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WindWolf
Sweden11767 Posts
On April 26 2014 17:29 Incognoto wrote: By the way, keep in mind that Haswell refresh and Z97 boards are incoming soon. 5 weeks I think? That's what I'm waiting on (mostly Haswell refresh) when it comes to buying a new machine (As it currently looks, I'm gonna buy it at the end of August, but that might change) Still need to do some more research before posting here for advice on my build and such | ||
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Cyro
United Kingdom20322 Posts
On April 26 2014 18:55 Incognoto wrote: I personally think I have my sights set on the Gigabyte Z97M-DS3H. I think this should be an mATX motherboard capable of overclocking the pentium. I could be totally wrong and obviously I'll do more research before doing anything. but the siblings are currently gaming on my old rig which isn't much for a gaming rig as is. so i might be able to get them a decent birthday present and finally be able to overclock a cpu. i'm tired of going into the haswell oc thread on oc.net without being able to do it myself. To be honest, i'm a little hesitant with pentiums now on the performance segment They're missing Hyperthreading (so just 2c2t) and avx+avx2 instructions, so it'd fly for sc2, but video encoding not so much This reviewer is surprisingly competent http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/cooling/69073-noctua-nh-d15/?page=3 To get a feel for how well all of the above coolers compare, we start by running our Core i7-4770K at its default frequency and use HandBrake to encode a large 4K video clip Each cooler is configured for optimum performance as per the manufacturer's recommendations, and any fans connected to a radiator are configured to draw air in from outside the chassis (hereby ensuring that the delta between the air temperature and the temperature of the radiator is maximised). ![[image loading]](http://img.hexus.net/v2/cooling/noctua/NH-D15/graph-2.png) Impressive. It wouldn't be quite as hot as custom x264 build (i'm curious how much lower their cpu utilization was, this is a bit too cool..), but it wouldn't surprise me to gain 5c switching to it from silver arrow. That's 60c@load on i7 at ~1.225 or ~1.245vcore (depending on how it was reported) If load temps are only 60c, it's not very representative of a strong overclock, though | ||
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Incognoto
France10239 Posts
The NH-D15 does indeed look amazing.. I'm looking forward to seeing some numbers from someone doing serious overclocking. But... the price tag.. dang it. | ||
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Thalandros
Netherlands1151 Posts
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Cyro
United Kingdom20322 Posts
On April 27 2014 01:25 Thalandros wrote: Hmm. I can get a 760 for €180. I'd be upgrading from an Radeon 6950 2GB - So atleast 3 generations ahead, apparently a good investment. But would I gain more from a €260-70 GTX 770 or R9 280X? A 780 is definitely out of my pricerange unfortunately. I'll mostly be playing WildStar in the future but want to be able to play games like Watch Dogs that are coming out soon enough on atleast medium/high quality with 60FPS. I've been looking at 120Hz gaming but it's just too expensive and not possible on msot recent games without a 780 or something equivalent, is it? Starcraft might be doable, but that's it. If you're looking to max settings, you absolutely need a ton of GPU horsepower for recent games @120hz. Many games run like 3x faster on medium-level settings, though. If you're paying more than like +30% for 760 to 770, you're losing out on value (+220-230 euros vs 180 is worth it, but 260-270? nty) http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/510?vs=598 ^This is approximate for 6950 vs 760. The 670 is better than the 760 (it's the same silicon, but with 7 smx enabled instead of 6 (~116.7%) but it clocks lower out of the box so that's offset a bit, basically the same thing | ||
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Incognoto
France10239 Posts
GTX 760 for €180 sounds quite all right, in France you need at least €205 for a good model (crazy ass taxes atm). €260 for a GTX 770 / R9 280X also sounds very nice. I paid my 7970 €306 if memory serves. So both are really good deals. Not sure about how much they out-perform a 6950. If the 6950 is a equivalent of a 7950 minus a generation then I'm not sure you'd gain too much upgrading to a GTX 760. <- don't take me up on this. there are definitely gains, just not sure of how big they are. If you can afford it it might be nice making the step up to GTX 770 / 280X. They're about a notch above a GTX 760 (say 6 to 10+ more fps, depending on the game). GPUs of this caliber can run most games on ultra-max settings at 1080p. GTX 760 would be high-ultra. Difference between going AMD and Nvidia is that AMD gets you Mantle which equates to some pretty good performance gains in the games that have it (BF4, Thief are the two that come to mind off the top of my head). Nvidia has G-sync which is really great to have if your monitor supports it; yes you do need a compatible monitor for this. I think, unsure, that Nvidia has slightly better drivers at the moment. E: yeah cyro is right about pricing, my bad. i made the mistake of comparing prices between what I had back then and now. not the same thing. gtx 760 for €180 is actually, when I think about it, a pretty damn good deal lol. E: that sc2 benchmark throws me off. I guess that GPU power does matter, at least a bit, when regarding fps. i'm just unfamiliar with the 6950 maybe? | ||
