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"I need a new PC!" 2010 Edition

nodle said:
Just ordered!

b3ANT.jpg


I can't wait. Should be a nice upgrade from my 260.:D
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Hey dude! Saw you on HardForum. I'm the one that suggested the 6870. :P
 
Looking to buy my girlfriend a gaming computer, since her laptop just went up in smoke-

I'd like to keep it around $600

Tentative build-
Radeon HD 6850 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 -$180
500GB-1TB HDD~ $80
DVD Drive~ $20
MSI 870-G45 AM3 AMD 770 ATX AMD Motherboard - $65
AMD Athlon II X4 640 Propus 3.0GHz Quad - $100
COOLER MASTER Elite RC-310 - $40
OCZ ModXStream Pro OCZ600MXSP 600W ATX12V V2.2 / EPS12V SLI - $75
CORSAIR XMS3 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) ~ $70

That's $630 there. She's in college so she can probably snag Windows 7 on the cheap. Any suggestions/compatibility issues?
 
BuddhaRockstar said:
Looking to buy my girlfriend a gaming computer, since her laptop just went up in smoke-

I'd like to keep it around $600

Tentative build-
Radeon HD 6850 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 -$180
500GB-1TB HDD~ $80
DVD Drive~ $20
MSI 870-G45 AM3 AMD 770 ATX AMD Motherboard - $65
AMD Athlon II X4 640 Propus 3.0GHz Quad - $100
COOLER MASTER Elite RC-310 - $40
OCZ ModXStream Pro OCZ600MXSP 600W ATX12V V2.2 / EPS12V SLI - $75
CORSAIR XMS3 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) ~ $70

That's $630 there. She's in college so she can probably snag Windows 7 on the cheap. Any suggestions/compatibility issues?
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Looks fine to me. With a combo and rebate you can squeeze a better mobo in there.
___
Updated for Q4 2010 (Pre-Sandy Bride / AM3+)

1)Basic Desktop Questions
Budget: Price Range + Country
Main Use: Light Gaming, Gaming, Video editing, 3D work, general usage (Word, Web, 1080p playback)
Monitor Resolution: What resolution will you be looking to play your games at? Are you going to upgrade later?
List SPECIFIC games that you MUST be able to play: Self Explanatory

2)General Guide on what to buy
$500-$600 Budget build: http://imgur.com/gdc1C.png
1k build: To be updated

3)15 minute video how-to
http://vimeo.com/5685229
40 minute how-to
http://www.tested.com/news/video-how-to-build-the-best-1500-gaming-pc-step-by-step/152/

4)Prospective laptop buyers please fill this out and ask their forum as well.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/wha...ould-i-buy-form-must-read-before-posting.html

gdc1C.png
 
Here's a bone for the Green Team:

http://www.chiphell.com/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=132801&extra=page=1

Again, from our trusted bothan Napoleon.

GTX 580 coming this November guarenteed, 20% more powerful than the GTX 480 yet uses 20% less power (?!)
GTX 570 coming later (December/Jan.???), equivalent to current GTX 480
GTX 560 (yes, thats right), next March, aimed against the 6800 series ( a bit late isn't it?)


I am unsure if these cards are merely a yearly refresh/rebadge shenanigans again, or the actual Kepler models Nvidia has been pitching....

Since there's no speculation thread for these cards, I'm posting it here.
 
Anyone have any suggestions on a sound card for an older PC? The onboard audio is starting to crap out with distortions, gaps, and just all around shitty quality on any media file I try to play now. I haven't looked at sound cards in years considering how onboard audio on motherboards works pretty fine. I don't need anything fancy, just something with 5.1 that I can plug in to my shitty logitech speakers and it needs to be a small PCI as this is a Pentium 4-era dell
 
Ok, so i'm considering popping down to my local PC store and picking up the following machine

AMD Phenom ll x6 1055T 2.8Ghz 9MB cache
2gb DDR3/1333 RAM
250gb 7200RPM Hard Drive
20x Dual Layer DVD Rewriter
6 x USB 2.0 Ports
Radeon HD4350 512mb Graphics
7.1 Audio support
Lan Port
16x PCI Express slot

for the sum of £429

What i want from my machine is to run TF2 at max settings @60FPS, and would like to know :

1 would it cost a lot to upgrade the machine to get the required performance, i'm willing to upgrade but not until next year, so i'm willing to get by at a lesser level until then

2 what kind of performance could i expect from the above config?

