rial one on
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SteevLWhat can I do for you?Registered Userregular
All right, my old PC here at my girlfriend's finally died, and I've been looking at building a new one. I already have Windows 7 on order, and I'll be making use of my old monitor and mouse. Everything else is pretty much getting replaced.
I'm fairly certain I am overspending here, and I know I can bring the price down a little bit with some combos that apply to these items. I'm definitely leaning on replacing the motherboard with the Gigabyte microATX mobo mentioned a few posts back, although I've never worked with one of those before. I'm assuming it'd work fine in that case.
For what it's worth, I still run at 1280x1024 resolution and I am happy with that (ignorance is bliss?). Also, I'm not sure about the power supply, but I definitely prefer modular, and I really liked the modular Corsair PSUs I've bought in the past.
The PC I'm replacing is the first one I ever built almost 6 years ago, and picking out all this stuff felt even more difficult than back then.
I would suggest going with the microATX board CPU combo and switching to this G.Skill ram because there have been problems with those boards with Crucial memory not working properly or not at all.
Thanks! Switched RAM in my wish list. I'll probably place my order in a few hours, but I'll check here before I do so in case anyone makes any other suggestions.
I'm building a new PC for my grandfather. I'm not sure of the exact stats of his old one, but it's a Dell of some kind, and probably about 5 years old and slower than molasses. He probably won't be doing much of anything on it besides, websurfing, email, and probably some photoshop (he likes taking pictures of birds in high res with his fancy digital camera). I figured I could build something to suit his needs without all of the bloatware that a prebought would provide, this is what I was thinking, suggestions:
SAMSUNG 22X DVD±R DVD Burner Black IDE Model SH-S222A
Antec NSK 4480B II w/ EarthWatts 380W Power Supply
Western Digital Caviar Black WD5001AALS 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5
Verbena: That should be good but you aren't really saving any money over buying another dell.
Also, I don't know how much porn your grandfather needs to store but you might be able to get a bigger, slightly slower drive (say a WD green) for the same price as the WD black.
lowlylowlycook on
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4GB is more than enough ram for windows 7, and the amount of video card really depends on exactly what kind of photo editing he'll do. Unless he's doing some way advanced stuff, photoshop is overkill. If we're just talking about basic tweaking a free/cheap program will do, and onboard video should handle it decently, as long as it's decent for on board.
Hi guys, I'm planning to build a gaming computer. I've never build one before so my knowledge of how they work are limited. The parts that I'll use to build this computer will be from newegg.com. This is what I got so far, not sure if it's a good build or not.
If there are cheaper/better parts to replace in my build, then please say so. Also if there are some kind of flaw or bottleneck with this setup, please advise since this is the first time I'm building my own PC. I'm pretty set on the 4870 for graphic card unless their is something else that will work better with my budget range. Thanks for any help.
Hmm... if I didn't care to play ARMA II, could I get a better build for less?
Also, should I worry about buying any heat sinks/fans?
Well, if you didn't care for ARMA performance I think the biggest thing is that you could save some money. Especially if you are committed to gaming at 720p. If you don't care about ARMA or Crysis then there would be no point in getting anything more than a 4850 or 5850 and a Phenom II X3 would be the high end of what you need instead of the low end. You'd be looking at a $500 PC basically.
Normally stock heatsinks will be fine unless you want to overclock or need a nearly silent PC. That said, it's easier to install a different heatsink when you build the PC than to take your motherboard out later and make the switch if you decide to upgrade later.
Hmm, what about those new cards that came out with the DX11? Are they worth the purchase over the 5850s? Also, are there any shwankier cases than the Antec combo that features a good PSU? I'll probably purchase them sometime next week as I'll be out of town this weekend.
Heh, ooops. I meant to say 5750 not 5850. All 5xxx cards are DX11 and they are the only DX11 cards for now.
There are at least a billion cases on newegg. But almost all non-Antec cases that include a PSU have terrible PSUs so you'll need a separate PSU. Of course it possible to find a combo deal for a case +PSU.
Thanks again so much for the help. I guess the only thing left before I pull the trigger is asking do you think there will be better deals in a month's time (closer to Christmas sales?). If not really, then I'll probably buy in the coming weeks, if yes then I guess I'll wait and see if you would recommend any updates! Thanks so much again lowly, you are awesome.
I'm interested in putting together a new gaming pc. My budget is round about 1k, but I can comfortably go higher if I would see economical performance improvement. After reading the awesome op, I quickly threw this together:
So, due to my 8800GT appearing to have issues (and having to use my 7100 as a backup) I'm thinking it may be time to go ahead and upgrade.
