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[Arsin]

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=6052729&CatId=4432

$249 after rebate via TigerDirect.

Oh wow, I am just blown away at how cheep these are going for. I hope they stay in stock long enough for me to buy one. First of the month can't come fast enough :lol. How do you guys feel about the 1090T? Would I be better off spending $50 more for an i7? I have mostly gaming in mind.

 

[drhankmccoyphd]

the 1090T is even cheaper with Bing Cash Back. Got mine for right around $213.

 

[Jokey665]

Ooooookay I think I have something put together finally, I'd like some input:

cpu
http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0334812
$200

gpu
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102868
$175

ram
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231277
$110

case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129021
$100

psu
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139006
$110 ($90 after rebate)

mobo
http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0331614
$155

total: $850 ($830 after psu rebate)


how does all this stuff look? am i missing anything?

 

[The Lamonster]

Hey guys, I'm having some serious PC issues and getting pretty desperate. Please check out my thread if you are tech savvy.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?p=20988748#post20988748

 

[Minsc]

If you can find a 4890 that would be a much better solution.

Naw, for StarCraft 2 a 5770 will max it, and the 5770s run cooler, quieter and use less energy at load and idle, so are cheaper to run.

 

[Odious Tea]

Naw, for StarCraft 2 a 5770 will max it, and the 5770s run cooler, quieter and use less energy at load and idle, so are cheaper to run.

Agreed. A 5770 is one hell of a card for the price.

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Naw, for StarCraft 2 a 5770 will max it, and the 5770s run cooler, quieter and use less energy at load and idle, so are cheaper to run.

If you can find a 4890 for a comparable price, I don't see why you it would be a better idea to go for a 5770. I thought the 5770 was just a refined 4870 1GB with DX11 support, but apparently it doesn't quite match the performance. Considering the 4890 is a much better card than the 4870, it just wouldn't make sense to get a 5770 over it. With that said, the 5770 is more than enough for something like Starcraft 2 and is a nice card for the price.

 

[FlyinJ]

Easy:

MB: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128435&Tpk=890gx gigabyte

CPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103851

RAM: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227495

Thats under the budget.

If you're looking to include the OS and PSU in that budget you might struggle a bit though. If thats the case go for this processor instead: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...03704&cm_re=amd_x4_630-_-19-103-704-_-Product

or even this one:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...103652&cm_re=phenom_x3-_-19-103-652-_-Product

What kind of PSU would I need for each of those processors? I'd also be running a GeForce 9800 GT in the box as well.

I -think- I have a 550 watt PSU. It may be 650

And what are the differences between those last two you posted? They are the same price, but one seems to be a quad core and one a 3 core?

Finally, will those last two work with the MB you recommended?

 

[Minsc]

If you can find a 4890 for a comparable price, I don't see why you it would be a better idea to go for a 5770. I thought the 5770 was just a refined 4870 1GB with DX11 support, but apparently it doesn't quite match the performance. Considering the 4890 is a much better card than the 4870, it just wouldn't make sense to get a 5770 over it. With that said, the 5770 is more than enough for something like Starcraft 2 and is a nice card for the price.

Here's a review of the non-gaming benches, it runs 10dB quieter at load, it runs 10C cooler, and uses about 100 less watts at load and 50 less watts at idle (which amounts to an additional ~$66/year @ 15¢/kWh 24/7 idling, more if you factor in gaming time, where the additional cost per hour doubles). In fact, it uses the least amount of watts of any GPU card in those benches at idle.

A 4890 is a ~30% faster card, and worth considering, but it does come at a slight efficiency cost in comparison to the 5770. If the main/only reason for the GPU purchase is StarCraft 2, a 5770 won't disappoint, and more would likely be overkill.

 

[GHG]

What kind of PSU would I need for each of those processors? I'd also be running a GeForce 9800 GT in the box as well.

I -think- I have a 550 watt PSU. It may be 650

And what are the differences between those last two you posted? They are the same price, but one seems to be a quad core and one a 3 core?

Finally, will those last two work with the MB you recommended?

Yes they both work with the recommended MB. They are all AM3 socket.

The difference is the L3 cache. Basically if your looking to game primarily the L3 cache will help a great deal, making the Phenom x3 a better choice. If you want a system where you want to do tons of multitasking them the Athlon x4 is better. See benchmarks here ---> http://www.anandtech.com/show/2836/8 . The x4 draws less power as well though but its not really significant.

