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^Sure
Sorry to be ADD but again i think I may go with the 4850 because Im not using a huge HDTV, im using some crappy maybe LCD monitor or whatever on craigslist. Even if I did spend money on a great monitor, it seems that 1600+ resolutions are basically extremely high-end HDTVs. Under 1600 the 4850 seems to be pretty good, maybe barely reaching the threshold of ultra, which seems fine. $25 to pay for Ultra + AA over Ultra with maybe one or two settings on just high seems fine to me, and its not really noticeably anyways (especially since I wont be playing on any crazy like organic LED HDTV widescreen, even if I had the money).
even though the 460 is basically twice as good... yea i can just upgrade later on. shouldnt be carried away with upgrading so much, especially going budget.
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If you're buying a computer to play SC2, then I guess other games might be of intrest to you as well.
There almost is no such thing as "GPU overkill" for a (new) gaming PC. In almost all scenarios the GPU will bottleneck before the CPU or RAM.
So the point is that your setup can handle a much more powerful GPU, and for gaming, the GPU will be the thing that matters the most.
I only know of a swedish site that did a comparison of this type where to goal was to find what bottlenecks. Might be more of those articles about.
EDIT: If SC2 is all you want, then nevermind  Still I think you've come up with a very cheap gaming PC in the last updated setup.
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You don't need a tri core it is literally a waste of money. But if it is a good deal for it I don't see why not. System looks good considering you aren't upgrading any time soon and so the lacking PSU won't be a worry for you.
By the way I used a HD 4850 from sapphire and a Phenom II 545 dual core at 3Ghz on ultra at 30 frames + at 1080p so I do believe you should get the 4850. It is an amazing card and I love it even though I know I have to upgrade I'm still keeping it.
I'm intrigued, please post back pictures and results of your frames.
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^ Why are you upgrading?
AyameStarcraft, processors are gone over into great detail at the Tomshardware Sc2 revisited page. Basically there is a big jump from single core to dual core, a minor bump up to tricore, and a minor, albeit more major minor, bump to quadcore that's really not worth the price premiums quad usually has in relation to not just tricores but dualcores. With that in mind, speed is the next biggest factor with a 3.2ghz singlecore doing great, 3.0ghz dual being good, 2.7 tri being good too. I'm only paying about $10 more than a dual core of the same speed, and it's worthwhile in SC2 performance to do this. I wouldn't say a $10 difference is a 'waste of money' when I'm doing a 3.2ghz tricore for about $60 when combo'd vs a 3.2ghz dualcore for about $50 in the same combo (as all athlon are able to do the biostar + athlon combo for $15 savings).
Your post doesnt really say enough to invalidate what everyone has said and the research Ive done, but if you want to argue that SC2 runs a 3.2ghz dualcore just as well as the tricore, with evidence, maybe Id be willing to shave $10 - after all, almost everyone but Myrmidon has been more keen to tell me to spend more then actually being budget and value conscious (which is why I've valued and appreciated his input a lot and his PSU comments give me a lot of trepidation because I really dont want to ride a thin line on PSUs).
Thanks though for your input on the 4850, I think I'll do this 4850 instead of the 260 (ive literally changed my post and mind on this at least 4 times now. The 460 is a hair away from being twice as good while only being $25, but I think I'll settle with the fact that the 4850 can run SC2 on ultimate unless I'm using a $1000 TV, which is a joke. And, I'm getting a PC to play SC2, nothing more. I can always upgrade in 3 months when I have an extra couple hundred dollars saved up, if its really that bad.
XFX HD-485X-ZNFC Radeon HD 4850 1GB 256-bit DDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150482
$79
Question though:
Can I just use any case that will hold an ATX motherboard? Can't I just use one of those beige generic cases? I may just not even order the $40 case, save money, and buy it either later or use one of those generic cases.
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On January 29 2011 13:07 Belial88 wrote:Question though:
Can I just use any case that will hold an ATX motherboard? Can't I just use one of those beige generic cases? I may just not even order the $40 case, save money, and buy it either later or use one of those generic cases.
Yes, any ATX case will work. Just make sure it can provide adequate airflow to the components.
