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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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DagsJT

Member
Got my two Asus 120hz monitors that I ordered last week. I'm pretty sure I have my basis covered now with 120hz, nvidia surround/3d, and 2560x1600 heh. Few pics:

surroundz9q06.jpg


night_surroundz5ole.jpg


Didn't go with powerline as I wasn't satisfied with Best Buy's offerings. Will look into one with multiple ports. In the meantime I just grabbed a decent USB wifi adapter. Did a speed test and got 21/6 which is fine for me.

Played a few games...BF3 and Crysis 2. I can definitely see how a Titan (or two) would really help in a setup like mine. Both were playable. BF3 in the 40ish range with Ultra everything. Crysis 2 on Extreme in the 50s. Could always use moar power though especially since Crysis 3 is going to destroy me tomorrow.

What GPU(s)?
 

kharma45

Member
What do you mean by PPP?

It's a shame really, as I hoped I could get away with testing it out for an hour or two on just a 550w. I'm tempted to pick up this PSU Corsair Builder Series CXM 750W Modular £69.99, it's fairly cheap, but without the ability to have a look at how much of an improvement I'd get from running 2 670's, I'm hesitant about pulling the trigger. Especially since it was only last November I built my PC.

The CX is fairly cheap as it's fairly rubbish, avoid.
 

kharma45

Member
still on the fence about snagging a 7950, simply because I'm already happy with my performance. Is going from 768mb gtx 460 to 7950 worth it? How much more powerful we talking here, aside from the obvious benefit of the amds 3gb at my res of 1080p? I just suffer from not wanting to spend extra cash haha

Difference is roughly this

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/542?vs=645

Well worth it, plus the 7950 overclocks very well.
 

LiquidMetal14

hide your water-based mammals
IT LIVES.

2wIwqt2.jpg


Everything went well for a first build. My bios threw up a warning that my CPU fan was dipping below 600 RPM but I set it to ignore it.

During idle and web-browsing CPU is 31-34C, GPU is around 44. That good?

My setup again:


Any advice for the best "idiots guide to overclocking" links or equivalent?

I would go to overclock.net or watch the Asus video with JJ on how to OC on their x79 platform. It gets you a 4.8ghz OC which I work tone down with that air cooler.

You got at least half the parts I did minus the case, CPU cooler, HDD, and GPU.

If you're happy with the memory at 1600, leave it be. I got mine to 2133 upon messing with mine but everyone's IMC on the CPU is different and memory may be better. CPU is at 4.6ghz with a manual voltage of around 1.320. Idles at 32-34 at the hottest core and peaks at around 56-58 while playing BF3. I have SLI 670's and they are reference cards. They both idle at lower temps than yours so you might want to work on a fan profile in eVGA Precision. Your temps aren't bad but the GPU could be lower with some tweaking I suspect.

Another piece of advice. Get to know the Asus UEFI. It's pretty important stuff.
 

Whooter

Member
still on the fence about snagging a 7950, simply because I'm already happy with my performance. Is going from 768mb gtx 460 to 7950 worth it? How much more powerful we talking here, aside from the obvious benefit of the amds 3gb at my res of 1080p? I just suffer from not wanting to spend extra cash haha

I went from a gtx 460 to a 7950 and the difference is Night and Day. I haven't regretted it for a second.
 

appaws

Banned
figured, thanks man, now its just down to which non reference design to go with. Which have the best coolers, have better rma quality, etc? I heard some companies lock the voltage so you cant oc, which ones do this?

I have the Gigabyte one and I love it. It overclocks well and the 3 fan cooling is really effective (and quiet).

I think the consensus is that Gigabyte, Sapphire, and MSI are the best choices at this point.
 

Hazaro

relies on auto-aim
New mb for my ARC mini build.

Will post pictures as soon as it's ready. The R4 I built a few weeks back will go to a friend of mine :)

img_1217xjstw.jpg


img_1218bms29.jpg
Got one of those in my Arc Mini :)

Surprises me how much it can actually do. Asus has some decent software to go with the thing.
 

Gibbo

Member
Hey AMD users, just wondering what your thoughts are on overclocking my 7970 using just the Catalyst Overdrive utility? Thinking of maxing everything out- and moving the fan from 50%-75%. What are the chances of me busting my card?
 

Smokey

Member
But how many titans do you need to run that setup @ 60fps in 3D? Looks fantastic.

Im still waiting for screens without bezels before doing a setup like that. Well that or a single ultrawide curved screen.

I haven't tried 3D surround, just regular 3d and it's pretty taxing. Depending on the game I imagine 3d surround is a rig destroyer. My 580s are getting a bit long in the tooth for a rig like this though. I'm missing out on PCI-E 3.0 and some other enchancements that Nvidia has brought to the 600 series. To get PCI-E 3.0 I'd have to purchase a new motherboard,CPU, and GPU(s). My 2600k is a workhorse and is running nice at 4.6ghz. Just makes you realize it's always something when you get into the high-end :p

How is that G710? They have them on sale on Bestbuy for $99. Thinking about picking one up.

