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"I need a new PC!" 2010 Edition

Druz said:
LEDs, the Samsung xl2370 for example, make the screen really bright. Whites are really really white. Looks nice. For gaming, you want a TN panel anyway. I don't miss my old IPS panel one bit.
TN gives you fast refresh but shitty color.
 
Hitokage said:
TN gives you fast refresh but shitty color.

2ms response times yep. 60hz is shared by all of them except the new 120hz. Shitty color? You're going to look at the pictures I just posted and say it has shitty color?

You're not designing an image you're playing games. It won't have the massive range of color a panel twice as expensive will, but you aren't going to notice. Biggest problem with TNs are the viewing angle.
 
BravoSuperStar said:
No you want to do a disk cleanup on that drive, but when you launch disk clean up look for an option at the bottom called clean up system files or something like that. Run that and it should take care of it for you. It probably wont let you delete just by throwing it in the recycle bin anyway.

Ok thanks, I'll do it this way, but will disk cleanup delete anything else besides the windows.old folder? Because I cut and pasted some stuff from it into the main windows folders. I just want that gone.
 
I installed more fans and a new cpu heatsink in my PC. Finally overclocked the q9550 to 3.4.

seriously, the intel stock cooler is awful. at the stock 2.83, playing shattered horizons had the heat skyrocket (70-80c) and so far the highest has been 58 at 3.4.
 
Druz said:
2ms response times yep. 60hz is shared by all of them except the new 120hz. Shitty color? You're going to look at the pictures I just posted and say it has shitty color?

You're not designing an image you're playing games. It won't have the massive range of color a panel twice as expensive will, but you aren't going to notice. Biggest problem with TNs are the viewing angle.

I notice the difference between the colors on the TN panel at my work and the colors on the MVA panel in my home immediately. And I only run my MVA at 50% brightness, and it still seems a ton better.

To say you won't notice the difference in color between a TN and MVA is like saying you won't notice the difference in ghosting between a TN and MVA. Both statements are incorrect. Luckily, there are SPVA and IPS monitors, so you can have the best of both worlds.

I wonder how many people complain about dithering in older games, and sit behind a TN, which dithers images 100% of the time.
 
If I were to break the bank and build a new PC with all top of the line parts, what parts and price am I looking at. I plan on going for broke in a few months.
 
Agent Icebeezy said:
If I were to break the bank and build a new PC with all top of the line parts, what parts and price am I looking at. I plan on going for broke in a few months.
In a few months any parts listed now would probably be irrelevant by then.
 
So from what I understand, TN panels are the way to go for gaming.

I'll be checking out Samsung and Asus panels soon, although I really liked the LG LED.
 
Okay so I'm contemplating the idea of buying a new PC, but I only need some parts.

Would it be possible to get this for $400 or under?
-A 1GB ATI GFX card
-An i5 CPU
-A shiny new motherboard
-Case
-Windows 7 64-bit

?
 
Dogenzaka said:
Okay so I'm contemplating the idea of buying a new PC, but I only need some parts.

Would it be possible to get this for $400 or under?
-A 1GB ATI GFX card
-An i5 CPU
-A shiny new motherboard
-Case
-Windows 7 64-bit

?
no
 
twdnewh_k said:
So from what I understand, TN panels are the way to go for gaming.

I'll be checking out Samsung and Asus panels soon, although I really liked the LG LED.

Not really, a good IPS will be a lot better than a TN.
 
I'm looking at helping a friend upgrade his PC. He basically needs to replace everything he currently has, so this needs to be a complete build (except for keyboard and mouse.) The budget is $2500. He goes a long time between upgrades so he tends to spend more. This is a quick build I did on the egg. Please suggest any worthwhile changes. Thanks!

Qty. Product Description Savings Total Price
1
Antec Nine Hundred Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Retail
$99.99
1
Western Digital Caviar Black WD1002FAEX 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive
$119.99
2
SAPPHIRE 100281SR Radeon HD 5870 (Cypress XT) 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video ... - Retail
$839.98
($419.99 each)
1
CORSAIR CMPSU-850TX 850W ATX12V 2.2 / EPS12V 2.91 SLI Ready CrossFire Ready Active PFC Power Supply - Retail
$139.99
1
G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL9D-4GBRL - Retail
$104.99
1
ASUS Maximus III GENE LGA 1156 Intel P55 Micro ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail
$199.99
1
i5-750 Lynnfield 2.66GHz LGA 1156 95W Quad-Core Processor Model BX80605I5750 - Retail
$194.99
1
CORSAIR Cooling Hydro Series CWCH50-1 120mm High Performance CPU Cooler - Retail
$77.89
1
Intel X25-M Mainstream SSDSA2M160G2XXX 2.5" 160GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) - OEM
$429.99

Subtotal: $2,207.80

The remaining $300 or so would go towards a new monitor for him.
 