You also have the potential to unlock the 4th core on the x3 as well which would give you a processor which would blow away the x4 athlon. But it depends on if your into that type of thing and overclocking. Note: it would be a breeze paired with that motherboard though. Basically, I'd recommend going for the X3 if you don't want to go for the new x6 (primary recommendation) unless power draw is a huge issue for you.

Oh and as long as your 550/650 watt PSU is a brand name then you should be fine. But you may want to check that here 1st. If its old (say 5-6 years old) you may want to invest in a new one as they lose power as they get older and last thing you'd want is to fry your new system because of a PSU failure.

 

[Smokey]

Just got notification from newegg...they have the EVGA GTX 480's in stock. So if interested you might wanna hurry!

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130552

 

[Lkr]

aww man, the i7 still outperforms the X6s
Do X6s work in a 785G mobo?

 

[ghst]

Agreed. A 5770 is one hell of a card for the price.

it really isn't. 4890's could be found over here for £130 nearly a full year ago, and there really is no comparison between those two cards. i stand by that card as the concorde moment for performance/value in graphics accelerators. more so that the 9700pro/8800gt even.

there really isn't a mid/upper range killer value card out there right now, and there won't be until we're seeing 5850's/470's for true midrange prices (£150).

 

[I NEED SCISSORS]

Here's a review of the non-gaming benches, it runs 10dB quieter at load, it runs 10C cooler, and uses about 100 less watts at load and 50 less watts at idle (which amounts to an additional ~$66/year @ 15¢/kWh 24/7 idling, more if you factor in gaming time, where the additional cost per hour doubles). In fact, it uses the least amount of watts of any GPU card in those benches at idle.

A 4890 is a ~30% faster card, and worth considering, but it does come at a slight efficiency cost in comparison to the 5770. If the main/only reason for the GPU purchase is StarCraft 2, a 5770 won't disappoint, and more would likely be overkill.

Slap a $20 aftermarket cooler onto the 4890, which can be recycled for future cards, and suddenly it looks better than the 5770. I have a 4890 and it's godly, haven't had a single problem.

 

[Deus Ex Machina]

Newegg has the Phenom II X6 in stock for $210. Have there been any tests/benchmarks on it? I'm still a few months away from buying my PC and I was going to go with an i5, but if the X6 is better than I would go that route.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PODxo0ZxIJk

Here's a little video review I found.

 

[tabsina]

So i'm thinking about getting this one for $499 AUD (1.4ghz isn't a concern, since it'll just be a lightweight university computer)
http://wireless1.com.au/ProductListing.aspx?Code=ACEAS3810T-354G25N

does anyone know if there is a way to implement middle mouse click functionality on an acer laptop? this supports multitouch and all that, but I feel as though a lack of a middle button, or equivalent functionality would be an absolute deal breaker for me

so yeh, any acer 3rd party middleclick capable touchpads out there?

 

[Lkr]

ok so I didn't realize that the only intel cpus beating the X6's at stock were the 980x and 975, which are $700 more. I think I'll get a 1090T since it can be easily pushed to 4.2GHz and a 5770 soon. Do X6s work on 785G chipsets?
this thing also needs a benchmark with a CPU intensive game like GTA IV

 

[Flynn]

Cooler Master Elite 335 Black ATX Mid Tower Case 4X5.25 1X3.25 6X3.25INT Front USB Audio No PSU
In Stock 33030 $42.96 $42.96

NCIX Gaming Bundle Deal AMD Phenom II X4 965 3.4GHZ Quad Core & ASUS M4A78T-E DDR3 790GX Motherboard
This product can only be exchanged or replaced with the exact same item.
In Stock 42468 $350.77 $350.77
1 x ASUS M4A78T-E ATX 790GX Socket AM3 DDR3 2PCI-E16 2PCI-E1 2PCI HDMI Video Sound GBLAN Motherboard
1 x AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition Quad Core Processor AM3 3.4GHZ 8MB Cache 125W 45NM Retail Box

Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 1TB SATA2 3.5IN 8.5MS 7200RPM 32MB Hard Drive OEM *3YR MFR Warranty*
In Stock 37232 $78.04 $156.08

