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[Sanctuary]

At absolute peak, the average gaming PC (assuming you don't SLI or anything else crazy) draws about 400w. Without knowing how much you pay for electricity, it's the equivalent of leaving 6 or 7 60w light bulbs on.

However, this is only during load (gaming or anything else intensive). Most of the time a modern Intel PC idles around 15-50w.

Obviously this doesn't include your monitor or any other peripherals.

Getting kind of off topic, but I was sort of wondering about this myself. Power consumption is one thing that worries me about the 780 GTX (and whatever cards come after). Yet, if I'm not gaming on my PC, I'm gaming on consoles that are hooked up to a power hungry plasma. Wondering if they would both be similar in that regard.

 

[IAmRandom31]

I haven't been able to read through this entire thread but saw something in the OP build list that was a bit false. It shows you HAVE to have a K series processor to " overclock " but that is not true. I have an I5-2400 and overclocked to 3.9Ghz ( from 3.1Ghz ). 39 is the highest it allows the multiplier to go on my BIOS with the unlocked processor. But an 800Mhz boost is still noticeable. Heck on my GB motherboard it also has a 3 stage overclock piece of software that lets you " boost " to 3.2, 3.4, 3.7Ghz with the press of a button and a restart.

Someone recently asked. I tested our outlet with my PC equipment plugged in and was at 210w when running a game that maxxed out my GPU.

Current build is the I5-2400 @ 3.9Ghz, Radeon 6770 1GB @ 950Mhz OCed, 1TB internal, 2TB external HDD, CD/DVD player, 3x 120mm fans blue LED, 1x 200mm fan ( top ) blue LED, 8GB of DDR3 ram @ 1600mhz, 21 inch 1600x900 monitor, laserjet printer, etc.

All that plugged into a surge protector. Plugged SP into the electronic tester to test. I was actually surprised. Thought it would be closer to 400w with everything plugged in and running. Ran the test for 24h. If I remember right, the yearly cost ( if I happened to play this game 24h a day all year lol ) was 100-150$ ... I think. I will have to run it again to be for certain on that.

 

[Saty]

My Syncmaster T240 is on its last legs. I think i'm going to check if it can be fixed and for how much.
Barring that, what would be the the better choice from Dell U2412M and LG 24EB23PM?

 

[schandmann]

Well, the Prodigy-M did just release... but I prefer the smaller mITX cases.

I wouldn't have a problem getting a new PSU if really needed. One that is 100% modulair might help with such a small case? Although I don't know what PSU is both really slim and modulair.

Do you still use mITX yourself?

Silverstone has some 140mm deep modular PSUs. They're recommended in the SFF post.

I don't use ITX anymore, because I moved up from my budget B75-ITX mobo to Z77, had room to spare and was too cheap to buy the Asus Z77 mobo. Using a Fractal Arc Mini at the moment. It's nice, but a bit bigger than the Prodigy.

If things haven't changed with Socket 1150, Asus is still the only company that makes ITX motherboards that can comfortably fit a CM 212. And they command a premium for that.

 

[kennah]

Howdy, could you give me any suggestion for a build specifically used for Cinema 4D renderings?

I've tried to render a building plan (medium quality, 841 × 1189 mm, 300 dpi) with my current gaming machine and it took 8h35min.
Better than 12-16h with the Macbook Pro but I hoped it would take a lot less than that.

Budget would be $1000-1500. Many thanks in advance.

What are the specs of your current gaming machine so I can use that as a bit of a benchmark.

 

[schwupp]

i´m looking at new graphics cards - especially the amd 280x / 7870.
do these cards require pci express 3.0?
its sometimes listed in the specs and my mb doesnt seem to support it :-/ (P8H61 PRO).

 

[Gaf_SentMe]

I bought the EVGA 780 ACX GPU with next day air delivery before noon eastern yesterday. Now I find out that UPS and Newegg don't deliver on saturdays =( Expecting the GPU on Monday. Had hopes of restarting my oldie. My final specs:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i5-3570K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor (Purchased For $0.00)
Motherboard: Asus P8Z68-V/GEN3 ATX LGA1155 Motherboard (Purchased For $0.00)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (Purchased For $0.00)
Storage: Samsung 840 Pro Series 256GB 2.5" Solid State Disk (Purchased For $0.00)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 780 3GB Video Card (Purchased For $0.00)
Case: NZXT Phantom 410 (White) ATX Mid Tower Case (Purchased For $0.00)
Power Supply: OCZ ModXStream Pro 600W 80 PLUS Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply (Purchased For $0.00)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8 (OEM) (64-bit) ($0.00)
Total: $0.00
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-10-12 13:22 EDT-0400)

 

[kennah]

i´m looking at new graphics cards - especially the amd 280x / 7870.
do these cards require pci express 3.0?
its sometimes listed in the specs and my mb doesnt seem to support it :-/ (P8H61 PRO).