3 Is it worth the asking price?

I'm not really very knowledgeble about all this stuff, so apologies in advance :-)
 
Dandare4444 said:
Ok, so i'm considering popping down to my local PC store and picking up the following machine

AMD Phenom ll x6 1055T 2.8Ghz 9MB cache
2gb DDR3/1333 RAM
250gb 7200RPM Hard Drive
20x Dual Layer DVD Rewriter
6 x USB 2.0 Ports
Radeon HD4350 512mb Graphics
7.1 Audio support
Lan Port
16x PCI Express slot

for the sum of £429

What i want from my machine is to run TF2 at max settings @60FPS, and would like to know :

1 would it cost a lot to upgrade the machine to get the required performance, i'm willing to upgrade but not until next year, so i'm willing to get by at a lesser level until then

2 what kind of performance could i expect from the above config?

3 Is it worth the asking price?

I'm not really very knowledgeble about all this stuff, so apologies in advance :-)
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Im not sure that 3d card would be upto the job! TF2 seems to be a resource hog ;) i think i struggle with a gtx 260 OC'd.

1. No to much you can get a 260 off ebay for £60 maybe £70.

2. dont know around 30fps i would think. on max

3. asking price seems ok . try building your own on ebuyer.com or another site.
 
Thanks for the advice, i took the plunge and got a extra 2GB of RAM and upgraded to a gt240, i'm going to splash out on a better gfx card some more memory next year.
 
Dandare4444 said:
Thanks for the advice, i took the plunge and got a extra 2GB of RAM and upgraded to a gt240, i'm going to splash out on a better gfx card some more memory next year.
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If you're going to buy a better GPU next month, don't waste money on the GT 240.
 
didn't realize that i needed a 6 pin pci express power cable.

my corsair modular PSU came with them but i can't find them.

does best buy, staples, etc have them?
 
DeathNote said:
didn't realize that i needed a 6 pin pci express power cable.

my corsair modular PSU came with them but i can't find them.

does best buy, staples, etc have them?
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What corsair model do you have? My modular corsair psu(850HX) has 2 6/8pins with the 24pin connected w/out counting the modular cables.
 
Outdoor Miner said:
I didn't want to make a new thread on such a small question so I ask here- Are there any good headsets out there that work well for both PC and 360?
Click to expand...
If you had a wired 360 controller, you can just use that with a 360 headset, pc will see it as a usb one. I mean for communication its great quality, sucks for playing music and game sounds through
 
Well, I finally ordered 90% of my build today. I took advantage of Newegg's Halloween special.

Intel Core i5-760
CORSAIR CMPSU-750TX 750W
Western Digital Caviar Black 640GB
COOLER MASTER Storm Scout
Cooler Master RR-B10-212P-G1 Hyper 212 Plus
ASRock P55 DELUXE3 LGA 1156 Intel P55 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
CORSAIR XMS3 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM

The one thing I'm missing is the video card. I want an Asus AMD 6870, but am not having much luck.

I had toyed with getting an SSD to boot off of, but my build was already getting a bit outside my comfort level in price.

Also, I need to find a good keyboard/mouse combo that is flexible, and can work either wired or wirelessly. And, the keyboard has to be a shorty, with no num pad. Any suggestions?
 
The max temp for my 4870 is rated at 104. I don't even start to get worried until I get over 90. My cooler is weird in that under full load I'll only go up to about 10 degrees to 73ish with a mere 10% fan speed increase. My laptop however can definitely get up near 90. You can always search what your gear is rated for, I find it easier to find max temps for CPUs than GPUs though.

