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[Computer Build Thread] - Bitcoiners can't keep us down! 1440p or bust!

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  • Options
    tsmvengytsmvengy Registered User regular
    tsmvengy wrote: »
    Aioua wrote: »
    Delmain wrote: »
    I don't have any help for you, but why do you need 9 5.25" bays?
    Aioua wrote: »
    Delmain wrote: »
    I don't have any help for you, but why do you need 9 5.25" bays?

    Yeah, you said it's for a NAS, do you mean 3.5in bays?

    EDIT: If so, this guy has 8 3.5" bays, and three 5.25" bays you could convert, all for $40.

    Yeah, 9 5.25 bays. I'm going to use 2 x ICY DOCK FatCage 5x3.5" in 3x5.25" Hot Swap SATA HDD Cage (or similar), and 2 x ICY DOCK ToughArmor 4 x 2.5" in 1 x 5.25" Hot Swap SATA HDD Cage (or similar). That puts me at 8 bays, plus I would like to have one extra for future expansion of the 2.5" drives.

    Do you already have those HDD cages?

    If you don't, I would say you're probably better off buying a purpose-built NAS case. Or even an all-in-one case/controller like Synology makes.

    Otherwise, it doesn't look like there's much out there.
    Maybe you guys could help me? I've been looking everywhere for a mid-tower ATX with 9 5.25" drive bays. It seems like they made a bunch of models like this a couple of years ago, and then took them off the market. I just need a simple case, I don't need the ability to hold 5 radiators and 20 fans, and 40 R9 295s. I need a simple, inexpensive case. The primary feature is 9 5.25 drive bays.

    I'm looking at upgrading my NAS. If I gotta spend the money on a Lian Li case, so be it; I would prefer this thing to cost me $60-$75.

    Using the Canadian PCPartpicker site, the only thing that appears is this Lian Li PC-P50. Everything else seems to be out of stock on both the CDN and US PCPartpicker sites.


    On another note, what are my odds of finding a Core i5 4690k on a decent sale for Black Friday/Cyber Monday? Like $200? I'm assuming probably pretty low.

    Not yet, I'm still in the planning stages right now. Anything Synology or QNAP makes in this range is way way more expensive. A 10-Bay NAS from QNAP is something like $2400 without drives. I get more for less if I do it myself. I was just hoping there wasn't something I missed.

    Looks like Lian-Li may be my only option. I just wish it wouldn't cost me $300. Thanks guys.



    @Soggybiscuit‌ not sure of your motherboard setup but:
    http://www.techspot.com/review/826-silverstone-ds380-nas/

    Also, 10 3.5" drives AND 8 2.5" drives? How much storage do you need?

    It's more about consolidation and future expansion. I would like to add a seperate share for my media, hence the 2.5" hot swap bays. I've already got 6 3.5" drives in a RAIDZ2 array on my current NAS, so I would need more than one hotswap cage if move everything to one case. I would like to move the drives to actual server hardware (aka a Xeon and ECC RAM).


    I guess I wonder if you might be better off getting some kind of server case with purpose-built hot swap drives spaces. You're looking at over $300 just for the hot swap bays you're talking about, plus whatever you spend on a case.

    The other option is to get a really big case without quite enough space and mod it to mount one of the hot-swap bays you buy on the inside.

    steam_sig.png
  • Options
    BouwsTBouwsT Wanna come to a super soft birthday party? Registered User regular
    Minerva_SC wrote: »
    Hey, first time poster in here!

    My PC is starting to shit the bed so I'm looking to build a new one within the coming months. At the moment, I'm just trying to grab whatever parts I can for a decent price, it being black november/december at the moment, so I'm looking for some deals.

    I was looking at http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130770 for the last couple of days, but I then saw http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130777 on the newegg best seller list, and was wondering if it was a good idea to pick up the cheaper one. It's 30% off at the moment, freakin 60$ cheaper, and it doesn't look like it's that much worse other than sound quality, though to be honest I'm not super savvy about building PC's. I'm not looking for super top of the line or anything, but I do want a solid mobo. Any suggestions?

    Personally, the price on the cheaper MOBO is way more enticing to me than any other gains (percieved or actual) than going with the gaming branded version. I'd rather take that 60 bucks and put it into the GPU or a decent CPU cooler if you're planning to overclock. Or maybe a larger SSD... Actually there are a lot of places I would rather spend that money.

    Plus, black/red themed PC's are so overdone.

    Between you and me, Peggy, I smoked this Juul and it did UNTHINKABLE things to my mind and body...
  • Options
    schussschuss Registered User regular
    TL DR wrote: »
    Is there a general consensus as to when the best time to order parts this time of year is? Black Friday? After xmas?

    When you're ready. There's always stuff coming out. That said, new intel chip series releases and new nvidia/amd releases are also things to watch for, as if they're less than 2 months out, you want to wait.

