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"I need a new PC!" 2010 Edition

Alright, new Day, more time trying to figure out why my new 460 is terrible at running games lol. It's so weird to, it's like my whole computer slowed down because of it.
 
Anyone overclock an HD 5850?

I attempted it last night following a simple guide online that had me using amds tool to raise speeds and furmark to test stability. I did it and everything was fine. Furmark was fine for 20 minutes. Unique ran for 15. No artifacts.

Then I ran windows experience index because I didn't do that yet and it crashed. Display driver stopped responding and reset. I turned everything back to default and its fine now. I'm afraid to do it again lol.

I never oc'ed anything before and I'm worried about breaking something. This is my second 5850 because my first one had issues right out of the box. I don't want to kill this one now.
 
Nabs said:
no, you pick your parts and add them to your cart, along with the 50 dollar assembly fee.

Ah, I see it. Wonder why they didn't make it as streamlined as the Canadian branch of their website.

Either way, thanks for the heads up man! :D
 
Looking to build a functional but cheap pc for my girlfriend, preparing for ffxiv! So with someone with some knowledge of what sort of requirements I need, help me build something for cheap? What I already have/can get cheap through work - monitor, RAM windows and maybe a HDD
 
Nabs said:
How cheap is cheap?

Well I should probably say first - I'm Canadian, so take that into consideration.

And if possible - not including RAM, a monitor and a HDD - something around 400 or even less.
 
Kinitari said:
Well I should probably say first - I'm Canadian, so take that into consideration.

And if possible - not including RAM, a monitor and a HDD - something around 400 or even less.

What kind of ram do you have? Can you get any type of ram? Is the HDD a sata drive? What is it used for?
 
Salaadin said:
Anyone overclock an HD 5850?

I attempted it last night following a simple guide online that had me using amds tool to raise speeds and furmark to test stability. I did it and everything was fine. Furmark was fine for 20 minutes. Unique ran for 15. No artifacts.

Then I ran windows experience index because I didn't do that yet and it crashed. Display driver stopped responding and reset. I turned everything back to default and its fine now. I'm afraid to do it again lol.

I never oc'ed anything before and I'm worried about breaking something. This is my second 5850 because my first one had issues right out of the box. I don't want to kill this one now.

might be heat related, maybe turn up the fan speed
 
SamuraiX- said:
Yeah, I tried that, but I don't see any "PC Builder" option on that site like on the Canadian site. :-/

Here it is mate:

http://www.ncixus.com/products/7842/PC-ASSEMBLY/NCIXPC/

They'll even install and config. Windows for you.


Kinitari said:
Looking to build a functional but cheap pc for my girlfriend, preparing for ffxiv! So with someone with some knowledge of what sort of requirements I need, help me build something for cheap? What I already have/can get cheap through work - monitor, RAM windows and maybe a HDD

Cheap and FF14 don't really go together. The standard $630 GAF build is about as low as you can go without compromising things too much, its going to be one of the most demanding games out there.
 
Zaraki_Kenpachi said:
What kind of ram do you have? Can you get any type of ram? Is the HDD a sata drive? What is it used for?

RAM - already have some leftovers from a while back - 4GB DDR2 800
HDD - don't have it yet, eyeballing a WD 320GB SATA for about 50 bucks.
 
Kinitari said:
RAM - already have some leftovers from a while back - 4GB DDR2 800
HDD - don't have it yet, eyeballing a WD 320GB SATA for about 50 bucks.

You really don't want to be using DDR2 RAM on a new build and a $50 320GB HDD is a terrible deal. I mean you can but you're kind of dicking yourself over if you ever want to upgrade it.
 
brain_stew said:
You really don't want to be using DDR2 RAM on a new build and a $50 320GB HDD is a terrible deal. I mean you can but you're kind of dicking yourself over if you ever want to upgrade it.

I assumed upgrading RAM in the future wouldn't actually be effected by the RAM I use now? :P I could honestly be wrong, there are a lot of intricate rules to building a computer I haven't quite grasped. Also, why is the HDD (retailing for 80, getting it through work for a bit cheaper) going to matter? I'm not looking to go solid state here.

Not trying to sound snarky, genuinely curious.
 
brain_stew said:
You really don't want to be using DDR2 RAM on a new build and a $50 320GB HDD is a terrible deal. I mean you can but you're kind of dicking yourself over if you ever want to upgrade it.