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Personally I think the 380W unit was a little on the low side (should work reliably, but closer to margins than preferred--though people overestimate where these margins are) for a GTX 460. Bumping up to the 430W makes sense if you're getting a GTX 460 and want to feel safer about things, or envision upgrading to something on that level or higher later. For a HD 4850, the 380W is already way plenty.
Look at the numbers again. A HD 4850 won't play SC2 on ultra at most resolutions, at least without fps drops that would be distracting to many/most players. Then again, at least for SC2, many players prefer playing on lower detail settings anyway for visibility/aesthetic reasons.
You can use any case that holds an ATX motherboard, but cheaper cases tend to have problems with bending/breaking, rattling, installation issues, and most importantly, poor airflow. You don't want to kill your medium-end gaming computer in a box that was really only designed for holding and cooling an office computer using integrated graphics.
That said, if you're scrapping on funds currently, I would forgo getting a case at all. If there's no danger of components getting drinks spilled on them, getting bumped into, etc., it should be fine as a temporary solution. Just monitor your temperatures to make sure they're fine.
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Well Belial I'm upgrading because I'm a tech nerd and the new sandy bridge processors caught my eye. I'll be throwing it into a system with 8GB of RAM and a GTX 580 so it should last me quite some time :D
As for the tri core dual core debate I'm pretty positive there are some threads on TL as well as other sources with the facts stating SC2 seemed optimized for dual core systems. I shall have a look but to be brutally honest you've got yourself a good build there and my nitpicking really doesn't need acted on
As for the case a generic black no PSU case will serve you nicely indeed. Over here you can buy a case for about 20 quid so I assume you could find one over in the states for 20 bucks (considering in tech terms pound price = dollar price instead of the exchange rate)
EDIT: On January 29 2011 13:29 Myrmidon wrote:
Look at the numbers again. A HD 4850 won't play SC2 on ultra at most resolutions, at least without fps drops that would be distracting to many/most players. Then again, at least for SC2, many players prefer playing on lower detail settings anyway for visibility/aesthetic reasons.
I'm afraid it can my good man. I'd be willing to screen it too. I can easily plug the good ol card back in.
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On January 29 2011 13:29 AyameStarcraft wrote:EDIT: Show nested quote +On January 29 2011 13:29 Myrmidon wrote:
Look at the numbers again. A HD 4850 won't play SC2 on ultra at most resolutions, at least without fps drops that would be distracting to many/most players. Then again, at least for SC2, many players prefer playing on lower detail settings anyway for visibility/aesthetic reasons. I'm afraid it can my good man. I'd be willing to screen it too. I can easily plug the good ol card back in.
Maybe "most" was not the right word in either case used, you're right. I half take it back. Are you running at 1600x900 or higher? I'd call min fps drops below 30-40 distracting, which should be about where the HD 4850 is at. Since you've personally tried the HD 4850, what did you recall about the fps?
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On January 29 2011 13:47 Myrmidon wrote:
Maybe "most" was not the right word in either case used, you're right. I half take it back. Are you running at 1600x900 or higher? I'd call min fps drops below 30-40 distracting, which should be about where the HD 4850 is at. Since you've personally tried the HD 4850, what did you recall about the fps?
I was at 1920x1080 Running constant 30 with a frame limiter. It only dropped below that in stupidly big games on UMS maps. Since then, I've started playing the game on low on a 5770 that I'm going to give to my friend once I get some sata cables to plug his dvd and hard drive into ( >.< didn't have enough when I got all the bits together) and to be honest the game just looks nicer on low. Anyway I'm rambling now...
The 4850 in question was a Standard Sapphire model with only 512 MB of VRAM overclocked by about 40MHz on core and 110 MHz on mem.
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I'll defer to your experience then. It's probably good news for the OP. I may be just forgetting that too many benchmarks I've seen are running AF and/or AA or testing situations where the game might even be CPU limited.
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Yeah I don't like it when they decide that all games must be run at 8xAA/16AF. Makes some cards look worse than they actually are.
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I just wanted to let you know that working with a mid-tower is misery incarnate. When I did it I could barely fit the motherboard into the case, and working on anything was always a major pain in the ass. I would suggest a full tower if you can find one for a decent price, a mid-tower gets the job done but it can be ugly.
