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[brain_stew]

What program does you guys use to stress test CPU again? I need to reoverclock my CPU.

OCCT. Nice and fully featured with a built in temp. monitoring program which will shut down the test if your CPU passes a certain pre-specified temp. threshold.

It'll bring up errors much faster than Prime/Orthos. I don't see Prime95 as a sufficient enough CPU test these days, it just doesn't work out a modern CPU nearly as much as other software can.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

OCCT. Nice and fully featured with a built in temp. monitoring program which will shut down the test if your CPU passes a certain pre-specified temp. threshold.

It'll bring up errors much faster than Prime/Orthos. I don't see Prime95 as a sufficient enough CPU test these days, it just doesn't work out a modern CPU nearly as much as other software can.

That's the name of it. Thanks!

And Hazaro, what voltage do you have your CPU at out of curiousity?

Edit: And you guys just do the default of an hour to test the temps?

 

[Spiderjericho]

I've been having issues with my desktop. At first, I wasn't getting a video signal to my monitor. I thought it was the video card so I RMA'd it. Now after getting the card back, the thing won't even boot up.

I'm thinking it could be the motherboard, power or processor. It would still boot if there was a bad RAM stick. A disk problem would be met with a different error message.

I'm going to dismantle it. Clean out fans, etc. Reapply the thermal paste.

I don't mind building PCs but at least with boutique, it's an easy replace and no hard work. But then I guess that's the attitude I have with my car and why Jiffy Lube can charge me $80 to $100 for an oil change.

 

[Shambles]

I've been having issues with my desktop. At first, I wasn't getting a video signal to my monitor. I thought it was the video card so I RMA'd it. Now after getting the card back, the thing won't even boot up.

I'm thinking it could be the motherboard, power or processor. It would still boot if there was a bad RAM stick. A disk problem would be met with a different error message.

I'm going to dismantle it. Clean out fans, etc. Reapply the thermal paste.

I don't mind building PCs but at least with boutique, it's an easy replace and no hard work. But then I guess that's the attitude I have with my car and why Jiffy Lube can charge me $80 to $100 for an oil change.

Did you connect both the 4/8 pin CPU power connection and the 20/24 pin power connection into the motherboard? When it fails to POST do you get error beeps? Check the pattern of these beeps to the motherboard manual, it will have different beeps for different errors.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

Not sure what's going on... If I go above 3.2 Ghz for overclocking it doesn't post or it'll start to boot windows and then say the install of windows is damaged and needs repair and does that loop until I knock it back down to 3.2.Ghz. I kept uping the voltage too and it didn't do anything. I got up to around 1.38V, did I not go high enough? I'm not sure why anything above 3.2Ghz is having so much trouble..

Edit: Getting errors on CPU 0 now. :/ What should I do?

 

[Smokey]

I've got an issue with my laptop that just started happening.

When I load up my computer like normal for some reason the wireless network adapter won't work. When I go to control panel/network nothing shows up it's just blank Window. Same if I click 'connect to network' (no networks are even listed in the menu, this is just when I press that option).

But when I load up the laptop in safe mode it works like normal every time. I can view wireless networks etc just as like I always could. I tried redownloading drivers from dell's website and that doesn't seem to do anything.

Anybody have any suggestions :/

 

[Thrilltacular]

I neglected to buy a copy of Windows 7 with my PC parts. Would it be ok buying an OEM version and saving myself $100? Some googling reveals thats its good only for that one machine, which is fine by me.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

I neglected to buy a copy of Windows 7 with my PC parts. Would it be ok buying an OEM version and saving myself $100? Some googling reveals thats its good only for that one machine, which is fine by me.

Yes, it's only good for one machine. If you're good with that then get the OEM version.

 

[TheExodu5]

The Razer Mamba I bought has been the biggest piece of shit mouse ever. $120 mouse, and it lasted all of 6 months. Tracking doesn't work anymore...only clicks work.

Seriously, it's been dropping connection several times, and I had to always unplug and replug it back in. Tracking would something fail. The mouse scratches on my pad because something must be protruding out of the bottom surface.