Corsair XMS3 Dominator 4GB DDR3 2X2GB DDR3-1600 CL 8-8-8-24 Bemp Dual Channel Memory Kit
In Stock 42535 $151.21 $151.21

Falcon Dust-Off Disposable Aerosol Computer Duster W/ Bitterant 17OZ 1 Pack
In Stock 51871 $4.87 $4.87

Samsung SH-S223L/BEBS 22X SATA Black DVD Writer Lightscribe OEM
In Stock 42349 $25.36 $25.36

AuzenTech X-PLOSION Cinema 7.1 Sound Card DTS Connect Dolby Digital Live Sound Card PCI 32BIT
In Stock 29233 $99.99 $99.99

G.SKILL F3-12800CL9D-4GBRL Ripjaws PC3-12800 4GB 2X2GB DDR3-1600 CL9-9-9-24 Core i5 1.5V Memory Kit
In Stock 42745 $116.09 $116.09

Antec Earthwatts 650W Power Supply ATX12V V2.2 EPS12V Active PFC 80PLUS 120MM Fan

Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium Edition 64BIT DVD OEM

This is what I'm looking at from NCIXUS. Gonna get them to build it for me and set up the drives in a RAID (will they do that?)

The price is right around $1100 right now. Any suggestions? Am I forgetting something? Will all this shit work together?

 

[Dipper145]

Well a 5770 doesn't max starcraft 2, at least not as far as I have seen. I'm not positive if a 4890 will max it either, but it will be better. Maybe people have different definitions of max, and set the goal at different frame rates.

Am I forgetting something?

Maybe I'm blind, but a video card?

 

[brain_stew]

What kind of PSU would I need for each of those processors? I'd also be running a GeForce 9800 GT in the box as well.

I -think- I have a 550 watt PSU. It may be 650

And what are the differences between those last two you posted? They are the same price, but one seems to be a quad core and one a 3 core?

Finally, will those last two work with the MB you recommended?

If you have to make budget cuts get a 770 DDR3 AM3 motherboard instead, don't ditch the processor. Those wattage figures are more than fine but they don't really tell you a great deal, what brand is the PSU?

 

[brain_stew]

You know it always makes sense to read at least the last few pages before posting. ;0

The 965 is terrible value now and it was never a good deal. You want a x6 Phenom now.

Unless you have a specific need for it and/or have high end speakers then the sound card is kinda unnecessary these days for most people.

You don't want a 790gx motherboard, they're old stock, get a 890GX board instead.

Am I blind or do you not have a GPU listed? A 5850 would be the sort of thing to look at.

Are we talking about a RAID-0 setup here? Can't say I'd recommend it (at all). If you want a fast OS drive then get a SSD, don't bother with RAIDing mehanical drives.


I'd change the drives to Samsung F3s as well.

 

[Flynn]

Well a 5770 doesn't max starcraft 2, at least not as far as I have seen. I'm not positive if a 4890 will max it either, but it will be better. Maybe people have different definitions of max, and set the goal at different frame rates.


Maybe I'm blind, but a video card?

Crap. I think I did miss that. Any suggestions?

 

[Pachinko]

So almost 4 months ago now I used this thread to assist with the building of a new gaming pc for myself. Things were grand for a good while but then my saphire 5850 up and totally died. I ended up RMA'ing it through NCIX.

The process went well and eventually resulted in me getting my money back(replacements were out of stock). So now I'm in need of a new vidya card , currently I'm using my old PC's 8800 gt but I'd like to get back on the ATI bandwagon and perhaps grab a 5870 but there are like 5 different brands to buy from and now I'm hesitant to buy another saphire as I had issues with a card of theirs a couple years back too.

I've been attempting to look elsewhere online and it seems the hardcore out there recommend XFX because they have a double lifetime warrenty.

Anyway help would be appreciated. In in Canada too if that makes any difference (it might both for price and warrenty).

Thanks to anyone who helps me out.

 

[·feist·]

Microcenter has another "buy an AMD & get a mobo free" deal. I think they were giving away free MSI uATX mobos last time, with the option of switching to a full ATX for $10. I didn't bother to check which brand it is this time. I doubt the board is particularly amazing, but it should be fine for those on a very tight budget, or building a system for a basic PC user.


