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"I need a new PC!" 2010 Edition

Hausmeister said:
Yeah, but a Mac has exactly one wire for electricity. A PC at mininum: Power for PC and screen, wire between PC an screen, a wireless dongle for mouse/keyboard and speakers are taking additional space on my desk, which I want to use from time to time as.. a desk :D

EDIT: I have a 360 and PS3 for gaming, I only have interest in those 2 blizz games :/ But yeah, I already guessed the 9400 isn't good enough. Damn :/

If you want just one wire, pick up a Touchsmart 600xt

Yeah its pretty expensive, but thats what you get for wanting one wire. Its 23' and comes with a 1gb 230m. Should be able to play those bliz games. Hell, you can even configure one with a corei7 if you got the cash to blow.
 
Ugh I think my power supply went on me tonight...PC shut off and now I can't get power to anything. Even after unhooking everything and plugging the PSU in by itself it just makes a low buzzing sound but won't turn on :(
 
MWS Natural said:
Ugh I think my power supply went on me tonight...PC shut off and now I can't get power to anything. Even after unhooking everything and plugging the PSU in by itself it just makes a low buzzing sound but won't turn on :(

Yeah sounds like your PSU's done. What kind of PSU was it?
 
what is a good site to config a new pc that I want to put together myself or something similar. I want to make it top notch, but I want to put it together myself. :D
 
CorporalDork said:
Heh... I'm actually saving for a Corsair 800D at the moment - without a doubt my favorite case ever.

I"m also over blue lights etc, I've actually taken out all my lighting and put in more quiet black fans throughout the current case (Thermaltake Armor)
I'm going from an p182 to an 800D myself when the price is right. That and Fermi I hope, if it has 3 video outputs and smokes ati's offerings as much as I'm hoping.
 
Anyone have any recommendations for a good HTPC keyboard? Kinda sad but I'd love to buy something like a Phantom Lapboard or something similiar. Something without a numpad (more compact but removal of the numpad helps keep the keys at full size) but feels good to hold in your lap and wireless.

The Logitech DiNovo Edge looks nice but it costs about half a million dollars.

I saw something called the 'Microsoft Arc Keyboard" which looks okay, anyone else have any recommendations?
 
I'm going to be buying a new PC this week, and I want to make sure this looks okay before I order it.
AMD Athlon II x4 620
Gigabyte GA-MA770T-UD3P ATX AM3
Corsair XMS3 4GB DDR3
Antec Basiq 550 Plus
XFX 5770
all in an Antec 300 case.

Does it all look like it'll work well together? I'm most worried about the ram since it wasn't listed on the gigabytes compatability list, but it also said that they can't test every ram. But it says 1.5v on the specs and that ram is 1.5v on corsairs website

Comes out to around 600$ without shipping, including price matches on stuff. I should be fine to put it together myself. It's not that hard right? I'm only worried about installing a CPU since that's the only component I have never installed.

Or is it worth it for me to pay the 50$ to get NCIX to put together and make sure everything works before they send it to me?

Another question, should I go for the Athlon II x3 435 instead of the 620 x4, I'm going to be doing mostly gaming, and the 435 is a bit cheaper.
 
Hard drive trouble.



So I recently purchased a 1tb Hitachi Deskstar external drive from a fellow Gaffer. I pieced it apart and I'm trying to get my Windows 7 configuration to acknowledge this drive internally. After connecting the SATA cable, and the power cable, the damn thing just beeps repeatedly, with a short click after each beep. What the heck does this mean?

Well, one thing it does mean is that my system is currently not shaking hands with this thing. Any insight as to why? I would think I just plug in the drive and format the damn thing, but apparently this is not the case.

It's been beeping/clicking for about 20 minutes now with no sign of slowing down. I tried to load up Windows 7 with just this drive to see if that would make a difference, nope. Tried gawking at it until it was scared into working, nope. Even tried intimidating this damn thing by clinching a fist....nope.