Resident Guru said:
I'm looking at helping a friend upgrade his PC. He basically needs to replace everything he currently has, so this needs to be a complete build (except for keyboard and mouse.) The budget is $2500. He goes a long time between upgrades so he tends to spend more. This is a quick build I did on the egg. Please suggest any worthwhile changes. Thanks!
Some of that is spending money for the sake of spending money, leaving you with puzzling things like a $2500 PC having a micro ATX motherboard in a full ATX case and having only 4gb RAM. Also, LGA1156 boards can currently only do 8x on each PCI-E slot when in SLI mode. You only get 16x on a single card.

Oh, and I've read multiple reports that motherboard can be temperamental with the kind of RAM you put into it.
 
You really need to crossfire a pair of $420 cards? For what, longevity? Won't next year's $300 card give you the same or better performance than $840 worth of video cards will buy you now?
 
Slo said:
You really need to crossfire a pair of $420 cards? For what, longevity? Won't next year's $300 card give you the same or better performance than $840 worth of video cards will buy you now?

He's not going to see any benefit unless he has a 30 inch monitor/resolution.
 
So yeah I'm going to build a HTPC for the living room (47" lcd tv). Mostly for watching movies and possibly gaming here and there (was thinking of a 5770). But yeah anyone have experience with this? I want a nice looking box/case since it will be seen a lot and I don't want any super ridiculously expensive parts (want to keep the total around $700~ CDN). Any tips/recommendations/builds would be greatly appreciated. :]
 
Resident Guru said:
I'm looking at helping a friend upgrade his PC. He basically needs to replace everything he currently has, so this needs to be a complete build (except for keyboard and mouse.) The budget is $2500. He goes a long time between upgrades so he tends to spend more. This is a quick build I did on the egg. Please suggest any worthwhile changes. Thanks!

Ask him what games he plays and what resolution they will run at (probably only 1080p if you are spending only $300 on the monitor). Look at benchmarks of the video card and see if you gain anything from having the SLI. I seriously consider buying a SSD or better monitor before a second video card.

Keep in mind Fermi is out in about 1 month, and could potentially make that $850 of video card hardware yesterday's news.
 
Septimus said:
So yeah I'm going to build a HTPC for the living room (47" lcd tv). Mostly for watching movies and possibly gaming here and there (was thinking of a 5770). But yeah anyone have experience with this? I want a nice looking box/case since it will be seen a lot and I don't want any super ridiculously expensive parts (want to keep the total around $700~ CDN). Any tips/recommendations/builds would be greatly appreciated. :]

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=366437
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=378353

Both have good information, both about components and how to set it up to maximize ease of use.
 
Minsc said:
Ask him what games he plays and what resolution they will run at (probably only 1080p if you are spending only $300 on the monitor). Look at benchmarks of the video card and see if you gain anything from having the SLI. I seriously consider buying a SSD or better monitor before a second video card.

Keep in mind Fermi is out in about 1 month, and could potentially make that $850 of video card hardware yesterday's news.

Don't count on being able to get a Fermi until May.
 
Hitokage said:
Some of that is spending money for the sake of spending money, leaving you with puzzling things like a $2500 PC having a micro ATX motherboard in a full ATX case and having only 4gb RAM. Also, LGA1156 boards can currently only do 8x on each PCI-E slot when in SLI mode. You only get 16x on a single card.

Oh, and I've read multiple reports that motherboard can be temperamental with the kind of RAM you put into it.


Well I haven't put much thought into his motherboard as of yet. As for the 8x on the PCI-E slot there is very little performance difference between two 8x lanes and two 16x lanes.

Edit:

MSI P55-GD80 LGA 1156 Intel P55 ATX Intel Motherboard

Does this seem like a better choice for the motherboard?
 
Minsc said:
Ask him what games he plays and what resolution they will run at (probably only 1080p if you are spending only $300 on the monitor). Look at benchmarks of the video card and see if you gain anything from having the SLI. I seriously consider buying a SSD or better monitor before a second video card.

Keep in mind Fermi is out in about 1 month, and could potentially make that $850 of video card hardware yesterday's news.