For general typing I think I prefer the CherryMX Blues in my Razer keyboard vs the Browns in the 710. It's still better than a standard keyboard though. Good amount of features on the board and it's fully backlit. I think it looks nice in person too. I would see if you can get them to open one for you and mess with the Browns to see if you like it or not first. If so, then I'd go for it!
 
Build 3/4 done. My wife wanted to build with me, but she got sick part way through so we had to put it on hold. Hoping to finish it today on my lunch break (she's on vacation today), and start installing software. Just need to install the GPU, and run the wires, so another 45 minues to an hour.

My god, modern cases are so much easier to build in than the last time I built (9 years ago, AMD64 baby :p). Screw in standoffs, bottom mounted PSUs, wire management space and no dealing with an IDE ribbon.

Can't wait to finish this baby off and try out crysis 3.

Also, I need to start saving for a new monitor, I realized my current one is just a backup to laptop screen and is total junk.
 

iavi

Member
Hey AMD users, just wondering what your thoughts are on overclocking my 7970 using just the Catalyst Overdrive utility? Thinking of maxing everything out- and moving the fan from 50%-75%. What are the chances of me busting my card?

Max out the sliders and you'll get artifacts/bsods, guaranteed. It takes a bit of tuning to get the right, stable OC.
 

kami_sama

Member
Guys, one question regarding downsampling.

If I want to game at 1440p, any monitor will do, right?
Also, how much performance you lose approximately with a 7950?
 

kharma45

Member
figured, thanks man, now its just down to which non reference design to go with. Which have the best coolers, have better rma quality, etc? I heard some companies lock the voltage so you cant oc, which ones do this?

I'd look to Gigabyte, Sapphire, ASUS and MSI.

RMA quality from country to country, I've no much clue outside of the UK on that side.

Hey AMD users, just wondering what your thoughts are on overclocking my 7970 using just the Catalyst Overdrive utility? Thinking of maxing everything out- and moving the fan from 50%-75%. What are the chances of me busting my card?

Use a proper utility like Afterburner or Trixx, you'll likely need to up your voltage which I don't think CCC does.
 

iavi

Member
Trixx doesn't let you alter the voltage anymore either. Only Afterburner at this point.


----

Count me in the camp that's blown away at how easy it is to OC the 'K' model intels. It's just changing a number in the bios. In my case from 32 to 43. That's it. It's not even as much of a process as the GPU OC, and that was ridiculously easy.
 

Dartastic

Member
Debating building a PC from scratch just to play Bioshock Infinite. I have a feeling that the Xbox version will be far worse than the PC version.
 

Kipp

but I am taking tiny steps forward
So I know there's the motto of "the best time to buy a PC is now" because there's always new tech coming out. However, if I'm building within the next 3 months probably, would it be wise to just wait for Haswell and get the new socket?
 

GHG

Gold Member
So I know there's the motto of "the best time to buy a PC is now" because there's always new tech coming out. However, if I'm building within the next 3 months probably, would it be wise to just wait for Haswell and get the new socket?

Rumors are that those CPU's wont offer much new in the way of gaming performance when using a dedicated GPU. The big new things are meant to be better power draw and thermals and improved integrated GPU's.

If you have the money now and see something you want then go for it. The only time you should really wait is when a new line of GPU's are just round the corner. Intel isn't going to surprise anyone anytime soon, they have limited competition right now from AMD.
 
www.pcpartpicker.com

Plug your info in there and see if the PSU is enough.

Thanks, that's a really useful site. Put my info in and it came to 511w. Obviously, too close to the maximum of my 550w for sustained use, but perhaps enough for me to test out the second card for an hour or two, if only to see if the benefits are worth buying a 750w PSU and using the second 670 permanently.
 

140.85

Cognitive Dissonance, Distilled
I would go to overclock.net or watch the Asus video with JJ on how to OC on their x79 platform. It gets you a 4.8ghz OC which I work tone down with that air cooler.

You got at least half the parts I did minus the case, CPU cooler, HDD, and GPU.

If you're happy with the memory at 1600, leave it be. I got mine to 2133 upon messing with mine but everyone's IMC on the CPU is different and memory may be better. CPU is at 4.6ghz with a manual voltage of around 1.320. Idles at 32-34 at the hottest core and peaks at around 56-58 while playing BF3. I have SLI 670's and they are reference cards. They both idle at lower temps than yours so you might want to work on a fan profile in eVGA Precision. Your temps aren't bad but the GPU could be lower with some tweaking I suspect.

