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[Pandemic]

Hi, I'm so close to finishing up my build, but I have a question.

I currently chose the MSI GeForce GTX 680 Twin Frozr III 2GB OC for $549 for my build, but someone told me to get the.. Gigabyte GeForce GTX 680 OC 4GB for $599. I'm not going to use three screens, just two, one for gaming, one for surfing the net, but would the 4GB graphics card do much in terms of performance when it comes to future games?

Hopefully this made sense.

Cheers.

 

[knitoe]

Hi, I'm so close to finishing up my build, but I have a question.

I currently chose the MSI GeForce GTX 680 Twin Frozr III 2GB OC for $549 for my build, but someone told me to get the.. Gigabyte GeForce GTX 680 OC 4GB for $599. I'm not going to use three screens, just two, one for gaming, one for surfing the net, but would the 4GB graphics card do much in terms of performance when it comes to future games?

Hopefully this made sense.

Cheers.

I would go with the 4GB. A few games can use more than 2GB of VRAM, and once next gen console are release, even more will follow.

 

[kennah]

Yeah, for $50 do it.

 

[appaws]

Hi, I'm so close to finishing up my build, but I have a question.

I currently chose the MSI GeForce GTX 680 Twin Frozr III 2GB OC for $549 for my build, but someone told me to get the.. Gigabyte GeForce GTX 680 OC 4GB for $599. I'm not going to use three screens, just two, one for gaming, one for surfing the net, but would the 4GB graphics card do much in terms of performance when it comes to future games?

Hopefully this made sense.

Cheers.

I think what people are saying is that, considering your budget is pretty high, it would be worth it to drop the extra 50 bucks on the 4gb model.

(Man, you have to reply quick in this thread)

 

[appaws]

Ok guys, two quick questions before I pull the trigger on my next set of pruchases.

1. Gigabyte HD 7950 > Sapphire one, right? I know they're supposed to be really close but I think I remember the Gigabyte one having better cooling or something, can't remember exactly.

2. Is Amazon still doing the buy the AMD HD 7950 and get Bioshock Infinite + Crysis 3 deal? I don't see it on the page but I remember seeing it on Newegg.

Any help would be appreciated just so I can know whether or not I'll be able to save a little bit of extra cash from Prime shipping or not. Thanks!

I don't know that the Gigabyte one is better. It's great, it's what I have personally, but I have read great reviews of the Sapphire card as well....so I don't think you can go wrong.

I just looked on Newegg and the deal is still there. I see nothing on Amazon.

 

[jsrv]

Question about upgrading cpus
I'm helping someone who has a Z77 motherboard upgrade their CPU to an i7 ivy bridge (i actually don't know what he has right now, but probably an i3 or i5 ivy bridge). after you switch out the CPUs, do you need to do or change anything in the BIOS or OS?

 

[kennah]

Question about upgrading cpus
I'm helping someone who has a Z77 motherboard upgrade their CPU to an i7 ivy bridge (i actually don't know what he has right now, but probably an i3 or i5 ivy bridge). after you switch out the CPUs, do you need to do or change anything in the BIOS or OS?

Don't need to do nothin' (except for the overclock)

 

[SloaneRisette]

I don't know that the Gigabyte one is better. It's great, it's what I have personally, but I have read great reviews of the Sapphire card as well....so I don't think you can go wrong.

I just looked on Newegg and the deal is still there. I see nothing on Amazon.

Thanks. Just bought it, so I'll just need the CPU, which I'm about 150-160 dollars away from.

The only thing I'm nervous about though is that after my order, Newegg took me to what I can only assume is my bank's site to enter the information. I didn't notice that it would do that at first, so I backed out, and upon reading it, said not to go back else I might be billed twice, so I just saw that I got an order confirmation email from Newegg and then exited out.

The order hasn't popped up on the order history on Newegg's site yet, though, nor have I been charged yet. So I'm a bit nervous that the order really hasn't gone through... hopefully everything works out with this though.

Edit: It juts did, fears alleviated! Now to save up money for the CPU!