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On January 29 2011 14:00 AyameStarcraft wrote:
I was at 1920x1080 Running constant 30 with a frame limiter. It only dropped below that in stupidly big games on UMS maps.
lol what who wants to play a videogame at 30fps
I'm running a 4850 at 1680x1050, which is not a high resolution, and like I said before, it's not a good card for starcraft 2. You'd be better off buying a 9800GT for SC2 and upgrading later.
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On January 29 2011 05:23 Belial88 wrote:
Cel.erity,
The $12.99 RAM I chose has 7 Cas Latency instead of the 9 of the one you posted. I was also under the impression that you need RAM in pairs/tris (dual/tri channel depending on mobo).
No offense, but do you even know what cas latency is? Don't buy things just because they sound faster. The RAM you have listed is 1066mHz, and what I listed runs at 1333mHz and $6 cheaper. In practice, you will never be able to tell the difference between budget RAM and the best RAM on earth, so buy whatever is cheapest.
Yes, there is an extremely minor performance difference between 2x 1GB and 1x 2GB, but is it worth $6? Not really. A single 2GB stick will make you upgradeable to 8GB instead of 6GB, and it has better resale value on eBay.
Also, depending on your OS, 2GB to 4GB will probably enhance your SC2 experience. With 2GB you will be forced to shut down any internet browsers and other programs while playing for flawless play, which I guess may or may not be a problem for you.
Also. As for GPU its either the 4850 for $79 or the GTX460 for $104. I know the 450 may be a step up for $10, but its not a huge step up, and the $15 to make it a 460, is a huge step.
I don't know where you're getting your information, but the GTS450 is about a 20% upgrade over the 4850. GTX460 is probably 25% over the GTS450, yes, but for SC2 on ultra it will make no difference unless you play an awful lot of 4v4 and Desert Strike. You wanted a cheap build that could play SC2 on max settings which the GTS450 can do.
I would emphatically recommend not buying a Galaxy brand GTX460, especially in a cheap case with OEM heatsink and only one fan. The cheap Galaxy cooler is going to make your card run 20-30 degrees hotter than more reputable cards, and it will turn your case into an oven, compromising your CPU, RAM, and HDD. Furthermore, you can see that over 20% of user reviews on Newegg are 1-2 eggs where their cards failed shortly after purchase, or the fan blades break off. I don't really know anything about the card I recommended for you, but 450's do not run nearly as hot as 460's, so the cooler shouldn't be as problematic.
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On January 29 2011 15:01 Cel.erity wrote:
I would emphatically recommend not buying a Galaxy brand GTX460, especially in a cheap case with OEM heatsink and only one fan. The cheap Galaxy cooler is going to make your card run 20-30 degrees hotter than more reputable cards, and it will turn your case into an oven, compromising your CPU, RAM, and HDD. Furthermore, you can see that over 20% of user reviews on Newegg are 1-2 eggs where their cards failed shortly after purchase, or the fan blades break off. I don't really know anything about the card I recommended for you, but 450's do not run nearly as hot as 460's, so the cooler shouldn't be as problematic.
newegg reviews mean literally nothing, and even if you were to take them seriously, there are only 5 bad reviews and most of the bad reviews are DOA cards, none of them are cards that failed "shortly after purchase" so I have to assume you never read the reviews at all!
and the rest of your arguments are all anecdotal. There's nothing wrong with the galaxy cooler except possibly the noise level and the idea that it could "cook your HDD" is possibly the dumbest thing I've ever read in this forum
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AyameStarcraft, I am aware SC2 is optimized for dualcore. There is actually a huge boost from singlecore to dualcore. However, there is a sizable increase from dualcore to triple core, and insignficant (a couple frames) from triple to quad (sorry I mixed that up in last post). I know what you are speaking of, but the boost in dual to tri is similar to .3-.5ghz in speed, worth the $10 increase in cost. Its not that big of a boost but it does increase performance.
I just wanted to let you know that working with a mid-tower is misery incarnate. When I did it I could barely fit the motherboard into the case, and working on anything was always a major pain in the ass. I would suggest a full tower if you can find one for a decent price, a mid-tower gets the job done but it can be ugly.
