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On August 06 2009 03:06 mahnini wrote:Show nested quote +On August 06 2009 03:02 Klapdout wrote:On August 06 2009 02:54 mahnini wrote:
don't get a caviar green. they may save you a little power but they are slower and that is something you will definitely notice.
i also wouldnt recommend the 545/550 simply because the price jump from the athlon ii's doesnt seem to justify the modest performance increase. that and also the fact that the phenom ii 720 is only about $20 more. Normally I'd agree, however newegg offers the 545+biostar mobo with a nice discount, making it cheaper than other AM3 dual cores, and much more so than the 720. Due to his strict budget its the best configuration I could come up with. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128397+ http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103688= ~$150 !!
cheap mobo's are a huge pet peeve of mine ;P
That gigabyte has no heatsinks over its mosfets, 785G north bridge,sb710 south bridge(compared to the proven 790GX and SB750), and only one pcie slot, he won't have the option of crossfire in the future if he wants it.
Also THREE of those SATA ports will be covered up by a large video card such as a 4870, leaving only two available, the Biostar mobo in my post has the sata ports facing at an angle to prevent this.
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United States22883 Posts
On August 06 2009 03:01 FragKrag wrote:
2 gb obviously doesn't justify a 64 bit OS, but upgrading does. 2 gb ddr2 is more than enough to run XP 32 bit >_>
Depends on what you're doing. At $30, I'd take a step up. Especially if you eventually plan on going to 7 (and going 64bit.)
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On August 06 2009 03:17 Klapdout wrote:Show nested quote +On August 06 2009 03:06 mahnini wrote:On August 06 2009 03:02 Klapdout wrote:On August 06 2009 02:54 mahnini wrote:
don't get a caviar green. they may save you a little power but they are slower and that is something you will definitely notice.
i also wouldnt recommend the 545/550 simply because the price jump from the athlon ii's doesnt seem to justify the modest performance increase. that and also the fact that the phenom ii 720 is only about $20 more. Normally I'd agree, however newegg offers the 545+biostar mobo with a nice discount, making it cheaper than other AM3 dual cores, and much more so than the 720. Due to his strict budget its the best configuration I could come up with. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128397+ http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103688= ~$150 !! cheap mobo's are a huge pet peeve of mine ;P That gigabyte has no heatsinks over its mosfets, 785G north bridge,sb710 south bridge(compared to the proven 790GX and SB750), and only one pcie slot, he won't have the option of crossfire in the future if he wants it. Also THREE of those SATA ports will be covered up by a large video card such as a 4870, leaving only two available, the Biostar mobo in my post has the sata ports facing at an angle to prevent this.
gigabyte is a reliable brand though! as far as i know there isnt too much difference between the two south bridges and the 785g is just an incremental improvement on the 780g. as for the sata being covered i'm sure they're still usable, you just have to make sure you plug them in before you install the video card.
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Ok thanks to everybody who has made suggestions, its been really helpful. I have decided to opt for 4gbs of RAM but not DDR3. After doing some research it seems that DDR3 does not really offer that much of a performance boost and that I would be better spending the extra $50+ on a better CPU or GPU.
To the poster above me about DirectX11 cards I really don't have a need for them in the foreseeable future. My PC is meant to play starcraft 2, a couple random games that might interest me in the next 1 to 2 years (which the 4870 should be able to do fine, I'm not set on maxing my settings) and to emulate games since my laptop was not really able to do that. Basically I'm building a powerful desktop that is a step up from my laptop I have now which has 2gbs of ram, an nVidia GeForce 7300 Go Series card, and a 2.0ghz dual core processor.
To the person who recommended an AMD processor, thanks for the recommendation. After looking at another one of my Maximum PC issues I found that they made a $690 dollar gaming PC I found that they centered their build around a newer AMD processor and the raedeon 4870. Here are the parts:
The Case, GPU and the DVD Drive are the same.