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Cyro
United Kingdom20322 Posts
Afaik if you want high fps in SC2 you need a very fast processor, the game isn't really GPU bound. Yes, and it's pointless running a high refresh rate with sc2. Motion looks intermittently smoother, but motion quality and consistency of input is a massive trainwreck in blizzards RTS engine, so 200fps in sc2 is less smooth than 60fps in some other games on 120hz If you can afford it it might be nice making the step up to GTX 770 / 280X. They're about a notch above a GTX 760 (say 6 to 10+ more fps, depending on the game). If the game is running at 30fps, then 10fps is a 1.33x performance gain. If it's running at 100fps, then 10fps is a 1.1x performance gain. I see people do this a lot, but >always< quote by percentage, because "X frames per second faster" only really works when you are quoting a specific game, scene and exact graphics settings, and the framerate before was specifically known At most, you'd expect like *1.33x performance for 770 over 760. Usually closer to *1.25 though Difference between going AMD and Nvidia is that AMD gets you Mantle which equates to some pretty good performance gains in the games that have it (BF4, Thief are the two that come to mind off the top of my head). Nvidia has G-sync which is really great to have if your monitor supports it; yes you do need a compatible monitor for this. I think, unsure, that Nvidia has slightly better drivers at the moment. The biggest advantages for Nvidia are: 1; Way more CPU efficient DX drivers, they doubled performance in some situations since Mantle launch. AMD's directx drivers are in the stone age by comparison, they put all of their eggs in the Mantle basket which only works with two games, meanwhile nvidia dx driver as a whole is way closer to Mantle than to amd's DX driver 2; NVENC, easy encoding. 1080p30* gameplay live encoding with as little as less than 5% FPS hit, no adverse affects on frametimes or game interaction (every software method i tried failed here, it was just a matter of which one failed the least) and pretty good data efficiency, just not as good as x264 (particularly ~medium preset) - and by nature, no noticable load on CPU or GPU (it's a hardware encoder) 1080p120 if you wanna take faster encoding that takes twice as much bitrate E: that sc2 benchmark throws me off. I guess that GPU power does matter, at least a bit, when regarding fps. i'm just unfamiliar with the 6950 maybe? Nvidia DX drivers are way better with CPU efficiency, like said. You can lose like a significant of your FPS just for having the wrong gpu vendor in a few cpu bound games, like 750ti +4670k @4.5ghz slaughtering a 290x + 4670k@4.5ghz in sc2 max settings in a battle | ||
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Incognoto
France10239 Posts
hmm i'd gotten the feeling that AMD drivers weren't up to speed compared to nvidia's but i never thought it would be that bad. but yeah mantle isn't something I would be looking for in a GPU if it's only limited to two games. i have a 7970 and I don't play either bf4 or thief and I certainly wouldn't buy either just to say I use mantle. well, time will tell perhaps other big titles in the future might get mantle. same thing for drivers, AMD drivers might be shitty right now but hopefully in the future that will get fixed. iirc tahiti when it came out had way worse performance than what they have now due to drivers. AMD is a problem child compared to nvidia intel really. they do some really nice stuff here and there but they have lackings in "mainstream" departments it feels like. they are cost-efficient though. still, the more i know, the more i think nvidia will be the next card i'll be getting. | ||
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Thalandros
Netherlands1151 Posts