Something ive always wondered about ram, with all the various speeds and timings and what not, does it ever show up any gains in games ? I mean, im currently on 2x2GB of DDR2 PC2-6400, if i was to get say, 2x2GB of DDR3 PC3-12800, would i see any change in games, or even Windows ? Just curious is all :)
 
Ogs said:
Something ive always wondered about ram, with all the various speeds and timings and what not, does it ever show up any gains in games ? I mean, im currently on 2x2GB of DDR2 PC2-6400, if i was to get say, 2x2GB of DDR3 PC3-12800, would i see any change in games, or even Windows ? Just curious is all :)

Nothing you'd ever notice really, no. Its one of the least crucial facets of performance in a modern rig.
 
Kinitari said:
I assumed upgrading RAM in the future wouldn't actually be effected by the RAM I use now? :P I could honestly be wrong, there are a lot of intricate rules to building a computer I haven't quite grasped. Also, why is the HDD (retailing for 80, getting it through work for a bit cheaper) going to matter? I'm not looking to go solid state here.

Not trying to sound snarky, genuinely curious.

All the new platform (AMD 880G/870/890GX and Intel P55/X58) use DDR3 exclusively so if you want to use a modern motherboard, you're going to have to get DDR3 RAM. On the Intel side, you've literally got no option though on the AMD side you can actually use their high end processors on a DDR2 based board but you'd lose out on the ability to upgrade to AMD's next generation Bulldozer processors which is kind of a big deal.

$50 for a 320GB HDD is a shitty deal because you can get a much faster 500GB Samsung F3 for $55 from Newegg or an even faster 1TB F3 for $75, there's even some retailers selling these drives for less than that. 500GB platter HDDs are all you should be considering these days.
 
brain_stew said:
All the new platform (AMD 880G/870/890GX and Intel P55/X58) use DDR3 exclusively so if you want to use a modern motherboard, you're going to have to get DDR3 RAM. On the Intel side, you've literally got no option though on the AMD side you can actually use their high end processors on a DDR2 based board but you'd lose out on the ability to upgrade to AMD's next generation Bulldozer processors which is kind of a big deal.

$50 for a 320GB HDD is a shitty deal because you can get a much faster 500GB Samsung F3 for $55 from Newegg or an even faster 1TB F3 for $75, there's even some retailers selling these drives for less than that. 500GB platter HDDs are all you should be considering these days.

Fair enough! Thanks for the info. I guess all I can really ask now is, can you point me in the direction of the FFXIV GAF build? :p
 
SamuraiX- said:
Thank you kindly. ;)

I was just lost because the site isn't set up the same way as their Canadian site.

Well they did use to have this as an option to add to your cart from the "view basket" screen, no idea why they took it off. It was there a few days ago because I was using it to put together a config for another GAfer.
 
Ok, I decided to only use the limited overclocking the CCC gives me and not go any higher than that and see if that helps me any. All I want is to eek a few more FPS in FFXIV for the more crowded areas.

I ran WEI and it ran thru successfully this time. Whats the best stability test out there? I cant use AtiTool because it has unsigned drivers. Is furmark my best bet? Is there any way to detect artifcacts in furmark other than my eyes?
 
So ive got my pc running and such. I had to rma my 5770 awhile back. while i was waiting for it to come back, i purchased a 5750.

So now as it stands i have my 5770 and 5750 in crossfire. But im not getting the performance increase online says i should. I am only scoring 750 more points on 3dmark 06 then when i had the 5770 alone. Any ideas as to why this might be?
 
Thrilltacular said:
Don't use that thermal grease it will probably be worse than the stuff you get with your heatsink. Everything else looks good.
 
Thrilltacular said:

Any reason in particular you want to go with i7? And you are bent on getting that i7, do you have a microcenter by you? I'm pretty sure it's still $200 there. Is there a range of how much you want to spend?
 
Mr_Brit said:
Don't use that thermal grease it will probably be worse than the stuff you get with your heatsink. Everything else looks good.

Ok, thanks!

Zaraki_Kenpachi said:
Any reason in particular you want to go with i7? And you are bent on getting that i7, do you have a microcenter by you? I'm pretty sure it's still $200 there. Is there a range of how much you want to spend?

Like I said, I have never built a computer before and have just been going on what has been said. It comes to ~1300 after everything, which is within my budget. Should I go with an i5 or an AMD instead?
 