Pci3 is backwards compatible/neither of those cards saturate the 2.0 bus anyway

 

[saelz8]

Got my Phenom yesterday. Case is cramped, but you make it work. Zip Ties are REQUIRED if you want internals to look even half decent. I still have to put a 280X in.

 

[Dawg]

Got my Phenom yesterday. Case is cramped, but you make it work. Zip Ties are REQUIRED if you want internals to look even half decent. I still have to put a 280X in.

How's the noise?

 

[friday]

Everything is up and running on the new pc, installing mobo drivers now.

So the new system is

- 4670k
- MSI z87-g45
- MSI 7970 twin frozr
- 1 tb f3 hd
- 8 gig ddr3 ram
- 7 year old Lian li case that continues to hold up great.

 

[saelz8]

How's the noise?

Noise is awesome. Quietest case I've ever owned. Included Fans are very quiet (2x 120MM) plus I have a Sickleflow for the Hyper 212. PSU is a Seasonic X650.

 

[Dawg]

Noise is awesome. Quietest case I've ever owned. Included Fans are very quiet (2x 120MM) plus I have a Sickleflow for the Hyper 212. PSU is a Seasonic X650.

Cool, I'm probably gonna order that one! (As soon as they're available here)

Was the Seasonic an easy fit? It's 100% modulair so that's a plus.

Also, what motherboard did you pick? I have a hard time finding a good Z77 board, Z87 seems better but I don't have Haswell.

 

[schandmann]

Cool, I'm probably gonna order that one! (As soon as they're available here)

Was the Seasonic an easy fit? It's 100% modulair so that's a plus.

Also, what motherboard did you pick? I have a hard time finding a good Z77 board, Z87 seems better but I don't have Haswell.

Like I said above, this is your best bet. The CPU socket is slightly offset so your 212 Evo doesn't touch the GPU.

 

[friday]

All drivers and such have installed great so far. CPU is running at 3.6 right now.

 

[saelz8]

Cool, I'm probably gonna order that one! (As soon as they're available here)

Was the Seasonic an easy fit? It's 100% modulair so that's a plus.

Also, what motherboard did you pick? I have a hard time finding a good Z77 board, Z87 seems better but I don't have Haswell.

I have the MATX version. Z77 UD3H Mobo, had it since last year, so I just transitioned my old system from a Mini P180 to this case.

Fit was fine for the PSU, but they are put in differently between ITX and MATX. ITX, goes in the back. MATX, goes in the front. Either way, make sure your PSU is 160MM MAX. Less for some breathing room.

 

[Dawg]

Might up going mATX after all then. Even the Asus Deluxe doesn't seem without its problems (a lot of DOA issues, ram not working and other problems.) Z87 has a lot more choice and a lot more good mITX boards, but I'm not upgrading my CPU for that.

Your case doesn't seem that big (it's on your desk) so I'm guessing the difference isn't that big between mATX and mITX?

 

[bro1]

Well, the Prodigy-M did just release... but I prefer the smaller mITX cases.

I wouldn't have a problem getting a new PSU if really needed. One that is 100% modulair might help with such a small case? Although I don't know what PSU is both really slim and modulair.

Do you still use mITX yourself?

Look at the silverstone strider

 

[bro1]

Everything is up and running on the new pc, installing mobo drivers now.

So the new system is

- 4670k
- MSI z87-g45
- MSI 7970 twin frozr
- 1 tb f3 hd
- 8 gig ddr3 ram
- 7 year old Lian li case that continues to hold up great.

No SSD?

 

[bro1]

Need a new 27" monitor. Already have a 27" 1080p monitor at 76hz. Would you buy a 144hz monitor or a 1440 monitor as a new main monitor? I have 770 and will replace it next year to stay current.

 

[Dawg]

Look at the silverstone strider

http://tweakers.net/pricewatch/274349/silverstone-st50f-p.html right?

That's quite cheap, actually.

 

[schandmann]

Your case doesn't seem that big (it's on your desk) so I'm guessing the difference isn't that big between mATX and mITX?

