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When using this resource, please read FragKrag's opening post. The Tech Support forum regulars have helped create countless of desktop systems without any compensation. The least you can do is provide all of the information required for them to help you properly. |
Sup TL!
Having played SC2 with a laptop + Show Spoiler +dual core 2.2ghz - intel gma 128mb video card - 3.0go ram
Actually i could hardly play SC2 but with intense practice and frame lags + Show Spoiler +around 20 fps at start and 0-10fps at end battles
Well now it's the time to seek advise. I'm a total noob regarding PC. Heck i don't even know what is the best in Intel or Amd now! Which CPU/GFX and brand would you guys recommend?
Before you guys tell me to build my own pc, i stop you right there i have got no clue. I have also an unlimited budget and i am willing to pay a fair amount for great quality. (Quality>Quantity, right?)
Is alienware the best for gaming or is it only fancy and shiny? Shipping PC recommended or not? Anyways you guys got the feeling i'm pretty lost and really need advise here. Moreover i don't really trust the sellers in shops, i've been a seller myself!
Thanks in advance!
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On August 15 2011 06:58 CaM27 wrote:Sup TL! Having played SC2 with a laptop + Show Spoiler +dual core 2.2ghz - intel gma 128mb video card - 3.0go ram i think it's about time to move on and buy a new kickass PC! I am willing to play games like Diablo III, Rage, Skyrim, DeusEx, HoS in the best way possible! Actually i could hardly play SC2 but with intense practice and frame lags + Show Spoiler +around 20 fps at start and 0-10fps at end battles i still managed to reach Diamond from Bronze where the macro was more important than the micro for winning games! Neverthless the good days of winning games ended when i started meeting High Diamond and Masters! Being unable to micro due to frame drops i quit playing SC2! Well now it's the time to seek advise. I'm a total noob regarding PC. Heck i don't even know what is the best in Intel or Amd now! Which CPU/GFX and brand would you guys recommend? Before you guys tell me to build my own pc, i stop you right there i have got no clue. I have also an unlimited budget and i am willing to pay a fair amount for great quality. (Quality>Quantity, right?) Is alienware the best for gaming or is it only fancy and shiny? Shipping PC recommended or not? Anyways you guys got the feeling i'm pretty lost and really need advise here. Moreover i don't really trust the sellers in shops, i've been a seller myself! Thanks in advance!
You can answer the following questions and then have NCIX assemble it for you, I just did it and it was a pretty easy process, I picked it out on Wednesday and they assembled it and shipped it out on Friday. As far as advice I'll leave that to the more knowledgeable :p.
+ Show Spoiler +Important questions you should ask yourself
If you request a build, please answer these questions. We will spend as much effort on your build as you spend on your answers to these questions! I urge people to abstain from providing builds unless all the questions are answered.
What is your budget?
This should be an obvious one, you should determine a price range that best describes how much you want to spend on your build. It makes it easier for people to make recommendations.
What is your resolution?
This is extremely important especially for a gaming machine. I see people all the time asking for a video card recommendation and 5 people reply "5850" and the person hasn't even given their gaming resolution; it turns out the person games at 1280x1024 and could have ended up wasting $200 on a card that is total and complete overkill for his resolution.
What are you using it for?
Mostly gaming? Some gaming with video encoding mixed in? Photoshop? Streaming? All this matters, you can end up spending a lot of money and not be able to do anything you wanted to or you can spend a lot of money on stuff you don't even want to do.
What is your upgrade cycle?
Knowing the answer to this question makes it easier for people to recommend CPU sockets and GPUs so you get the most for your money. A person with a longer upgrade (2+ years) cycle will probably end up spending more initially but end up saving more at the expense of some performance. On the other hand a person with a shorter upgrade cycle (1 - 2 years) wants to spend less initially so they can put more money toward their next build.
When do you plan on building it?
Computer parts shift in prices often. With the release of new products, exist prices may drop further. Even without the release of new prices, changes in supply can affect the price of a specific part. The HD 5850 was supposed to retail at the $260 mark, but in a mere 4-5 months after its release it climbed to top $300 for basic reference models.
