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"I need a New PC!" 2013 Part 1. Haswell, Crysis 3, and secret fairy sauce. Read da OP

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BlazinAm

Junior Member
2x4GB for $40. Do you need 16GB of RAM in your laptop?

I would ask Head-Fi and/or headphone GAF depending on how serious you want to be.

So I just buy an extra stick because the laptop will come with 4GB of ram on one stick.
Edit: sorry for the dumb question but if I just do that then I will buy from the manufacture and keep the warranty.
 

BigAT

Member
Do any of you guys have a recommendation on a good place to get inexpensive printer ink? I don't want to spend more on a single replacement cartridge than what I spent on the entire printer to begin with.
 

Hazaro

relies on auto-aim
So I just buy an extra stick because the laptop will come with 4GB of ram on one stick.
Edit: sorry for the dumb question but if I just do that then I will buy from the manufacture and keep the warranty.
I would purchase another 4GB stick of DDR3 and install it.
If you need to send it back, just remove the stick. Does that really void your warranty?
 

BlazinAm

Junior Member
I would purchase another 4GB stick of DDR3 and install it.
If you need to send it back, just remove the stick. Does that really void your warranty?

Read through the paperwork online... it seems like they are cool with their own chips besides it is only 34.99. Also if something goes wrong I have only one company to get in contact with.
 
This may be slightly off topic, but in September I'll be starting a computer programming course at Uni, and because of that I want to get a mechanical keyboard. Can anyone recommend a good UK retailer and decent brands?
 

kharma45

Member
First question, is the CM 690 II Advanced Black and White actually a good looking case or am I going slightly mad?

cm690IIadvbw_w1_590x443.jpg


Secondly, it worth the extra £10 over the Zalman Z11 Plus, Corsair 200R, Fractal 3000 et al?
 

BlazinAm

Junior Member
Crazy how dedicated graphics has moved out of the $500-$1000 range laptops everything is intel mobile unless you are looking at AMD.
 
D

Deleted member 125677

Unconfirmed Member
PC GAF, I have a quick question:

I'm thinking of upgrading my pc, but I'm not sure if I have the money to to a full overhaul right now.

My rig:

MSI H55M-E33, H55, Socket-1156, DDR3
Intel Core i5 Quad Processor i5-760, 2,8gHz
MSI GeForce GTS 250 1GB PhysX CUDA
Crucial DDR3 1333MHz 4GB KIT
NO SSD

I would like to exhange all of this with:

ASUS P8Z77-V PRO, Socket-1155
Corsair Vengeance DDR3 1600MHz 16GB CL9 Kit w/4x 4GB
Intel® Core i7-3770 Processor Socket-LGA1155, Quad Core, 3.4GHz
Gigabyte GeForce GTX 670 4GB PhysX CUDA PCI-Express 3.0
Samsung SSD 840 PROSeries 128GB

As for the question:

Because of limited money atm, I'm considering upgrading just the GPU, but will my other old gear slow me down so much it's not worth it? Should I rather wait and do the whole upgrade as a whole?
 

Hazaro

relies on auto-aim
Read through the paperwork online... it seems like they are cool with their own chips besides it is only 34.99. Also if something goes wrong I have only one company to get in contact with.
I think all RAM has a lifetime warranty. RAM is basically RAM. Buy whatever is cheapest.
This may be slightly off topic, but in September I'll be starting a computer programming course at Uni, and because of that I want to get a mechanical keyboard. Can anyone recommend a good UK retailer and decent brands?
Read the OP.
First question, is the CM 690 II Advanced Black and White actually a good looking case or am I going slightly mad?

cm690IIadvbw_w1_590x443.jpg


Secondly, it worth the extra £10 over the Zalman Z11 Plus, Corsair 200R, Fractal 3000 et al?
Buy what you think looks nice :p
PC GAF, I have a quick question:

I'm thinking of upgrading my pc, but I'm not sure if I have the money to to a full overhaul right now.