CPU: AMD Phenom II X3 720 2.8GHz 3 x 512KB L2 Cache 6MB L3 Cache Socket AM3 95W Triple-Core Black Processor
Motherboard: ASUS M4A78 Plus AM3/AM2+/AM2 AMD 770 ATX AMD Motherboard
PSU: Rosewill RP550V2-D-SL 550W ATX12V v2.01 SLI Ready CrossFire Ready Power Supply (This PSU was able to run both the Phenom II X3 720 overclocked and the Raedeon 4870 in the Maximum PC article I read so I'm not worried about it. If somebody thinks it will not work please say something.)
RAM: A-DATA 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) (While its not a brand like Kingston it was really highly rated on newegg so I though I would go with it.)
Hard Drive: Western Digital Caviar Blue WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive
Any criticism is appreciated. If you think there will be a problem with these parts please say something!
Edit: The total is $610.12 shipped but there is a $10 rebate so its fits my budget perfectly!
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that psu looks fine. i overestimated the power consumption of the phenom ii x4s. they range in the low 200s at load! :O
oh, the board you chose says am3/am2+ but i think that just means it's am2+ since they have the ability to run am3 processors as well. and if youre looking for upgradability you should go for an am3 board + ddr3. it's a slight premium but i think it would be worth it.
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Go for a different motherboard with ACC in the BIOS settings so you can unlock the 4th core on that processor.
(Tri-Cores are basically quad cores with 1 core disabled, some motherboards come with a feature called ACC which can be tweaked in the BIOS, thus enabling the 4th core once again. It's basically like getting a quad core for the price of a tri-core. Check the reviews on certain motherboards for people who unlock their 4th core this way)
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core unlocking is a total crap shoot. Don't buy a 720 if you aren't going to be happy with 3 cores, the likelihood of the 4th core unlocking is relatively low.
It's still a good chip and a good overclocker but getting 4th core to unlock is just a bonus it shouldn't be a realistic expectation if you buy it
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Yeah I am not looking into core unlocking. Its really a gamble which I'm not interested in with such a low budget.
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For the most part it's a good set up. I tend to agree with what everyone has said here, though: you need more RAM.
Klapdout recommends AMD/ATI hardware. I humbly disagree. AMD/ATI have been doing "ok" in the past couple of years (ie, 3rd quarter 2006 and beyond). Intel/Nvidia, on other other hand, have been rock solid. All of their hardware and drivers work, work well, and often times game developers cater to those brands.
I would recommend getting better brands than you currently have. VisionTek, G.Skill, and MSI are all brands that get simply "ok" reviews. For your motherboard and Video card, I recommend ASUS, Gigabyte, or EVGA. Those are the top 3 companies for mobo/video card manufacturing. EVGA has the fairest price to reliability, in my opinion. ASUS is the best of the best, but you're going to pay a few bucks more. As for RAM, Kingston is a solid value brand, and Corsair is probably the best consumer RAM company on the market, and they're still very cheap to purchase. I'd also recommend bumping up your PSU to 550 watts, just to be safe. Graphics cards are beasts when it comes to power consumption, and you never want your PSU running at full load. 85% is optimum for longevity.
The case, while optional, I'd recommend going with Antec with them, just like you did the PSU. Antec is a good brand for PSUs. Their cases are also very, very good. They get incredible airflow, which, again, will help make your hardware last longer.
Honestly, unless getting this computer is a pressing matter, I'd wait until you have $800. The extra $200 will go a long way to get you much newer stuff. You will easily be able to get a much better CPU, video card, motherboard, bigger PSU and a lot more RAM. You could also probably squeeze in a better case. $600 makes it so that you can have a computer, and one that will run well, but it will have no lasting value. You simply won't have the parts or the space in your case or on your motherboard when you want to upgrade your system.
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Intel/Nvidia does not bode well for the budget.
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On August 06 2009 11:11 VorcePA wrote:
For the most part it's a good set up. I tend to agree with what everyone has said here, though: you need more RAM.
not really. im running vista x64 with 2gb of ram and it's fine. i hardly feel limited by ram.
Klapdout recommends AMD/ATI hardware. I humbly disagree. AMD/ATI have been doing "ok" in the past couple of years (ie, 3rd quarter 2006 and beyond). Intel/Nvidia, on other other hand, have been rock solid. All of their hardware and drivers work, work well, and often times game developers cater to those brands.
there's nothing wrong with ATI/AMD. in fact, ATI GPUs are usually considered better value and are recommended by many many sites and athlon ii / phenom ii are now competitive if not better than their intel counterparts.