  • Options
    Ed GrubermanEd Gruberman Registered User regular
    I never noticed the Price History chart at the bottom on PC Part Picker. That's awesome. Seems the CPU I'm looking for has been at least $20 cheaper at one point. I'm hoping for more of a cut but it's nice to know that it's at least been cheaper in the past.

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    SteamID: edgruberman GOG Galaxy: EdGruberman
  • Options
    Minerva_SCMinerva_SC Registered User regular
    Thanks guys, gonna go with the cheaper mobo. Now time to wait and see what pops up next week for black friday in terms of deals. cheap i7's surely......

    "If a cherry pie filled cape is wrong, I don't want to be right.
    I'm dead serious."
  • Options
    SoggybiscuitSoggybiscuit Tandem Electrostatic Accelerator Registered User regular
    tsmvengy wrote: »
    tsmvengy wrote: »
    Aioua wrote: »
    Delmain wrote: »
    I don't have any help for you, but why do you need 9 5.25" bays?
    Aioua wrote: »
    Delmain wrote: »
    I don't have any help for you, but why do you need 9 5.25" bays?

    Yeah, you said it's for a NAS, do you mean 3.5in bays?

    EDIT: If so, this guy has 8 3.5" bays, and three 5.25" bays you could convert, all for $40.

    Yeah, 9 5.25 bays. I'm going to use 2 x ICY DOCK FatCage 5x3.5" in 3x5.25" Hot Swap SATA HDD Cage (or similar), and 2 x ICY DOCK ToughArmor 4 x 2.5" in 1 x 5.25" Hot Swap SATA HDD Cage (or similar). That puts me at 8 bays, plus I would like to have one extra for future expansion of the 2.5" drives.

    Do you already have those HDD cages?

    If you don't, I would say you're probably better off buying a purpose-built NAS case. Or even an all-in-one case/controller like Synology makes.

    Otherwise, it doesn't look like there's much out there.
    Maybe you guys could help me? I've been looking everywhere for a mid-tower ATX with 9 5.25" drive bays. It seems like they made a bunch of models like this a couple of years ago, and then took them off the market. I just need a simple case, I don't need the ability to hold 5 radiators and 20 fans, and 40 R9 295s. I need a simple, inexpensive case. The primary feature is 9 5.25 drive bays.

    I'm looking at upgrading my NAS. If I gotta spend the money on a Lian Li case, so be it; I would prefer this thing to cost me $60-$75.

    Using the Canadian PCPartpicker site, the only thing that appears is this Lian Li PC-P50. Everything else seems to be out of stock on both the CDN and US PCPartpicker sites.


    On another note, what are my odds of finding a Core i5 4690k on a decent sale for Black Friday/Cyber Monday? Like $200? I'm assuming probably pretty low.

    Not yet, I'm still in the planning stages right now. Anything Synology or QNAP makes in this range is way way more expensive. A 10-Bay NAS from QNAP is something like $2400 without drives. I get more for less if I do it myself. I was just hoping there wasn't something I missed.

    Looks like Lian-Li may be my only option. I just wish it wouldn't cost me $300. Thanks guys.



    @Soggybiscuit‌ not sure of your motherboard setup but:
    http://www.techspot.com/review/826-silverstone-ds380-nas/

    Also, 10 3.5" drives AND 8 2.5" drives? How much storage do you need?

    It's more about consolidation and future expansion. I would like to add a seperate share for my media, hence the 2.5" hot swap bays. I've already got 6 3.5" drives in a RAIDZ2 array on my current NAS, so I would need more than one hotswap cage if move everything to one case. I would like to move the drives to actual server hardware (aka a Xeon and ECC RAM).


    I guess I wonder if you might be better off getting some kind of server case with purpose-built hot swap drives spaces. You're looking at over $300 just for the hot swap bays you're talking about, plus whatever you spend on a case.

    The other option is to get a really big case without quite enough space and mod it to mount one of the hot-swap bays you buy on the inside.

    I think I finally got something figured out. I'm going to use a iStar S-917 and do some reassignment of my existing storage to get better utilization while upgrading to better hardware overall. It will also let me do my upgrade in 2 steps so I don't hit the budget as hard.

    Steam - Synthetic Violence | XBOX Live - Cannonfuse | PSN - CastleBravo | Twitch - SoggybiscuitPA
  • Options
    TOGSolidTOGSolid Drunk sailor Seattle, WashingtonRegistered User regular
    edited November 2014
    Ok, so in a nice turn of events I find myself with some funds available to throw at my long dormant HTPC project but I have a hardware question.

    My basic requirement is that I want to be able to run Rocksmith 2014 well on it and that's about as crazy as I want to get with it performance wise. It's general duties will involve being my home media server, playing Blu-Rays, and playing lightweight Steam stuff (maybe even being a Steam streaming receiver just for laughs). So with all that established, my question is this: Would an AMD A10-7850k APU get the job done? If not, what's a cheap CPU/GPU combo that could? I'm only really used to working on my desktop which is basically a hot rod at this point so I'm kinda outta touch with budget part picking these days. I'm looking at spending up to $500 US total for my HTPC with some leeway above that.