My rig:

MSI H55M-E33, H55, Socket-1156, DDR3
Intel Core i5 Quad Processor i5-760, 2,8gHz
MSI GeForce GTS 250 1GB PhysX CUDA
Crucial DDR3 1333MHz 4GB KIT
NO SSD

I would like to exhange all of this with:

ASUS P8Z77-V PRO, Socket-1155
Corsair Vengeance DDR3 1600MHz 16GB CL9 Kit w/4x 4GB
Intel® Core i7-3770 Processor Socket-LGA1155, Quad Core, 3.4GHz
Gigabyte GeForce GTX 670 4GB PhysX CUDA PCI-Express 3.0
Samsung SSD 840 PROSeries 128GB

As for the question:

Because of limited money atm, I'm considering upgrading just the GPU, but will my other old gear slow me down so much it's not worth it? Should I rather wait and do the whole upgrade as a whole?
Upgrade your GPU first, then to Haswell in June when you can afford it.
What PSU are you running? 670 isn't super amazing value for the price, 660Ti / 7950 are much better FPS/$
 

kharma45

Member
PC GAF, I have a quick question:

I'm thinking of upgrading my pc, but I'm not sure if I have the money to to a full overhaul right now.

My rig:

MSI H55M-E33, H55, Socket-1156, DDR3
Intel Core i5 Quad Processor i5-760, 2,8gHz
MSI GeForce GTS 250 1GB PhysX CUDA
Crucial DDR3 1333MHz 4GB KIT
NO SSD

I would like to exhange all of this with:

ASUS P8Z77-V PRO, Socket-1155
Corsair Vengeance DDR3 1600MHz 16GB CL9 Kit w/4x 4GB
Intel® Core i7-3770 Processor Socket-LGA1155, Quad Core, 3.4GHz
Gigabyte GeForce GTX 670 4GB PhysX CUDA PCI-Express 3.0
Samsung SSD 840 PROSeries 128GB

As for the question:

Because of limited money atm, I'm considering upgrading just the GPU, but will my other old gear slow me down so much it's not worth it? Should I rather wait and do the whole upgrade as a whole?

With an overclock on your i5 it'll still be a very, very good CPU for gaming, even if you just moved to a 670 for the mean time it'll still see you have a good performance boost.

On the topic of your new proposed build, what do you plan to do with the rig?
 

kharma45

Member
Buy what you think looks nice :p

Well ideally I want the Zalman Z11 Plus but it's out of stock everywhere, the non-Plus version I could get but for the sake of £5 seems a bit of a bad deal to step down and lost some nice stuff like USB 3 at the front.

In your opinion Haz is the CM 690 II Advanced worth the $15 in your money over something like a 200R?
 

Hazaro

relies on auto-aim
Well ideally I want the Zalman Z11 Plus but it's out of stock everywhere, the non-Plus version I could get but for the sake of £5 seems a bit of a bad deal to step down and lost some nice stuff like USB 3 at the front.

In your opinion Haz is the CM 690 II Advanced worth the $15 in your money over something like a 200R?
I delegate cases. Ask mkenyon, TheExodu5, or fiest :p
I've worked with the base 690 before and liked it. The 690 II seems to be a good upgrade.
 
Been looking at 670 2GB vs 7970 3GB as the Gigabyte versions are both the same price, seems to be some not massive but noticable swings in FPS for each card in different games.

I still think I'm going with the 7970 just for the extra VRAM but what causes the issues, is it drivers or just that some games were designed with a certain card in mind?
 
D

Deleted member 125677

Unconfirmed Member
Upgrade your GPU first, then to Haswell in June when you can afford it.
What PSU are you running? 670 isn't super amazing value for the price, 660Ti / 7950 are much better FPS/$

Thank you, so a good 660 is perhaps the way to go? I have a Chieftec Smart Series 550W PSU.

With an overclock on your i5 it'll still be a very, very good CPU for gaming, even if you just moved to a 670 for the mean time it'll still see you have a good performance boost.

On the topic of your new proposed build, what do you plan to do with the rig?

Thank you, as well! I'll look into overclocking then, and perhaps just go for a new GPU for now. I thought about keeping the old motherboard as well, but it bothers me that it doesn't support sATA600 (for the SSD) or USB 3.0.

You mean the new rig? I do plan to play some games on it, for sure. Got to be ready for GTA V when it gets a PC release.. ;)
 
Looking to go with this for my audio setup (Keep in mind i will mainly be doing video on my rig):

Sony MDR-7506

Avid 9900-65143-12 Fast Track

If anyone have some experience with either, i would love to hear.