Also, they're giving $50 off on CPU/motherboard combos for anyone purchasing a hexa-core X6 chip.

For some people, this could turn out to be a better deal than waiting for the $50 TigerDirect mail in rebate.


http://www.microcenter.com/specials/promotions/0427.AMDbundle.html
http://www.microcenter.com/storefronts/amd/indexX6.html

 

[·feist·]

Man, I've been waiting for a price drop on a 2TB drive for months, and when it finally happens I have no cash :lol

Sadly, I JUST missed out on it myself even though I posted it (and I'm in dire need of storage). Now I get to pay full price knowingly having just missed out on a $30 sale...

 

[dejan]

it really isn't. 4890's could be found over here for £130 nearly a full year ago, and there really is no comparison between those two cards. i stand by that card as the concorde moment for performance/value in graphics accelerators. more so that the 9700pro/8800gt even.

there really isn't a mid/upper range killer value card out there right now, and there won't be until we're seeing 5850's/470's for true midrange prices (£150).

If you're going with a 4890 be sure to get one with a custom cooling solution (e.g. Sapphire's Vapor-X cards), because a stock 4890 is almost as noisy under load as a GTX 480.

 

[Minsc]

Well a 5770 doesn't max starcraft 2, at least not as far as I have seen. I'm not positive if a 4890 will max it either, but it will be better. Maybe people have different definitions of max, and set the goal at different frame rates.

The game is heavily limited by it's use of just 2 CPU cores too, I wouldn't claim anything as inadequate based on demo performance. Not too long along people were reporting their framerates dropping to 15fps for no reason at all. Have any benches?

There's a whole can of worms with that engine, you can prove the engine to be CPU limited, turn off a GPU feature and get like a 400%+ framerate boost.

I have a 5870, and I can see framerates of under 60fps without even trying, Blizzard's got some work to do, I simply don't believe it's all working properly yet.

 

[Mr_Brit]

Guys how can you check how many CPU cores a program is using?

Task manager and the resource monitor both have cpu charts for individual cores. You can just run the game and after opening one of them, set the update frequency a little slower so they show cpu usage over 10 minutes instead of like 1 minute, and run your game, then alt+tab out (or just run the game in a window while keep the column of CPU cores from the monitor visible).

Cheers for that.

 

[Minsc]

Guys how can you check how many CPU cores a program is using?

Task manager and the resource monitor both have cpu charts for individual cores. You can just run the game and after opening one of them, set the update frequency a little slower so they show cpu usage over 10 minutes instead of like 1 minute, and run your game, then alt+tab out (or just run the game in a window while keep the column of CPU cores from the monitor visible).

 

[José Mourinho]

I'm looking to upgrade from a 4850 to 5850 or 5870. I only have an Corsair HX450W PSU. I know ATI recommend a 500W but do you guys think the 450W would be okay? I don't really want to have to get a new one. Supposedly the my HX450 is rated at 33A on its single +12V rail... Is this good? I don't know a great deal about this stuff.

Edit: Need specs to help answer the question I assume...

CPU
AMD Penom II X4 965 3.4GHz Black Edition
Mobo
Asus M4A785D-M PRO
Memory
4.0GB Corsair Dual-Channel DDR2
GPU
SAPPHIRE ATI Radeon HD 4850 1GB GDDR3 PCI-E HDMI
HDD
500GB Seagate
PSU
HX450W Corsair Profesional Series.
OS
MS Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

 

[Minsc]

Well a 5770 doesn't max starcraft 2, at least not as far as I have seen. I'm not positive if a 4890 will max it either, but it will be better. Maybe people have different definitions of max, and set the goal at different frame rates.


Maybe I'm blind, but a video card?

Found some benches!

Keep in mind they're 2 months old, so performance is a little outdated, and I'm willing to bet beta > full version + expansions /w patches will see performance optimizations.

Anyway, here they are:

As you can see a 5770 clears 60fps maxed, the game's optimized for 2 cores, and is heavily reliant on CPU speed.

Although we do see a nice 25% performance increase when going from 2 to 4 cores in StarCraft II with the Core i7 processor at 2.70GHz, the game does only appear to be dual-core optimized when looking at the Windows Task Manager CPU utilization data.