What do I have to consider to get this thing working on my system? Thanks in advance.
 
Does this look right to you guys? Do I have more room to overclock or should this be enough?

stock.jpg

stock2.png
 
Help
Builds in mind

Build 1 (leaning more towards this one)
Case http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811133086
Mobo http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131614.
GPU http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102858
PS http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139006
CPU http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115202
RAM http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145224
OS HDD http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136284
DVD http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136167
OS http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116758
Cooler http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103055
Heaven knows I will need this as its my first time http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16899261003

1600 +/-

Build 2

Case http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129042
Mobo http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131359
GPU http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102858
PSU http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817341018
CPU http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115202
RAM http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145222
HDD http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136284
DVD http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827151188
OS http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116758
Cooler http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103055

$1379+/-
 
AgentWhiskersX said:
Does this look right to you guys? Do I have more room to overclock or should this be enough?

[im]http://i.imagehost.org/0764/stock.jpg[/img]
[im]http://f.imagehost.org/0510/stock2.png[/img]

Idle temperatures are fine, I don't know if you have room to go higher, but what really matters is that the 100% load temperatures don't go past 80 (preferably closer to 70)!

That XS Bench button on Real Temp will run a test and you will see how your CPU temperatures scale from 0-100% load, you need to try that.
 
I just ordered a CM 690 and a few extra fans. My current PC was put together by a friend, but I'd like to manage the transplant all on my own. But, I have to ask, how hard is it to connect the I/O ports, power buttons, and the power/activity indicators? Any other pro tips for the whole transplanting process?
 
Minsc said:
Idle temperatures are fine, I don't know if you have room to go higher, but what really matters is that the 100% load temperatures don't go past 80 (preferably closer to 70)!

That XS Bench button on Real Temp will run a test and you will see how your CPU temperatures scale from 0-100% load, you need to try that.
While playing Crysis, I noticed temperature climbing upto 85C. Does this look bad?

stock3.png
 
AgentWhiskersX said:
While playing Crysis, I noticed temperature climbing upto 85C. Does this look bad?

stock3.png

Sorry it was the Sensor Test button that you do to get the 0-100% results, do that one. But yea, Crysis probably won't even use all your cores, so you may need better cooling or to back down the overclock, 85C is a bit too high...
 
Minsc said:
Sorry it was the Sensor Test button that you do to get the 0-100% results, do that one. But yea, Crysis probably won't even use all your cores, so you may need better cooling or to back down the overclock, 85C is a bit too high...
I bumped down the overclock to 3.3GHz. This better?

stock4.jpg
 
I have a Noctua NH u12P SE cooler, Cosmos S case, all components except for the CPU and SSD at the moment is it a bad idea to install the backplate, build in my mobo, do cable management etc and then when i get the cpu within a month just put it in and screw on the cooler?

some people attach the bigger cpu cooler OUTSIDE the case first but is it really necessary? if not i could connect every q connector and shit thus saving me alot of time when i actually get the CPU, but if it has any dangers or something ill just wait
 
Speaking of cable management does anyone have a link to a good guide? Should I be running cables under the mobo? Usually I just tie up all the loose wires with a ziptie.
 
TheExodu5 said:
Your CPU will only be a bottleneck in quad-core enabled CPU intensive games (maybe E:TW, Arma 2, Bad Company 2, Grand Theft Auto 4) and a very slightle bottleneck in games like Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age (slight meaning you'll still be able to manage 60fps the majority of the time).

Go ahead and upgrade to a 5850. You'll still see a massive increase in performance. Down the road you can either put in an Intel Core 2 Quad (my recommendation) or upgrade to an i5/i7 rig.

To anyone that has a motherboard that can support a Core 2 Quad, I think that's the preferable option at this point. You're not getting that much more performance going i5/i7, and you'd need to replace your DDR2 with DDR3. I might suggest otherwise if socket 1156 was a solid platform, but there's no guarantee that LGA1156 boards will offer much future upgradability.
Cool, thanks for the advice.
 