    TOGSolid on
    wWuzwvJ.png
  • Options
    Ed GrubermanEd Gruberman Registered User regular
    I can say that I have been playing Rocksmith 2014 on a Core 2 Duo E8400 with 4GBs of ram and a 1GB 250 gts video card and it has run perfectly if that helps.

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    SteamID: edgruberman GOG Galaxy: EdGruberman
  • Options
    MugsleyMugsley DelawareRegistered User regular
    @TOGSolid‌ If you're interested, I have both a E8400 and a Q6600 that are no longer in use but still work fine. Shoot me an email and we can chat.

    mrsherretz [G Mail]

  • Options
    tsmvengytsmvengy Registered User regular
    TOGSolid wrote: »
    Ok, so in a nice turn of events I find myself with some funds available to throw at my long dormant HTPC project but I have a hardware question.

    My basic requirement is that I want to be able to run Rocksmith 2014 well on it and that's about as crazy as I want to get with it performance wise. It's general duties will involve being my home media server, playing Blu-Rays, and playing lightweight Steam stuff (maybe even being a Steam streaming receiver just for laughs). So with all that established, my question is this: Would an AMD A10-7850k APU get the job done? If not, what's a cheap CPU/GPU combo that could? I'm only really used to working on my desktop which is basically a hot rod at this point so I'm kinda outta touch with budget part picking these days. I'm looking at spending up to $500 US total for my HTPC with some leeway above that.

    Yes, I think you should be good using that CPU/GPU.

    steam_sig.png
  • Options
    RedTideRedTide Registered User regular
    So today I'm gonna get together my box since my case arrived yesterday. I was in here a few months ago asking questions and eventually bought the parts after taking advice from a lot of people in here, so thanks again to those who helped.

    CPU: Core I5-4690
    Mobo: MSI Z97-G45
    Ram: 16 gigs HyperX DDR3 1600
    PSU: Rosewill 800w
    Case: Rosewill Thor V2 White
    GPU: Asus GTX 760
    SSD: Samsung 840 EVO 250gb
    HDD:Western Digital 1GB HDD
    Optical Drive: LG 12x BD-Rom

    Overall it ran me about 1200 dollars after taxes and shipping. I know the amount of storage is pretty anemic, but the PC I'm currently using only has 500gb of space used, is about 7 and a half years old and has never been formatted. Personal habits and the streaming age we live in keep my disc tidy.

    With all that being said, does anyone have a recommendation for a monitor(s) to pair this with? As it is I'll still be using my almost 8 year old Acer.

    RedTide#1907 on Battle.net
    Come Overwatch with meeeee
  • Options
    an_altan_alt Registered User regular
    TOGSolid wrote: »
    Ok, so in a nice turn of events I find myself with some funds available to throw at my long dormant HTPC project but I have a hardware question.

    My basic requirement is that I want to be able to run Rocksmith 2014 well on it and that's about as crazy as I want to get with it performance wise. It's general duties will involve being my home media server, playing Blu-Rays, and playing lightweight Steam stuff (maybe even being a Steam streaming receiver just for laughs). So with all that established, my question is this: Would an AMD A10-7850k APU get the job done? If not, what's a cheap CPU/GPU combo that could? I'm only really used to working on my desktop which is basically a hot rod at this point so I'm kinda outta touch with budget part picking these days. I'm looking at spending up to $500 US total for my HTPC with some leeway above that.

    As an aside, there's a decent chance you'll get better audio performance using built-in audio on the mobo instead of a discrete card.

    Pony wrote:
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  • Options
    Zen VulgarityZen Vulgarity What a lovely day for tea Secret British ThreadRegistered User regular
    an_alt wrote: »
    TOGSolid wrote: »
    Ok, so in a nice turn of events I find myself with some funds available to throw at my long dormant HTPC project but I have a hardware question.

    My basic requirement is that I want to be able to run Rocksmith 2014 well on it and that's about as crazy as I want to get with it performance wise. It's general duties will involve being my home media server, playing Blu-Rays, and playing lightweight Steam stuff (maybe even being a Steam streaming receiver just for laughs). So with all that established, my question is this: Would an AMD A10-7850k APU get the job done? If not, what's a cheap CPU/GPU combo that could? I'm only really used to working on my desktop which is basically a hot rod at this point so I'm kinda outta touch with budget part picking these days. I'm looking at spending up to $500 US total for my HTPC with some leeway above that.

    As an aside, there's a decent chance you'll get better audio performance using built-in audio on the mobo instead of a discrete card.

    Or built-in could horribly fuck up

    Thanks Asus

  • Options
    Zen VulgarityZen Vulgarity What a lovely day for tea Secret British ThreadRegistered User regular
    RedTide wrote: »
    So today I'm gonna get together my box since my case arrived yesterday. I was in here a few months ago asking questions and eventually bought the parts after taking advice from a lot of people in here, so thanks again to those who helped.