That said, we saw just a 9% increase for the average frame rate when going from a single core (with HT) to a dual-core configuration with Hyper-Threading. While the average frame rate only increased by 9%, the minimum frame rate was boosted by 43%, and an increase of just 20% was seen when going from a dual-core to a quad-core configuration.

With 8 threads (4 cores) enabled, half the threads are seen to be doing absolutely nothing, these are the threads enabled by Hyper-Threading. However if you were to think that Hyper-Threading does nothing for StarCraft II you would be wrong. The single core data with Hyper-Threading enabled shows the second thread to be working almost as hard as the first, with a total CPU utilization level of over 85%. The problem with Hyper-Threading enabled on four dedicated cores is that there is nothing left for it to do.

With 4 threads enabled the CPU utilization drops to around 30% and here we see just the first thread working hard. The Hyper-Threading enabled threads are doing very little work, while only about 10-20% of the second core is being used. With 8 threads enabled the data is much the same, though because there are 4 threads doing nothing the utilization drops below 20%.

For the sake of finding out we disabled Hyper-Threading with just a single 2.70GHz core enabled. The CPU utilization was locked at 100% the entire time and this is why we see spikes in the minimum frame rate when using less cores or threads. As it stands StarCraft II appears only to be dual-core optimized, no surprises there really.

I've also found this chart:

Showing the engine's flaws, as a GTX 275 & GTX 260 should never score the same framerate.

Then there's this benchmark of course (how could I forget):

Showing the game hardly getting over 30fps on a 5870 w/ i5 860. The game's all kinds of wack if you ask me.

Edit: I missed the icing on the cake!

The 5770 is beating the 4890

 

[pix]

Hey guys,

Looking for some advice on a new Mobo+CPU combo. I have the current setup.

AMD Athlon X2 6400+ 3.2 Ghz
Asus M2N SLI Motherboard
nVidia GeForce 260 Black Edition 896MB

My graphics card is fine for what I use it for but I want to upgrade my mobo+cpu to a quad core and was looking for some advice. Intel or AMD is fine but a nice combo for under $300 would be great. Obviously I use my PC for gaming.

 

[pix]

After some searching I came across this deal on Newegg.ca

ASUS M4A89GTD PRO/USB3 AM3 AMD 890GX SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 HDMI ATX AMD Motherboard

AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition Deneb 3.2GHz Socket AM3 125W Quad-Core Processor Model HDZ955FBGIBOX


http://www.newegg.ca/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.376853


Any thoughts?

 

[brain_stew]

After some searching I came across this deal on Newegg.ca

ASUS M4A89GTD PRO/USB3 AM3 AMD 890GX SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 HDMI ATX AMD Motherboard

AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition Deneb 3.2GHz Socket AM3 125W Quad-Core Processor Model HDZ955FBGIBOX


http://www.newegg.ca/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.376853


Any thoughts?

Phenom X4s are all a crappy deal now (bar maybe the 925), and you're missing the fact that you're going to need DDR3 RAM.

Have a look at your motherboard manufacturer's website and see what CPUs it supports, it may support some quads. If not for $300 this is the best you can do:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131649&cm_re=880g-_-13-131-649-_-Product

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...103851&cm_re=phenom_x6-_-19-103-851-_-Product

But you'll need to stump up an extra $100 for some DDR3 RAM.

 

[pix]

Hmm yeah the DDR3 thing is true, didnt think of that. I was just thinking the X4 would be faster because it clocks at 3.4 GHZ rather than 2.8 GHZ. Not sure how to compare cores & speeds.

Could you recommend some good DDR3 RAM?

Also for $5 more I can get USB3 compatibility.

http://www.newegg.ca/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.382876

 

[Jokey665]

Quick question about a part.

http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0331614

Under 'Power Connectors' it says "24-pin ATX Power Connector, 8-pin EPS12V Power Connector"

I know what the 24-pin ATX is, but what's the other one? Will this PSU work with it?

 

[·feist·]

Quick question about a part.

http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0331614

Under 'Power Connectors' it says "24-pin ATX Power Connector, 8-pin EPS12V Power Connector"

I know what the 24-pin ATX is, but what's the other one? Will this PSU work with it?

It's the CPU connector:

It plugs into a part of that motherboard (to the left of the CPU) that looks like this:

That Corsair you posted has a 4/8-pin EPS12V cable so you're covered.