Well I finished transferring my computer to the P183.

Didn't go too well.

First I had problems (since it was my first time), learning how to put the thermal paste on my CPU, took me a few tries and used more thermal paste than I would've liked, but hey now I know toothpicks are the best for evenly distributing it across the CPU.

The P183 was a bitch. Some of the cables could not go on the backside of the case. So I had problems closing the case itself. As well some of my PSU cables could not reach all the way to the top of the case. I broke one of the hinges of the side panel to the case, because closing it was a nightmare, took me over 1 hour. So I glued that back on, and now I'm waiting for it to dry (it is glue that is use for cars - strongest shit I could buy). That should be fine. Also I managed to make a scratch (very light and hard to see), on the matte finish right above the door. So I am going this weekend to buy some matte paint and dab on some and it should be fine.

Other than my minor problems (if you will) everything went smoothly, transferring, putting on the heatsink. Only problem was cable management. The doors are a bitch to put on, they should've made it at least slightly easier.

My temps underload under prime95 for my Q6600 2.4ghz is around 54C :D Those were my idle temps before. Plus my room temperature was around 26.4C. So it might of been a bit less, with a window open.

qzj70l.jpg


Now if you will excuse me, I need to go ice my hands, they are all scratched up. :lol
 
Smash88 said:
Well I finished transferring my computer to the P183.

Didn't go too well.

First I had problems (since it was my first time), learning how to put the thermal paste on my CPU, took me a few tries and used more thermal paste than I would've liked, but hey now I know toothpicks are the best for evenly distributing it across the CPU.

The P183 was a bitch. Some of the cables go not go on the backside of the case. So I had problems closing the case itself. As well some of my PSU cables could not reach all the way to the top of the case. I broke one of the hinges of the side panel to the case, because closing it was a nightmare, took me over 1 hour. So I glued that back on, and now I'm waiting for it to dry (it is glue that is use for cars - strongest shit I could buy). That should be fine. Also I managed to make a scratch (very light and hard to see), on the matte finish right above the door. So I am going this weekend to buy some matte paint and dab on some and it should be fine.

Other than my minor problems (if you will) everything went smoothly, transferring, putting on the heatsink. Only problem was cable management. The doors are a bitch to put on, they should've made it at least slightly easier.

My temps underload under prime95 for my Q6600 2.4ghz is around 54C :D

http://i47.tinypic.com/qzj70l.jpg

Now if you will excuse me, I need to go ice my hands, they are all scratched up. :lol
Gonna be my first time doing everything that you just did pretty soon now. Only difference is that I'll be using a CM 690 Advanced II. Asked for some tips earlier, hoping to mitigate some of the newbie screw ups.
 
Odious Tea said:
Gonna be my first time doing everything that you just did pretty soon now. Only difference is that I'll be using a CM 690 Advanced II. Asked for some tips earlier, hoping to mitigate some of the newbie screw ups.

Good luck. And be super patient and don't get frustrated. It was 2am and the back side panel would not go on, so I thought maybe if I pushed hard it would. Bad idea. Take it slow.

Took me 8 hours (I expected around 3-4 hours) :lol

I plan to OC to 3GHZ tonight, and try to push it bit by bit. Hopefully I can reach at least 3.4GHZ.
 
Smash88 said:
Good luck. And be super patient and don't get frustrated. It was 2am and the back side panel would not go on, so I thought maybe if I pushed hard it would. Bad idea. Take it slow.

Took me 8 hours (I expected around 3-4 hours) :lol

I plan to OC to 3GHZ tonight, and try to push it bit by bit. Hopefully I can reach at least 3.4GHZ.
My current case is absolute shit. I have your temps on idle with speedstep enabled. I plan to reapply thermal paste and hopefully the airflow in my new case will help out. I'd really love to hit 3GHZ.