I'm not looking for anything really premium, just something that's a decent amount better. I'd like to stay in the 60-70 dollar range, but if I can get something massively better for a bit more then I'd be all for it.
Edit: I guess I should also mention that I have a fairly massive bottleneck in terms of my single core AMD Athlon 3800+ processor.
Zetx, mynameisguido: I'd say best bet for both of you would be to wait until the 5750 .5 Gb version hits. It should be $109 or so and represent pretty good bang for the buck, last a good while, and also be a good upgrade on the 8800GT (I don't think any sub $100 are going to put a 8800GT to shame).
lowlylowlycook on
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I am as well thinking about upgrading, I seem to be getting low frame rates during visually intense sequences in several games... any area in particular I should focus?
amd phenom quad core 2.6ghz
6gb 1066 speed ram (waiting on an RMA for this to be 8)
9800 GT looks like 512mb ddr3.
(secondary monitors connected to an 8600 gts)
onboard audio/networking/etc
I want to upgrade for smooth Borderlands and Dragon Age enjoyment. I haven't built a new system in ages. My current rig is based around an Athlon 64 X2 4400+ socket 939 and a Geforce 7900GS. So I'm out of the loop on CPUs and mobos in particular. I thought for a while that Core 2 Duos and Quads were the go-to procs, but now I'm seeing mentions of Phenoms and Athlon IIs and am confused because I thought AMD has been behind the times for a quite a while. Would any AMD option be better than, say, this for mid-range gaming:
Follow-up question: What would the next "step down" be in price/performance from i7? an i5? How much performance would that give up?
I think I understand the current GPU scene, where the new Radeon 5770 or 5850 seem like smart choices. Are 5850s expected to be available anytime soon?
HarshLanguage on
> turn on light Good start to the day. Pity it's going to be the worst one of your life. The light is now on.
I want to upgrade for smooth Borderlands and Dragon Age enjoyment. I haven't built a new system in ages. My current rig is based around an Athlon 64 X2 4400+ socket 939 and a Geforce 7900GS. So I'm out of the loop on CPUs and mobos in particular. I thought for a while that Core 2 Duos and Quads were the go-to procs, but now I'm seeing mentions of Phenoms and Athlon IIs and am confused because I thought AMD has been behind the times for a quite a while. Would any AMD option be better than, say, this for mid-range gaming:
Follow-up question: What would the next "step down" be in price/performance from i7? an i5? How much performance would that give up?
I think I understand the current GPU scene, where the new Radeon 5770 or 5850 seem like smart choices. Are 5850s expected to be available anytime soon?
Intel is in the lead currently. An i5, or i7 will spank a phenom clock for clock.
However, that's not all there is to the story. On the quadcore side a black edition phenom is unlocked, intels chips are locked. Also, i5/i7 minimum frame rates are slightly higher then min on a phenom, but max frames are a lot higher. So you get into an argument of how smooth things are.
The last, and probably most important thing here, is platform cost. You can get a really cheap AMD setup when you also factor in motherboard cost.
Also, there is no really compelling Intel chip for less than $200.
HarshLanguage: There is no real justification for buying anything more expensive than an i5 if all you need the CPU power for is gaming. It will be a long, long time before a i5-750 becomes a bottleneck for any game but maybe MS Flight Simulator.
lowlylowlycook on
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you really need to get a better video card for that rig. the GTS 250 really isn't that great of a card. It's kind of like building a tank, but using a pellet gun as the main weapon.
Ah, you already have the 250, I'm guessing.
Just one thought, if you think you might want to do two cards then that PSU probably won't cut it (if they are high end). If not then that motherboard is more expensive than it needs to be.
(Please do not gift. My game bank is already full.)
Yeah, that should work. Depending on your monitors resolution you might want to bump up to a 5770.
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Would a 380w PSU be good enough for an i5 and a 5770? Or would it be better to go for more, like a 500w?
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cpu: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115215&cm_re=intel_i5_750-_-19-115-215-_-Product
memory: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145260
hardrive: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148433
graphics card: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121349&cm_re=radeon_5850-_-14-121-349-_-Product
case/power supply: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129060
dvd: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827118030
This of course leaves a motherboard. This will be my first time putting together my only pc, and I'm pretty ignorant of the finer points of compatabilites. Anything there glaringly wrong, or someone has a better suggestion? Thank you for any advice.
You'll need more power than that. Most good 500W PSUs or the Antec Sonata III case w/ PSU should work.
(Please do not gift. My game bank is already full.)