 ). I'm mostly looking towards other games (Let's pick Watch Dogs as an example right now.)My current specs would be: HIS HD Radeon 6950 2GB Intel i5 4670 (@3.4Ghz) 8 GB of 1333Mhz RAM 120GB SSD 1 TB HDD 550 Watt power supply (forgot brand) Looking at my graphics card compared to my CPU, there's a huge power gap. By the way, I'm grabbing prices from US amazon and translating 'em into €, considering I can get those with free shipping for a while (benefits of family visiting other family over there!). The 280x would cost me $310 = €224,- (or slightly higher, depending on producer) The GTX 770 would cost me $346 = €250,- and the GTX 760 would cost me $250 = €181,- Along with that I might be buying my mouse, Cyro!  I've been having trouble with the AMD drivers for the longest time aswell. In SC2 (and Dota 2 too actually) every once in a while the cursor changes to a weird corrupt cursor that you have to disable and re-enable the driver to fix (sometimes moving the mouse to the corner of the window works too.), and I might like to try Nvidia because I never have before. So I guess the question remains: Which would be the most value? Now that you've got the exact prices. Personally I don't mind spending a little more for much more power, but I'd rather save the extra money if it's not worth it/not possible. | ||
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Cyro
United Kingdom20322 Posts
I got a 4770k and 770, but it really should have been 4670k and 760 i feel now after a year hmm i'd gotten the feeling that AMD drivers weren't up to speed compared to nvidia's but i never thought it would be that bad. Yea it's quite big in some cases, they were already a bit faster than AMD DX in Star Swarm, but they almost doubled performance in two driver releases (which included like ~40% fps boosts for battlefield 3, for example) while there was no change from the red guys. They either need to bring their DX drivers somewhere close to Nvidia's level or get Mantle out to a lot of the cpu bound games that need it (think planetside 2, mmo's, rts - civilization is a start, but it's ONE game), preferably both | ||
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Thalandros
Netherlands1151 Posts
On April 27 2014 03:41 Cyro wrote: Out of those, i'd prefer the 760 - but mainly because it's a little better performance/dollar, and it's less comfortable for upgradability in the future if you have a card that's stronger and more expensive than midrange, but it's also harder to hang on, because it's not anywhere remotely close to as fast as the top cards today (780ti is basically as good as sli770) I got a 4770k and 770, but it really should have been 4670k and 760 i feel now after a year Yea it's quite big in some cases, they were already a bit faster than AMD DX in Star Swarm, but they almost doubled performance in two driver releases (which included like ~40% fps boosts for battlefield 3, for example) while there was no change from the red guys. They either need to bring their DX drivers somewhere close to Nvidia's level or get Mantle out to a lot of the cpu bound games that need it (think planetside 2, mmo's, rts - civilization is a start, but it's ONE game), preferably both Is there any other you can recommend? Considering you said ''out of those''. Could've been indicating the pricerange though. | ||
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Cyro
United Kingdom20322 Posts
On April 27 2014 04:01 Thalandros wrote: Is there any other you can recommend? Considering you said ''out of those''. Could've been indicating the pricerange though. You're stuck in that price range unless you wanted to get a 750ti for laughs or a 290. r9 280 is good if you want cheaper AMD, performance difference is quite small (waaay smaller than 760 vs 770, maybe 1/3'rd of the gap) | ||
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Thalandros
Netherlands1151 Posts
Out of the GTX 760's http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias=aps&field-keywords=GTX 760 Which is the best? I figured one of the first two, but which is the best for the money? Never really know the difference except it looks like a lot of shiny marketing. | ||
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Cyro
United Kingdom20322 Posts
R9 290's are super overpriced in the US, wonder why... ^^ 290 and 780, if all parts are OC'd, perform like 1.4x or even higher compared to 770. If 770 is $330, then $430 is way better perf/dollar on a 290 290's were hitting 750 dollars, that was overpriced. 430 is not All of the 760's, basically (assume gk104 gpu's are volt locked @1.212v unless there is an exception) are the same, they're not hard to cool either (with good airflow, 20c room and an aftermarket cooler at half fan, you can be peaking like 55-60c at max overclock..) so honestly, whichever sounds the least annoying windforce cooler is good til >60% fan, then it whirrs loudly, annoying sound profile. That's only useful on gtx780/780ti, though - or maybe multiple cards in SLI 1:00 to 1:30 for example, this noise doesn't seem to be just from fans spinning up, because it doesn't really start at all until ~60% fan, then suddenly gets quite bad by 65-70% fan | ||
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Thalandros
Netherlands1151 Posts
Also, should I expect to want to overclock (is it often worth the extra power it gives) and buy a decent fan with it? | ||
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Cyro
United Kingdom20322 Posts