Do you plan on overclocking?
If you plan on overclocking, the motherboard choice and heatsink choice will be affected. Enthusiast overclocking requires enthusiast heatsinks and at least a stable motherboard. A simple budget Foxconn motherboard will not be adequate for your overclocking needs!
Do you need an Operating System?
An OS is around $100. It affects how much of your budget we can spend on the actual hardware.
Do you plan to add a second GPU for SLI or Crossfire?
CrossFire and SLI are powerful solutions that allow higher performance, but in order to utilize them, we have to choose motherboards and PSUs that can support the increased demands that Crossfire and SLI place on your components.
Where are you buying your parts from?
If you have a nearby Fry's or Microcenter you can utilize their deals. If you're in Europe you obviously cannot use Newegg/Fry's/Microcenter so we need to know where you are from to put together a list of parts from a website or area you can actually buy from.
If you can't answer these questions, make sure you can answer them before you ask us to help you put together a list of parts for you. Every single question affects the build we will put together for you greatly so make sure you can answer them accurately!
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On August 15 2011 08:23 colblitz wrote:Hey, does anyone have any opinions on this case? http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811208027Alternatively, could you guys suggest some good micro-ATX $50-or-less cases, preferably with a side panel? (also, if I have a 2.5" SSD could I get away with just taping it down somewhere?) Thanks 
Shit case, by all appearances. No cable management or CPU cooler cutouts, PSU will be stealing air from the CPU.
Yes you can tape down an SSD if you so desire. I don't think there's many mATX cases with side panels in that price range, good or otherwise. Or many good mATX cases in that price range in general.
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It's 802.11n (backwards compatible with 802.11b, g, and a), which won't benefit you until you get an 802.11n adapter. It uses a 2x2:2 configuration (2 antennas on transmitter side, 2 antennas on receiver side, and 2 data streams supported), and is dual band, which can be useful. Max link rate is 300 Mbps and not 600 Mbps, though that's probably an unimportant distinction for most home users. Specs look decent.
Cons are that it's not supported by 3rd-party firmware like DD-WRT (yet), which can often offer more advanced functionality. I think most 802.11n routers aren't supported though. It doesn't have external antennas, which is probably not good (it's a form over function tradeoff and/or cost over performance tradeoff), but that's not an issue unless you need that last bit of extra signal strength.
As for functionality, reliability, and so on, hard to say. It's not like I've used one.
On August 15 2011 06:14 buhhy wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2011 02:50 Myrmidon wrote:Those are best-case sequential transfer speeds. The reason why they're twice as fast is that SandForce's 2nd generation controller was designed to be...about twice as fast as the previous generation. Real-world speeds aren't as high in general and depend on what flash is being used. The higher-end SandForce 2xxx drives are the fastest consumer SATA SSDs under realistic usage, but it's not by a large margin. The SandForce controller does real-time data compression for all data coming through, so if what you're writing is like straight 0's (or something relatively simple with low entropy, like not compressed media files) and can be compressed really well, you can get those kinds of high transfer speeds. The quoted speeds only apply for that kind of data that compresses very well. If you've got a budget 60GB SandForce 2xxx drive like an OCZ Agility 3, write speeds are going to be nowhere resembling 500 MB/s on any kind of typical data. Maybe 1/5 of that, or slightly less depending? (Still pretty good though) edit: Corsair Force 3 should be same as OCZ Agility 3, and not the Force GT (GT is like Vertex 3). See here: http://www.anandtech.com/show/4604/the-sandforce-roundup-corsair-patriot-ocz-owc-memoright-ssds-compared/6 Interesting, after reading some more, it seems the Sandforce 2 drives have issues with stability. What would you suggest for a new 120GB SSD?
