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[EternalGamer]

That may be so, but: -


http://www.microsoft.com/oem/en/licensing/sblicensing/pages/licensing_faq.aspx#fbid=NOKgNRr1eA9?faq1

Yeah that's what they tell you. I've pretty sure I've done it, though. Just use magic jelly bean to find the Windows key and he should be good. Sometimes those keys that are stored in the system and the ones that come with discs are different for whatever reason.

Anyway hopefully that stuff will be cleared up on a legal end soon. The EU courst sytem just ruled on something like this didn't? It concluded that consumers OWN the license to software and therefore can transfer it or even sell it to another person.

 

[MMBosstones86]

hey GAF! Account just got verified and I just wanted to thank everyone for the advice in this thread. Built my first computer a little over a month ago and couldn't be happier. 4 hours from parts to desktop.

CPU running a little hot now, next purchase will be a 212+ for sure.

Getting P634? right now in 3DMark11 after OC'ing the GPU.


Case Cooler Master Elite 430 RC-430-KWN1 ($35)
MoBo ASUS P8Z68-V LX ($118)
CPU Intel i5-2500k ($199.99)
RAM CORSAIR Vengeance 8GB DDR3 1600 ($39)
GPU EVGA 560 ti 448 Classified Ultra ($239)
PS SeaSonic S12II 620 Bronze 620W ($60)
OS HD Crucial M4 64GB ($65)
HDD WD Caviar Black 1 TB SATA III 7200 RPM 64 MB ($100)
Monitor Acer G245HQABD 23.6" LCD ($119)
OS Windows 7 Professional Upgrade ($65)
Fans 3 x Cougar Vortex (12cm) ($36) + 1 CM (stock 12cm)
TOTAL : $1075

Thanks again guys! Couldn't have done it with this thread.

 

[GoingGreen]

Right now i'm rocking onboard video on the Ivy Bridge i7. What video card you guys recommend for a high midrange?

 

[mkenyon]

That may be so, but: -


http://www.microsoft.com/oem/en/licensing/sblicensing/pages/licensing_faq.aspx#fbid=NOKgNRr1eA9?faq1

Yeah, doesn't matter. Microsoft cares so very little about consumer licenses.

 

[Arsin]

So looking into some of the 670s on the market, I am not really sure which one to get. Seems like the two best ones i have seen so far are the EVGA 670 FTW version and the GIGABYTE Windforce version. Is there a consensus on which 670 is the best card to get?

 

[Flunkie]

So looking into some of the 670s on the market, I am not really sure which one to get. Seems like the two best ones i have seen so far are the EVGA 670 FTW version and the GIGABYTE Windforce version. Is there a consensus on which 670 is the best card to get?

I recently struggled with this as well. I had convinced myself on the Gigabyte, but when the day came for me to order and the Gigabyte went out of stock and then came back into stock at a higher price than what I was planning, so I switched my order and ended up going EVGA FTW.

 

[Ceebs]

So looking into some of the 670s on the market, I am not really sure which one to get. Seems like the two best ones i have seen so far are the EVGA 670 FTW version and the GIGABYTE Windforce version. Is there a consensus on which 670 is the best card to get?

I have had zero problems with my Asus DC2 Top. It's dead silent.

 

[Sutton Dagger]

I've actually done it, I've built my first computer

So I'm do some stress tests now and all my cores are below 60 (max 57) with 100% load. Seems like I have some room for overclocking right? Also how can I control my fan speeds without going into bios?

 

[extremepabs]

I have got a small problem on my new build for some reason when playing a game my game keeps minimizing to the start bar everything 30 seconds or so. I had a little look on the net and it seems that something else is requsting "Focus" and that a major culprit of this is AVG antivirus, however I do not use AVG and I have tried closing all other applications apart from Steam but still get the same problem. the games are not crashing the are just minizing so I can restart them by clicking in the task bar.

If it helps I use Mcafee as my antivirus

Has anyone else had an issue like that?

 

[Keylime]

Just dropping in to say that I greatly appreciated this thread when I decided I was going to build my gaming PC for ~$1K...I pretty much verbatim built the "Excellent" tier system in the OP.

2500K
8GB RAM
GTX670 1.2GB
120GB SSD
775W

...run Diablo 3 like a boss (which is all I really wanted).

Haven't built a PC in roughly 7 years but it was just as simple as I remember it being back then. Everything is still keyed so you pretty much can't mess it up which is awesome.