 

[Deus Ex Machina]

ok so I didn't realize that the only intel cpus beating the X6's at stock were the 980x and 975, which are $700 more. I think I'll get a 1090T since it can be easily pushed to 4.2GHz and a 5770 soon. Do X6s work on 785G chipsets?
this thing also needs a benchmark with a CPU intensive game like GTA IV

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

X6 1090T beats i7 975

 

[brain_stew]

Hmm yeah the DDR3 thing is true, didnt think of that. I was just thinking the X4 would be faster because it clocks at 3.4 GHZ rather than 2.8 GHZ. Not sure how to compare cores & speeds.

Could you recommend some good DDR3 RAM?

Also for $5 more I can get USB3 compatibility.

http://www.newegg.ca/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.382876

The X6 actually clocks to 3.3ghz when using three cores or less.

 

[Minsc]

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

X6 1090T beats i7 975

X6 is 4Ghz (overclocked) 6 core vs 975 (stock) is 3.2 ghz 4 core in those graphs. Why the X6 overclock but not the 975 one?

For gaming, a i5 750 will beat a X6 1090T more than it loses right now, maybe that will change in three years, maybe they'll be more like 50/50. Even a Phenom II 965 beats a X6 from time to time in benches with games.

 

[Dipper145]

boatload of SC2 benchmarks

Well don't I feel silly.. hahaha oops.

I was just going off my own experience with my 5770. I do love my 5770 though, and I definitely recommend it.

Crap. I think I did miss that. Any suggestions?

Depending on what you want to play at what resolutions and what settings. I'd go for either a 5770 or 4890 on the cheaper end or a 5850 if you want to spend some more.

 

[Draft]

X6 is 4Ghz (overclocked) 6 core vs 975 (stock) is 3.2 ghz 4 core in those graphs. Why the X6 overclock but not the 975 one?

For gaming, a i5 750 will beat a X6 1090T more than it loses right now, maybe that will change in three years, maybe they'll be more like 50/50. Even a Phenom II 965 beats a X6 from time to time in benches with games.

Yeah.

It's good that AMD's not totally smoked and that the chips are at least price competitive (which is not a little thing.) But I think a few of you are too full of Kool Aid and looking for a victory that's just not happening. Intel remains king.

 

[brain_stew]

X6 is 4Ghz (overclocked) 6 core vs 975 (stock) is 3.2 ghz 4 core in those graphs. Why the X6 overclock but not the 975 one?

For gaming, a i5 750 will beat a X6 1090T more than it loses right now, maybe that will change in three years, maybe they'll be more like 50/50. Even a Phenom II 965 beats a X6 from time to time in benches with games.

At $300 I say Intel has the best offering for gamers with the i7 930 but personally I'd just go ahead and save the $100 and pick up the 1055T. Giving up a little performance now (which you won't really notice) for better performance later on and better upgrade options is a pretty decent trade off when you're pocketing an extra $100.

 

[Minsc]

Well don't I feel silly.. hahaha oops.

I was just going off my own experience with my 5770. I do love my 5770 though, and I definitely recommend it.

I actually thought you had me, when you said that, thank god for those benches! They saved me :lol

I think the best way to get SC2 @ 60 fps, is simply to use a build from 2011. The game just needs more optimizations than the beta currently has, it's more CPU dependent than GPU, yet by some freaking stroke of genius it only uses 2 cores, and it lacks any AA options, just to piss us all off.

Spoiler

That's getting to me, it's 2010 Blizzard!

Sure, you get better framerates with a 5870 or GTX 285, but at what cost? Both those cards still hit the 30s in large battles, and to get higher framerates with those cards you need a fast CPU over 3GHz.

I've given up saying you need a high-end GPU card for SC2 maxed, because in reality you just need a build that doesn't exist. So for now, I am just going to believe you need merely around a 5770 to run it max, as the benchmark proves above, and hope down the road things are even brighter.

 

[Minsc]

At $300 I say Intel has the best offering for gamers with the i7 930 but personally I'd just go ahead and save the $100 and pick up the 1055T. Giving up a little performance now (which you won't really notice) for better performance later on and better upgrade options is a pretty decent trade off when you're pocketing an extra $100.