I have these Sonys. And while I just use it for casual listening, it has served me well for 5 years.
Not the most comfortable headset I don't think, but very crisp sound and distinct highs and lows ( good for monitoring obviously haha).

Interesting thing with these is that you hear sounds you can't usually hear with standard headphones.

Also, the current $100 I see there isn't the best price I've seen so keep that in mind.
I got mine in the $70s mark but not sure how much they go now.
 

kharma45

Member
Thank you, as well! I'll look into overclocking then, and perhaps just go for a new GPU for now. I thought about keeping the old motherboard as well, but it bothers me that it doesn't support sATA600 (for the SSD) or USB 3.0.

You mean the new rig? I do plan to play some games on it, for sure. Got to be ready for GTA V when it gets a PC release.. ;)

Old motherboard also won't support new CPUs, either the current Ivy Bridge range for the future Haswell series.

If it's just gaming an i7 may be a tad overkill.

Will there be Haswell CPUs for the 1155 socket?

Nope 1150.
 
Old motherboard also won't support new CPUs, either the current Ivy Bridge range for the future Haswell series.

If it's just gaming an i7 may be a tad overkill.



Nope 1150.

Hm, are there any technical reasons for this or do they just want you to buy a new board as well?
 
D

Deleted member 125677

Unconfirmed Member
Old motherboard also won't support new CPUs, either the current Ivy Bridge range for the future Haswell series.

If it's just gaming an i7 may be a tad overkill.



Nope 1150.

If i7 already is a bit overkill, then there should be no point waiting for the Haswell-compatible motherboards? Or are there other reasons to wait for this?
 

kennah

Member
Hm, are there any technical reasons for this or do they just want you to buy a new board as well?
Not to be that flippant but has staying with the same socket helped AMD?

Serious answer my best guess is different power requirements. Haswell uses a lot less power than the xBridges. And they change sockets every 2-3 years since forever.
 

DietRob

i've been begging for over 5 years.
So after a few delay's from helping the kids with homework,ect.. I finally got the build together last night about midnight.

Then I noticed it.. Just below the CPU slot there was a capacitor that was missing. Not broke off just missing, gone, vanished. It had to have been never there in the first place..

So I'm off to microcenter for an exchange as soon as their doors open at 10am.

Fuck.
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
So after a few delay's from helping the kids with homework,ect.. I finally got the build together last night about midnight.

Then I noticed it.. Just below the CPU slot there was a capacitor that was missing. Not broke off just missing, gone, vanished. It had to have been never there in the first place..

So I'm off to microcenter for an exchange as soon as their doors open at 10am.

Fuck.

Yeah, nothing worse than noticing something that is off like a missing pin or something in that nature. It's bad luck in my eyes as most of the HW is guaranteed to work. Some recommended I get the board off Amazon and not Newegg for some reason. I think I will do just that as I got my last board from them (Biostar) and I have never had an issue.

I'm sending you a PM.
 

kennah

Member
It may just be an empty spot. What motherboard is it? That capacitor might be for a higher up version of your motherboard. You could compare the one you have against the picture on the manufacturers website
 

Addnan

Member
First question, is the CM 690 II Advanced Black and White actually a good looking case or am I going slightly mad?
Its a really nice case, I bought it and will build in it next Monday. I ordered it when CCL sold it for £60 few weeks ago, guessing you are doing the same now that they put the price down again?
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
It may just be an empty spot. What motherboard is it? That capacitor might be for a higher up version of your motherboard. You could compare the one you have against the picture on the manufacturers website

I'm hoping he already has gone through the steps before taking the plunge and going back out to the store for an exchange.
 

garath

Member
So after a few delay's from helping the kids with homework,ect.. I finally got the build together last night about midnight.

Then I noticed it.. Just below the CPU slot there was a capacitor that was missing. Not broke off just missing, gone, vanished. It had to have been never there in the first place..

So I'm off to microcenter for an exchange as soon as their doors open at 10am.

Fuck.

Did the build not work?
 

aristotle

Member
Do any of you guys have a recommendation on a good place to get inexpensive printer ink? I don't want to spend more on a single replacement cartridge than what I spent on the entire printer to begin with.

I work at a newspaper. We order almost all of our ink & toner from www.inkjetsuperstore.com It's usually the cheapest around (for non-name brand stuff).
 

kharma45

Member
Woah, I think you're right. Not used to seeing Cooler Master cases that don't look hideous.