Got all the parts at a local Micro Center which actually rivaled the prices of Amazon/Newegg really well. CPU was cheaper by a good margin...GPU was more expensive by a bit...but everything else was right about on.

Thanks again!

 

[Lanbeast]

Amazon has these SSDs as their daily deal today:

Kingston SSDs

120gb - $245 $79.99
240gb - $479 $169.99
480gb - $970 $553.72

 

[gutterboy44]

So looking into some of the 670s on the market, I am not really sure which one to get. Seems like the two best ones i have seen so far are the EVGA 670 FTW version and the GIGABYTE Windforce version. Is there a consensus on which 670 is the best card to get?

My Gigabyte windforce 670 should be arriving today. I was torn between that and the Asus DC2 Top but the Asus has been out of stock for a while and was more expensive.

HDDs,SSD,CPU,GPU and heatsink/fan arrive today. My build will be complete! Better than Christmas.

Edit: Dawwww, the UPS shipping is now showing the GPU arriving Tuesday. Oh well, one more day, i'll live.

 

[TheExodu5]

Asus DCII or Gigabyte Windforce.

Better coolers -> quieter operation -> cooler operation -> better speeds and overclocking

 

[SniperHunter]

Hey guys so the fan on top of my GPU heatsink broke! I tried cleaning it but it just didn't budge at all. So I attached a normal cooling fan (I just wedged it into the heatsink). But the thing is, the idle GPU temp is 50-60 Celsius and if I play BF3 the temp rises to 90+

I don't have any money to buy a new fan...I will just buy a 7970 once I get a job. 5850 was getting old anyway. I should be ok right?

 

[cametall]

Amazon has these SSDs as their daily deal today:

Kingston SSDs

120gb - $245 $79.99
240gb - $479 $169.99
480gb - $970 $553.72

Newegg has the Samsung 830 128gb for $89.99 with coupon code EMCYTZT1880 plus free shipping, or $3 3 day shipping.

I'd jump on it myself if I hadn't already ordered a Crucial M4 from Buy.com.

 

[saltinekracka]

Newegg has the Samsung 830 128gb for $89.99 with coupon code EMCYTZT1880 plus free shipping, or $3 3 day shipping.

I'd jump on it myself if I hadn't already ordered a Crucial M4 from Buy.com.

Was just coming to post that deal. Bought!

 

[hey_it's_that_dog]

I just realized I ordered an i5 3570 instead of a 3570K. I was never planning to overclock anyway, so is there any functional difference between the two CPUs (aside from allowing overclocking) that I should care about?

 

[Sethos]

I just realized I ordered an i5 3570 instead of a 3570K. I was never planning to overclock anyway, so is there any functional difference between the two CPUs (aside from allowing overclocking) that I should care about?

Girls will be less attracted to you with a non-K model

 

[hey_it's_that_dog]

Girls will be less attracted to you with a non-K model

I'm building my own computer so I don't think girls could be less attracted to me.

 

[kennah]

I just realized I ordered an i5 3570 instead of a 3570K. I was never planning to overclock anyway, so is there any functional difference between the two CPUs (aside from allowing overclocking) that I should care about?

http://ark.intel.com/products/65702/Intel-Core-i5-3570-Processor-(6M-Cache-3_40-GHz)

Biggest difference is it has the Intel HD 2500 graphics instead of the Intel HD 4000.

http://ark.intel.com/compare/65520,65702

Intel Comparison site.

 

[hey_it's_that_dog]

http://ark.intel.com/products/65702/Intel-Core-i5-3570-Processor-(6M-Cache-3_40-GHz)

Biggest difference is it has the Intel HD 2500 graphics instead of the Intel HD 4000.

http://ark.intel.com/compare/65520,65702

Intel Comparison site.

Thanks, looks like it will be fine. And I saved $30.

 

[Keylime]

I'm assuming that there's little reason for me to overlock my system if I'm getting the performance I need to run the game I'm playing well, right?

With my 2500K and GTX570, I seem to be running Diablo 3 at max settings at 60 fps (FPS counter is busted with 1.0.3 apparently, so I can't tell for sure, but it looks butter to my well trained eyes).