I will never buy a Razer product again. Going back to my 5 year old MX518.

edit: this is infuriating. They have no fucking technical support link on their site. It only brings you to their "knowledge base". I want a new mouse with my warranty. God damn Razer. Never again.

edit2: I found it. Support tells me to open the Razer Configuration, and low and behold, the mouse somehow works again. Wtf? I even restarted my computer and it didn't fix the issue. The mouse may be still working, but I can tell you I'm still not happy with its shoddy quality. The only reason I'm still using it over my MX518 is that I love the form factor so much.

 

[theRizzle]

So I've been reading this thread every day for the last three months and it has really made me want to get back into PC Gaming. The last PC I built for myself was a P4 2.8 ghz with RDRAM and a Radeon 9700 Pro, so obviously it's been a while since I've had a decent PC.

I probably won't even start looking at parts to buy until another 6 months to a year due to being away from home because of work, but I was wondering if anyone had advice in regards to cooling.

I would like to do some OC'ing on whatever I end up getting, probably air-cooling to start and maybe moving into some water-cooling if I'm not happy with the results. Obviously we don't know what will be available when I start this build, but I'm looking for suggestions for cases, coolers and fans mostly. What case has good cable management and airflow? What the best coolers and fans available now?

 

[SapientWolf]

The Razer Mamba I bought has been the biggest piece of shit mouse ever. $120 mouse, and it lasted all of 6 months. Tracking doesn't work anymore...only clicks work.

Seriously, it's been dropping connection several times, and I had to always unplug and replug it back in. Tracking would something fail. The mouse scratches on my pad because something must be protruding out of the bottom surface.

I will never buy a Razer product again. Going back to my 5 year old MX518.

edit: this is infuriating. They have no fucking technical support link on their site. It only brings you to their "knowledge base". I want a new mouse with my warranty. God damn Razer. Never again.

edit2: I found it. Support tells me to open the Razer Configuration, and low and behold, the mouse somehow works again. Wtf? I even restarted my computer and it didn't fix the issue. The mouse may be still working, but I can tell you I'm still not happy with its shoddy quality. The only reason I'm still using it over my MX518 is that I love the form factor so much.

I have to hold down the reset button on the bottom of my Copperhead every once in awhile to get it to respond on startup. Kind of annoying but it's not really a big deal.

 

[TheExodu5]

I really like the Antec Nine Hundred Two for cooling and cable management. Really sweet looking case too (other than the LED fans which I'm not a fan of).

I also like the P183 for its sleek look and the fact that it's really quiet. Not the best for cable management though.

As for cooling, there are really damned good air coolers out there. The best would be the DH14 but it's a little expensive and absolutely gigantic.

I'm currently using the Scythe Mugen 2. Great cooler, and much cheaper than similarly performing coolers. This one comes in at under $40.

 

[vazel]

So I've been reading this thread every day for the last three months and it has really made me want to get back into PC Gaming. The last PC I built for myself was a P4 2.8 ghz with RDRAM and a Radeon 9700 Pro, so obviously it's been a while since I've had a decent PC.

I probably won't even start looking at parts to buy until another 6 months to a year due to being away from home because of work, but I was wondering if anyone had advice in regards to cooling.

I would like to do some OC'ing on whatever I end up getting, probably air-cooling to start and maybe moving into some water-cooling if I'm not happy with the results. Obviously we don't know what will be available when I start this build, but I'm looking for suggestions for cases, coolers and fans mostly. What case has good cable management and airflow? What the best coolers and fans available now?

The Corsair H50 is a popular choice these days. It has as good cooling as the best air coolers but with the silence of water cooling. It will not perform as well as a good water cooling setup but then again those cost hundreds of dollars.

 

[DrForester]

I also like the P183 for its sleek look and the fact that it's really quiet. Not the best for cable management though.

I have the P193, which is pretty much the same case except it has the extra huge fan on the side, and I found cable management to be pretty easy. Enough room in the back if you really want it to look nice and plenty of room in main area if you just want to cram them somewhere.

 

[Diablohead]

Look at the damn size of that thing :lol

I have never seen a chip cooler that big before outside of an entire watercooling setup, daaaaaaaaaamn

 

[TheExodu5]

Look at the damn size of that thing :lol

I have never seen a chip cooler that big before outside of an entire watercooling setup, daaaaaaaaaamn

Yeah it's massive. Any decent case will fit it just fine though. Incredible cooler for the money. I doubt you can find any cooler at $40 that will compete with it.