Thrilltacular said:
Ok, thanks!



Like I said, I have never built a computer before and have just been going on what has been said. It comes to ~1300 after everything, which is within my budget. Should I go with an i5 or an AMD instead?

Eh, don't have to. If it's within your budget then I really wouldn't worry about it. The i5 are about the same for gaming right now, it's just that intel can run more expensive but if you're ok with spending the money then I don't really see a problem. Like I said though, check if there is a microcenter by you since you can save $80 by buying it in store over newegg.

MomoPufflet said:
Have you looked around on newegg at all? I was thinking of an sli board for use with the 460 but it seems like the only sli boards for amd are all older boards. There are some if you don't mind have 3/GBs channels and usb 2.0. It seems they only have crossfire with amd boards anymore. :/ If you keep looking around you may find something but from my quick looking I haven't found anything to my satisfaction since the rest of the board has older standards just to get sli.
 
Bah, that was my initial finding as well, I was hoping I missed something. Ordered a bunch of parts already before I decided I wanted to SLI in the future, guess I'll just have to do some returning :lol So basically if I change my CPU to an Intel I'll have a better selection? Thanks for the advice.
 
MomoPufflet said:
Bah, that was my initial finding as well, I was hoping I missed something. Ordered a bunch of parts already before I decided I wanted to SLI in the future, guess I'll just have to do some returning :lol So basically if I change my CPU to an Intel I'll have a better selection? Thanks for the advice.

Is there anything you're looking to do in particular? I wound up wanting to keep the cheaper AMD parts with the 460 and just upgrade the GPU when necessary or another big boost like the 460 is.
 
Zaraki_Kenpachi said:
Is there anything you're looking to do in particular? I wound up wanting to keep the cheaper AMD parts with the 460 and just upgrade the GPU when necessary or another big boost like the 460 is.

I'm building this rig mostly for Final Fantasy XIV, so I am kind of set on the 460. Are there any Intel CPUs you can recommend of a similar speed and price as the AMD one I posted? Looking at the i5s on Newegg they seem pretty expensive for comparable speed, but I'm only looking at the GHz (not much of an expert obviously). As long as it overclocks well I'm willing to take a bit of a hit on the speed provided there's not a massive performance difference.
 
Intel is more expensive normally and if you find a processor at a decent price, the motherboards are many times more expensive than the AMD counterparts. You're hardest problem will be finding a cheap motherboard with SLI.
 
Ok, Finally found a stable light overclock for my 5850.
I downloaded MSI afterburner and set the fan speeds up then OCed. This is what I got:

Core Clock: 760MHz
Mem Clock: 1125MHz
Everything else is default.

I ran OCCT for 30 mins with no errors detected. Should I run it longer or is that enough?
Also, my GPU temp on load was 71C. Good? Bad? Iffy?

Maybe nows a good time to invest in a side wndow fan for my Antec 900.
 
Zaraki_Kenpachi said:
Intel is more expensive normally and if you find a processor at a decent price, the motherboards are many times more expensive than the AMD counterparts. You're hardest problem will be finding a cheap motherboard with SLI.

I see, thanks again for your help. You're right, the modern SLI mobos are pretty expensive. Seems I have some thinking to do.
 
MomoPufflet said:
I see, thanks again for your help. You're right, the modern SLI mobos are pretty expensive. Seems I have some thinking to do.

Ya, pretty much what turned me off from sli and intel this time around went with the $200 AMD 6 core. Now, I just need money. :P
 
I just some advice on what kind of performance I should be getting out the following setup I have.

AMD 965 x4 @3.4 GHZ
2x460's with 1gig each
4 Gig's of 1600 G-Skill Ram
Running under Win7 32...soon to be 64bit with 4 more gigs of Ram.

Using the Mafia2 Benchmark, no matter what SLI option I choose, I cannot get more than around 33 FPS with all settings on Max and dedicating 1 card to the Physx.

Turning off Physx and dedicating both cards to rendering the game I get around 45 FPS. I thought having 2 460's would of netted me better results. I have the latest drivers installed as well. Maybe there is some tweaks I need to make perhaps?

What should I expect of out a set up like this?
 
Hawk269 said:
I just some advice on what kind of performance I should be getting out the following setup I have.