Ugly on the inside? I really don't even care about what the case looks like anyways, even the coolest looking cases aren't as good looking as, say, a slot for the computer in a desk which has a door to go over it. And, if aesthetics (or budget aesthetics even) was a concern, at all, I'm sure I could get creative and bust out the elementary school art class knowledge and craft something up. I'm sure there are a million McGuyver articles out there to make cool looking cases for less than $50 with household materials or whatever.
As for the case a generic black no PSU case will serve you nicely indeed. Over here you can buy a case for about 20 quid so I assume you could find one over in the states for 20 bucks (considering in tech terms pound price = dollar price instead of the exchange rate)
I was just in Spain/Morocco/Portugal for a month (the reason I have to get this computer is because my roommate moved his shared computer into his room) and although not familiar too well with 'quid', I know it's somewhat similar to euros. i think actually the 'quid' was worth more than the euro. Current exchange rates are pretty bad Euro vs USD, I mean you're looking at .7 USD to 1 euro. I'm not only an economist actually, but I travel a lot so i kind of keep up with that (never been to the UK though so pounds are a bit beyond me, and doesnt the UK accept euros?). With that said, 20 pounds is like 25 euros, and 25 euros is more like 39 USD, which is exactly the price of the case I'm looking at.
According to the Logical Increments PC Buying Guide ( http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/af150/The_FalconO6/CurrentLogicalPCBuyingGuide/Guide.png) which is an absolute amazing resource and what I used to pick my case/PSU since so many of both exist at the bottom price level, the NXZT is the best value, or best at the price of $39.
I just wanted to let you know that working with a mid-tower is misery incarnate. When I did it I could barely fit the motherboard into the case, and working on anything was always a major pain in the ass. I would suggest a full tower if you can find one for a decent price, a mid-tower gets the job done but it can be ugly.
I really dont understand what this means, its almost borderline unhelpful if I wanted to be a jackass. Are you telling me its impossible to use a midtower with my setup, or that it just takes a little more elbow grease and an extra 20 minutes to plug everything in? I mean why would i be working on anything? Even if i did work on anything, say did an upgrade every 2 months (LoL) I dont think its a deal, at all, to have to spend an extra minutes setting something up internally that I pretty much open up a few times a year compared to the hours of time I'll be using it straight up.
So i really dont understand what ugly means. It's not like my case is see through, who cares how bundled up or scrunched things are? Unless its a performance issue. If you can find for me, on Newegg (or anywhere really) a full tower of equal or better quality for $39 or less, I'll buy it. I don't say that to be lazy or a dick, its just that I lack the technical knowledge to be able to tell what is a better case or not. Same with PSUs, which is why I simply picked them straight up from the above linked Logical Increments Guide. (I sort of understand its the 12v rail amperage of the PSU and the rating, but obviously I dont know how to read this because people say different things that are posted so im all hell confused on that still)
From what I understand, the 4850 is better than the GT250, which was basically the lowest rated processor that could do ultimate graphics on the lower resolutions. Mind you, I'm aiming for medium quality for one, secondly I play this game competitively (even if I am not good, didnt play SC1, and a month in Spain means literally I went from mid Diamond skill to Silver level), and third *I dont have a crazy organic LED HDTV* Im going to be using a lay-around LCD monitor, maybe something off Craigslist or whatever i can scrounge up for free.
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FYI I think part of the reason why the NZXT Gamma is considered a good value is that the insides are painted black and thus look good lol. Also, it has a whole bunch of fan cutout grills for people to add their own fans. In addition, it has a bottom-mounted PSU layout, which allows a PSU with a bottom-mounted fan to suck air from outside the case if you orient it that way. The 500W and under Earthwatts models have blow-through fans, so that's irrelevant. i.e. these may be features unimportant to you.
It only comes with a single 12cm fan. It's still probably a decent option though. It has some decent cable management options, which should improve airflow through the case a bit.
Using some old smaller-res monitor lying around, a HD 4850 is probably good to go then.
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Strongly recommend waiting for a power supply deal on Newegg. If you go with a wimpy 380W power supply, you will not be able to add a beefy video card at a later date to turn your average gaming machine into a high quality one.
I've seen quality 500W PSUs on there for $30 after rebate... you should at least get 430W, which can handle a 5770.