Intel 320 (last-gen performance though), Intel 510 (expensive though), Samsung 470 (last-gen performance though), Crucial M4, Crucial C300 (last generation but led that pack), possibly Corsair Performance 3 (expensive though). Unless you need top performance for some pseudo-enterprise usage, all of these will be pretty much in the same class of "omg way faster than HDD but doesn't magically improve performance of anything else in my computer" though, so I wouldn't worry about performance differences like that.
On August 15 2011 08:23 colblitz wrote:Hey, does anyone have any opinions on this case? http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811208027Alternatively, could you guys suggest some good micro-ATX $50-or-less cases, preferably with a side panel? (also, if I have a 2.5" SSD could I get away with just taping it down somewhere?) Thanks
Looks pretty outdated and bad for the price. I also think it's hideous but that's kind of a subjective thing, so I'm sure you know what's better for you there. The case fits microATX motherboards as do all cases that fit ATX motherboards, but usually when people talk about microATX cases, they mean those that fit microATX motherboards but not ATX motherboards (i.e. only 4 expansion slots in back).
edit: if you want a plasticky case with blue highlighting and a side panel window for around the price, the NZXT M59 should be significantly better:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811146058
On August 15 2011 08:35 naolin wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2011 06:58 CaM27 wrote:Sup TL! Having played SC2 with a laptop + Show Spoiler +dual core 2.2ghz - intel gma 128mb video card - 3.0go ram i think it's about time to move on and buy a new kickass PC! I am willing to play games like Diablo III, Rage, Skyrim, DeusEx, HoS in the best way possible! Actually i could hardly play SC2 but with intense practice and frame lags + Show Spoiler +around 20 fps at start and 0-10fps at end battles i still managed to reach Diamond from Bronze where the macro was more important than the micro for winning games! Neverthless the good days of winning games ended when i started meeting High Diamond and Masters! Being unable to micro due to frame drops i quit playing SC2! Well now it's the time to seek advise. I'm a total noob regarding PC. Heck i don't even know what is the best in Intel or Amd now! Which CPU/GFX and brand would you guys recommend? Before you guys tell me to build my own pc, i stop you right there i have got no clue. I have also an unlimited budget and i am willing to pay a fair amount for great quality. (Quality>Quantity, right?) Is alienware the best for gaming or is it only fancy and shiny? Shipping PC recommended or not? Anyways you guys got the feeling i'm pretty lost and really need advise here. Moreover i don't really trust the sellers in shops, i've been a seller myself! Thanks in advance! You can answer the following questions and then have NCIX assemble it for you, I just did it and it was a pretty easy process, I picked it out on Wednesday and they assembled it and shipped it out on Friday. As far as advice I'll leave that to the more knowledgeable :p. + Show Spoiler +Important questions you should ask yourself
If you request a build, please answer these questions. We will spend as much effort on your build as you spend on your answers to these questions! I urge people to abstain from providing builds unless all the questions are answered.
What is your budget?
This should be an obvious one, you should determine a price range that best describes how much you want to spend on your build. It makes it easier for people to make recommendations.
What is your resolution?
This is extremely important especially for a gaming machine. I see people all the time asking for a video card recommendation and 5 people reply "5850" and the person hasn't even given their gaming resolution; it turns out the person games at 1280x1024 and could have ended up wasting $200 on a card that is total and complete overkill for his resolution.
What are you using it for?
Mostly gaming? Some gaming with video encoding mixed in? Photoshop? Streaming? All this matters, you can end up spending a lot of money and not be able to do anything you wanted to or you can spend a lot of money on stuff you don't even want to do.
What is your upgrade cycle?
Knowing the answer to this question makes it easier for people to recommend CPU sockets and GPUs so you get the most for your money. A person with a longer upgrade (2+ years) cycle will probably end up spending more initially but end up saving more at the expense of some performance. On the other hand a person with a shorter upgrade cycle (1 - 2 years) wants to spend less initially so they can put more money toward their next build.
When do you plan on building it?
Computer parts shift in prices often. With the release of new products, exist prices may drop further. Even without the release of new prices, changes in supply can affect the price of a specific part. The HD 5850 was supposed to retail at the $260 mark, but in a mere 4-5 months after its release it climbed to top $300 for basic reference models.