Thank you for the response. So
case/power supply: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129024&Tpk=antec%20sonata%20III
Would you happen to have a motherboard recommendation?
Anandtech really likes this motherboard and it's pretty cheap for what you get.
(Please do not gift. My game bank is already full.)
Anyone have any thoughts on Asus vs MSI vs Gigabyte?
I've not been a fan of MSI lately. The last two boards I bought from them (granted, a few years back; socket 939 stuff) both had problems. One had the chipset fan die. When I made a support call, they wound up sending me the wrong fan. I called again, then they sent me the right fan, but it died two weeks later.
The second board (which I ordered before the first one had problems) was DOA, and the replacement I got from NewEgg never had functioning front-side USB or headphone jacks. Yes, they were connected properly and worked when I installed a different motherboard. The Firewire never worked, either. And then the MSI video card my fiancee was using had the fan crap out on it after only a few months.
MSI strikes me as the new ECS/Elitegroup. They seem to have decent enough features, but the construction quality is awful.
Personally, I swear by Gigabyte these days. Never once had a problem with any of their hardware. Asus? Eh, bad experiences about a decade ago. I still have this mental image of all Asus products being the PC equivalent of a Honda Civic with yellow paint, wing spoilers, a half-assed body kit, and a few "turbo" and "Type-R" stickers on it. Whether that's justified or not, I'll leave to you.
What should I get if my budget is ~$200, and I cannot fucking get the 5850?
I'm also noticeing that Amazon's prices seem to be a little lower.
Newegg: SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 5850 $279.99
Amazon: SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 5850 $259.99 + Free shipping
Then go with a 5770 for awhile. You can then Crossfire it and get good performance or just upgrade to a 5790 when they come out or similar because the 57*0 X2s should be out by then as well.
Amazon is also selling these cheaper than Newegg with free shipping as well.
The preliminary build so far:
Case: Antec 900 $99.99
Power Supply: CORSAIR CMPSU-520HX 520W ATX12V $109.99
Processor: Intel i5 $199.99
Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-P55-UD4P $169.99
RAM: Crucial 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 $69.99
Video: ASUS EAH5770/2DIS/1GD5 Radeon HD 5770 $159.99
Hard drive: SAMSUNG Spinpoint F1 HD103UJ 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB $84.99
DVD :SAMSUNG Black 22X DVD+R $29.99
Speakers: Logitech X-240 $48.99
Keyboard: Regular ol' Microsoft keyboard $11.99
I'm fairly certain I am overspending here, and I know I can bring the price down a little bit with some combos that apply to these items. I'm definitely leaning on replacing the motherboard with the Gigabyte microATX mobo mentioned a few posts back, although I've never worked with one of those before. I'm assuming it'd work fine in that case.
For what it's worth, I still run at 1280x1024 resolution and I am happy with that (ignorance is bliss?). Also, I'm not sure about the power supply, but I definitely prefer modular, and I really liked the modular Corsair PSUs I've bought in the past.
The PC I'm replacing is the first one I ever built almost 6 years ago, and picking out all this stuff felt even more difficult than back then.
My Backloggery
I would suggest going with the microATX board CPU combo and switching to this G.Skill ram because there have been problems with those boards with Crucial memory not working properly or not at all.
Just read it.
http://www.guru3d.com/article/radeon-hd-5770-in-3way-crossfirex-review-test/
Good to know. I have a pretty solid Asus board, but that's from back in the s939 days (and admittedly, it did replace a fried Asus whose fan died.)
If you think Gigabyte is the manufacturer to go with, then the mid-range Giga it is! Thanks for the tips.
So I need a recommendation on a good PSU for this system:
Athlon II x3 435
ATi 4770 (Or less, like a 4670, depends)
1 HDD
etc
Thinking a Corsair 450W, or possibly something by Antec (The 'Basiq' range is probably too basic for this, though?); basically I don't really want to be going much over £50 on this; I'll be sticking to one GPU and it won't be going much higher than anything like a 48xx in the forseeable future.
Okay...
Or gems like:
...or that the 5770s your recommended run $180-200 each. Durandal has a $200 budget, and you're linking tests where a single $400 card is only slightly out-performed by a $600 set of cards in CrossfireX3. And it's all academic, anyway, because they're running at 1920x1200 with 8x FSAA - which virtually no one does - and still getting more frames than anyone's monitor is refreshing at.
I mean, I see your point that at the 5770's price range, if you're willing to spend $600 on video cards, probably an extra $100 premium on a motherboard, and shell out $200 for a PSU, running 3 5770s in Crossfire looks pretty viable for getting ZOMG the best.