    CPU: Core I5-4690
    Mobo: MSI Z97-G45
    Ram: 16 gigs HyperX DDR3 1600
    PSU: Rosewill 800w
    Case: Rosewill Thor V2 White
    GPU: Asus GTX 760
    SSD: Samsung 840 EVO 250gb
    HDD:Western Digital 1GB HDD
    Optical Drive: LG 12x BD-Rom

    Overall it ran me about 1200 dollars after taxes and shipping. I know the amount of storage is pretty anemic, but the PC I'm currently using only has 500gb of space used, is about 7 and a half years old and has never been formatted. Personal habits and the streaming age we live in keep my disc tidy.

    With all that being said, does anyone have a recommendation for a monitor(s) to pair this with? As it is I'll still be using my almost 8 year old Acer.

    Why are you doing all that ram and having a 760

    Why the Thor?

    I'm very confused with some of those things but so long as you're happy

  • Options
    Jebus314Jebus314 Registered User regular
    TOGSolid wrote: »
    Ok, so in a nice turn of events I find myself with some funds available to throw at my long dormant HTPC project but I have a hardware question.

    My basic requirement is that I want to be able to run Rocksmith 2014 well on it and that's about as crazy as I want to get with it performance wise. It's general duties will involve being my home media server, playing Blu-Rays, and playing lightweight Steam stuff (maybe even being a Steam streaming receiver just for laughs). So with all that established, my question is this: Would an AMD A10-7850k APU get the job done? If not, what's a cheap CPU/GPU combo that could? I'm only really used to working on my desktop which is basically a hot rod at this point so I'm kinda outta touch with budget part picking these days. I'm looking at spending up to $500 US total for my HTPC with some leeway above that.

    @TOGSolid‌ what are you thinking about using for bluray playback? I've been pretty happy with totalmedia theatre until recently when I noticed some glitching with it's WMC integration, and apparently arcsoft is no longer selling/updating/supporting that software so I'm thinking about switching. Still looks like there isn't any free software for full bluray + menu support, with winDVD and powerdvd being the two remaining licensed pay for software.

    "The world is a mess, and I just need to rule it" - Dr Horrible
  • Options
    SeptusSeptus Registered User regular
    Jebus314 wrote: »
    Septus wrote: »
    So I badly need a new pc, and I'm trying to build my own again. A big part of the reason for the purchase is just the need for a desktop pc in general since my ipad and shitty netbook don't cut it, but I figure 90% of my actual time spent on it will be gaming as a sideproduct of finally having a newer computer.

    Does anyone have any thoughts or concerns about going the route of the Lifehacker $600 budget build?

    I certainly read plenty of arguments to go with an intel i3 instead, but the difference seems neglible enough, especially if more and more games will start using multi-threading. Moreover, it probably won't make a huge difference and may just cost more money, since other than Elite:Dangerous, there's not really any particularly new games that I'd want to play on it.

    What I'm struggling with most is whether to keep the cheaper hard-drive, or replace it with an SSD. I'd probably be willing to drop an extra $40 to get a 256 gb SSD, but I have no concept for how much storage is required these days for an OS, or games in general. I likely wouldn't keep any media on my computer other than ~15 gigs of music and a small selection of pictures.

    @Septus‌ that build doesn't have an OS, keyboard, mouse, or monitor so keep that in mind. Personally I would only get the fx-6300 (or fx-8320 which is probably what I would recommend for amd) if you were planning on overclocking (which means you'd also need an aftermarket cpu cooler like the 212 evo or the noctua dh-14). If you do overclock I think either of those chips would do very well, but without the overclocking I think the per core speeds lag too far behind intel and the new architecture they are pushing hasn't been developed enough to really see huge benefits in multitasking or parallel processing (with some rare exceptions like video processing).

    A nice i3 is a good middle ground for a budget gaming pc but if you can drop the extra $50 or so an i5 will hold out longer before needing to be replaced and seems to be the current sweet spot.

    I'd be fine switching to the intel chip since I definitely don't want to overlock, that article did mention the i3 4330 as an alternative, is that a reasonable recommendation? I don't know what motherboard I would need to pair with that to stay pretty close to budget. Also, if I can only up my budget by 50 or so, do you think the processor switch is better than stepping up to an SSD?

    PSN: Kurahoshi1
  • Options
    Donovan PuppyfuckerDonovan Puppyfucker A dagger in the dark is worth a thousand swords in the morningRegistered User regular
    an_alt wrote: »
    TOGSolid wrote: »
    Ok, so in a nice turn of events I find myself with some funds available to throw at my long dormant HTPC project but I have a hardware question.