Looks like the overclocking guide in the OP starts talking about buying new components to overclock which immediately makes me "meh? to the idea. My powersupply is from DiabloTek which I'm assuming isn't a great brand (it had the best price/watt ratio and seemed decent)...and I'm just using the stock heat sink that came with my processor...so I'm thinking that I could only do some modest overclocking in the system I've got now without opening up the case again.

But either way, it sounds like something I won't be doing until further down the road as a stop-gap to buying new components as long as the games I play are running well.

 

[hypernima]

Was just coming to post that deal. Bought!

I can't find it. linkage?

nvmd found it, had the wrong one

 

[mkenyon]

It will boot tonight!

(paper towels in second pic made lighting impossible)

 

[EternalGamer]

I'm assuming that there's little reason for me to overlock my system if I'm getting the performance I need to run the game I'm playing well, right?

With my 2500K and GTX570, I seem to be running Diablo 3 at max settings at 60 fps (FPS counter is busted with 1.0.3 apparently, so I can't tell for sure, but it looks butter to my well trained eyes).

Looks like the overclocking guide in the OP starts talking about buying new components to overclock which immediately makes me "meh? to the idea. My powersupply is from DiabloTek which I'm assuming isn't a great brand (it had the best price/watt ratio and seemed decent)...and I'm just using the stock heat sink that came with my processor...so I'm thinking that I could only do some modest overclocking in the system I've got now without opening up the case again.

But either way, it sounds like something I won't be doing until further down the road as a stop-gap to buying new components as long as the games I play are running well.

You probably don't want to overclock until you need to since it may cause more wear and tear on your system.

And yeah, a 2500k and 570 is completely overkill for a game like Diablo. In fact, it will probably be overkill for 90% of the games on the market. It will probably be at least a year before that system starts being challenged by even high graphics settings in most games.

 

[mkenyon]

You probably don't want to overclock until you need to since it may cause more wear and tear on your system.

And yeah, a 2500k and 570 is completely overkill for a game like Diablo. In fact, it will probably be overkill for 90% of the games on the market. It will probably be at least a year before that system starts being challenged by even high graphics settings in most games.

Hyperbole. Most UE3 games as well as any single threaded beasts need 4.0+ Ghz to run at 60+ FPS with decent settings.

Need to OC it. $30 heatsink and you're on your way.

Not sure if posted yet, but:

128GB Samsung 830 for $90 with Promo Code EMCYTZT1880

 

[EternalGamer]

Hyperbole. Most UE3 games as well as any single threaded beasts need 4.0+ Ghz to run at 60+ FPS with decent settings.

Need to OC it. $30 heatsink and you're on your way.

I don't know what you consider "decent" settings. I have a Lynfield i7 920 and 2 Radeon 6860s, a system weaker than his, and even I can run everything I've tried at max settings at 1080p with solid framerates. And I did say 90%. Yeah there are Battlefield 3s out there, but they are not that common.

Enthusiasts often over estimate the power needed. I have half dozen friends still running old dual cores and 5000 series Radeon cards and they can still run almost everything we play multi-player at medium settings.

 

[abunai]

Jumping on the GTX 670 discussion from earlier, if I can get a Gigabyte 670 for £300 or an ASUS 670 (non-TOP) for £320, which would I go for? I heard the Gigabyte has coil whine and when overclocked the ASUS is really unstable. I'm going to assume there's some Internet hyperbole being thrown about but what is your opinion? Thanks.

 

[gutterboy44]

Oh man, this Noctua NH-D14 is massive! I knew it was going to be a beast but holy hell it is a hefty fucker. Well, it is supposed to be very quite with great cooling. Can't wait to install it tonight.

 

[mkenyon]

I don't know what you consider "decent" settings. I have a Lynfield i7 920 and 2 Radeon 6860s, a system weaker than his, and even I can run everything I've tried at max settings at 1080p with solid framerates. And I did say 90%. Yeah there are Battlefield 3s out there, but they are not that common.

Enthusiasts often over estimate the power needed. I have half dozen friends still running old dual cores and 5000 series Radeon cards and they can still run almost everything we play multi-player at medium settings.

Actually, BF3 is one of the few games that isn't CPU limited at all. What do you have your proc OC'd too? 920 is still a beast, and if you're in the 4.0 range, you're going to be better off than a stock running 2500K.

My point wasn't that the proc is limited, but the proc at stock clocks. I don't think I made that clear.