 

[ColonelColon]

Ok guys, two quick questions before I pull the trigger on my next set of pruchases.

1. Gigabyte HD 7950 > Sapphire one, right? I know they're supposed to be really close but I think I remember the Gigabyte one having better cooling or something, can't remember exactly.

2. Is Amazon still doing the buy the AMD HD 7950 and get Bioshock Infinite + Crysis 3 deal? I don't see it on the page but I remember seeing it on Newegg.

Any help would be appreciated just so I can know whether or not I'll be able to save a little bit of extra cash from Prime shipping or not. Thanks!

From what I've read, the Gigabyte 7950 has been voltage locked, which might restrict your ability to overclock the GPU. The $270 AR Sapphire card is not voltage locked. Also, that deal is still active.

 

[mkenyon]

Hopefully I am not painting myself too green here, I probably am, but if I am looking at a GTX 680 and I7-3770K, what sort of power supply would I need?

Also what sort of motherboard would I need. Those I know the least about :/

Your questions and more are covered in the OP. Fill out that questionnaire if you want specific help so folks know what to push you towards.

Well, I'm guessing the Tiki itself is probably North America only, I was wondering if there was anything similar on this side of the pond.



Yes... but a 660Ti still isn't high-end, is it?

How does the 660 or 660Ti compare to a mobile Radeon 7970, for example? Just trying to figure out if the gaming laptop might be a better option after all.

It's a lot more powerful than the mobile 7970. Significantly so.

Here's the thing, the form factor you want doesn't allow for 'normal' placement of parts. People have to avoid 120mm fans (standard), and you can't even put a video card in the motherboard at the normal 90 degree angle. You have to get PCI-E 90 degree risers and then create a custom mount in order to make everything fit in that briefcase type shape.

As a result, you're looking at a very customized system that will be significantly more expensive than other PC's similarly spec'd. If you were in the US, I'd offer to build it for you, but alas.

Any UK GAF up to the task?

The Alienware X51 can be upgraded to a 670. If you sell the 660 it ships with, you'd be able to swap it. The 660 in the X51 should handle most games with ease at 1080p though.

 

[SirBukkake]

I gotta give a big thanks to mkenyon and everyone else in this thread for the help. I'm about 99.8% done with the build. (I'd upload my pic, but I need to reserve total ridicule because of my... interesting wire setup )

Here's what's new
• i5 3570k OC to 4.5GHz
• AS Rock Z77 Extreme 4
• Cooler Master HAF 912 Case
• Samsung 840 Series 240GB SSD
• Dual EVGA GeForce GTX 680 2048MB GDDR5 cards (should these be OC'd?)

Here's what I've brought in from my old Dell
• 500GB HDD (figure since my rig will be for movie/games only, no need for me to go 1TB+)
• Antec 750W ATX12V PSU (Thought this was an AX750, sorry for the misinformation. Wires on this thing sucks sucks suck)
•RAM? Well...

I realized that my old Dell had 6 2GB 1067MHz sticks. Since there's only 4 memory slots in the Extreme 4, I'm temporarily on 8GB total ram. I'm getting some 4x4GB Corsair Vengeance sticks tomorrow afternoon. Was it wise for me to go that route, or should I have gotten the 2x8GB sticks? Did I even have to get new RAM?

Also, does anyone have any ideas on what to do with my old Dell? It still has an i7-920 Chip and (as soon as I get my Corsar's) 12GB of Ram. Can I make a makeshift server out of it? I think I can squeeze some more life out of that old POS.

And... since I grabbed the Win7 ISO a few pages back, but didn't get a license yet; does it count as an "upgrade" if I had a dell-stock Vista Home Premium disk?

Aside from the questions, again, big thanks. Playing The Witcher 2, 2880x1620 downsampled, pushed to the max sans Ubersampling, 8X SGSSAA, and STILL getting a buttery smooth 60 FPS. All I can say is Hooooly Shit.

 

[comu]

What is the most reliable 250gb SSD available right now below the £150 mark?