That's good enough for me!

Its a really nice case, I bought it and will build in it next Monday. I ordered it when CCL sold it for £60 few weeks ago, guessing you are doing the same now that they put the price down again?

Yeah it's £61 there atm, gonna stick an order in now I think.

Edit - Or not, fuck paying £12 delivery to Northern Ireland.
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
Full seal of approval on the Corsair 500R. It may still be on sale for $89 as well. This is a 140USD case so that is a pretty decent deal.

Rechecked, that deal expired but it's still 120 right now. 20 dollar rebate as well.
 

Exuro

Member
Bumping from the last page, two questions from a friend looking at replacing his old phenom 1/mobo.

My friend dual boots windows 7 with Fedora and wants to know if there'll be any complications with the UEFI that newer boards have, if he needs to get a certain board or whatnot.

EDIT: Third question. Will hyperthreading be useful for next gen games?
 
I suppose I should ask about this here, as my thread about it seems to got buried in the OT. (Maybe that wasn't the best area to post it in...) And given that I'm not buying a new laptop, I figured that the Gaming Laptop thread isn't for me.

My laptop's 5400 RPM disk drive feels... lethargic during boots and app loads, and I see some freezing during first loads of applications after boot.

Should I replace the disk drive? If so, what should I get? A 7200 RPM disk drive, a hybrid disk drive, or a pure SSD, knowing that the 750 GB drive is currently filled with over 210 GB of data, and I'm actually looking to improve boot times and app load times only. Factor cost and the fact that there is only one standard SATA drive bay (9.5 mm high), no PCI-e slots, and a non-user-removable optical drive (I need it anyway). No external disk drives as junctions, please.
 

clav

Member
I suppose I should ask about this here, as my thread about it seems to got buried in the OT. (Maybe that wasn't the best area to post it in...) And given that I'm not buying a new laptop, I figured that the Gaming Laptop thread isn't for me.

My laptop's 5400 RPM disk drive feels... lethargic during boots and app loads, and I see some freezing during first loads of applications after boot.

Should I replace the disk drive? If so, what should I get? A 7200 RPM disk drive, a hybrid disk drive, or a pure SSD, knowing that the 750 GB drive is currently filled with over 210 GB of data, and I'm actually looking to improve boot times and app load times only. Factor cost and the fact that there is only one standard SATA drive bay (9.5 mm high), no PCI-e slots, and a non-user-removable optical drive (I need it anyway). No external disk drives as junctions, please.

SSD. Hybrid is only supported by one manufacturer, so you're at the mercy if they EOL it. 7200 rpm drives still spin, so if you drop your laptop, your data can be all gone in a second.

Put in a budget because you're going to be spending a pretty penny.

I'll just throw one here for everyone in here.

Old drive, but it's reliable, and the price doesn't break the bank although performance is not as good as the recent SSD drives, but tons better than traditional drives.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicat...ffiliateID=lw9MynSeamY-PvCaVUOjDy9mSqRrdFiivQ
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
If you can afford it, get a 256 or 512 MB SSD. I know they cost in the 200 range but damn if you won't notice immediate increases in just about everything your PC does. SSD or bust. I don't care if you have to compromise and get a piddly 128GB SSD, do it. You know what would be smart is doing what I did, I took my internal 500GB HDD and bought a cheapt 5 dollar USB 3.0 enclosure and use it as a data drive.

SSD or pants on fire
I made that up, not sure what mystical meaning it has but it sounds legit

Really good price on that SSD in previous post. Best do some reading before committing but even if it's a modest gain, your socks will be rocked going from mechanical to SSD.
 
All right, then. OK, some considerations: over $160 and I think I'll begin to hesitate. I'm in Singapore, so US-only sites/offer are out of the question.

I refuse to use an external as a main data drive, so there's that. It's annoying every single time I need a piece of data, only to end up not being able to use it.
 
How often do you guys clean under your keyboard keys? I popped all the keys and used some compressed air to blast out all the gunk underneath, and man, it can get pretty gross. I don't think I've cleaned it in about a year. Nasty!