 

[MrBig]

Jumping on the GTX 670 discussion from earlier, if I can get a Gigabyte 670 for £300 or an ASUS 670 (non-TOP) for £320, which would I go for? I heard the Gigabyte has coil whine and when overclocked the ASUS is really unstable. I'm going to assume there's some Internet hyperbole being thrown about but what is your opinion? Thanks.

There's not really much difference between the two. There is nothing different about the Asus chip that makes it bad, it's the same GK104 that GB has. The factory OC the top launched with was too high for some chips to handle after kepler boost kicked in because of the cooling overhead. If you end up getting a chip that can't handle itself you would just have to downclock it, or alternatively get the non top and experimenter with finding the max clock yourself. There's nothing Asus was able to do besides downing the stock clock. I'd go with the Asus simply because of the backplate and the terrible blue pcb of the GB.

So damn clean. What are you doing for the cables?

 

[Ceebs]

Oh man, this Noctua NH-D14 is massive! I knew it was going to be a beast but holy hell it is a hefty fucker. Well, it is supposed to be very quite with great cooling. Can't wait to install it tonight.

The bonus is that thing was the easiest to install heatsink I have ever worked with. Just make sure you have a long screwdriver to reach from the top to the screws at the bottom.

Jumping on the GTX 670 discussion from earlier, if I can get a Gigabyte 670 for £300 or an ASUS 670 (non-TOP) for £320, which would I go for? I heard the Gigabyte has coil whine and when overclocked the ASUS is really unstable. I'm going to assume there's some Internet hyperbole being thrown about but what is your opinion? Thanks.

From what I gather the ASUS' problem was a far to aggressive factory overclock at first. My recent top has been fine.

 

[Edvardelis]

The bonus is that thing was the easiest to install heatsink I have ever worked with. Just make sure you have a long screwdriver to reach from the top to the screws at the bottom.

They include one.

 

[Krauser Kat]

So I decided I want the M4. I see 2 and i read the difference was for $10 more I can get the 2.5 to 3.5 bracket

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148443
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=20-148-526

I assume both those drives are the same and I need the bracket?

Double stick tape... anywhere in the case. SSD can fit most places just dont put them in a super hot place.

 

[gutterboy44]

The bonus is that thing was the easiest to install heatsink I have ever worked with. Just make sure you have a long screwdriver to reach from the top to the screws at the bottom.

Awesome, glad to hear it. I installed two Hyper 212s for friend's builds I assembled and they were a pain in the ass. Thanks for the heads up on the screw driver. I will borrow some longer ones from work. good call, just looked in the box and saw the included screw driver.

 

[Slayer-33]

Oh man, this Noctua NH-D14 is massive! I knew it was going to be a beast but holy hell it is a hefty fucker. Well, it is supposed to be very quite with great cooling. Can't wait to install it tonight.

holy shit lol

 

[Ceebs]

They include one.

That thing was JUST long enough to reach. I went and got one of my 12" ones.

 

[Sethos]

Oh man, this Noctua NH-D14 is massive! I knew it was going to be a beast but holy hell it is a hefty fucker. Well, it is supposed to be very quite with great cooling. Can't wait to install it tonight.

Big you say?

 

[gutterboy44]

Mother of god. Does the motherboard deflect with things attached? It felt so heavy to have cantilevered out like that. I suppose the mounting bracket helps distribute the force.

 

[Sethos]

Mother of god. Does the motherboard deflect with things attached? It felt so heavy to have cantilevered out like that. I suppose the mounting bracket helps distribute the force.

Wasn't too bad with the motherboard in place, the backplate taking the strain but I quickly realised we moved into joke territory. Not only does it look terrible, I couldn't even have the bottom fan clips as they were hitting the GPU - Terrible design.

 

[cametall]

It will boot tonight!

(paper towels in second pic made lighting impossible)

It looks like some sort of iPod video card

 

[abunai]

There's not really much difference between the two. There is nothing different about the Asus chip that makes it bad, it's the same GK104 that GB has. The factory OC the top launched with was too high for some chips to handle after kepler boost kicked in because of the cooling overhead. If you end up getting a chip that can't handle itself you would just have to downclock it, or alternatively get the non top and experimenter with finding the max clock yourself. There's nothing Asus was able to do besides downing the stock clock. I'd go with the Asus simply because of the backplate and the terrible blue pcb of the GB.

From what I gather the ASUS' problem was a far to aggressive factory overclock at first. My recent top has been fine.