I would recommend getting better brands than you currently have. VisionTek, G.Skill, and MSI are all brands that get simply "ok" reviews. For your motherboard and Video card, I recommend ASUS, Gigabyte, or EVGA. Those are the top 3 companies for mobo/video card manufacturing. EVGA has the fairest price to reliability, in my opinion. ASUS is the best of the best, but you're going to pay a few bucks more. As for RAM, Kingston is a solid value brand, and Corsair is probably the best consumer RAM company on the market, and they're still very cheap to purchase. I'd also recommend bumping up your PSU to 550 watts, just to be safe. Graphics cards are beasts when it comes to power consumption, and you never want your PSU running at full load. 85% is optimum for longevity.
i dont know about the psu part but the rest is pretty BS. though it's true brand recognition can mean a lot it also can be very misleading. ram is ram. you plug it in, it doesnt blue screen, you're good to go. same with video card etc etc. you're better off paying attention to specs than just buying by brand. though as with anything brands have reputations and you shouldnt totally ignore them.
The case, while optional, I'd recommend going with Antec with them, just like you did the PSU. Antec is a good brand for PSUs. Their cases are also very, very good. They get incredible airflow, which, again, will help make your hardware last longer.
i cant argue as i have an antec case myself, but there are also a lot of nice cases as well such as the one the OP is getting.
Honestly, unless getting this computer is a pressing matter, I'd wait until you have $800. The extra $200 will go a long way to get you much newer stuff. You will easily be able to get a much better CPU, video card, motherboard, bigger PSU and a lot more RAM. You could also probably squeeze in a better case. $600 makes it so that you can have a computer, and one that will run well, but it will have no lasting value. You simply won't have the parts or the space in your case or on your motherboard when you want to upgrade your system.
this is wrong. oh so wrong. you buy according to budget, need, and upgrade cycle. unless you are waiting for something specific, there's no point in waiting if you want / need it now. $600 is a perfectly fine budget that gives you plenty of room to upgrade, you just have to spend time to research.
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Since I've already wrote two very long posts today (the last one being 3.5 pages long), I'm just going to sum up my opinion of your opinion of my researched facts:
Nuh-uh.
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Ok I thank you both VorcePA and mahnini for your very long posts. I have decided to expand my budget by $50 dollars in order to switch over to DDR3 since I will be able to salvage it if I ever want to upgrade. As for the ATI card and AMD processor VorcePA, it seems from my research that these are the best cards within the $600 to (what you suggested) $800 price range since an i7 machine would cost more then $1000 pc which is a purchase I don't think I will ever be able to justify (since even a $600 machine will be such a huge leap compared to the laptop I'm using).
So I've decided to swap out the motherboard and RAM in order to use DDR3.
Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-MA770T-UD3P AM3 AMD 770 ATX AMD Motherboard
I'm not sure which DDR3 RAM to get though (should be 4gbs) so if anybody could recommend some that would be great.
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On August 06 2009 22:59 Flow.of.soul wrote:Ok I thank you both VorcePA and mahnini for your very long posts. I have decided to expand my budget by $50 dollars in order to switch over to DDR3 since I will be able to salvage it if I ever want to upgrade. As for the ATI card and AMD processor VorcePA, it seems from my research that these are the best cards within the $600 to (what you suggested) $800 price range since an i7 machine would cost more then $1000 pc which is a purchase I don't think I will ever be able to justify (since even a $600 machine will be such a huge leap compared to the laptop I'm using). So I've decided to swap out the motherboard and RAM in order to use DDR3. Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-MA770T-UD3P AM3 AMD 770 ATX AMD MotherboardI'm not sure which DDR3 RAM to get though (should be 4gbs) so if anybody could recommend some that would be great.
I wasn't recommend you gettting DDR3 ram, I just think you should be getting more RAM
DDR2 is still the industry standard. It's on its way out the door as such, though, because DDR3 is quickly dropping in price. Instead of spending $50 on newer generation RAM, pick up 4gb instead of 2, and purchase a better CPU if you can.
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