I have no idea how airflow works, but my initial plans are to have this configuration:

Front: 1x 140mm
Side: 1x120mm (considering using both spots)
Rear: 1x120mm
Top: 2x120mm

I'd still have spots to put another fan on the side and two on the bottom. Addditionally, I'm still trying to work out whether to use side fans as intake or exhaust. So many conflicting reports.

Do we have an airflow guru here on GAF?
 
TheExodu5 said:
Your CPU will only be a bottleneck in quad-core enabled CPU intensive games (maybe E:TW, Arma 2, Bad Company 2, Grand Theft Auto 4) and a very slightle bottleneck in games like Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age (slight meaning you'll still be able to manage 60fps the majority of the time).

Go ahead and upgrade to a 5850. You'll still see a massive increase in performance. Down the road you can either put in an Intel Core 2 Quad (my recommendation) or upgrade to an i5/i7 rig.

To anyone that has a motherboard that can support a Core 2 Quad, I think that's the preferable option at this point. You're not getting that much more performance going i5/i7, and you'd need to replace your DDR2 with DDR3. I might suggest otherwise if socket 1156 was a solid platform, but there's no guarantee that LGA1156 boards will offer much future upgradability.

What is the sweet spot for price/performance in a Core 2 Quad if you're upgrading from an E8400? I'm looking at the prices and I'm kinda balking at what amounts to be a $200-$300 upgrade that really should be used to making the jump to an i5...
 
xero273 said:
It's been awhile since I applied AS5 to a cpu. For quad core CPUs, I just put a line of paste through the middle, correct?
Yes, but you'd do best to peruse some kind of instructions for applying the AS5 to a quadcore. If only such a thing existed.
 
I've never had such an issue in the past deciding on hardware heh...


We're looking into building a "gaming" machine mid March. Its come down to what cpu+mobo...

Can go the i7 860 route or the i7 920...

Crossfire/sli isn't the biggest concern but if we have the option down the road would be cool. We'll be getting the 5870 so we wouldn't need to use it now.

Is there one that is more future proof over the other? Also which one has the better mobo's (175~$ price range)?
 
Odious Tea said:
My current case is absolute shit. I have your temps on idle with speedstep enabled. I plan to reapply thermal paste and hopefully the airflow in my new case will help out. I'd really love to hit 3GHZ.

I have no idea how airflow works, but my initial plans are to have this configuration:

Front: 1x 140mm
Side: 1x120mm (considering using both spots)
Rear: 1x120mm
Top: 2x120mm

I'd still have spots to put another fan on the side and two on the bottom. Addditionally, I'm still trying to work out whether to use side fans as intake or exhaust. So many conflicting reports.

Do we have an airflow guru here on GAF?

The front is intake, the side is intake, the back and top are for sucking out hot air from your case.

Gully State said:
What is the sweet spot for price/performance in a Core 2 Quad if you're upgrading from an E8400? I'm looking at the prices and I'm kinda balking at what amounts to be a $200-$300 upgrade that really should be used to making the jump to an i5...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115041&cm_re=q9550-_-19-115-041-_-Product
 
AgentWhiskersX said:
I bumped down the overclock to 3.3GHz. This better?

[im]http://i.imagehost.org/0112/stock4.jpg[/img]

Looks good, from what I read, the Corei7s are rated to operate 24/7 at 20C from the TJMax, so your test looks good, I'd just be sure to check every 4-6 months that your thermal paste and cooling hasn't let up by running the test again, I believe it's possible for thermal paste become less effective and need to be reapplied every few years.

3.3GHz is i7-975 speed, which is a $1,000 CPU, so it's not too shabby!
 
Gully State said:
What is the sweet spot for price/performance in a Core 2 Quad if you're upgrading from an E8400? I'm looking at the prices and I'm kinda balking at what amounts to be a $200-$300 upgrade that really should be used to making the jump to an i5...