    My basic requirement is that I want to be able to run Rocksmith 2014 well on it and that's about as crazy as I want to get with it performance wise. It's general duties will involve being my home media server, playing Blu-Rays, and playing lightweight Steam stuff (maybe even being a Steam streaming receiver just for laughs). So with all that established, my question is this: Would an AMD A10-7850k APU get the job done? If not, what's a cheap CPU/GPU combo that could? I'm only really used to working on my desktop which is basically a hot rod at this point so I'm kinda outta touch with budget part picking these days. I'm looking at spending up to $500 US total for my HTPC with some leeway above that.

    As an aside, there's a decent chance you'll get better audio performance using built-in audio on the mobo instead of a discrete card.

    Not generally true unless you buy a top-tier motherboard and a very shitty soundcard. Otherwise if you're getting better quality sound out of your mobo compared to something like a Xonar DGX, there must surely be something seriously wrong with said soundcard.

  • Options
    ThirithThirith Registered User regular
    edited November 2014
    Related question: do I understand correctly that using a USB headset bypasses any soundcard (or on-board sound)?

    Edit: Thanks to @Erlkönig‌ for the reply! (Interesting username, by the way - I now imagine the poem with a My Little Pony instead of the horse.)

    Thirith on
    webp-net-resizeimage.jpg
    "Nothing is gonna save us forever but a lot of things can save us today." - Night in the Woods
  • Options
    ErlkönigErlkönig Seattle, WARegistered User regular
    Thirith wrote: »
    Related question: do I understand correctly that using a USB headset bypasses any soundcard (or on-board sound)?

    Yes, you are understanding it correctly.

    | Origin/R*SC: Ein7919 | Battle.net: Erlkonig#1448 | XBL: Lexicanum | Steam: Der Erlkönig (the umlaut is important) |
  • Options
    Minerva_SCMinerva_SC Registered User regular
    Wow, Microcenter apparently has i7-4790K's for 249$, was gonna buy a 4790 for the same price from amazon. Hopefully they still them when I wake up. Now to hold out for a sub 300 970 and this will be the bestest holiday ever. It'll happen....

    "If a cherry pie filled cape is wrong, I don't want to be right.
    I'm dead serious."
  • Options
    Ed GrubermanEd Gruberman Registered User regular
    an_alt wrote: »
    TOGSolid wrote: »
    Ok, so in a nice turn of events I find myself with some funds available to throw at my long dormant HTPC project but I have a hardware question.

    My basic requirement is that I want to be able to run Rocksmith 2014 well on it and that's about as crazy as I want to get with it performance wise. It's general duties will involve being my home media server, playing Blu-Rays, and playing lightweight Steam stuff (maybe even being a Steam streaming receiver just for laughs). So with all that established, my question is this: Would an AMD A10-7850k APU get the job done? If not, what's a cheap CPU/GPU combo that could? I'm only really used to working on my desktop which is basically a hot rod at this point so I'm kinda outta touch with budget part picking these days. I'm looking at spending up to $500 US total for my HTPC with some leeway above that.

    As an aside, there's a decent chance you'll get better audio performance using built-in audio on the mobo instead of a discrete card.

    Not generally true unless you buy a top-tier motherboard and a very shitty soundcard. Otherwise if you're getting better quality sound out of your mobo compared to something like a Xonar DGX, there must surely be something seriously wrong with said soundcard.

    I think @an_alt‌ was making a point more towards use with rocksmith which has some unusual sound preferences to reduce latency. In particular, they recommend having analog output instead of digital.

    steam_sig.png

    SteamID: edgruberman GOG Galaxy: EdGruberman
  • Options
    toloveistorebel toloveistorebel Impressive. Most impressive. Central FLRegistered User regular
    Septus wrote: »
    Jebus314 wrote: »
    Septus wrote: »
    So I badly need a new pc, and I'm trying to build my own again. A big part of the reason for the purchase is just the need for a desktop pc in general since my ipad and shitty netbook don't cut it, but I figure 90% of my actual time spent on it will be gaming as a sideproduct of finally having a newer computer.

    Does anyone have any thoughts or concerns about going the route of the Lifehacker $600 budget build?

    I certainly read plenty of arguments to go with an intel i3 instead, but the difference seems neglible enough, especially if more and more games will start using multi-threading. Moreover, it probably won't make a huge difference and may just cost more money, since other than Elite:Dangerous, there's not really any particularly new games that I'd want to play on it.

    What I'm struggling with most is whether to keep the cheaper hard-drive, or replace it with an SSD. I'd probably be willing to drop an extra $40 to get a 256 gb SSD, but I have no concept for how much storage is required these days for an OS, or games in general. I likely wouldn't keep any media on my computer other than ~15 gigs of music and a small selection of pictures.

    @Septus‌ that build doesn't have an OS, keyboard, mouse, or monitor so keep that in mind. Personally I would only get the fx-6300 (or fx-8320 which is probably what I would recommend for amd) if you were planning on overclocking (which means you'd also need an aftermarket cpu cooler like the 212 evo or the noctua dh-14). If you do overclock I think either of those chips would do very well, but without the overclocking I think the per core speeds lag too far behind intel and the new architecture they are pushing hasn't been developed enough to really see huge benefits in multitasking or parallel processing (with some rare exceptions like video processing).