It's still firmly in the realm of e-wankery, though, and like the polar opposite end of the spectrum from what Durandal's looking to spend. He might as well run RAID-0 in that setup, too, for all the good that extra cash does.
Thanks! Switched RAM in my wish list. I'll probably place my order in a few hours, but I'll check here before I do so in case anyone makes any other suggestions.
My Backloggery
I'm building a new PC for my grandfather. I'm not sure of the exact stats of his old one, but it's a Dell of some kind, and probably about 5 years old and slower than molasses. He probably won't be doing much of anything on it besides, websurfing, email, and probably some photoshop (he likes taking pictures of birds in high res with his fancy digital camera). I figured I could build something to suit his needs without all of the bloatware that a prebought would provide, this is what I was thinking, suggestions:
SAMSUNG 22X DVD±R DVD Burner Black IDE Model SH-S222A
Antec NSK 4480B II w/ EarthWatts 380W Power Supply
Western Digital Caviar Black WD5001AALS 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5
GIGABYTE GA-MA785GM-US2H AM3/AM2+/AM2 AMD 785G HDMI Micro ATX AMD Motherboard
CORSAIR XMS2 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Desktop Memory Model TWIN2X4096-8500C5C G
AMD Athlon II X2 240 Regor 2.8GHz Socket AM3 65W Dual-Core Processor Model ADX240OCGQBOX
Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit 1-Pack for System Builders
Comes out to just over $500.
My main concerns are
- Is that enough video card (onboard) for photoshop/Win 7
- Is that enough RAM for photoshop/Win 7
Thanks.
Also, I don't know how much porn your grandfather needs to store but you might be able to get a bigger, slightly slower drive (say a WD green) for the same price as the WD black.
(Please do not gift. My game bank is already full.)
case: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811156063&cm_re=raidax_smildon-_-11-156-063-_-Product
motherboard+cpu combo deal: http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.273371
psu+gpu combo deal: http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.264833
monitor:http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824009127&Tpk=acer%20x193w
hd: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136218
memory: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820211188
Total Cost: $712~
Prefered Budget range: $600~800
If there are cheaper/better parts to replace in my build, then please say so. Also if there are some kind of flaw or bottleneck with this setup, please advise since this is the first time I'm building my own PC. I'm pretty set on the 4870 for graphic card unless their is something else that will work better with my budget range. Thanks for any help.
Thanks again so much for the help. I guess the only thing left before I pull the trigger is asking do you think there will be better deals in a month's time (closer to Christmas sales?). If not really, then I'll probably buy in the coming weeks, if yes then I guess I'll wait and see if you would recommend any updates! Thanks so much again lowly, you are awesome.
Anything glaringly wrong? Going to pull the trigger on this unless there is something I missed.
So I'm thinking another 2gb, but I have no idea what to do GFX card-wise. My budget is ~$150
I'm not looking for anything really premium, just something that's a decent amount better. I'd like to stay in the 60-70 dollar range, but if I can get something massively better for a bit more then I'd be all for it.
Edit: I guess I should also mention that I have a fairly massive bottleneck in terms of my single core AMD Athlon 3800+ processor.
(Please do not gift. My game bank is already full.)
amd phenom quad core 2.6ghz
6gb 1066 speed ram (waiting on an RMA for this to be 8)
9800 GT looks like 512mb ddr3.
(secondary monitors connected to an 8600 gts)
onboard audio/networking/etc
CPU: Core i7 860 2.8ghz
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-P55-UD4P
Follow-up question: What would the next "step down" be in price/performance from i7? an i5? How much performance would that give up?
I think I understand the current GPU scene, where the new Radeon 5770 or 5850 seem like smart choices. Are 5850s expected to be available anytime soon?
> turn on light
Good start to the day. Pity it's going to be the worst one of your life. The light is now on.
Intel is in the lead currently. An i5, or i7 will spank a phenom clock for clock.
However, that's not all there is to the story. On the quadcore side a black edition phenom is unlocked, intels chips are locked. Also, i5/i7 minimum frame rates are slightly higher then min on a phenom, but max frames are a lot higher. So you get into an argument of how smooth things are.
The last, and probably most important thing here, is platform cost. You can get a really cheap AMD setup when you also factor in motherboard cost.
HarshLanguage: There is no real justification for buying anything more expensive than an i5 if all you need the CPU power for is gaming. It will be a long, long time before a i5-750 becomes a bottleneck for any game but maybe MS Flight Simulator.
(Please do not gift. My game bank is already full.)