I'm running a shitty Q8300 @ 3.0GHz, and have the fan running at 300rpm. Load temps don't go above 52C and you can't even hear the damned thing. Love it.

Only bad thing about the cooler: installing it. The mounting bracket on the back of the CPU needs to be screwed directly to the cooler, which means you need someone holding up the cooler while you screw everything in place.

Seems like it's been renamed:

Scythe SCMG-2100
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...m_re=scythe_cpu_cooler-_-35-185-142-_-Product

If you want something smaller, then the Thermalright U120 Extreme is nice:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...021&cm_re=thermalright-_-35-109-021-_-Product

Little more money though. Pretty much equal to the Scythe in terms of performance.

 

[MikeE21286]

What's the purveying thoughts on the performance from hooking up your PC to a large LED-LCD or Plasma?

I'm trying to nail down which monitor I want to buy and I'm almost of the notion that if I'm going to spend money on a 3D monitor I might as well get one that would work for my consoles as well as my bluray player.

 

[Haint]

What's the purveying thoughts on the performance from hooking up your PC to a large LED-LCD or Plasma?

I'm trying to nail down which monitor I want to buy and I'm almost of the notion that if I'm going to spend money on a 3D monitor I might as well get one that would work for my consoles as well as my bluray player.

All the present 3D Televisions cap at 720p60Hz and/or 1080p24Hz for full quality 3D due to an HDMI bottleneck. They do not support 1080p60Hz or (AFAIK) 1080p30Hz, save for half resolution implementations like side/side or top/bottom. If you're ok with those lower resolutions and frame rates in 3D, they're probably better than 3D monitors. You will require Nvidia's special software (3DTV Play) to play on a 3DTV, which isn't out yet last I checked.

 

[TheExodu5]

What's the purveying thoughts on the performance from hooking up your PC to a large LED-LCD or Plasma?

I'm trying to nail down which monitor I want to buy and I'm almost of the notion that if I'm going to spend money on a 3D monitor I might as well get one that would work for my consoles as well as my bluray player.

If you're not so set on getting a 3D TV, I highly recommend getting a cheapish LCD TV. The current Sony and LG models are really nice with low input lag as well. They'll look far better than any LCD monitor you get, barring high end IPS displays.

 

[MikeE21286]

All the present 3D Televisions cap at 720p60Hz and/or 1080p24Hz for full quality 3D due to an HDMI bottleneck. They do not support 1080p60Hz or (AFAIK) 1080p30Hz, save for half resolution implementations like side/side or top/bottom. If you're ok with those lower resolutions and frame rates in 3D, they're probably better than 3D monitors. You will require Nvidia's special software (3DTV Play) to play on a 3DTV, which isn't out yet last I checked.

Hmm...ok. After your post I was reading up on that piece of software and I had no idea of it, but you are right. I'm still kind of in the dark on why it's necessary, but if it is then it is.

I'll have to mull the whole situation over some more before I make a decision on what route I want to take in this whole endeavor.

If you're not so set on getting a 3D TV, I highly recommend getting a cheapish LCD TV. The current Sony and LG models are really nice with low input lag as well. They'll look far better than any LCD monitor you get, barring high end IPS displays.

yeah, I think that's what I have to decide for myself right now :lol

I know that I want a new monitor, and I just figured that if I was going to get one it would be 3d. Decisions Decisions....

 

[TheExodu5]

I think 3D tech just isn't mature enough. The monitors have bad crosstalk, and the TVs can't handle very high resolutions over HDMI (monitors can since they use DVI dual link).

Sorry for the crappy iPhone pic, but here's my setup. I also use it for Wii/PS3/360.

 

[Hazaro]

That's the name of it. Thanks!

And Hazaro, what voltage do you have your CPU at out of curiousity?

Edit: And you guys just do the default of an hour to test the temps?

My E7200 at 3.8Ghz:

BIOS Voltage: 1.3250V
Idle Voltage: 1.312V
Load Voltage: 1.320V / 1.312V

Temps you can get a good idea of within 10 minutes, but if you don't have the best airflow temps might slowly go up over time. Note that some worker programs stress the CPU moreso than others.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

My E7200 at 3.8Ghz:

BIOS Voltage: 1.3250V
Idle Voltage: 1.312V
Load Voltage: 1.320V / 1.312V

Temps you can get a good idea of within 10 minutes, but if you don't have the best airflow temps might slowly go up over time. Note that some worker programs stress the CPU moreso than others.