    A nice i3 is a good middle ground for a budget gaming pc but if you can drop the extra $50 or so an i5 will hold out longer before needing to be replaced and seems to be the current sweet spot.

    I'd be fine switching to the intel chip since I definitely don't want to overlock, that article did mention the i3 4330 as an alternative, is that a reasonable recommendation? I don't know what motherboard I would need to pair with that to stay pretty close to budget. Also, if I can only up my budget by 50 or so, do you think the processor switch is better than stepping up to an SSD?

    Since you're using the machine mainly for gaming, I'd say skip the SSD for now and upgrade to an i5. Pretty much anything other than the 4690K that isn't some weird ultra low power version. You should be able to find one around US$180 or so (The unlocked K model will run you about $230). In games you won't see that much improvement from an SSD. Maybe in load times, but that's it. An i5 will give you better framerstes by getting rid of the CPU bottleneck and giving your system a longer lifespan at the same time.

  • Options
    amnesiasoftamnesiasoft Thick Creamy Furry Registered User regular
    So, since cheap computer parts is happening soon, is there anything that would be worth upgrading from my Xeon E3-1230 for? My best understanding is that it's (more or less) equivalent to the i7 2600, which is alongside every other recent Intel processor at the top of the Tom's Hardware gaming CPU hierarchy. I just find it difficult to believe that nothing has been placed a higher hierarchy level during the past 3.5 years.

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    ThirithThirith Registered User regular
    edited November 2014
    I've had a look at what choosemypc.net suggests within the price range I'm looking at, with the proviso that prices and availabilities won't be identical here. (The shop I generally get my wares from is https://www.digitec.ch/en.) I'm planning to build a machine that's likely to handle anything I throw at it over the next couple of years, with only minor upgrades.

    In general, how does the following look? I've also got some specific questions, which I'm bolding.



    *CPU: Intel Core i7-5930K 3.5GHz 6-Core Processor

    *CPU Cooler: Phanteks PH-TC14PE_BK 78.1 CFM CPU Cooler
    --> I'm not planning for extreme overclocking; does this cooler make sense?

    *Motherboard: ASRock X99 Extreme3 ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard
    --> This doesn't seem to be available at my end; would e.g. the ASUS X99-S be an alternative?

    *Memory: Crucial 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2133 Memory
    --> If I go for 16GB, should I get 2x 8GB or 4x 16?

    *Storage: Crucial MX100 256GB 2.5" Solid State Drive

    *Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive

    *Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 4GB ACX 2.0 Video Card
    --> I'm considering getting a 970 instead, with the option to SLI at a later stage
    --> Does it make sense to use an old 570 for PhysX?


    *Case: Fractal Design Define R4 w/Window (Black Pearl) ATX Mid Tower Case
    --> Will this fit the motherboard I'm considering?

    *Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA NEX 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply
    --> Not available; since I'm considering SLI at a later stage, would be quiet! POWER ZONE (850W) be an option?

    *Optical Drive: Any Blu-ray drive/DVD writer, really.

    *Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8.1 - 64-bit (OEM) (64-bit)

    Do these (or corresponding) components come with everything I'd need, i.e. screws, cooling paste, cables, or would it make sense to order e.g. additional cables?

    Thirith on
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    klemmingklemming Registered User regular
    Thirith wrote: »
    *Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 4GB ACX 2.0 Video Card
    --> I'm considering getting a 970 instead, with the option to SLI at a later stage
    --> Does it make sense to use an old 570 for PhysX?
    [/b]

    I'm looking into getting a new card myself, and it looks like the 970s are the better value.
    A few overclocking sites have said they've gotten 970 cards running at very close to/just above baseline 980 performance, so I guess it's down to what performance/price balance you're after.

    Nobody remembers the singer. The song remains.
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    DelmainDelmain Registered User regular
    Yeah, I think the thing with the 980s is that they're just a better value straight up. Run almost as well for considerably less money. If you're budget limited at all, I'd say go 970 over 980. Of course, you're gonna have a hard time grabbing a 970, they've been consistently sold out everywhere.

    I would go ahead and say don't get an older GPU. It seems like a good deal, but you're gonna have to upgrade at some point and going older gen now is just pushing forward the date when you're gonna have to bump it up.

  • Options
    an_altan_alt Registered User regular
    an_alt wrote: »
    TOGSolid wrote: »
    Ok, so in a nice turn of events I find myself with some funds available to throw at my long dormant HTPC project but I have a hardware question.

    My basic requirement is that I want to be able to run Rocksmith 2014 well on it and that's about as crazy as I want to get with it performance wise. It's general duties will involve being my home media server, playing Blu-Rays, and playing lightweight Steam stuff (maybe even being a Steam streaming receiver just for laughs). So with all that established, my question is this: Would an AMD A10-7850k APU get the job done? If not, what's a cheap CPU/GPU combo that could? I'm only really used to working on my desktop which is basically a hot rod at this point so I'm kinda outta touch with budget part picking these days. I'm looking at spending up to $500 US total for my HTPC with some leeway above that.