I was leaning towards the ASUS based on some other stuff I read since I posted earlier, but this seals it. Thanks for your input.

 

[Sarcasm]

Okay..I made a list of part to look for cause her I have to go to a local shop (Taiwan) in Taipei (not nova building cause they are ripoffs) and find parts. I think I have everything from the build list, what do I need to look for?

the i core models that end with K are OC'able right?

What mobos allow easy OCing?

stuff like that.

 

[abunai]

Okay..I made a list of part to look for cause her I have to go to a local shop (Taiwan) in Taipei (not nova building cause they are ripoffs) and find parts. I think I have everything from the build list, what do I need to look for?

the i core models that end with K are OC'able right?

What mobos allow easy OCing?

stuff like that.

Yup. E.g. the i5 2500 is locked, i5 2500k is unlocked. Overclocking since Sandy Bridge (2500k onwards) got ridiculously easy, you just boot into BIOS setup and change multipliers at the very least, so there isn't really a particular motherboard you can buy that is easier to overclock in terms of executing the overclock.

Cheaper motherboards will only go so far while more expensive ones will be able to support higher overclocks, so in that regard they are easier to achieve better results with. A good midrange would be the ASUS P8Z77-LX and similar boards around that pricepoint from other known brands. The OP will have good boards for particular price points, and all of them will be fine to overclock with.

 

[Starfish_Oxide]

Ordered my PC parts today.

Fucking hype!!!

 

[cametall]

Amazon and Newegg have spoiled me with their fast purchase-to-shipping times. Buy.com is taking FOREVER to ship this SSD... been "processing; preparing to ship" since Saturday evening.

This is what I get for not waiting 24 hours to see new SSD sales, I'd have an 830 on its way to me by now

EDIT: When updating an SSD's firmware for the first time (before OS install) can I connect it as a secondary HDD to do the update through Windows? I believe Crucial has a Windows executable now for firmware updates.

 

[Jburton]

ok guys I am in a bit of a muddle ....... my budget allows for either a i5-2500k, 8gig 1600mhz, 7870

or

i5-2500k, 4gig 1600mhz, 670.


I can buy another stick in another month or two but will the 4gig system ram really strangle performance until that point and is the 670 worth getting over the 7870?


A bit of advice please, I am going around in circles in my head.

 

[mkenyon]

ok guys I am in a bit of a muddle ....... my budget allows for either a i5-2500k, 8gig 1600mhz, 7870

or

i5-2500k, 4gig 1600mhz, 670.


I can buy another stick in another month or two but will the 4gig system ram really strangle performance until that point and is the 670 worth getting over the 7870?


A bit of advice please, I am going around in circles in my head.

4 is plenty, just dont have a ton of chrome tabs open when playing games. 8 is still pretty much overkill, but is so cheap that it has become standard.

 

[mxgt]

4gb is fine, go with the better card.

 

[Hazaro]

Okay..I made a list of part to look for cause her I have to go to a local shop (Taiwan) in Taipei (not nova building cause they are ripoffs) and find parts. I think I have everything from the build list, what do I need to look for?

the i core models that end with K are OC'able right?

What mobos allow easy OCing?

stuff like that.

K = overclocking.
Any Z68 board will OC fine to 4.0 or 4.2Ghz. It's about that that you might want to spend more than $130 USD.

Amazon and Newegg have spoiled me with their fast purchase-to-shipping times. Buy.com is taking FOREVER to ship this SSD... been "processing; preparing to ship" since Saturday evening.

This is what I get for not waiting 24 hours to see new SSD sales, I'd have an 830 on its way to me by now

EDIT: When updating an SSD's firmware for the first time (before OS install) can I connect it as a secondary HDD to do the update through Windows? I believe Crucial has a Windows executable now for firmware updates.

Probably because Buy.com doesn't need to have the item in stock to bill you and they do fulfillment.
Call them or cancel.

ok guys I am in a bit of a muddle ....... my budget allows for either a i5-2500k, 8gig 1600mhz, 7870

or

i5-2500k, 4gig 1600mhz, 670.


I can buy another stick in another month or two but will the 4gig system ram really strangle performance until that point and is the 670 worth getting over the 7870?


A bit of advice please, I am going around in circles in my head.

What? That's like $20 RAM difference and $100 GPU difference.
Save and get 8GB of RAM and the 670 if you need that level of performance. It's an absolute beast of a card.