It depends. The Prodigy is pretty big for an ITX case (look at it compared to the Fractal Node 304) and there's mATX cases that are almost as small, like for example the Silverstone PS07.

The Fractal Arc Mini, and by extension the Define Mini, are comparable to the Prodigy in height and width, but deeper.

If silence is important to you and you can live with mATX, maybe wait for the Nanoxia Deep Silence 4?

 

[RumblingRosco]

As a few of you may recall, I've been in this thread on-and-off for the past 12-18 months bitching about a lack of space on my OS SSD (40 GB drive with only W7 on it essentially). I have been down to between 1-2 GB of space for months and was about to the point I had to reinstall W7 to my other SSD.

As it turns out, Microsoft has now made it easy to delete old Windows Updated files. I saved ~6GB of space just by a new option they added to Disk Cleanup. See my photo below, and here's a link to the article I found about this.

Just a heads-up!

 

[friday]

No SSD?

Not for now. Was on a tight budget, most non essential items were reused from my last build. I will add things to this PC as I go.

 

[Dawg]

It depends. The Prodigy is pretty big for an ITX case (look at it compared to the Fractal Node 304) and there's mATX cases that are almost as small, like for example the Silverstone PS07.

The Fractal Arc Mini, and by extension the Define Mini, are comparable to the Prodigy in height and width, but deeper.

If silence is important to you and you can live with mATX, maybe wait for the Nanoxia Deep Silence 4?

I'm currently thinking Prodigy-M, Gigabyte G1. Sniper M3 and Seasonic X650

 

[Sanctuary]

Just a heads-up!

That's pretty awesome, thanks. Just removed 6gb worth of crap.

edit: Uh, I don't know what the hell happened, but it said that I'd be removing close to 6gb worth of files, yet when I deleted them the remaining space on my disk was exactly the same. So I ran the cleanup again, and apparently all of the previous files were deleted, so I have no idea what's going on.

I'm currently thinking Prodigy-M, Gigabyte G1. Sniper M3 and Seasonic X650

Have you seen the Corsair Carbide Air 540? I don't find it quite as sleek looking, but it's supposed to be a phenomenal case.

 

[LordAlu]

It depends. The Prodigy is pretty big for an ITX case (look at it compared to the Fractal Node 304) and there's mATX cases that are almost as small, like for example the Silverstone PS07.

The Fractal Arc Mini, and by extension the Define Mini, are comparable to the Prodigy in height and width, but deeper.

If silence is important to you and you can live with mATX, maybe wait for the Nanoxia Deep Silence 4?

For mATX you could also go for the Aerocool Dead Silence, based on the Xigmatek Aquila?

 

[Sanctuary]

For mATX you could also go for the Aerocool Dead Silence, based on the Xigmatek Aquila?

Damn, those DS cases are really nice looking too. Just wondering about the graphics card space, since it says "up to 320mm". Something like the GTX 780 is 266mm, but you still need clearance for the cables.

 

[Dawg]

For mATX you could also go for the Aerocool Dead Silence, based on the Xigmatek Aquila?

That one is even bigger than the Prodigy M though

mATX is amazing for saving money. I can buy a (quite) decent motherboard for $99 or less and the cases are half the price of a decent ATX case as well.

 

[Addnan]

The Bitfenix Phenom looks sexy. ITX and MATX variants.

 

[Kerrinck]

Ok, need some help. PC parts are absurdly expensive where I live and since I will be traveling to the US next month, I was wondering what I should upgrade so I can have this build ready for at least 3-4 more years. Would like to spend around 300-400$
Here's my current build:

CPU: i5 750
Memory: 8 gigs
Graphics: 6950 2gb.
I have no idea what my motherboard is

 

[bro1]

http://tweakers.net/pricewatch/274349/silverstone-st50f-p.html right?

That's quite cheap, actually.

Mo, do the 600w silver rated one

 

[Sanctuary]

That one is even bigger than the Prodigy M though

mATX is amazing for saving money. I can buy a (quite) decent motherboard for $99 or less and the cases are half the price of a decent ATX case as well.

All of my previous builds have been a tower of power, but I've honestly never actually put much of the free space and expansion slots to use. I'd primary buy them thinking I might actually add more components later on, cooling solutions and because they were easier to work with.

Now though, I want to build a system that I can carry around, and I'm also probably going to go with one of Corsair's prepackaged watercooling solutions just to help cut down on the noise factor, and because I'm sick of having to worry about the ginormous heatsink putting all of that stress on the motherboard; making it harder to move too due to the "wobble" factor. Aside from the obvious "will it fit?" questions, I think the biggest hurdle for mATX is getting a good board that you can actually overclock with, on top of it having good thermals in the case.