    As an aside, there's a decent chance you'll get better audio performance using built-in audio on the mobo instead of a discrete card.

    Not generally true unless you buy a top-tier motherboard and a very shitty soundcard. Otherwise if you're getting better quality sound out of your mobo compared to something like a Xonar DGX, there must surely be something seriously wrong with said soundcard.

    I think @an_alt‌ was making a point more towards use with rocksmith which has some unusual sound preferences to reduce latency. In particular, they recommend having analog output instead of digital.

    Yes, my comment was specifically to do with Rocksmith. Because you hear the guitar directly from the strings as well as from your TV/speakers, a small delay on the audio is a problem. The devs pulled out every trick in the book to reduce latency. Change a few settings to make Rocksmith actually work with your Xonar card and the delay is unbearable. Tweak a few more settings to reduce delay and the quality drops to terrible. I've found a non-horrible balance between latency and quality, but I'm going to see how much of a pain it is to use a separate output device just for Rocksmith.

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    Ed GrubermanEd Gruberman Registered User regular
    an_alt wrote: »
    an_alt wrote: »
    TOGSolid wrote: »
    Ok, so in a nice turn of events I find myself with some funds available to throw at my long dormant HTPC project but I have a hardware question.

    My basic requirement is that I want to be able to run Rocksmith 2014 well on it and that's about as crazy as I want to get with it performance wise. It's general duties will involve being my home media server, playing Blu-Rays, and playing lightweight Steam stuff (maybe even being a Steam streaming receiver just for laughs). So with all that established, my question is this: Would an AMD A10-7850k APU get the job done? If not, what's a cheap CPU/GPU combo that could? I'm only really used to working on my desktop which is basically a hot rod at this point so I'm kinda outta touch with budget part picking these days. I'm looking at spending up to $500 US total for my HTPC with some leeway above that.

    As an aside, there's a decent chance you'll get better audio performance using built-in audio on the mobo instead of a discrete card.

    Not generally true unless you buy a top-tier motherboard and a very shitty soundcard. Otherwise if you're getting better quality sound out of your mobo compared to something like a Xonar DGX, there must surely be something seriously wrong with said soundcard.

    I think @an_alt‌ was making a point more towards use with rocksmith which has some unusual sound preferences to reduce latency. In particular, they recommend having analog output instead of digital.

    Yes, my comment was specifically to do with Rocksmith. Because you hear the guitar directly from the strings as well as from your TV/speakers, a small delay on the audio is a problem. The devs pulled out every trick in the book to reduce latency. Change a few settings to make Rocksmith actually work with your Xonar card and the delay is unbearable. Tweak a few more settings to reduce delay and the quality drops to terrible. I've found a non-horrible balance between latency and quality, but I'm going to see how much of a pain it is to use a separate output device just for Rocksmith.

    I actually had analog out from my on-board audio to my stereo receiver and the delay was absolutely painful until I realized that I had the receiver set to Spacious (basically post-processing). As soon as I switched the receiver to Straight it was completely fixed.

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    MercadeMercade Registered User regular
    Computer Build Thread, I need your wisdom. This seems like such an easy question, but I don't want to fry my shit.

    I'm trying to give my PC a graphics update on the cheap. The card I'm looking at requires a 300W PSU with 20A on the 12V rail. These are my PSU's specs. Do the 12VA and 12VB combine to exceed this requirement or am I totally off here? I'm just trying to get a ~$100 or less card without a PSU upgrade, and I pretty just play WoW and Steam games.

    Switch: SW-1909-0466-9585
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    ErlkönigErlkönig Seattle, WARegistered User regular
    Delmain wrote: »
    Yeah, I think the thing with the 980s is that they're just a better value straight up. Run almost as well for considerably less money. If you're budget limited at all, I'd say go 970 over 980. Of course, you're gonna have a hard time grabbing a 970, they've been consistently sold out everywhere.

    I would go ahead and say don't get an older GPU. It seems like a good deal, but you're gonna have to upgrade at some point and going older gen now is just pushing forward the date when you're gonna have to bump it up.

    Just thought I'd mention that NewEgg seems to have gotten a fairly large shipment of them in. Zotacs, MSIs, Gigabytes, EVGAs...looks like they're all in stock in some flavor.

    | Origin/R*SC: Ein7919 | Battle.net: Erlkonig#1448 | XBL: Lexicanum | Steam: Der Erlkönig (the umlaut is important) |
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    BouwsTBouwsT Wanna come to a super soft birthday party? Registered User regular
    Mercade wrote: »
    Computer Build Thread, I need your wisdom. This seems like such an easy question, but I don't want to fry my shit.