Do you plan on overclocking?
If you plan on overclocking, the motherboard choice and heatsink choice will be affected. Enthusiast overclocking requires enthusiast heatsinks and at least a stable motherboard. A simple budget Foxconn motherboard will not be adequate for your overclocking needs!
Do you need an Operating System?
An OS is around $100. It affects how much of your budget we can spend on the actual hardware.
Do you plan to add a second GPU for SLI or Crossfire?
CrossFire and SLI are powerful solutions that allow higher performance, but in order to utilize them, we have to choose motherboards and PSUs that can support the increased demands that Crossfire and SLI place on your components.
Where are you buying your parts from?
If you have a nearby Fry's or Microcenter you can utilize their deals. If you're in Europe you obviously cannot use Newegg/Fry's/Microcenter so we need to know where you are from to put together a list of parts from a website or area you can actually buy from.
If you can't answer these questions, make sure you can answer them before you ask us to help you put together a list of parts for you. Every single question affects the build we will put together for you greatly so make sure you can answer them accurately!
Not if he's in Belgium. I agree with the rest though. btw Alienware usually gives you a terrible value.
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Ah right didn't notice his country
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On August 15 2011 06:58 CaM27 wrote:Sup TL! Having played SC2 with a laptop + Show Spoiler +dual core 2.2ghz - intel gma 128mb video card - 3.0go ram i think it's about time to move on and buy a new kickass PC! I am willing to play games like Diablo III, Rage, Skyrim, DeusEx, HoS in the best way possible! Actually i could hardly play SC2 but with intense practice and frame lags + Show Spoiler +around 20 fps at start and 0-10fps at end battles i still managed to reach Diamond from Bronze where the macro was more important than the micro for winning games! Neverthless the good days of winning games ended when i started meeting High Diamond and Masters! Being unable to micro due to frame drops i quit playing SC2! Well now it's the time to seek advise. I'm a total noob regarding PC. Heck i don't even know what is the best in Intel or Amd now! Which CPU/GFX and brand would you guys recommend? Before you guys tell me to build my own pc, i stop you right there i have got no clue. I have also an unlimited budget and i am willing to pay a fair amount for great quality. (Quality>Quantity, right?) Is alienware the best for gaming or is it only fancy and shiny? Shipping PC recommended or not? Anyways you guys got the feeling i'm pretty lost and really need advise here. Moreover i don't really trust the sellers in shops, i've been a seller myself! Thanks in advance!
As has been said before, Alienware is terrible value and they give you a very limited choise. Its better to create your own system and let a store build it if you aren't comfortable doing it yourself.
I know that the hardware prices in belgium are quite high, so most people import from the Netherlands or Germany. The three shops that are used most, as far as I know, are Hardwareversand.de, Azerty.nl and Alternate (both german and dutch). There is allso a belgian alternate only I think the prices are higher. Not really sure how they import it, try to research it if you want to find out.
If you want to do it the easy way, just order at Alternate.be. Here is the link to the belgian pc builder on alternate. You sellect the components (with our help if you need it) and they build it for you.
Allso try to figuer out what you exactly want to do with your computer (The list of questions that was quoted earlier). With an unlimited budget you can get a lot of high end equipment that wont really do you any good if you just want to have a high quality simple system.
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Would the performance of an i3 2100 or i5 2300 be faster for non-gaming PERFECTLY? I am very stuck between those two. I have a lot of people suggesting 2400, 2300, and 2100.
Graphics Card GT 430 w/ 4 GB RAM
Excuse me if I am getting repetitive, but I have never used a Dual-Core before, and have a feeling I am underestimating them.
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On August 15 2011 11:04 epikAnglory wrote:
Would the performance of an i3 2100 or i5 2300 be faster for non-gaming PERFECTLY? I am very stuck between those two. I have a lot of people suggesting 2400, 2300, and 2100.
Graphics Card GT 430 w/ 4 GB RAM
Excuse me if I am getting repetitive, but I have never used a Dual-Core before, and have a feeling I am underestimating them.