 

[Dawg]

All of my previous builds have been a tower of power, but I've honestly never actually put much of the free space and expansion slots to use. I'd primary buy them thinking I might actually add more components later on, cooling solutions and because they were easier to work with.

Now though, I want to build a system that I can carry around, and I'm also probably going to go with one of Corsair's prepackaged watercooling solutions just to help cut down on the noise factor, and because I'm sick of having to worry about the ginormous heatsink putting all of that stress on the motherboard; making it harder to move too due to the "wobble" factor. Aside from the obvious "will it fit?" questions, I think the biggest hurdle for mATX is getting a good board that you can actually overclock with, on top of it having good thermals in the case.

That's pretty much my reason for doing it. My ATX case looks empty and everything looks too big. And ATX motherboard have too much stuff on it that I don't use but I'm paying for it. I will never do SLI either, so boards with one slot are no problem for me.

I'm still looking around for the best board. That Sniper used to be $180 and is now $99 and it has very good audio, but it's not that good on overclocking.

I'm currently going for the Prodigy-M, I like the design more than the Phenom.

 

[kharma45]

My original idea was to go mATX, wish I'd stuck to it.

 

[theSlacker]

That's pretty much my reason for doing it. My ATX case looks empty and everything looks too big. And ATX motherboard have too much stuff on it that I don't use but I'm paying for it. I will never do SLI either, so boards with one slot are no problem for me.

I'm still looking around for the best board. That Sniper used to be $180 and is now $99 and it has very good audio, but it's not that good on overclocking.

I'm currently going for the Prodigy-M, I like the design more than the Phenom.

Thirded. Exactly why I'm going for matx now. All the free and wasted space for nothing. Not even a money issue since the stuff I'm going for is the same or more expensive then I could get full atx stuff for, like the asus gene motherboards.

Still waiting on the Arc Mini R2 to show its head.

 

[solarus]

PC Gaf I need your help. I overclocked my new build a week ago and it's been running fine, CPU temp is fine.
I opened CPUID today and checked the temps and holy shit it says the mainboard is running at 120 degrees celcius?! Is this correct, or maybe the sensor is wrong? Or am I currently frying my computer and need to do somehting immediately. Really would like some advice, I'll get rid of my overclock if I have to. CPU temp is fine currently, it's in the 40s.

 

[ekim]

I found the scaling option in the CCC but it doesn't work. I tried to run Crysis 3 at 720p but I have big black borders/bars everywhere - it doesn't fill the whole screen. I at least thought my TV would automatically switch to that resolution. Any ideas?

Anyone?
(I'm playing on a 1080p TV via HDMI)

 

[Dawg]

Anyone?
(I'm playing on a 1080p TV via HDMI)

Could you try going into CCC, opening "my digital flat panels" and then "scaling options"

Change it around and tell me if it does anything.

edit: fuck, I just saw you've already tried that. Sorry.

 

[Azzurri]

Is the 840 Pro still the fastest SSD?

 

[VillageBC]

I'm currently sitting on a q9550 core duo quad, coupled with a 6850.
Should I upgrade to another mid tier, newer card, or just wait and save money for a whole new rig?(I'm thinking about like, two years from now anyway, when ddr4 will have become a day to day reality, and ssd will have a more affordable price per gb ratio).

My fear is that I would just end up wasting money, on a gpu that's going to stay throttled by the cpu + ddr2 combo anyway.
Still,I'd love to inject more life in this rig I'm using for now, and enjoy more 1080p goodness.

I'm somewhat in the same vote w/ a q9450 oc'd to 3.2ghz. Honestly I would wait till next gen games sort out what is required on the PC before deciding on an upgrade path. Personally I don't see much value in upgrading until Skylake (Intel) or perhaps an unknown hail mary from AMD. So I'm trying to hold off until then, and so far the 7870 has been up to the task.

I would upgrade your 6850 to something newer to tide you over.

 

[ekim]

Could you try going into CCC, opening "my digital flat panels" and then "scaling options"

Change it around and tell me if it does anything.

edit: fuck, I just saw you've already tried that. Sorry.

Funnily enough - Tomb Raider does actually upscale from 720p to 1080p. But only in this resolution. All other games I tried still have black bars. I guess it's game dependent?