Another piece of advice. Get to know the Asus UEFI. It's pretty important stuff.

Thanks for the info. Yeah I definitely need to go over the ASUS stuff more when I get a chance. My CPU temp seems pretty stable. It got into the 50's when I ran 3DMark. Actually, now that look in the Catalyst "Performance" tab, the GPU usually idles around 53C and got around 65C when I did 3DMark. It looks like eVGA Precision is for GTX only? I'll need to find something similar for my card.
 

Dartastic

Member
Well, of course. We're talking about ancient tech at this point.
I know. But like, WAY worse. What would be the cheapest amount of money I could spend to build a PC that could play Bioshock Infinite on high? I'd want to plug it into my TV and surround sound system via HDMI. I've read the OP, but I dunno what builds would do what I want them to do.
 
If I want to go sli 670, do I have to have two of the same model? I have a reference evga 670, but I would like to get the FTW edition as my second one(if I decide to sli).
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
What's the best video card right now to spend around $400 - $450 on?

I'm upgrading from a Radeon 5870 1GB and want to buy within the next month or two.
 

GHG

Gold Member
If I want to go sli 670, do I have to have two of the same model? I have a reference evga 670, but I would like to get the FTW edition as my second one(if I decide to sli).

No you can mix and match. The FTW version will downclock to match your reference card though so if its cheaper, you may be better off getting another reference card.
 

DJ_Lae

Member
Finally got my monoprice order so I hooked up the 24" HDTV on my desk as a secondary monitor. Also got an HDMI matrix switch so I can cycle my consoles between that small TV if I'm playing at my desk or doing computer work on the main monitor, and the bigger basement TV for Kinect. I could conceivably run HDMI from my PC to that switch as well and double that second monitor output to the big TV if I want to play controller based games. It's a weird, weird setup, but I'm pleased with how it works.

My only complaint is that now that I'm no longer solely running PC games on the right monitor and 360 games on the left, I really notice the size difference (22" vs 24") and the colours on the HDTV are more exaggerated than they should be. Is there a way to tweak this through AMD's panel? I found colour settings in there but it seems to be global and applies to both monitors.

Makes me want to do an early monitor refresh and go with two (or three) identical panels rather than my jerry-rigged setup here. Though poking through the AMD control panel makes me curious about particularly insane setups, like five portrait oriented monitors in a row or three side by side with a fourth above as a dedicated Steam monitor or something equally superfluous.
 
I know. But like, WAY worse. What would be the cheapest amount of money I could spend to build a PC that could play Bioshock Infinite on high? I'd want to plug it into my TV and surround sound system via HDMI. I've read the OP, but I dunno what builds would do what I want them to do.

It's difficult to say. We do know that the PC version of Bioshock Infinite supports DX11 and has exclusive graphical features. However, there's really no telling how well it will perform until the game is released. But since you already know that you want Bioshock Infinite, a 7850 or 7870 would probably be a good choice. Until the end of March, Radeon 7800 and 7900 series cards include a free copy of Bioshock Infinite.
 

kami_sama

Member
Guys, one question regarding downsampling.

If I want to game at 1440p, any monitor will do, right?
Also, how much performance you lose approximately with a 7950?
Anyone?
I haven't ran benches enough times to say conclusively, only ran a Dota 2 bench once as I thought it just felt different (more smooth), but it went from 13.3 to ~11ms.
Well, it seems that amd is getting better and better with their drivers. It was always the worst past of their cards.
 

Takuya

Banned
What the hell are you running that you would be surprised by its relative performance?

The same games as everyone else, just that I always run them at max resolution (2560x1440), usually got quite a bit happening on my other monitors though as well. Not that I'd see immediate benefit or anything crazy, but I just like to keep it 'new'.
 
Having major display issues with my new PC (it looks like crap, like a version of Windows 2000 is running). If anybody is willing to help I would really appreciate it.

Running Windows 7 with a 7870.
 

Kipp

but I am taking tiny steps forward
All right, so I think I need to pick up a new HDD today. The OP doesn't have any 3TB drives suggested. Is this for any particular reason? I only see the 2TB WD Greens up there, but looking up prices, the 3TB is only marginally cheaper, so if it's the same quality I'd like to go that route.

Also, how come the WD Reds aren't in the OP anymore?
 
Just ordered a new motherboard, CPU, RAM, and heatsink from New egg.
The motherboard is the Asus one in the OP and I went with the i5 CPU. On newegg the motherboard came with 8gb of free RAM, Corsair Vengeance ones too!

My power supply should still work, as long as I don't need any more power plugs, haha.

Can't wait to replay witcher 2 with the new CPU and my 660ti. Also looking forward to running dolphin games at full speed. I even got my Wii remotes working on my pc. :)
 
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