Q9400 and Q9550 are the two you should be considering.
 
Smash88 said:
The front is intake, the side is intake, the back and top are for sucking out hot air from your case.
That's exactly how I planned it. Do you think that many fans is overkill? It comes with 3 and I ordered a Cooler Master 4 pack for $15. Still not sure whether or not to use them all at the same time. The specs say that they're 19.7 dba, but I'm sure they're rounding down. If they're not too deafening I may end up using them.
 
Odious Tea said:
That's exactly how I planned it. Do you think that many fans is overkill? It comes with 3 and I ordered a Cooler Master 4 pack for $15. Still not sure whether or not to use them all at the same time. The specs say that they're 19.7 dba, but I'm sure they're rounding down. If they're not too deafening I may end up using them.

It won't be overkill as long as the proper rotation of air is going through your case. Intake from the front usually provides cold air for the CPU and GPU (as well as the side fan - although mainly for the GPU). The back fans are meant to take out the hot air. It won't be overkill.

I bought two of these (blue led):

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103062

They move 69CFM (supposedly) but I think at 35dba+. Yours move around 40CFM @ 25dba+. I would try to go for more air if you are making two of them intake. In the long run it will help.

These 120mm will always be loud, just because they move so much air. Although I don't mind it and the fact that I have a noise dampening P183 :p Especially if you are OCing or want cool temps expect noise. Mine are running between 1800-2000RPM, if that helps.
 
TheExodu5 said:
Hmmm. Got a pass from HardOCP which means it's not a bad PSU (just bad for the money, according to the review).

http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article/2009/03/18/xigmatek_nrpmc751_750w_power_supply/9

Are you plugged into a surge protector? Maybe there was a surge that killed it.


Well I got it with discounts and a rebate when I bought it. It was the cheapest 750W available at the time, Xigmatek was a name I have heard before so I figured their PSU's were of decent quality. I did have it plugged into a surge protector but perhaps I should invest in a more quality protector like the one I have my home theater system hooked up to.
 
So I have a question re: video cards that I hope the Master Race denizens in this thread can help me out with.

Last year, I bought an HIS ATI Radeon 4850 w/512 MB memory. I remember back then, it was the boss of the mid-range, and an incredible value given its power relative to its cost. After that, the new 5xxx family of ATI cards and Gxxx/9xxx Nvidia cards came out, and the numbers kinda fucked me up.

Now, I am trying to overhaul the rest of my rig to bring it up to modern gaming standards (currently riding with a 4-year old Athlon X2 4200 overclocked, 2GB of RAM to go along with that R4850), but I want to make sure the Radeon I got from last year will still serve me well with new games going forward.

Where does the Radeon 4850 fit with today's group of cards? Are there tier lists/groups that I can view? The guys in this thread here:

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=387348

made me think that the card is still beastly in the mid-range even compared to the new 5xxx series, so yeah. Let me know; thanks in advance, guys!
 
Alright, here's what I've thrown together for a work PC build. I can probably drop another $50 or so on it if anyone thinks such an upgrade would make sense. I'll probably be using this computer for work for another 3 years or so. Unless there's a cheap way for me to switch to Windows 7, I'm probably stuck with XP still :(

Any suggestions? Did I forget anything? :P
I went with the 4770 over the 5760 because the benchmarks I saw had it performing better and the price was lower. I don't have room on my desk for a 3rd monitor, so Eyefinity isn't too important.
etglc3.jpg
 
captmcblack said:
So I have a question re: video cards that I hope the Master Race denizens in this thread can help me out with.

Last year, I bought an HIS ATI Radeon 4850 w/512 MB memory. I remember back then, it was the boss of the mid-range, and an incredible value given its power relative to its cost. After that, the new 5xxx family of ATI cards and Gxxx/9xxx Nvidia cards came out, and the numbers kinda fucked me up.