 

[Sanctuary]

That's pretty much my reason for doing it. My ATX case looks empty and everything looks too big. And ATX motherboard have too much stuff on it that I don't use but I'm paying for it. I will never do SLI either, so boards with one slot are no problem for me.

I'm still looking around for the best board. That Sniper used to be $180 and is now $99 and it has very good audio, but it's not that good on overclocking.

I'm currently going for the Prodigy-M, I like the design more than the Phenom.

Stupid question, but I keep seeing these boards with onboard sound. You can still add your own sound card right? I'm not quite ready to give up my Xonar just yet. I mean, I know that most of the regular ATX boards had onboard sound, so is it just randomly not on mATX boards, or on the boards that have it, does it take up an expansion slot?

 

[Dawg]

Stupid question, but I keep seeing these boards with onboard sound, but you can still add your own sound card right? I'm not quite ready to give up my Xonar just yet.

As long as it has a slot, sure. Regular ATX boards always have onboard sound too. There's no difference afaik, the motherboard just has to have a second slot (next to the gpu slot)

My current setup:

Bitfenix Prodigy M
GTX 770
Seasonic X-650
Samsung EVO 256 GB
BenQ XL2411T
Gigabyte G1 Sniper M3 motherboard

The Asus Gene V is pretty much the best Micro-ATX Z77 board, but you can't find it anywhere. The Gigabyte Sniper seems to be a lighter version of that and it was already a good deal at $140, it's $99 atm.

 

[Ally1987]

I noticed that my videocard got very warm. How many max degrees should the videocard be during gaming? Mine was up to 82 degrees, isnt that very much?

 

[maneil99]

I noticed that my videocard got very warm. How many max degrees should the videocard be during gaming? Mine was up to 82 degrees, isnt that very much?

Nvidia Cards Target 80c by default.

 

[Celcius]

Finally joined the SATA3 club today with a 256GB Samsung 840 Pro. Huge jump from my 160gb Intel 320 Series

 

[ziadoz]

A friend of mine is having some trouble with his gaming rig randomly crashing, and he's tried everything he can think of to fix it. Does anyone have any ideas what else he could try?

Here's all the information he gave me:

PC freeze, mostly when playing some games but also sometimes when watching a flash video player (most recently on Steam's website). Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon is the current game I've been trying and I cannot get further than 15 minutes in before it freezes. Whereas Saints Row The Third worked fine over a 2 hour session. I also managed numerous sessions extended sessions on Castle Story (steam early access) for up to 6 hours with no issues.

Spec
* Windows 7
* Gigabyte HD 6950 2GB GDDR5
* Antec TruePower New 650W PSU
* Intel Core i7 960 3.2 GHz
* Intel DX58OG X58 Socket 1366
* Crucial 2GB DDR3 1600MHz Ballistix Sport (x5)
* Western Digital WD5000BEVT 500GB 2.5" Hard Drive SATAII 5400rpm

Overheating?
Intel's own monitor (Intel Desktop Utilties) shows temperatures as being within limits. When the CPU is stressed to 100% usage the CPU temp does hit the threshold but this doesn't cause the crash. When gaming the temperature is within limits.

Third party programs show SYSTIN being 128C. This is constant, from boot to gaming this stays the same with the occasional flicker to 20-50C but instantly goes back to 128C so I think this is bugged.

Memory Issue?
I've used memtest84+ but this found zero issues.

Things I've Tried

- Updated bios.
- Updated GFX driver.
- Stressed tested with: FurMark and others, none cause the crash.
- Cleaned and applied new thermal paste. CPU temp dropped about 5°C.
- Checked RAM timings (automatic seems correct).
- Checked all the connections inside the PC as secure.

He'd really appreciate any help. Thanks.

 

[zoku88]

Man, I'm such an idiot. Yesterday, I was trying to figure out why my computer couldn't get past the CPU boot test for hours and then suddenly remembered that these motherbards required a firmware update to handle the new CPUs.... How many times I reseated that CPU.....

Finally joined the SATA3 club today with a 256GB Samsung 840 Pro. Huge jump from my 160gb Intel 320 Series

Wow, we both both did the same upgrade. Same sizes and everything (though, I still have the 320 in my computer, just not booting from it.)

 

[Dawg]

Finally joined the SATA3 club today with a 256GB Samsung 840 Pro. Huge jump from my 160gb Intel 320 Series

Is the difference from PRO <-> Samsung 840 EVO 250GB worth it?

The PRO 256GB is 190$ and the EVO 250GB is 140$