9600 GSO: Maximum GPU Temperature (in C) 105 C
 
Shambles said:
The max temp for my 4870 is rated at 104. I don't even start to get worried until I get over 90. My cooler is weird in that under full load I'll only go up to about 10 degrees to 73ish with a mere 10% fan speed increase. My laptop however can definitely get up near 90. You can always search what your gear is rated for, I find it easier to find max temps for CPUs than GPUs though.

9600 GSO: Maximum GPU Temperature (in C) 105 C
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Awesome. I have a weird version tho. Evga 384mb. I suppose it's the same?
 
I created the PC hardware and tech. discussion thread for a reason. :/

Please don't make huge posts about upcoming parts here, it only gets in the way.
 
DeathNote said:
Nice. I was used to my zalman keeping my old card at 49c.

I'm only running a 9600 GSO.

Edit: turned settings up. I hope 65-75c is ok on it.
Click to expand...

Modern GPUs are specified to run at temperatures in excess of 100C. Its fine.
 
Azzurri said:
Hey guys. Well it's that time again; build a new PC.

Anyways, I have pretty much know what I want but I'm stuck on the VC.

Right now I'm running a ATi 4870x2 and I would like a big upgrade. I was thinking buying two GTX 470's, or waiting on the new GTX 580 or the 69XX series?

Suggestions?
Click to expand...

Anyone help me with this?
 
Is there good free software that lets me clone my 1gig hard drive directly to another?

all these programs I'm looking at require me to pay, create an image and restore, or only work for windows 7 32. All I need to do is take everything from one hard drive and put it on another.
 
Linkzg said:
Is there good free software that lets me clone my 1gig hard drive directly to another?

all these programs I'm looking at require me to pay, create an image and restore, or only work for windows 7 32. All I need to do is take everything from one hard drive and put it on another.
Click to expand...

www.partedmagic.com You can gift me something awesome from Steam later as a thank you. ( :lol )

In other news, my new gaming rig is now put together and running. Guild Wars and LotRO are installing as I type this. Everything came together wonderfully. I used Hazaro's $500 build suggestion except that I bought the Radeon HD 6850. I also bought a 6ft. hdmi cable to hook it up to my Vizio 42" and I'm glad I did. I bought XFX's 6850 (only one in stock on Newegg) and while the card is doing great thus far, it didn't come with anything but the card itself and an install cd. Keep that in mind if anyone else buys the XFX 6850, you don't get any cables or DVI adapters.

I'll post back later with impressions and screenshots.
 
Clevinger said:
How important is it to go with memory on the motherboard's QVL (qualified vendor list)?
Click to expand...


I used to have a small PC repair/oem business. I always went with the manufacturer recommended list if possible. At that time, I had very little compatibility problems with Crucial or Kingston memory. I didn't build them for OC'ing though, so that's another issue maybe. I'm sure others have more to offer here as I'm not familiar with all of the other reputable the brands on the market now.
 
I just pulled (the rest of the) trigger on my PC. I already have the processor, the CPU cooler, the case and the 6870 here at home as I ordered them in advance of the other parts, but I just finished my order. I think I read enough of this thread to know I picked some decent stuff but Ill ask anyway before it all gets here around Monday (so I can refuse the delivery if I have fucked up, get a refund and start over :lol )

VbLVg.jpg

eX4gX.jpg


The Apevia cable listed at the top there is just an 9.25 inch 8 pin Motherboard extension cable, Ive seen reviews for the corsair power supply saying the 8pin isn't long enough to route around the back of a motherboard tray on a large case and make it to the 8pin on the mobo without an extension. So I got one, and some non conductive thermal paste since its my first build and I don't want to ruin anything.

And that price is not right, that's just what the price was before I added all the coupon codes, linked the items through the Newegg combos and stuff. I actually only paid 1737.24 for the build. I would appreciate any input at all, Id like to get this right the first time. Cant wait to play some SC2 with some decent settings.
 