I'm not a hardcore PC gamer but I will be using it for daily web browsing, watching media and for OS.

Thanks

 

[gilljoy]

I regret buying my 7970... I now has the upgrade itch its a terrible thing.

I want to upgrade my current i7 930 rig as its 1. loud, 2. hot, 3. the case is ugly.

I've got a £500ish budget to upgrade to an ivy bridge setup now for everything except PSU, HDD SSD + GPU as I just got my 7970. Though a bigger SSD would be nice.

What would you recommend?

If I'm not going to gain a big difference from my i7 930 to Ivybridge I may just try and tame the CPU I have atm until Haswel. In this case any suggestions on a Case / Cooler?

 

[Pandemic]

I would go with the 4GB. A few games can use more than 2GB of VRAM, and once next gen console are release, even more will follow.

Yeah, for $50 do it.

I think what people are saying is that, considering your budget is pretty high, it would be worth it to drop the extra 50 bucks on the 4gb model.

(Man, you have to reply quick in this thread)

True, thanks a ton for the responses!

 

[mkenyon]

I gotta give a big thanks to mkenyon and everyone else in this thread for the help. I'm about 99.8% done with the build. (I'd upload my pic, but I need to reserve total ridicule because of my... interesting wire setup )

Here's what's new
• i5 3570k OC to 4.5GHz
• AS Rock Z77 Extreme 4
• Cooler Master HAF 912 Case
• Samsung 840 Series 240GB SSD
• Dual EVGA GeForce GTX 680 2048MB GDDR5 cards (should these be OC'd?)

Here's what I've brought in from my old Dell
• 500GB HDD (figure since my rig will be for movie/games only, no need for me to go 1TB+)
• Antec 750W ATX12V PSU (Thought this was an AX750, sorry for the misinformation. Wires on this thing sucks sucks suck)
•RAM? Well...

I realized that my old Dell had 6 2GB 1067MHz sticks. Since there's only 4 memory slots in the Extreme 4, I'm temporarily on 8GB total ram. I'm getting some 4x4GB Corsair Vengeance sticks tomorrow afternoon. Was it wise for me to go that route, or should I have gotten the 2x8GB sticks? Did I even have to get new RAM?

Also, does anyone have any ideas on what to do with my old Dell? It still has an i7-920 Chip and (as soon as I get my Corsar's) 12GB of Ram. Can I make a makeshift server out of it? I think I can squeeze some more life out of that old POS.

And... since I grabbed the Win7 ISO a few pages back, but didn't get a license yet; does it count as an "upgrade" if I had a dell-stock Vista Home Premium disk?

Aside from the questions, again, big thanks. Playing The Witcher 2, 2880x1620 downsampled, pushed to the max sans Ubersampling, 8X SGSSAA, and STILL getting a buttery smooth 60 FPS. All I can say is Hooooly Shit.

\m/

The 920 would make an excellent file server. If you have some network media playback application (Like Plex), you can actually have it encode videos at different bitrates for different devices on the fly. Like, streaming from your phone over 4G connection type stuff.

The new RAM will be great. I'd get a new PSU sometime in the future and then just move it back to the Dell when you repurpose it.

 

[Hawk269]

Does anyone know if Prime95 works with Windows 8? I am OC my CPU, but doing for the first time under Win8 and just want to make sure Prime95 works with Win8.

Thanks

 

[mkenyon]

Should be.

 

[teh_pwn]

Prime95 does, OCCT doesn't.

 

[appaws]

From what I've read, the Gigabyte 7950 has been voltage locked, which might restrict your ability to overclock the GPU. The $270 AR Sapphire card is not voltage locked. Also, that deal is still active.

Hmmm...is that something they would have just done on newer ones...? I bought mine back in August and I have been able to raise the voltage in Afterburner.

I have it at 1100/1500 right now at 1.2v....(I know I can get that voltage down lower when I have some more time to do it....or that core clock up a little.)