Now, I am trying to overhaul the rest of my rig to bring it up to modern gaming standards (currently riding with a 4-year old Athlon X2 4200 overclocked, 2GB of RAM to go along with that R4850), but I want to make sure the Radeon I got from last year will still serve me well with new games going forward.

Where does the Radeon 4850 fit with today's group of cards? Are there tier lists/groups that I can view? The guys in this thread here:

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=387348

made me think that the card is still beastly in the mid-range even compared to the new 5xxx series, so yeah. Let me know; thanks in advance, guys!

5750 = 4850, or thereabout anyway.
 
captmcblack said:
So I have a question re: video cards that I hope the Master Race denizens in this thread can help me out with.

Last year, I bought an HIS ATI Radeon 4850 w/512 MB memory. I remember back then, it was the boss of the mid-range, and an incredible value given its power relative to its cost. After that, the new 5xxx family of ATI cards and Gxxx/9xxx Nvidia cards came out, and the numbers kinda fucked me up.

Now, I am trying to overhaul the rest of my rig to bring it up to modern gaming standards (currently riding with a 4-year old Athlon X2 4200 overclocked, 2GB of RAM to go along with that R4850), but I want to make sure the Radeon I got from last year will still serve me well with new games going forward.

Where does the Radeon 4850 fit with today's group of cards? Are there tier lists/groups that I can view? The guys in this thread here:

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=387348

made me think that the card is still beastly in the mid-range even compared to the new 5xxx series, so yeah. Let me know; thanks in advance, guys!

The 4850 will continue to serve you well. Right now it sits somewhere between the 5770 and 5750 performance. Your CPU definitely could use an overhaul but i'd leave your GPU for another generation of cards. It will continue to perform well unless you plan on changing your display setup to multi-monitors. Toms Hardware has plenty of graphs for GPU comparison.
 
Smash88 said:
It won't be overkill as long as the proper rotation of air is going through your case. Intake from the front usually provides cold air for the CPU and GPU (as well as the side fan - although mainly for the GPU). The back fans are meant to take out the hot air. It won't be overkill.

I bought two of these (blue led):

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103062

They move 69CFM (supposedly) but I think at 35dba+. Yours move around 40CFM @ 25dba+. I would try to go for more air if you are making two of them intake. In the long run it will help.

These 120mm will always be loud, just because they move so much air. Although I don't mind it and the fact that I have a noise dampening P183 :p Especially if you are OCing or want cool temps expect noise. Mine are running between 1800-2000RPM, if that helps.
I already ordered everything, so I'll have to make do. I'm thinking of doing 3 intake and 3 exhaust. 4x120mm 2x140mm. Both of the 140mm and 1 of the 120mm come stock with the case.
 
Whats the deal with RAM currently? Back In october, I ordered THIS RAM for 80 bucks and I now see it listed at 108.99. Are the prices going to continue going up?

Im using a 64bit OS and 4GBs of that RAM and the PC is fast but I was thinking about adding another 4GBs just as a "because I can" type of thing. I dont do a ton of multitasking but I figure that you can never have enough RAM. I have the slots and the 64bit OS so is there any reason why I shouldnt? Are prices kinda steady? Are they expected to go up or down?
 
I want to buy a gaming laptop but I really have no idea where to start! I want to spend somewhere around $1,000 and I would love for it to have 3D capabilities. Is there anything in that range right now or would I need to wait for a while to get to the $1,000 range? Also, what sites give good laptop reviews? I tried Google but I keep getting re-routed to sites trying to sell stuff instead of reviews. I should also mention that brand doesn't matter to me as long as the laptop performs well.
 
Odious Tea said:
I already ordered everything, so I'll have to make do. I'm thinking of doing 3 intake and 3 exhaust. 4x120mm 2x140mm. Both of the 140mm and 1 of the 120mm come stock with the case.

Oh I'm not saying they are bad fans, they could move a good amount of air, just hopefully the pay off for having less air movement you will have a quieter fan.
 
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