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/289?vs=363
Close enough, the quad is about 9% or so faster than the 2300 (It's the 2400 since they don't have a 2300 in the bench) but results are reasonably close enough that you can compare?
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the i5 2300/2400/2500 are better than the i3 2100. How much better depends on what you're doing with it. The 2100 is a very good processor and most likely enough for most tihngs you can trow at it. I'm not gonne read through this whole thread to know what you want to do with it.
So look at benchmarks, look at the price, think what you want to do with it and make a decision.
The GT 430 is not a very good gpu for gaming.
4gb is enough for most people, so unless you multitask a lot and/or multitask during gaming you can go with 4gb. But since its so cheap you might as well just take 8 gb. So just take 8 gb ram unless you are on a strick budget.
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Would a SEASONIC Sonic S12II-430 - 430 W (link below) be enough for for an overclocked i5-2500K with a gtx 560 Ti? Only standard components otherwise.
http://www.jmedata.se/PartDetail.aspx?q=p:2604527
How accurate are the power supply calculators out there? Like this one:
http://extreme.outervision.com/psucalculatorlite.jsp
For a 560 Ti setup I get a minimum wattage psu of 440 W and 490 recommended. If you add the capacitor aging number like they recommend you get +60 W added to that.
Seems like I should be getting a higher psu in such a configuration but based on the recommendations in this thread, those numbers seems high.
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On August 15 2011 10:57 Madoga wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2011 06:58 CaM27 wrote:Sup TL! Having played SC2 with a laptop + Show Spoiler +dual core 2.2ghz - intel gma 128mb video card - 3.0go ram i think it's about time to move on and buy a new kickass PC! I am willing to play games like Diablo III, Rage, Skyrim, DeusEx, HoS in the best way possible! Actually i could hardly play SC2 but with intense practice and frame lags + Show Spoiler +around 20 fps at start and 0-10fps at end battles i still managed to reach Diamond from Bronze where the macro was more important than the micro for winning games! Neverthless the good days of winning games ended when i started meeting High Diamond and Masters! Being unable to micro due to frame drops i quit playing SC2! Well now it's the time to seek advise. I'm a total noob regarding PC. Heck i don't even know what is the best in Intel or Amd now! Which CPU/GFX and brand would you guys recommend? Before you guys tell me to build my own pc, i stop you right there i have got no clue. I have also an unlimited budget and i am willing to pay a fair amount for great quality. (Quality>Quantity, right?) Is alienware the best for gaming or is it only fancy and shiny? Shipping PC recommended or not? Anyways you guys got the feeling i'm pretty lost and really need advise here. Moreover i don't really trust the sellers in shops, i've been a seller myself! Thanks in advance! As has been said before, Alienware is terrible value and they give you a very limited choise. Its better to create your own system and let a store build it if you aren't comfortable doing it yourself. I know that the hardware prices in belgium are quite high, so most people import from the Netherlands or Germany. The three shops that are used most, as far as I know, are Hardwareversand.de, Azerty.nl and Alternate (both german and dutch). There is allso a belgian alternate only I think the prices are higher. Not really sure how they import it, try to research it if you want to find out. If you want to do it the easy way, just order at Alternate.be. Here is the link to the belgian pc builder on alternate. You sellect the components (with our help if you need it) and they build it for you. Allso try to figuer out what you exactly want to do with your computer (The list of questions that was quoted earlier). With an unlimited budget you can get a lot of high end equipment that wont really do you any good if you just want to have a high quality simple system.
Thanks for replying to me - i will keep the thread updated about my future actions and ofcourse will ask great advise before pre/ordering/buying. Cheers all!
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So I am completely new to building a desktop but I want to build one(or at least order the parts) before I have to go back to school (~ a week from now) and these are the parts I noticed on newegg.com. I just wanted to run by all ye tech nerds before making my final decision, looking for things like if there are better deals, and if I am making a serious judgment error on any particular item. I have a monitor of 1920x1080 resolution which I'll hook up to this. The total of what I listed come out to be ~$730.