 

[Kadey]

I'm reading up on the GB 7950 and it seems there are tons of these cards being faulty going around. I just happened to be one of the few people to run into one. Decided to RMA. I want a full refund at this point.

 

[Xdrive05]

Hmmm...is that something they would have just done on newer ones...? I bought mine back in August and I have been able to raise the voltage in Afterburner.

I have it at 1100/1500 right now at 1.2v....(I know I can get that voltage down lower when I have some more time to do it....or that core clock up a little.)

Yup. This is the reason I chose the MSI Twin Frozr one instead of the Gigabyte.

And I'm a noise guy too (as in I prefer quieter cards). The MSI is probably a lot louder. I'll just have to deal.

 

[mkenyon]

I'm reading up on the GB 7950 and it seems there are tons of these cards being faulty going around. I just happened to be one of the few people to run into one. Decided to RMA. I want a full refund at this point.

Any links? This is really good info.

 

[OriginofHysteria]

How is the 7950 compared to the 7970? Tomorrow is when I'm going to pull on a card and right now I'm 90% set on the 7970, but the 7950 (MSI Twin Frozr) is almost $100 less with about a 5% difference. If I'm only going to be gaming at 1080p, is the 7970 overkill compared to the 7950? I've already set aside the money for the 7970 but saving $100 for a 7950 isn't bad either.

 

[mkenyon]

How is the 7950 compared to the 7970? Tomorrow is when I'm going to pull on a card and right now I'm 90% set on the 7970, but the 7950 (MSI Twin Frozr) is almost $100 less with about a 5% difference. If I'm only going to be gaming at 1080p, is the 7970 overkill compared to the 7950? I've already set aside the money for the 7970 but saving $100 for a 7950 isn't bad either.

They're both great and pretty much fall in the same priceerformance category.

If you are trying to pinch where it counts, I think buying the "second tier" card every two years will generally net better performance per dollar in the long run.

 

[Skel1ingt0n]

I regret buying my 7970... I now has the upgrade itch its a terrible thing.

I want to upgrade my current i7 930 rig as its 1. loud, 2. hot, 3. the case is ugly.

I've got a £500ish budget to upgrade to an ivy bridge setup now for everything except PSU, HDD SSD + GPU as I just got my 7970. Though a bigger SSD would be nice.

What would you recommend?

If I'm not going to gain a big difference from my i7 930 to Ivybridge I may just try and tame the CPU I have atm until Haswel. In this case any suggestions on a Case / Cooler?

Did you get as big of a performance jump as you were expecting with the 7970? What card did you upgrade from?

I have a similar setup as you - i7 930/12GB/GTX 570, and the case is terrible for modding and airflow - everything runs way too warm. I'm going to do a new build this summer, but want to splurge on a GPU to "tide me over" until then. Thing is, I'm at a loss for how exotic I want to go with the GPU... GTX670? 680? 680 4GB? Titan or 690? Arg...

 

[Xdrive05]

How is the 7950 compared to the 7970? Tomorrow is when I'm going to pull on a card and right now I'm 90% set on the 7970, but the 7950 (MSI Twin Frozr) is almost $100 less with about a 5% difference. If I'm only going to be gaming at 1080p, is the 7970 overkill compared to the 7950? I've already set aside the money for the 7970 but saving $100 for a 7950 isn't bad either.

7950 is better price/performance (given overclocking potential*), but for some people every extra frame is worth whatever the cost. You wouldn't be making a bad decision if you got a 7970, but for me a 7950 + $100 in the bank is way more attractive.

If you were going multi-monitor then the 7970 would be better justified though.

*edited for better accuracy

 

[Demon Ice]

So Origin PC has these "ready to ship" pre configured small form factor PC's that I assumed would be garbage, but upon looking at the specs and price...I'm intrigued.