    I'm trying to give my PC a graphics update on the cheap. The card I'm looking at requires a 300W PSU with 20A on the 12V rail. These are my PSU's specs. Do the 12VA and 12VB combine to exceed this requirement or am I totally off here? I'm just trying to get a ~$100 or less card without a PSU upgrade, and I pretty just play WoW and Steam games.

    Doing some looking around, it looks like if your card truly isn't getting enough power it won't even fire. That being said, nVidia likes to over-rate their power requirements some.

    I can't find the 6 pin plug for that card, so I can't comment on how it hooks up, but I SERIOUSLY doubt that you can hook up more than one 12V rail to it. I would say that you're likely in the clear with the 17A the PSU rates at, but YMMV. At worst, you GPU would demand too much power and likely cause a crash, either forcing you to turn settings down, or upgrade your PSU. Not fry.

    Between you and me, Peggy, I smoked this Juul and it did UNTHINKABLE things to my mind and body...
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    TOGSolidTOGSolid Drunk sailor Seattle, WashingtonRegistered User regular
    Jebus314 wrote: »
    TOGSolid wrote: »
    Ok, so in a nice turn of events I find myself with some funds available to throw at my long dormant HTPC project but I have a hardware question.

    My basic requirement is that I want to be able to run Rocksmith 2014 well on it and that's about as crazy as I want to get with it performance wise. It's general duties will involve being my home media server, playing Blu-Rays, and playing lightweight Steam stuff (maybe even being a Steam streaming receiver just for laughs). So with all that established, my question is this: Would an AMD A10-7850k APU get the job done? If not, what's a cheap CPU/GPU combo that could? I'm only really used to working on my desktop which is basically a hot rod at this point so I'm kinda outta touch with budget part picking these days. I'm looking at spending up to $500 US total for my HTPC with some leeway above that.

    @TOGSolid‌ what are you thinking about using for bluray playback? I've been pretty happy with totalmedia theatre until recently when I noticed some glitching with it's WMC integration, and apparently arcsoft is no longer selling/updating/supporting that software so I'm thinking about switching. Still looks like there isn't any free software for full bluray + menu support, with winDVD and powerdvd being the two remaining licensed pay for software.

    I haven't looked at the software side of life just yet, I'm still getting the hardware sorted out.

    I'm actually in a bit of a purchasing crossroads cause I kinda want to get my mass media storage out of my desktop but HTPC cases only have so much room in em and I want to keep my build small. So naturally I'm now looking at an NAS option like WD's EX2 because of course I am. And of course, this means that if I do go this route I can then completely cut out the mass storage in my HTPC build and only have an SSD in there and then I can get an even more compact case and then I'll have all sorts of spare room in my desktop so I can do a neater wiring job and...

    Oh sweet, sweet PC tech, I can't escape your siren call.
    an_alt wrote: »
    an_alt wrote: »
    TOGSolid wrote: »
    Ok, so in a nice turn of events I find myself with some funds available to throw at my long dormant HTPC project but I have a hardware question.

    My basic requirement is that I want to be able to run Rocksmith 2014 well on it and that's about as crazy as I want to get with it performance wise. It's general duties will involve being my home media server, playing Blu-Rays, and playing lightweight Steam stuff (maybe even being a Steam streaming receiver just for laughs). So with all that established, my question is this: Would an AMD A10-7850k APU get the job done? If not, what's a cheap CPU/GPU combo that could? I'm only really used to working on my desktop which is basically a hot rod at this point so I'm kinda outta touch with budget part picking these days. I'm looking at spending up to $500 US total for my HTPC with some leeway above that.

    As an aside, there's a decent chance you'll get better audio performance using built-in audio on the mobo instead of a discrete card.

    Not generally true unless you buy a top-tier motherboard and a very shitty soundcard. Otherwise if you're getting better quality sound out of your mobo compared to something like a Xonar DGX, there must surely be something seriously wrong with said soundcard.

    I think @an_alt‌ was making a point more towards use with rocksmith which has some unusual sound preferences to reduce latency. In particular, they recommend having analog output instead of digital.

    Yes, my comment was specifically to do with Rocksmith. Because you hear the guitar directly from the strings as well as from your TV/speakers, a small delay on the audio is a problem. The devs pulled out every trick in the book to reduce latency. Change a few settings to make Rocksmith actually work with your Xonar card and the delay is unbearable. Tweak a few more settings to reduce delay and the quality drops to terrible. I've found a non-horrible balance between latency and quality, but I'm going to see how much of a pain it is to use a separate output device just for Rocksmith.

    Good to know, thanks!

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    TubeTube Registered User admin
    New thread time

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    ThirithThirith Registered User regular
    Sorry, I thought this was already locked, so I went ahead and posted a new thread here.

    webp-net-resizeimage.jpg
    "Nothing is gonna save us forever but a lot of things can save us today." - Night in the Woods
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    HamurabiHamurabi MiamiRegistered User regular
    edited November 2014
    (Oops, sory for the necropost.)

    Hamurabi on
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