I can't get my processor over 3.2 to save my life. Did you have to up your northbridge or anything will overclocking or just your CPU voltage? I keep getting blue screens and other errors if I go above 3.2.

 

[opticalmace]

Did my first real overclock, my 3.16Ghz E8500 @ 4Ghz! The temps are low and so is Vcore (I'd have to check the number I forget exactly right now), but I don't wanna push it in fear of shortening its life.

I should have learned how to do this years ago!

 

[Corky]

pardon my birdlike brain ; but going from like 0xAA to 16xAA without a significant reduction in performance/fps is an indication that one is cpu-bottlenecked right?

 

[TheExodu5]

pardon my birdlike brain ; but when going from like 0xAA to 16xAA without a significant reduction in performance/fps is an indication that one is cpu-bottlenecked right?

That's generally the case.

 

[MikeE21286]

**pic**

Is that 27" ?

 

[Corky]

That's generally the case.

Alrighty then

 

[Curufinwe]

BJs had some good deals on Samsung monitors today like a 23 inch one for only $180 in store ($200 online).

http://shop.bjs.com/Samsung-ToC-23-...productId104338351VVcatId428440VVviewprod.htm

But if I got that, I'd need to upgrade my 8800 GTS, too, because it can struggle even with 1440 x 900 resolution.

 

[Blueblur1]

GA-X58-UD3R motherboard.

I need help setting up a Raid 0 array on my new PC. I have installed the OS on a SSD, and would like the RAID 0 array to hold my programs.

The hard drives would not shot up on their own after they were put in to Windows 7, 64 bit. They do not show up when they are put in RAID. The system did recognize the array, and installed it, when it booted up, but they still cannot be seen in my computer.

I am very new to RAID, so if someone could give some step by step instructions I would appreciate it.

I have only gone as far as put the BIOS into XHD mode, and set up the 2 drives in array, as per the Manual. Which is very confusing.

But even after installing XHD from the MB disc, it won't start up. I click it, the PC thinks about it, but does nothing.

Both of the Hard drives are identical. WD500AAKS (Western Digital 500GB drives) and set up on the first two SATA ports of the board.

Thank you.

 

[Hazaro]

I can't get my processor over 3.2 to save my life. Did you have to up your northbridge or anything will overclocking or just your CPU voltage? I keep getting blue screens and other errors if I go above 3.2.

You will probably have to bump NB voltage 1 or 2 notches as well.

Try disabling C1E or speedstep if it is still not stable.

Also some chips will just hit a road block or a FSB 'black hole'
If 400x9.5 isn't working and you have 1066 sticks... you can try 447x8.5 or something, etc.

My friend had a E7200 that would not budge past 3.0Ghz, so you might just have one that doesn't clock as high.

GA-X58-UD3R motherboard.

I need help setting up a Raid 0 array on my new PC. I have installed the OS on a SSD, and would like the RAID 0 array to hold my programs.

The hard drives would not shot up on their own after they were put in to Windows 7, 64 bit. They do not show up when they are put in RAID. The system did recognize the array, and installed it, when it booted up, but they still cannot be seen in my computer.

I am very new to RAID, so if someone could give some step by step instructions I would appreciate it.

I have only gone as far as put the BIOS into XHD mode, and set up the 2 drives in array, as per the Manual. Which is very confusing.

But even after installing XHD from the MB disc, it won't start up. I click it, the PC thinks about it, but does nothing.

Both of the Hard drives are identical. WD500AAKS (Western Digital 500GB drives) and set up on the first two SATA ports of the board.

Thank you.

No point in RAID on a desktop unless it's backup imo.

Read your motherboard manual (and google) for this kind of stuff, it should walk you through everything. Make sure your second (or both) drives are on the RAID SATA.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

You will probably have to bump NB voltage 1 or 2 notches as well.

Try disabling C1E or speedstep if it is still not stable.

Also some chips will just hit a road block or a FSB 'black hole'
If 400x9.5 isn't working and you have 1066 sticks... you can try 447x8.5 or something, etc.

My friend had a E7200 that would not budge past 3.0Ghz, so you might just have one that doesn't clock as high.

No point in RAID on a desktop unless it's backup imo.