You get the following for $1099:

ASUS P8H61-1 Mobo
Intel Core i5 3570k @ 3.4 GHz
3GB Radeon HD 7950
500 watt PSU (I guess an Origin proprietary brand)
8 GB Kingston HyperX DDR3 @ 1333 Mhz
1 TB 7200 RPM SATA Hard drive (again, brand not specified)
24x DVDRW Burner

Seems like a good deal to me. I know the majority of the posters are gonna want to yell at me and tell me to just build my own, but if someone were looking to avoid the hassle of separately purchasing all the components and wanted to have the peace of mind of a full system warranty and lifetime tech support, how's that price?

Those components + the case they're using (Bitfenix Prodigy) from Newegg come out to ~$950 before shipping. So not a huge markup at all. Thoughts? I game at 1680x1050, and I do not require a constant 60 fps.

 

[mkenyon]

So Origin PC has these "ready to ship" pre configured small form factor PC's that I assumed would be garbage, but upon looking at the specs and price...I'm intrigued.

You get the following for $1099:

ASUS P8H61-1 Mobo
Intel Core i5 3570k @ 3.4 GHz
3GB Radeon HD 7950
500 watt PSU (I guess an Origin proprietary brand)
8 GB Kingston HyperX DDR3 @ 1333 Mhz
1 TB 7200 RPM SATA Hard drive (again, brand not specified)
24x DVDRW Burner

Seems like a good deal to me. I know the majority of the posters are gonna want to yell at me and tell me to just build my own, but if someone were looking to avoid the hassle of separately purchasing all the components and wanted to have the peace of mind of a full system warranty and lifetime tech support, how's that price?

Those components + the case they're using (Bitfenix Prodigy) from Newegg come out to ~$950 before shipping. So not a huge markup at all. Thoughts? I game at 1680x1050, and I do not require a constant 60 fps.

H61 mobo with 3570K is an awful pairing. Any way to bump that up to a Z77?

 

[Demon Ice]

H61 mobo with 3570K is an awful pairing. Any way to bump that up to a Z77?

The build isn't configurable at all, unfortunately. Why is that a bad pairing? I have not been keeping up with the latest mobos for the past few years so I'm fairly clueless, sorry.

 

[mkenyon]

H61 means you can't OC the 3570K, which is half the reason why they're so highly suggested. You only change one setting in BIOS to get them to 4.0, and you don't even need an aftermarket cooler.

H61 also means no native USB 3.0 or PCI-E 3.0. H61 is the 'budget' motherboard intended for things like client desktops, not gaming machines.

 

[Demon Ice]

H61 means you can't OC the 3570K, which is half the reason why they're so highly suggested. You only change one setting in BIOS to get them to 4.0, and you don't even need an aftermarket cooler.

H61 also means no native USB 3.0 or PCI-E 3.0. H61 is the 'budget' motherboard intended for things like client desktops, not gaming machines.

Ah I see. The Core i5 has a "TurboBoost" of 3.8 Ghz. Is that different from overclocking? I assumed that meant they overclocked the processor to that speed before they shipped the system out.

 

[mkenyon]

That means when there is a heavy load on a single core, it will boost that core up to 3.8 GHz. Not really beneficial outside of a few games that remain single-threaded.

 

[kennah]

H61 is also the previous generation chipset. They are trying to trick people into buying old stock.

 

[Demon Ice]

Ah. Okay, won't be taking that route then. Thanks for the heads up!

 

[statham]

I have a phenom x6 2.7 on oem motherboard that I can't overclock, running a 7850 with 8gb. I know my cpu chip can be over clocked by a bit, how much work is it to change out the motherboard and getting a windows installed.

 

[kennah]

I have a phenom x6 2.7 on oem motherboard that I can't overclock, running a 7850 with 8gb. I know my cpu chip can be over clocked by a bit, how much work is it to change out the motherboard and getting a windows installed.

... about as much work as it is to change out the motherboard and install windows. Couple hours?

The problem you might run into with an OEM setup is an incompatible case. (one that can't take new motherboards) and risk of shitty powersupply

 

[mkenyon]

I have a phenom x6 2.7 on oem motherboard that I can't overclock, running a 7850 with 8gb. I know my cpu chip can be over clocked by a bit, how much work is it to change out the motherboard and getting a windows installed.