+ Show Spoiler +
CPU: AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition Thuban 3.2GHz Socket AM3 125W Six-Core Desktop Processor HDT90ZFBGRBOX $170 free shipping
RAM: G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1866 (PC3 14900) Desktop Memory Model F3-14900CL9D-8GBXL (Model:F3-14900CL9D-8GBXL) $70 free shipping
or G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL9D-4GBNQ $34 free shipping
HD: HITACHI Deskstar 7K3000 HDS723015BLA642 (0F12114) 1.5TB 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive (Model:0F12114) $65 -10, free shipping
CASE: COOLER MASTER Elite 330 RC-330-KKN1-GP Black SECC ATX Mid Tower Computer Case $40 + 8 shipping
Cooling unit: COOLER MASTER Hyper N 520 RR-920-N520-GP 92mm Sleeve CPU Cooler Intel Core i7 compatible (Model:RR-920-N520-GP) $34
Optical Drive: LITE-ON DVD Burner - Bulk Black SATA Model iHAS124-04 - OEM $19
PSU: Antec EarthWatts EA-650 GREEN 650W ATX12V v2.3 SLI Ready CrossFire Certified 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC Power Supply (Model:EA-650 Green) $70
Motherboard: ASUS M4A88T-M LE AM3 AMD 880G HDMI Micro ATX AMD Motherboard $80
GPU: ZOTAC GeForce GTX 460 (Fermi) ZT-40408-10P Video Card $160
wireless adapter: Rosewill RNX-N180PCe PCI Express Revision 1.1 Wireless Adapter $20
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On August 15 2011 17:55 Tachkilius wrote:So I am completely new to building a desktop but I want to build one(or at least order the parts) before I have to go back to school (~ a week from now) and these are the parts I noticed on newegg.com. I just wanted to run by all ye tech nerds before making my final decision, looking for things like if there are better deals, and if I am making a serious judgment error on any particular item. I have a monitor of 1920x1080 resolution which I'll hook up to this. The total of what I listed come out to be ~$730. + Show Spoiler +
CPU: AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition Thuban 3.2GHz Socket AM3 125W Six-Core Desktop Processor HDT90ZFBGRBOX $170 free shipping
RAM: G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1866 (PC3 14900) Desktop Memory Model F3-14900CL9D-8GBXL (Model:F3-14900CL9D-8GBXL) $70 free shipping
or G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL9D-4GBNQ $34 free shipping
HD: HITACHI Deskstar 7K3000 HDS723015BLA642 (0F12114) 1.5TB 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive (Model:0F12114) $65 -10, free shipping
CASE: COOLER MASTER Elite 330 RC-330-KKN1-GP Black SECC ATX Mid Tower Computer Case $40 + 8 shipping
Cooling unit: COOLER MASTER Hyper N 520 RR-920-N520-GP 92mm Sleeve CPU Cooler Intel Core i7 compatible (Model:RR-920-N520-GP) $34
Optical Drive: LITE-ON DVD Burner - Bulk Black SATA Model iHAS124-04 - OEM $19
PSU: Antec EarthWatts EA-650 GREEN 650W ATX12V v2.3 SLI Ready CrossFire Certified 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC Power Supply (Model:EA-650 Green) $70
Motherboard: ASUS M4A88T-M LE AM3 AMD 880G HDMI Micro ATX AMD Motherboard $80
GPU: ZOTAC GeForce GTX 460 (Fermi) ZT-40408-10P Video Card $160
wireless adapter: Rosewill RNX-N180PCe PCI Express Revision 1.1 Wireless Adapter $20
Don't buy an AMD processor. Intel Sandy Bridge CPUs are much better.
Depending on where you live, if there is a MicroCenter nearby, you can pick up the 2500k for $180+tax, and if you decide to buy a motherboard there as well, you can save an additional $40 on the motherboard if you buy them together.
If you don't need to/want to overclock, you can get the cheaper i5-2400.