While doing this I suddenly remembered that there is a dust filter underneath my tower, right below the PSU. I am really good about cleaning out my computer every couple months, including the front dust filter, but I completely forgot that there is even a dust filter underneath the tower... I hadn't cleaned it, ever, since I put my PC together in June of 2011. Man, it was pretty caked on when I finally removed it and washed it. I'm sure I just lowered my PSU's operating temps and fan's RPM by quite a bit by getting all that dust off that filter.

So remember folks: Don't forget to clean the dust filter under your PSU!
 
Just saw Nvidia's facebook update, not sure but leaving this here:

Geforce 313.95 Beta Drivers out.
http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/articles/nvidia-geforce-313-95-beta-drivers-released

Apparently tuned for the Crysis 3 Open Beta, Assassin’s Creed 3 & Far Cry 3

Quote from facebook post:
The new GeForce 313.95 beta driver is now available to download.
An essential update for gamers jumping into the Crysis 3 Open Beta, 313.95 beta improves multi-GPU performance in Crytek’s sci-fi shooter by up to 35%.

And we didn't forget the other games you are playing.
Our GeForce 313.95 beta driver delivers single-GPU performance gains of up to 27% in Assassin’s Creed III, 14% in Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 and 10% in Far Cry 3.
 

Alucrid

Banned
That GPU is a legend, unbelievable how long it stayed relevant. It will run next gen games(most likely) just don't expect cranking up the settings. Wait till games are out then you will know if its good enough or not.

Thanks. Yeah, I guess time will tell, c'mon next gen.
 

mkenyon

Banned
First question, is the CM 690 II Advanced Black and White actually a good looking case or am I going slightly mad?

cm690IIadvbw_w1_590x443.jpg


Secondly, it worth the extra £10 over the Zalman Z11 Plus, Corsair 200R, Fractal 3000 et al?
It is an amazing case. Sorry about the shipping price :(

OC3D did a review of it a little ways back. Do a quick search on OC3D.tv if you want to watch.
Hm, are there any technical reasons for this or do they just want you to buy a new board as well?
There are tons of reasons, all based around creating a more efficient architecture. The number of features that have moved from the motherboard to the CPU die have increased fairly rapidly over the last 6 years, which requires different amounts of pins/contacts.
Bumping from the last page, two questions from a friend looking at replacing his old phenom 1/mobo.
1) No issues that I'm aware of.
2) Absolutely no way of knowing. The only evidence we have at hand says no.
Interestingly Toms now recommends Athlon II X4 640 and the Phenom II X4 965 in the entry level, over the Pentium G860 etc...
They specifically mention that the newer games they are testing are using more than two cores. I actually have been wondering what the effect of eight core chips in consoles will have in porting them over to PC. Will PC games two years from now need a six or eight core to operate at a higher level?
Ugh. "Well, games can use more than two cores, so more than two cores = better performance!"

This kind of recommendation without good evidence is really frustrating.

The thing is though, if you buy an AMD processor, then you have also paid for an AMD board. If you buy a pentium, you are set up to put any SB/IB proc on there down the line for killer performance without touching the mobo/RAM. In addition to that, the i3, which is marginally more expensive, eats anything outside of the 8350 for breakfast.

Also, the AMD chips on consoles aren't octo cores. They do have eight cores, but they function as though there were quad cores as they work in pairs.
 

mkenyon

Banned
I'm doing a second post so this deal doesn't get missed.

SEASONIC X-750 ON NEWEGG FOR $90

That is $100 off MSRP.

Promo code: EMCYTZT2857
 

kharma45

Member
:) you go, kharma! whatcha makin'? Did you go with the white CM 690 ii adv?

Started off as a very budget rig but one thing led to another and it went a bit over budget :p


Also got a set of homeplugs too.

Should be alright for the 1280x1024 monitor I've got lying around, it's only going to be a secondary gaming PC for my house at uni so didn't want to spend anything too big.

I'm doing a second post so this deal doesn't get missed.

SEASONIC X-750 ON NEWEGG FOR $90

That is $100 off MSRP.

Promo code: EMCYTZT2857

Unreal bargain, it's almost $200 or so for us ;_;

It is an amazing case. Sorry about the shipping price :(

OC3D did a review of it a little ways back. Do a quick search on OC3D.tv if you want to watch.

Went for the 200R in the end, couldn't justify the extra £20 for it. £50 was ideally as far as I wanted to go in the first place.
 
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