most other gpu's you can get significant (think 10-20%+) gains | ||
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Craton
United States17274 Posts
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Blisse
Canada3710 Posts
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Cyro
United Kingdom20322 Posts
On April 27 2014 07:34 Craton wrote: By aftermarket cooling are you referring the non-reference designs (as opposed to replacing the gpu cooling yourself)? Yea | ||
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killerdog
Denmark6522 Posts
I've done part upgrades/helped friends builds computers before, but haven't followed hardware at all in the last few years, so I'm kind of at a loss as to what the current prices/expected performances are. I've just been using an alienware m15x laptop for everything, but it's nearing on 4 years and is a little bit dated/unstable :p I use my computer a ton, for both work and games etc, (like 5+ hours on a typical day, generally more.) So I'm willing to dump a fair bit of money on something that'll run well, and preferably last for at least a few years (which decent upgrade options for when it eventually falls off.) Anyway, here's the q/a + Show Spoiler + What is your budget? Flexible, I have no idea what a decent rig costs these days, but I'd be willing to drop the equivalent of roughly 1-1.5k usd on it, maybe up to 2k if there's a noticeable improvement, but obviously the cheaper the better. Could potentially go higher then that if really needed, but that shouldn't really be needed (should it?) What is your monitor's native resolution? always used 1920x1080 What games do you intend to play on this computer? What settings? Mostly play sc2/cs:go/LoL, for games like these I've always just played on low graphics, and don't really "need" to play them on higher. Sometimes I'll spend a while going through some single player/casual co-op game I'll find on steam, and in those cases it would be really nice to be able to ramp up the graphics. Examples, the new tomb raider, assassins creed black flag, etc Where it would be really nice to be able to just play on high/max. Dunno what the estimated costs for that is though. But the majority is spent in "competitive" multiplayer games, again like dota2/lol/sc2/csgo What do you intend to use the computer for besides gaming? Mostly just browsing/watching streams/document editing (Mostly pdf's in LaTex) although I'm considering starting some extra programming courses next year, so that would be some compiling, (or whatever part of programming is the most resource intensive, nothing industrial scale though.) I'd also like to be able to stream at decent quality, both to record the inhouses we do on the lol subforum, and also just for random use. My internet is good (fiber, 50/50 at it's worst) so a build which would let me stream at 720p/1080p easily with good fps would be really nice. I've messed around with streaming on my current (very old) laptop, but it doesn't have the power to do anything at decent resolution/fps. I also have a fair few movies/tv shows which I've had to keep on an external 1TB drive, because my laptop drive is full. 500GB drive full of stuff + another 400-500GB on the external, so it would be nice to have a large drive, I tend to use up a lot of space. (Although an ssd for sick loading times would be great, again not sure of cost though.) Do you intend to overclock? Preferably not~ Unless it's really needed/big savings to be made. Do you intend to do SLI / Crossfire? Dunno, again no specific desire to. Do you need an operating system? Yes, Do you need a monitor or any other peripherals and is this part of your budget? Have a mouse and headset but that's about it. Would need speakers/monitor, and maybe a keyboard. (Although some cheap-ass keyboard is fine, I've been using a laptop keyboard for 4 years :p) If you have any requirements or brand preferences, please specify. Prefer intel/nvidia, but again, haven't followed things in ~2 years so no idea if there have been any changes in which are "best." What country will you be buying your parts in? I live in Denmark, so that would be easiest, but if it's easier/cheaper, I can easily buy in england through my dad, and he can bring them over. If you have any retailer preferences, please specify. No idea, nice/reliable warranty would be nice if possible, I tend to break things :p Any mail order sites for denmark or england would be perfect. Also, I'm not at all against buying a premade build from somewhere, as opposed to building myself. If it's only slightly more expensive then that would just be an easier route. (also more reliable warranties that way?) But if there are big-ish savings/optimisations from building I'm fine doing that too. I'm looking at building/buying probably this spring/summer if possible (unless there's some new generation coming out soon which will slash prices.) Thanks in advance for any help ^^ | ||
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