I did put both an 160GB X25-M G2 SSD and a 1TB WD Cavair Black. Good suggestion on going single video card and putting that in a better monitor. I think I can talk him into that. I personally have a 3007WFP-HC and will never go back to using anything smaller.
 
Minsc said:
I notice the difference between the colors on the TN panel at my work and the colors on the MVA panel in my home immediately. And I only run my MVA at 50% brightness, and it still seems a ton better.

To say you won't notice the difference in color between a TN and MVA is like saying you won't notice the difference in ghosting between a TN and MVA. Both statements are incorrect. Luckily, there are SPVA and IPS monitors, so you can have the best of both worlds.

I wonder how many people complain about dithering in older games, and sit behind a TN, which dithers images 100% of the time.

Like I said, I moved from a $700 IPS(from 5 years ) to a TN and it still looks great. Not all TNs are created equal even though they're universally crap in some areas.
 
So what would my options be for a good IPS gaming monitor?

TheExodu5 said:
I wouldn't even consider IPS for gaming. Then again, I'm sensitive to mouse and input lag.

This is the impression I was under. Basically I haven't seen a non-TN panel thats suitable for 60fps+ gaming yet.
 
Violater said:
Winks at my 2209WA

I use a 2209wa too. Had a TN monitor previously. 100% satisfied with my choice to get it. Granted, the old TN monitor wasn't the greatest and my choice was between the 2209wa and that samsung 120hz monitor, but I'm more than happy with what I ended up with. Great monitor.
 
Linkzg said:
I use a 2209wa too. Had a TN monitor previously. 100% satisfied with my choice to get it. Granted, the old TN monitor wasn't the greatest and my choice was between the 2209wa and that samsung 120hz monitor, but I'm more than happy with what I ended up with. Great monitor.

Hi 5
Deep rich colors, looking out for a deal to get another one. :D
 
Okay, so I finally got Windows 7 in the mail and installed it (whoo hoo). I ran the OCCT CPU test for about 10 minutes and all the cores maxed out at the 50C mark (with Core3 staying around 51-52C). From what I've read, this is okay, but I wanted to double check.

So to summarize:

Idle: 24-31C
Full Load: 49-52C

CPU: i5 750
Cooler: ZEROtherm CORE92 Socket 1156/1366 HDT Cooler

Is this good? Should I stop worrying about whether I correctly applied the thermal grease? :D
 
crisdecuba said:
Okay, so I finally got Windows 7 in the mail and installed it (whoo hoo). I ran the OCCT CPU test for about 10 minutes and all the cores maxed out at the 50C mark (with Core3 staying around 51-52C). From what I've read, this is okay, but I wanted to double check.

So to summarize:

Idle: 24-31C
Full Load: 49-52C

CPU: i5 750
Cooler: ZEROtherm CORE92 Socket 1156/1366 HDT Cooler

Is this good? Should I stop worrying about whether I correctly applied the thermal grease? :D

Yes, your temps are great. Max temp is 72.7 for the 750.
 
crisdecuba said:
Okay, so I finally got Windows 7 in the mail and installed it (whoo hoo). I ran the OCCT CPU test for about 10 minutes and all the cores maxed out at the 50C mark (with Core3 staying around 51-52C). From what I've read, this is okay, but I wanted to double check.

So to summarize:

Idle: 24-31C
Full Load: 49-52C

CPU: i5 750
Cooler: ZEROtherm CORE92 Socket 1156/1366 HDT Cooler

Is this good? Should I stop worrying about whether I correctly applied the thermal grease? :D

Looks great to me. So, how did your first build work out for ya? You liking it? You glad to have the experience now? Or would you consider it mostly a waste of time.

I won't be offended by any answer...I'm curious. :)
 
I've decided to take another whack at Overclocking my CPU. I'm running an X3 435 on a Gigabyte MA770T mobo. I'm currently running stable at 3.3GHz on stock voltage, but no matter what I do with voltages (I've raised CPU voltate to +0.1V) I cannot get passed that wall in 1 hour Prime 95. Under load the Hyper 212 keeps the CPU less than 35C so I think I should have a lot of room for more OC.