Read your motherboard manual (and google) for this kind of stuff, it should walk you through everything. Make sure your second (or both) drives are on the RAID SATA.

Well balls. :/

 

[Combine]

Yeah, I use a RAID 0 on my current machine and it is useless. For some reason when I was purchasing this machine (5 years ago) I thought RAID was a better/faster HD. Shows what I knew, since I've never seen any difference between this and the SATA drives I used to use at work. Mine doesn't even have the backup functionality so it is more useless where if one of the drives breaks, then the whole works is screwed. I'm sort of lucky that it's lasted as long as it has. But I better get a new computer soon because I can't imagine it continuing (along with the old CPU and motherboard).

Not making this mistake again twice. Also probably won't go back to Dell either, not happy with them at all (and they put so much useless bloatware on the machine, and McAfee is such a joke). I'll try to build my own machine or have one of the local computer shops build it for me since I don't think I'd trust myself to build stuff from scratch unless I had someone to help out.

 

[Diablohead]

I decided to replace my led screen on tuesday, now that I have used it for a few days a few things which were unnoticed have appeared such as the bottom of the screen is lit brighter then the top 3rd, you can tell this by using the screen in the dark at night as I sometimes do, also that yellow tint which I originally fixed is still there in the corners, it's invisible playing games or movies but on solid colour screens it's yellow in the corners, ick!

i'm dropping down to the £20 cheaper but hopefully better regular lcd version, half an inch bigger and has more ports.

If this screen was just for games it's superb and looks lush, but it's not helping any that my mind also keeps thinking "yellow, yellow, yellow!"

 

[evil solrac v3.0]

The Razer Mamba I bought has been the biggest piece of shit mouse ever. $120 mouse, and it lasted all of 6 months. Tracking doesn't work anymore...only clicks work.

Seriously, it's been dropping connection several times, and I had to always unplug and replug it back in. Tracking would something fail. The mouse scratches on my pad because something must be protruding out of the bottom surface.

I will never buy a Razer product again. Going back to my 5 year old MX518.

edit: this is infuriating. They have no fucking technical support link on their site. It only brings you to their "knowledge base". I want a new mouse with my warranty. God damn Razer. Never again.

edit2: I found it. Support tells me to open the Razer Configuration, and low and behold, the mouse somehow works again. Wtf? I even restarted my computer and it didn't fix the issue. The mouse may be still working, but I can tell you I'm still not happy with its shoddy quality. The only reason I'm still using it over my MX518 is that I love the form factor so much.

I have one too, I never turn it off, that way you won't lose signal. I like it well enough but I do agree with the problems you listed. and the form factor is the best though.

fake edit: wait do you have the wired or wireless?

 

[coopolon]

The Razer Mamba I bought has been the biggest piece of shit mouse ever. $120 mouse, and it lasted all of 6 months. Tracking doesn't work anymore...only clicks work.

Seriously, it's been dropping connection several times, and I had to always unplug and replug it back in. Tracking would something fail. The mouse scratches on my pad because something must be protruding out of the bottom surface.

I will never buy a Razer product again. Going back to my 5 year old MX518.

edit: this is infuriating. They have no fucking technical support link on their site. It only brings you to their "knowledge base". I want a new mouse with my warranty. God damn Razer. Never again.

edit2: I found it. Support tells me to open the Razer Configuration, and low and behold, the mouse somehow works again. Wtf? I even restarted my computer and it didn't fix the issue. The mouse may be still working, but I can tell you I'm still not happy with its shoddy quality. The only reason I'm still using it over my MX518 is that I love the form factor so much.

I tried a Mamba and eventually returned it. It was a good mouse, but it did lose tracking often enough that I wasn't happy. If I'm paying $130 for a mouse, it had better be perfect, completely perfect.

 

[Minsc]

The Razer Mamba I bought has been the biggest piece of shit mouse ever. $120 mouse, and it lasted all of 6 months. Tracking doesn't work anymore...only clicks work.

Seriously, it's been dropping connection several times, and I had to always unplug and replug it back in. Tracking would something fail. The mouse scratches on my pad because something must be protruding out of the bottom surface.