A $100 savings in CPU moved to GPU will net far more than the difference between the i7 and X6s. Even in the games where the framerates favor the i5/7s by a decent margin (over 10%), it's still likely nothing compared to the framerate advantage of another $100 in a GPU. So I agree, I'm curious to see what CPU May's Tech Report system guide uses in their mid-range system. Consider they were just using a $200 CPU before, the only reason I see them changing it is if they feel the future performance or higher non-gaming performance is worthwhile over the i5 750, which it probably is I think. So I'd be surprised if they didn't switch it.

If intel wants to strike back, they need to give us the 6-core budget i7 970 (Q3 I think) at around $300 too, that'd put a huge damper on the X6 potential advantage down the road, and probably be worth the extra money.

Yeah.

It's good that AMD's not totally smoked and that the chips are at least price competitive (which is not a little thing.) But I think a few of you are too full of Kool Aid and looking for a victory that's just not happening. Intel remains king.

Disregarding prices, Ghz to Ghz, for gaming I see:
i7s ~> i5s >= X6s > X4s

For non-gaming, it's more like:
i7 980X > 8-threaded i5/7s ~= X6s > 4-threaded i5s > X4s

Price as a factor:
X6 >= All.

There certainly are benchmarks that can put the X6 above a i5, but there's more benchmarks putting the i5 over the X6.

 

[wwm0nkey]

Just ordered my GTX 470, cant wait for it too come in.

 

[brain_stew]

I'd love a $300 6 core i7 as much as the next guy but its not going to happen. The 970 will probably be more in the ~$600 range and its performance will make that pricepoint more than justifiable.

 

[longdi]

We really need more competition for the cpus. i7 930 was to be a direct replacement for 920 but now Intel has slowly raised it by $15 more since releasing it! :lol
Good news is Intel 80GB SSD has a small price revision, can get at amazon for $218 with 2 day shipping!

 

[diztrukted]

So I finished building my system a couple of days...here are some pics

This is my first build, so excuse the crappy cable management. I know it sucks, I'm in the middle of organizing it because my temps seem to be a bit off (somewhere in the 90's).

I have been running into some issues though when installing the OS. Basically, I started it up last night with the OEM version of W7 in the CD ROM drive- I go straight into the BIOS to put in the proper settings and under the BOOT tab it'll say BOOT PRIORITY or HDD BOOT PRIORITY (something close to that) in that menu and I configured it so it looks into the CD-ROM drive first, SSD second, and the third HDD is disabled. Then there's a another menu, I can't recall the actual name of it but I remember that it asks you to list the HDD/CD-ROM DRIVE/SSD's in order. I basically put that in the same order as the menu I mentioned before.

After all the settings have been changed I boot up and it says No Hard Disk Drive found, please insert BOOT MEDIA and press any key (I don't remember the exact wording). So basically it can't find the CD-ROM drive to boot from, but it's clearly listed, along with my other drives, in the BIOS.

My intention is to install the OS on the SSD and have my computer boot from it after it's installed, if that makes a difference.

 

[Minsc]

So I finished building my system a couple of days...here are some picsI have been running into some issues though when installing the OS. Basically, I started it up last night with the OEM version of W7 in the CD ROM drive- I go straight into the BIOS to put in the proper settings and under the BOOT tab it'll say BOOT PRIORITY or HDD BOOT PRIORITY (something close to that) in that menu and I configured it so it looks into the CD-ROM drive first, SSD second, and the third HDD is disabled. Then there's a another menu, I can't recall the actual name of it but I remember that it asks you to list the HDD/CD-ROM DRIVE/SSD's in order. I basically put that in the same order as the menu I mentioned before.

After all the settings have been changed I boot up and it says No Hard Disk Drive found, please insert BOOT MEDIA and press any key (I don't remember the exact wording). So basically it can't find the CD-ROM drive to boot from, but it's clearly listed, along with my other drives, in the BIOS.

My intention is to install the OS on the SSD and have my computer boot from it after it's installed, if that makes a difference.

Sounds like there's a problem with the DVD drive? You have it first, so there should be no confusion from the motherboard, I have no idea. It's probably a good idea to post on the forums of the manufacturer of your motherboard (and list the model of it) so people familiar with that particular BIOS/board can tell you what you need to do.