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Sorry Celerity I dont know how I missed your post. To address you...
No offense, but do you even know what cas latency is? Don't buy things just because they sound faster. The RAM you have listed is 1066mHz, and what I listed runs at 1333mHz and $6 cheaper. In practice, you will never be able to tell the difference between budget RAM and the best RAM on earth, so buy whatever is cheapest.
Yes, there is an extremely minor performance difference between 2x 1GB and 1x 2GB, but is it worth $6? Not really. A single 2GB stick will make you upgradeable to 8GB instead of 6GB, and it has better resale value on eBay.
Also, depending on your OS, 2GB to 4GB will probably enhance your SC2 experience. With 2GB you will be forced to shut down any internet browsers and other programs while playing for flawless play, which I guess may or may not be a problem for you.
No offense taken, I have no idea what Cas latency is. I had just heard lower is better, I think on the 1st page. That's an interesting point about it being cheaper since I just get 1, I thought with dual channel you had to get two stick, and twi channel meant you needed 3. I didnt realize you could run whatever you wanted, or just a single. Am i getting that right? You recommended a different mobo, will the single stick work with my mobo?
Assuming it works, its a great find though, its the cheapest RAM if you can do just a single stick on a dual channel, zero shipping and $5 rebate. I'll use it if its really compatible.
Of course Im going to close all my browsers when playing. Even if all my gear was $1000 top notch, you close everything to speed up things a bit. If I really need a browser open I can always either save the page and view in HTML, pull it up on my Droid, or on my laptop.
I don't know where you're getting your information, but the GTS450 is about a 20% upgrade over the 4850. GTX460 is probably 25% over the GTS450, yes, but for SC2 on ultra it will make no difference unless you play an awful lot of 4v4 and Desert Strike. You wanted a cheap build that could play SC2 on max settings which the GTS450 can do.
I would emphatically recommend not buying a Galaxy brand GTX460, especially in a cheap case with OEM heatsink and only one fan. The cheap Galaxy cooler is going to make your card run 20-30 degrees hotter than more reputable cards, and it will turn your case into an oven, compromising your CPU, RAM, and HDD. Furthermore, you can see that over 20% of user reviews on Newegg are 1-2 eggs where their cards failed shortly after purchase, or the fan blades break off. I don't really know anything about the card I recommended for you, but 450's do not run nearly as hot as 460's, so the cooler shouldn't be as problematic.
I would prefer something more objective than simply throwing around percentages. The only reason I talked about 4850 being 50% of the 460 is because it literally is that exact amount on benchmarks (about 21fps vs 39fps in Crysis warhead at a reputable site). I think I may have mispoke (i think I meant 460 is `100% better not 50%) but a 20% instead is not that big when you saying 40 frames to 48 frames, and secondly i think thats a bit overstated from what Ive read.
A lot of the reviews were also about DOAs, as someone above said, that doesnt really mean much for the quality. That could be a criticism of UPS if anything (a recent Popular Mechanics article actually said while on average they are the 'softest' they also have the most abrupt g-force changes).
However maybe the 450 is worthwhile, I'll do some research into that. I read that SC2 is optimized for nVidia over Radeon so maybe nVidia cards get a little extra bonus compared to radeon cards in benchmarking. On tomshardware radeons befored much worse than comparable geforces but I think thats just a difference in quality levels rather than actually comparable nvidia vs radeons.
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So anyways:
I'm going with the this PSU, GPU, and RAM:
Antec EarthWatts Green EA-430D Green 430W Continuous power ATX12V v2.3 / EPS 12V 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC Power Supply
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371034
$44
XFX Radeon HD 4850 1GB 256-bit DDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150482
$79
And Celerity's recommended 2gb single stick vs the 2x1gb sticks I had selected earlier, for $6 less. I was under the impression I needed 2 because dual channel.
Kingston HyperX Blu 2GB 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820104216
$19
I will look into celerity's comments about the 450 because I just read something about sc2 being optimized for SC2 over radeon, meaning the $10 price increase may actually be enough of a performance boost to justify it. Also, a lot of case comments. I may set my setup on a table for now and use the $40 in savings to buy food, and buy the case later.
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EPT