I will never buy a Razer product again. Going back to my 5 year old MX518.

edit: this is infuriating. They have no fucking technical support link on their site. It only brings you to their "knowledge base". I want a new mouse with my warranty. God damn Razer. Never again.

edit2: I found it. Support tells me to open the Razer Configuration, and low and behold, the mouse somehow works again. Wtf? I even restarted my computer and it didn't fix the issue. The mouse may be still working, but I can tell you I'm still not happy with its shoddy quality. The only reason I'm still using it over my MX518 is that I love the form factor so much.

I feel a little better about my Sidewinder X8 mouse now, always sorta regretted not getting a razer, but I do rather like MS and Logitech products over all else.

 

[firehawk12]

I'm not sure if I should start a new thread or just ask here, but since this is where all the PC people are...

I have an okay gaming laptop but it's starting to act up with games (very framey, even on low settings/resolutions).

Brief specs:
Windows 7 Pro
Intel Core2 Duo T5800 2.00GHz @ 2 GHz
4GB System RAM
NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT

I was just wondering if this a case of the hardware being too slow, or could there be a problem with one of the components (dying GPU/CPU)? I haven't played games in a while, but I tried Bioshock 2 and Mass Effect 2 again and they run very sluggishly. I seem to remember them being playable when they came out, but I can't remember now. Starcraft 2 is okay except when there are hundreds of units on screen (ie, Nexus Wars). At that point, the game just grinds to a halt for me.

If the specs are okay to play modern games on low settings, what can I do to see if there's a problem with my hardware?

 

[Momar]

I currently have 2 8800GT's SLI'd together and am looking for a single-slot solution to upgrade. Haven't kept up with the latest hardware the past few years, what's good? Here are my priorities:

- Single-slot (as previously mentioned)
- Decent enough stock cooling that I don't need to shell out an extra $30 for a Zalman
- My mobo supports PCIe x 16, so nothing that requires anything beyond that (should it exist?)
- Obviously, at least as good of performance as my existing 2 cards (this should be the relatively easy, though)

Thanks GAF.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

I currently have 2 8800GT's SLI'd together and am looking for a single-slot solution to upgrade. Haven't kept up with the latest hardware the past few years, what's good? Here are my priorities:

- Single-slot (as previously mentioned)
- Decent enough stock cooling that I don't need to shell out an extra $30 for a Zalman
- My mobo supports PCIe x 16, so nothing that requires anything beyond that (should it exist?)
- Obviously, at least as good of performance as my existing 2 cards (this should be the relatively easy, though)

Thanks GAF.

GTX 470 probably but you have to give us of how you're gaming/want to game. What are your other specs, what resolution do you game at, etc...

 

[Momar]

GTX 470 probably but you have to give us of how you're gaming/want to game. What are your other specs, what resolution do you game at, etc...

Right, sorry about that. Resolution is 1920x1200, play just about any popular AAA PC game there is, primarily FPS, also SC2 more recently. I'm not constantly gaming on my PC, but when a new game comes out, I like to be able to play it on maximum settings, or close to. Obviously, a lot of what I'm saying is hand-wavy and game-dependent, but hopefully you get the general idea.

Other specs include a C2D e8400 (technically, a xeon e3110) 3GHz, not OC'd, 2GB DDR2 RAM (forgot the exact specs on these, but CPUz says they're running at 533.3 MHz), all on an eVGA 780i SLi ATX board.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

Right, sorry about that. Resolution is 1920x1200, play just about any popular AAA PC game there is, primarily FPS, also SC2 more recently. I'm not constantly gaming on my PC, but when a new game comes out, I like to be able to play it on maximum settings, or close to. Obviously, a lot of what I'm saying is hand-wavy and game-dependent, but hopefully you get the general idea.

Other specs include a C2D e8400 (technically, a xeon e3110) 3GHz, not OC'd, 2GB DDR2 RAM (forgot the exact specs on these, but CPUz says they're running at 533.3 MHz), all on an eVGA 780i SLi ATX board.

Is there a limit you want to spend? GTX 470 will give you nice performance at 1920x1080 but depends on the game for maxing with high FPS. There's also the GTX 480 but that's a considerable leap in price. Probably close to what you spent on your two 8800GTs originally though.

 

[Momar]

Is there a limit you want to spend? GTX 470 will give you nice performance at 1920x1080 but depends on the game for maxing with high FPS. There's also the GTX 480 but that's a considerable leap in price. Probably close to what you spent on your two 8800GTs originally though.