I know everyone here hates apple and alienware but I was wondering what GAF thinks about Falcon Northwest? Are they just overpriced or are their PC's well worth the money? I was thinking of getting a falcon talon.
 
Puncture said:
build
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Looks good man, it's remarkably similar to my soon-to-be finished product. Only differences I have are the case, ram, monitor, psu, and thermal paste, and even here all of these differences are minor. I'm just holding up on BF for some (unlikely) price drops, and for the next-gen SSDs to come by and possibly replace the c300.
 
gotee12 said:
www.partedmagic.com You can gift me something awesome from Steam later as a thank you. ( :lol )

In other news, my new gaming rig is now put together and running. Guild Wars and LotRO are installing as I type this. Everything came together wonderfully. I used Hazaro's $500 build suggestion except that I bought the Radeon HD 6850. I also bought a 6ft. hdmi cable to hook it up to my Vizio 42" and I'm glad I did. I bought XFX's 6850 (only one in stock on Newegg) and while the card is doing great thus far, it didn't come with anything but the card itself and an install cd. Keep that in mind if anyone else buys the XFX 6850, you don't get any cables or DVI adapters.

I'll post back later with impressions and screenshots.
Click to expand...
Excellent. Please take pictures of the case/interior and if possible get idle and load temps (using Prime95 after 10 minutes). I'm interested in how much possible OC headroom there is on a stock cooler. :D
Puncture said:
I just pulled (the rest of the) trigger on my PC.
Click to expand...
Well that rig is going to just fly. That C300 is a beast when it comes to read speed.
Didn't know SATA 6/ USB 3 x58 boards were down to $230.
Anticitizen One said:
I know everyone here hates apple and alienware but I was wondering what GAF thinks about Falcon Northwest? Are they just overpriced or are their PC's well worth the money? I was thinking of getting a falcon talon.
Click to expand...
Depends what you are looking for in regards to service, quality, price, etc.

I wouldn't tell you to restrict your purchase (especially if its a 'boutique' buy) to some place like Falcon NW, Maingear, or any of the higher end places.

Good deals usually will pop up if you check Slick Deals/Fat Wallet and they can give you an idea of what you want. In most cases buying and piecing it together is the best option for price and quality. Most parts you buy will have solid warranties on them and you have the knowledge and experience of building it yourself.

1)Basic Desktop Questions
Budget: Price Range + Country
Main Use: Light Gaming, Gaming, Video editing, 3D work, general usage (Word, Web, 1080p playback)
Monitor Resolution: What resolution will you be looking to play your games at? Are you going to upgrade later?
List SPECIFIC games that you MUST be able to play: Self Explanatory
 
Well, my machine is about to celebrate its first birthday soon. This is the first time I've purchased new hardware, and it is still nearly top of the line after a full year. Things must be slowing down a bit in the hardware world.

i7 920 @4GHz
6GB DDR3
Sapphire Radeon 5850

It looks like I'm going to get a solid few years out of this rig, with a strong upgrade path potential. :D
 
pestul said:
Well, my machine is about to celebrate its first birthday soon. This is the first time I've purchased new hardware, and it is still nearly top of the line after a full year. Things must be slowing down a bit in the hardware world.

i7 920 @4GHz
6GB DDR3
Sapphire Radeon 5850

It looks like I'm going to get a solid few years out of this rig, with a strong upgrade path potential. :D
Click to expand...


Curious as to what CPU cooling solution you're using.

Also made a bit of a impulse buy and ordered up an Acer GD235HZ and an Nvidia 3dVision kit.
 
I was taking a look at Hazaro's build and I was wondering if it would be suitable if not better to replace the athlon II x4 640 with a phenom II x2 555 to save some money.

I hear the 555 is a beastly chip and has the potential to unlock an additional 2 cores, but even if it doesn't unlock any cores, would it still be on par with the 640?
 
theshizzle said:
I was taking a look at Hazaro's build and I was wondering if it would be suitable if not better to replace the athlon II x4 640 with a phenom II x2 555 to save some money.