Don't throw money at a processor that is already well past its prime. Save up that extra bit to do a proper upgrade.

 

[OriginofHysteria]

They're both great and pretty much fall in the same priceerformance category.

If you are trying to pinch where it counts, I think buying the "second tier" card every two years will generally net better performance per dollar in the long run.

7950 is better price/performance (given overclocking potential*), but for some people every extra frame is worth whatever the cost. You wouldn't be making a bad decision if you got a 7970, but for me a 7950 + $100 in the bank is way more attractive.

If you were going multi-monitor then the 7970 would be better justified though.

*edited for better accuracy

Thanks, I think I'm going to switch to the 7950 for now and save the $100 bucks. (If I don't see a big upgrade from my old 560 ti 448 then I'll jump to the 7970). I do plan on OC'ing it too so if I can get to stock 7970 speeds that would be good enough for me.

 

[statham]

so I should savage parts and start new?

 

[kennah]

You should fill out the form in the OP to let us know what you have and what you can spend, and then we'll go from there.

 

[statham]

Don't throw money at a processor that is already well past its prime. Save up that extra bit to do a proper upgrade.

I was hoping that sony/MS going with x8 x 1.6 that my x6 x 2.7 would play out well.

 

[MisterNoisy]

Argh. Everything installed in my funky orange box but one stick of RAM.

Lesson learned: Don't order parts piecemeal if you can avoid it.

 

[kennah]

Argh. Everything installed in my funky orange box but one stick of RAM.

Lesson learned: Don't order parts piecemeal if you can avoid it.

You got a Prodigy?

 

[mkenyon]

I was hoping that sony/MS going with x8 x 1.6 that my x6 x 2.7 would play out well.

Nope.

The 8 core CPUs, though techinically possessing 8 cores, act more like quad cores for all intents and purposes. Each pair of 2 CPUs share a workload.

 

[MisterNoisy]

You got a Prodigy?

Yea. I'm pretty sure that I got the last Atomic Orange Prodigy (or any Prodigy for that matter) that Newegg had in stock at the time, since the listing read 'sold out' after I bought mine.

 

[kennah]

Yea. I think I got the last Atomic Orange Prodigy (or any Prodigy for that matter) that Newegg had in stock at the time, since the listing read 'sold out' after I bought mine.

Nice, that was what I was going to get, but now I'm leaning more towards the CaseLabs Mercury.

(Oh god, you'll be able to order it in primer and take it to an autobody shop to get painted)

 

[MisterNoisy]

Nice, that was what I was going to get, but now I'm leaning more towards the CaseLabs Mercury.

(Oh god, you'll be able to order it in primer and take it to an autobody shop to get painted)

Very cool - looks like it should be a bit larger, which would definitely play more nicely with your watercooling plans.

 

[kennah]

Very cool - looks like it should be a bit larger, which would definitely play more nicely with your watercooling plans.

Let it be known to everyone. PMing mkenyon is a BAD EXPENSIVE AWESOME GOOD IDEA

EDIT: Can you measure the distance between the top screw holes and the back wall of the case?

 

[MisterNoisy]

Let it be known to everyone. PMing mkenyon is a BAD EXPENSIVE AWESOME GOOD IDEA

EDIT: Can you measure the distance between the top screw holes and the back wall of the case?

2.5 inches from the center of the rearmost top-mount fan screws to the inside of the back wall of the case.

 

[minasodaboy]

Ok I've got 1 final decision to make for my Photo Editing / Video Editing / Gaming build (all include Fractal R4, Win 7 Pro, 16Gb RAM):

CPU Prices
3570K = Xeon E3-1230 V2 vs. 3770k (+$105)

Is it worth paying the extra $105 to get the 3770K vs. the Xeon? I'm leaning towards just getting the 3770K and maybe...

Bonus Question
Is there any reason to hold off on getting a graphics card today and hoping for nice price drop in the next couple months? I could be patient if needed this is a gaming machine 2nd and I could wait)? Otherwise I'm going to get a 660 (absolutely the top of my budget).