AMD 965 x4 @3.4 GHZ
2x460's with 1gig each
4 Gig's of 1600 G-Skill Ram
Running under Win7 32...soon to be 64bit with 4 more gigs of Ram.

Using the Mafia2 Benchmark, no matter what SLI option I choose, I cannot get more than around 33 FPS with all settings on Max and dedicating 1 card to the Physx.

Turning off Physx and dedicating both cards to rendering the game I get around 45 FPS. I thought having 2 460's would of netted me better results. I have the latest drivers installed as well. Maybe there is some tweaks I need to make perhaps?

What should I expect of out a set up like this?

What's probably screwing you is the 32bit windows 7. It can only page a little bit under 4gb of total system memory so a lot of your upgrades are doing absolutely nothing. Roughly 1/2 of your memory isn't even accessible.... Why do you need 8GB of ram? That's overkill unless you need it for video encoding or something....
 
Zaraki_Kenpachi said:
What's probably screwing you is the 32bit windows 7. It can only page a little bit under 4gb of total system memory so a lot of your upgrades are doing absolutely nothing. Roughly 1/2 of your memory isn't even accessible.... Why do you need 8GB of ram? That's overkill unless you need it for video encoding or something....

To be honest...I just went overkill across the board on most of the stuff. I just wanted something that would be able to run almost anything out there and I had some extra money and started adding more memory and a 2nd 460.

So with Win64bit I should see a performance boost?
 
can somebody explain to me how i can get a nvidia card to be used as a dedicated physx card on a ati setup
my specs are

phenom 2 x6 1090
ati 5870
gigabyth 790XTA - UD4

i was thinking of getting a 260 or a 8800 to be the dedicated card.
 
Hey guys, first of all, thanks for all the help with selecting components for my new computer. You gave me some great advice!

Second, my hard drive appears to be transferring incredibly slow, and I would like some advice on how to fix it. I ran ATTO Disk Benchmark to confirm my suspicions: the transfer rates are unbelievably slow:

fc4368.jpg


Note: I quite the test early because the speed was unbearable. Any suggestions on what I can do to fix this? The hard drive is a Samsung 1TB Spinpoint F3. Thanks in advance!
 
Kinitari said:
Fair enough! Thanks for the info. I guess all I can really ask now is, can you point me in the direction of the FFXIV GAF build? :p
http://i36.tinypic.com/33ubz2q.jpg

It's similar to Brain_strew's build, but combo'd (Dunno if Canada has) and with a 4870 instead of a 460.
MomoPufflet said:
I see, thanks again for your help. You're right, the modern SLI mobos are pretty expensive. Seems I have some thinking to do.
AM3 SLi mobos are cheaper, if you grab that with a x4 955 you are fine.

http://i.imgur.com/A55hA.jpg
Thrilltacular said:
Hey everyone, with the release of SC2 and upcoming release of FF14, I've decided to replace my old inspiron 1720. I've been reading through this thread and decided on going with an i7/460 1GB combo. I never actually built a computer on my own before, so I don't know exactly what I should pick up. Here's my current build and I would love any advice on what else I would need/what I should change. Thanks!
Most of your choices seem to be good, but I'd go with an i5 and i7 if you want Intel (better performance now). The difference between i5 and i7 is marginal, while the cost is not.
Intel mobos listed here. Same with coolers.

http://i.imgur.com/A55hA.jpg
 
RickA238 said:
Hey guys, first of all, thanks for all the help with selecting components for my new computer. You gave me some great advice!

Second, my hard drive appears to be transferring incredibly slow, and I would like some advice on how to fix it. I ran ATTO Disk Benchmark to confirm my suspicions: the transfer rates are unbelievably slow:

fc4368.jpg


Note: I quite the test early because the speed was unbearable. Any suggestions on what I can do to fix this? The hard drive is a Samsung 1TB Spinpoint F3. Thanks in advance!
Try running the 4MB or 8MB stripes and see if it is that slow.
If it is change the SATA port it's plugged into and look at a new cable as well.
Salaadin said:
Ok, Finally found a stable light overclock for my 5850.
I downloaded MSI afterburner and set the fan speeds up then OCed. This is what I got:

Core Clock: 760MHz
Mem Clock: 1125MHz
Everything else is default.

I ran OCCT for 30 mins with no errors detected. Should I run it longer or is that enough?
Also, my GPU temp on load was 71C. Good? Bad? Iffy?
Fine.
 
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