As for a motherboard, I am a pretty big fan of the Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD3H (if you plan on overclocking), if not I would recommend the Gigabyte GA-P61-USB3-B3 (very much a budget board/not too much knowledge on P61/H67/H61). Primary reason as to why I am recommending these Gigabyte boards is that Gigabyte has come out and said that their boards will be Ivy Bridge compatible (which most will be), as well as PCI Express 3.0 compatible with a bios update which is pretty sweet.
You also don't need to spend $35 on a CPU HSF. Consider looking at the 212+ ($29 on Amazon and Newegg), that thing is potentially the best bang for the buck in terms of CPU HSFs. If you're not overclocking at all, you can go with the stock HSF. It will be good enough, and save you $30
As for RAM, you don't need DDR3 1866 speed ram, the differences between DDR3 1600 and 1866 is SLIM, more often than not 1-2FPS. You can even go DDR3 1333 RAM and be completely fine.
If you're willing to pay a few extra bucks, I would recommend that you get a case with room behind the motherboard tray for wiring, it'll help keep the wiring clutter in the case to a minimum and as a result, have better airflow and temperatures. I would look into either the Antec 100 (not ISK) case, or the Coolermaster 690 II Advanced.
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5930 Posts
Fuck Gigabyte out of principle. Can't believe they still use that Award BIOS.
Also PCIe 3.0 is pointless. Its the next SATA 6.0 on mechanical disks.
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On August 15 2011 19:12 Womwomwom wrote:
Fuck Gigabyte out of principle. Can't believe they still use that Award BIOS.
Also PCIe 3.0 is pointless. Its the next SATA 6.0 on mechanical disks.
Just curious, what's wrong with the Award BIOS?
And as for PCIe 3.0. If you're going to spend money on a computer, and the price difference was minimal to none, why wouldn't you get a motherboard that could support PCIe 3.0? Maximize your bang for the buck. You wouldn't buy a motherboard today that only had SATA 3.0 if you could get SATA 6.0 for the same price, even if you were only planning on using mechanical drives.
Maybe you'll switch to SSDs in the future, maybe they'll come down in price.
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What is your budget?
Around £600 which is about $950
What is your resolution?
Just got a new monitor so resolution up to 1920x1200
What are you using it for?
Nothing more than gaming.
What is your upgrade cycle?
Around a 2 year upgrade cycle.
When do you plan on building it?
Within 2 months. Not in any rush so if anything really worth waiting for its possible.
Do you plan on overclocking?
No plans to overclock, with a long upgrade cycle would rather things last.
Do you need an Operating System?
Need an OS yes. Prefer some Windows7 home etc
Do you plan to add a second GPU for SLI or Crossfire?
Not 100% if this would be needed, please advise. As mentioned I just want the rig for gaming. Would this boost my experience more or not so much?
Where are you buying your parts from?
Generally www.ebuyer.co.uk or www.dabs.com
Notes:
Have looked into RAID 0 a little and was thinking this might be quite nice to boost the speed of the machine. Again in terms of just gaming would this be benefitial?
Currently have 2 x 2gb ram sticks. After looking around people say you don't really need more than 4 for gaming so could spare this, your thoughts.
Also have a Nvidia GeForce GTS 450. Don't think so but might be usful still. After checking the section about GPU I think I'd need a new one for the resolution I now have. Just mentioning it anyway.
Regards
James
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5930 Posts
Video cards are probably not going to benefit much from PCIe 3.0 spec - even if you run dual GPUs in PCIe 4x/4x mode, you actually don't take a really significant hit. So buying a motherboard just for PCIe 3.0 isn't exactly worth it since you don't exactly benefit from it straight up - enterprise will love it but we're just consumers who only ever use PCIe lanes for GPUs.
Award BIOS isn't used by anyone but Gigabyte - everyone has some sort of uEFI implemented. Its not intuitive, has no native support for 3TB drives (it works around it with a bootloader), and it doesn't boot as fast. They're the only company that haven't adopted the modern age and its not like their support and motherboard design is better than the competitors.
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EPT