Hoping someone here can give me a little advice if if I post my mobo settings:

Code:
CPU Clock Ratio: 3335MHz
CPU NB Freq: 2070 MHz
CPU Freq: 230
PCIE Clock: Auto
HT Link Freq: Auto 
Set Memory Clock: Auto 
Memory Clock: x5.33     1225Mhz (OCZ DDR3 RAM is advertised as 1333MHz)
DRAM Config: Auto

DRAM Voltage: Normal 1.600V
DDR VTT Voltage Control: Normal 0.900V
NB Voltage Control: Normal 1.100V
SB/HT Voltage Control: Normal 1.200V
NB PCIE Voltage Control: Normal 1.800 MHz
CPU NB VID Control: Normal
CPU Voltage Control: Normal 1.425V

What would be the next logical step to get to around 3.6-3.7GHz?

edit: I'm using this RAM
 
TheExodu5 said:
Looks great to me. So, how did your first build work out for ya? You liking it? You glad to have the experience now? Or would you consider it mostly a waste of time.

I won't be offended by any answer...I'm curious. :)
Haha it was an awesome experience. And one I intend to repeat in the future. :)

I definitely liked picking out each component based on user reviews and commentary - it feels like I got solid components for about the same price as, if not a bit less than, what I would have paid to get a pre-built system.

So here's to the next 3-4 years of use. :) *cheers*
 
Druz said:
Like I said, I moved from a $700 IPS(from 5 years ) to a TN and it still looks great. Not all TNs are created equal even though they're universally crap in some areas.

tnvseips01.jpg


The image on the left and right are the same image, the left side is how it will look on a TN, and the right side is how it is actually supposed to look when displayed correctly. Vertical viewing angle shift will make any TN panel inferior to an IPS.

tnshift.jpg


The picture above is a TN monitor trying to show a solid blue background and instead giving you a free gradient! TN panels are especially worse the larger they get, because the shift will be more drastic.

Newer IPS panels don't have the lag of older ones. Here's a review of the Dell Tech Report recommended, I read other reviews too, and there is no visible ghosting on the slower mode, and if somehow you were someone able to see ghosting despite others saying they can't, it still has a gaming mode, which further reduces ghosting (at the cost of color).

Edit: Found a thread with the average input lag value of the Dell IPS panel, it's 14ms, or less than a single frame at 60fps gaming.

I can't imagine you'd notice the lag of less than a single frame.
 
I'm looking to finally upgrade my videocard, the 8800 GT has served me very well, but time to move on. I just have a dumb question since I don't follow PC parts like I used to. I remember a year back or so Nvidia buying Physx and some thing coming out about using an old nvidia GPU in your PC as a Physx accelerator as long as you had another Nvidia GPU. Is that so? It's one of the reasons I'm leaning towards an Nvidia instead of a couple of HD4850s or something. Would using an 8800 as a Physx board be worth it?


EDIT: well the faq now answers most of my questions, but how many games are coming out with Physx, and would my old card do it well enough to justify not getting the better seeming crossfired Radeon cards instead?
 
calder said:
I'm looking to finally upgrade my videocard, the 8800 GT has served me very well, but time to move on. I just have a dumb question since I don't follow PC parts like I used to. I remember a year back or so Nvidia buying Physx and some thing coming out about using an old nvidia GPU in your PC as a Physx accelerator as long as you had another Nvidia GPU. Is that so? It's one of the reasons I'm leaning towards an Nvidia instead of a couple of HD4850s or something. Would using an 8800 as a Physx board be worth it?


EDIT: well the faq now answers most of my questions, but how many games are coming out with Physx, and would my old card do it well enough to justify not getting the better seeming crossfired Radeon cards instead?

You can actually do that with an ATI card these days with a little messing around, so long as you're on W7. Considering how few games use PhysX effects, I wouldn't let it be the deciding factor in a GPU puchase if I was you. Nvidia currently have no competitive high end parts, fyi.

Also, don't crossfire a couple of slower cards for the love of God. Buy one fast card, and avoid the headaches.
 
calder said:
I'm looking to finally upgrade my videocard, the 8800 GT has served me very well, but time to move on. I just have a dumb question since I don't follow PC parts like I used to. I remember a year back or so Nvidia buying Physx and some thing coming out about using an old nvidia GPU in your PC as a Physx accelerator as long as you had another Nvidia GPU. Is that so? It's one of the reasons I'm leaning towards an Nvidia instead of a couple of HD4850s or something. Would using an 8800 as a Physx board be worth it?


EDIT: well the faq now answers most of my questions, but how many games are coming out with Physx, and would my old card do it well enough to justify not getting the better seeming crossfired Radeon cards instead?

Don't buy Crossfired HD4850s.
 
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