I should clarify that I spent considerably less than retail on my 8800GTs

Sorry for not giving a price point, obviously that's quite important. I wanted to get an idea of what the top units were first, then figure out which price was best. I can tell you the 480 is pretty far out of my price range; I'd heard the GTX 460 was the new value king. Is one GTX 460 still not enough to beat out 2x8800GTs?

 

[Spiderjericho]

Did you connect both the 4/8 pin CPU power connection and the 20/24 pin power connection into the motherboard? When it fails to POST do you get error beeps? Check the pattern of these beeps to the motherboard manual, it will have different beeps for different errors.

No beeps sadly. Thing just does not power on whatsoever. I can see the sound card and graphics card momentarily light up. Then nothing. Maybe the mother board or power supply is bad. I don't have any spare parts lying around.

I have a Gigabyte motherboard and I still have about 7 months on the motherboard.

If it's the power supply, I don't care. I hate it. I have the 750w PC and Cooling power supply. I'm not sure why I bought it. I didn't try to figure out the wattage requirements of my components (just a QQ6600, GTX 8800GT, Xifi, 2GB ram and 750GB HD at the time).

I think I'm going to replace it (if it's the culprit) with a corsair 650w.

I really just want to get it operational so I can use it to study Cisco, VMware and Microsoft certifications.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

I should clarify that I spent considerably less than retail on my 8800GTs

Sorry for not giving a price point, obviously that's quite important. I wanted to get an idea of what the top units were first, then figure out which price was best. I can tell you the 480 is pretty far out of my price range; I'd heard the GTX 460 was the new value king. Is one GTX 460 still not enough to beat out 2x8800GTs?

It can probably outperform or at least come close, plus if you get a decent one you can overclock usually to around the stock performance of a 470. It's not going to max out all games at 1080p but your 8800s weren't doing that anyhow.

 

[thinklong]

Hey guys... been browsing for a while.
I'm trying to put together a new PC, primarily for Photoshop/After Effects use. I'd also like to be able to do some gaming, but its not the main priority.
I based this off another build I saw, and was hoping for some guidance on how to make it better or if its okay as is. Im a complete beginner at this so forgive any stupid mistakes! thanks

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

Hey guys... been browsing for a while.
I'm trying to put together a new PC, primarily for Photoshop/After Effects use. I'd also like to be able to do some gaming, but its not the main priority.
I based this off another build I saw, and was hoping for some guidance on how to make it better or if its okay as is. Im a complete beginner at this so forgive any stupid mistakes! thanks

Get a 470 over a 5850.

 

[brain_stew]

Don't get a BFG PSU, the company is about to go bust and is refusing warranty claims.

 

[·feist·]

Zotac prepares AMP! Edition GTX 460

http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=25984

NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 460 hasn't been out that long and we've already seen a whole raft of factory overclocked models pushing the frequencies way above the stock 675MHz.

Today it's Zotac's turn to join in on the action with its latest AMP! Edition card. This new GTX 460 isn't the fastest we've seen, but it isn't too far off.

The card will come with a core frequency of 810MHz and 1,620MHz for the 336 shaders - a 20% increase over reference speeds - and a full 1GB frame buffer clocked at an effective 4,000MHz. Practically identical, then, to the recently-reviewed KFA2 LTD OC edition.

Similar to the company's standard-clocked GTX 460s - including one we reviewed back in July - the card comes with a custom back-plate.

And, instead of the standard two DVI and one mini-HDMI outputs, Zotac's card also sports a full-sized HDMI-port and a standard DisplayPort. These sit either side of a DVI connector, resulting in the second DVI output being positioned in the middle of the card's rear exhaust vent.

The fan on this new card looks, at first glance, to be quite similar to NVIDIA's reference cooler. However, Zotac claims that this is a new design that can drastically reduce temperatures while keeping noise levels low.

Continuing the recent resurgence of including games with video cards, the AMP! Edition model comes with a copy of Ubisoft's recent Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands.

We have no idea as to pricing or availability just yet, but expect this card to join the fray in the coming weeks.

 

[brain_stew]

Nice, Zotac have sure put out some nice cards recently. They're a really innovative company, their fully featured M-ITX baords caused a mini revolution and they look to be stepping up their game in the GPU market as well.