I hear the 555 is a beastly chip and has the potential to unlock an additional 2 cores, but even if it doesn't unlock any cores, would it still be on par with the 640?
Click to expand...

Even with the L3 cash a dual core Phenom will often perform poorly against a quad core Athlon. I really can't recommend anything lower than a quad core for any price range anymore as it accomplishes so much more now that software is taking advantage of the extra cores. Using the ACC unlock is fairly risky as even if they unlock you'll probably get very poor overclocking if you're looking to do that. If you want to go that route I'd suggest getting a Phenom II X3 instead. Costs more but even if the unlock fails you still at least have a triple core. Back when the Athlon II X4 620 came out you could even unlock the L3 cache on it turning into a Phenom II. Those are pretty rare now though and the newer models since then don't even have L3 on the chip anymore.
 
Looking to put together a PC for my mom for xmas.

Looking at around 5-600USD.

It's mostly for email and internet. All around I'd like it to be fast and quiet.

Here's what I'm looking at

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811154087

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157190

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820211485

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820211188

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827135204

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820223103

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116754


What would be a good CPU and video card for this? I imagine the video card doesn't need to be anything special at all. For CPU, at first I had an i5 750, but it seemed like overkill for something like this (and demolished my budget :lol). AMD cpu is a possibility.
 
Don't know if I'm getting the best out of my XFX Radeon HD 6870.
I've installed the latest amd catalyst drivers (10.10c I believe) and performance is great in some games and not so much in others like Metal of Honor. I keep getting white flickering/texture lines around vehicles, and pretty crappy framerate. My hdmi hasn't come in yet so I'm running it to my 1280x1024 dvi monitor. I tried turning AA off, medium quality but still getting some weird ass texture glitches. No other game/bench I've tested it with has done this so I'm thinking it might be the game right? Freaking Metro 2033, Crysis and warhead run way better than this on my rig right now...
Also, does Force Unleashed 2 run like complete ass on your rigs as well? Feels like its running in slow-motion...ugh.

Help would be greatly appreciated, thanks.
 
Kaako said:
Don't know if I'm getting the best out of my XFX Radeon HD 6870.
I've installed the latest amd catalyst drivers (10.10c I believe) and performance is great in some games and not so much in others like Metal of Honor. I keep getting white flickering/texture lines around vehicles, and pretty crappy framerate. My hdmi hasn't come in yet so I'm running it to my 1280x1024 dvi monitor. I tried turning AA off, medium quality but still getting some weird ass texture glitches. No other game/bench I've tested it with has done this so I'm thinking it might be the game right? Freaking Metro 2033, Crysis and warhead run way better than this on my rig right now...
Also, does Force Unleashed 2 run like complete ass on your rigs as well? Feels like its running in slow-motion...ugh.

Help would be greatly appreciated, thanks.
Click to expand...

Check the Medal of Honor thread to see if its just a really bad PC port. Doesn't surprise me on TFU2 seeing as it's once again capped at 30fps and no v-sync.
 
Jin34 said:
Check the Medal of Honor thread to see if its just a really bad PC port. Doesn't surprise me on TFU2 seeing as it's once again capped at 30fps and no v-sync.
Click to expand...
Ah I see. The TFU2 one I kinda figured but regarding MoH, I saw a youtube vid of some guy running it on the same card but it seemed smoother so I thought maybe I fucked up something. I'm reading/searching through a bunch of other forums right now as well to pinpoint the problem but since the cards are fairly new, there's not a whole bunch of materials to read up on regarding this issue.
 
Hey guys. What kind of a system would I need to run GTAIV with the high res texture mods that make it look REAL? I currently have a pentium dual core 2160 oc'ed to 2.9ghz, 2gb ddr2 ram, and a 8800gt. It runs alright, but stutters a lot, and there a LOT of pop in.
Thanks.
 
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