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"I Need a New PC!" 2015 Part 2. Read the OP. Rocking 2500K's until HBM2 and beyond.

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bomblord1

Banned
Yeah, that's an excellent cooler. It's been the king of budget coolers for a few years now. I'm not sure what you mean by "low profile" though, the 212 Evo is 160mm tall. How small does the cooler have to be to fit your needs?

Amazon specs list it at 120mm
 

derFeef

Member
So I am rocking this 2500k for a while now and it works great at 4.1ghz
However I start to think that I can squeeze a little bit more performance for gaming out of this machine without having to change everything. Here is my setup.

Would a CPU upgrade be worthwhile? Especially money/performance?
Supported CPU list: http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/P67 Extreme6/?cat=CPU

Thanks!

So I guess ride the thing out as long as I can, like the title says :D
 

OmegaSkittle

Neo Member
Noticed today that my Windows 10 PC will not shut down. I give the command to shut down, it does, and immediately boots back up.

I noticed Windows updated the last time I shut it down. Anybody else having this issue? What kinds of steps are typical when troubleshooting an issue like this?

Look at the Power Management properties on your Ethernet/Wifi Controller. Look to see if "Allow this device to wake the computer" box is checked.

My PC was doing the same thing until I realized my HTPC was turning on my computer whenever it tried to access anything on my main PC.
 
I am a bit worried. My case, the Fractal Design R4 has a CPU clearance of 170mm, the CPU cooler has a height of 170mm, will I be fine ?

They should take cpu coolers up to 170mm. Although, that's gonna be cutting it really close. You won't be able to use side fans either.

From their site:

CPU coolers up to 170mm tall (when no fan is installed in the side panel)

I would personally use something a bit smaller.
 
Look at the Power Management properties on your Ethernet/Wifi Controller. Look to see if "Allow this device to wake the computer" box is checked.

My PC was doing the same thing until I realized my HTPC was turning on my computer whenever it tried to access anything on my main PC.

Thanks, I will check this, although it is wired (no wifi card either) and shouldn't be pulling any data after a shutdown command. And why would that setting change all of the sudden?

I also read to use the Power Management troubleshooter. Will try these things tonight.
 
They should take cpu coolers up to 170mm. Although, that's gonna be cutting it really close. You won't be able to use side fans either.

From their site:


I would personally use something a bit smaller.

So how tall should it be then ? I am going to change my order. Is 162mm fine or should I go as small as 143mm ? No experience with this whatsoever.
 

Ally1987

Member
I just moved my graphiccard to PCIe slott #2 because I wanted to moved it more far from the cpu cooler, and I noticed that the coreclock and memoryclock goes up to the max when I'm browsing or whatch a clip in fullscreen. Is there any way to stop this? My mb is Asus x99-a
 

RGM79

Member
I posted the picture it tells me nothing without scale.

I don't know what picture you're looking at. The official specifications say 158.5mm height, which is usually rounded up to 159mm or 160mm when talking about the 212 Evo in general.

Hyper-212-EVO-measurement-600.jpg


That image is from the bottom of the official product page for the 212 Evo. You can also click on "specs" to see numerical stats.

I just moved my graphiccard to PCIe slott #2 because I wanted to moved it more far from the cpu cooler, and I noticed that the coreclock and memoryclock goes up to the max when I'm browsing or whatch a clip in fullscreen. Is there any way to stop this? My mb is Asus x99-a

Does it not do that in slot 1 for sure? Web browsers and video players can and do use the GPU for hardware acceleration. And what CPU cooler do you have that interferes with the graphics card?

If possible, I would recommend you keep it in the first/uppermost slot, that is usually the fastest slot for motherboards. This screenshot is from page 1-13 of your motherboard manual, it says the second PCI-E x16 slot is limited to PCI-E 2.0. While that's not a bottleneck for most graphics cards, it isn't the fastest slot either. Studies by HardOCP and Guru3D have shown that PCI-E 2.0 x16 will result in slightly less performance than running in PCI-E 3.0 x16.
 

bomblord1

Banned
I don't know what picture you're looking at. The official specifications say 158.5mm height, which is usually rounded up to 159mm or 160mm when talking about the 212 Evo in general.

Hyper-212-EVO-measurement-600.jpg


That image is from the bottom of the official product page for the 212 Evo. You can also click on "specs" to see numerical stats.



Does it not do that in slot 1 for sure? Web browsers and video players can and do use the GPU for hardware acceleration. And what CPU cooler do you have that interferes with the graphics card?

If possible, I would recommend you keep it in the first/uppermost slot, that is usually the fastest slot for motherboards. This screenshot is from page 1-13 of your motherboard manual, it says the second PCI-E x16 slot is limited to PCI-E 2.0. While that's not a bottleneck for most graphics cards, it isn't the fastest slot either. Studies by HardOCP and Guru3D have shown that PCI-E 2.0 x16 will result in slightly less performance than running in PCI-E 3.0 x16.

So the fan is mounted on the side? I've never used a heatsink like that before lol. I assumed you placed the opposite side of the fan on the CPU like with all the reference coolers I've installed thanks.
 
I asked this earlier but I just wanted to double check before I pull the trigger this afternoon:

A EVGA 600W Bronze power supply is fine for a 980 ti, right? This is the rest of my build if you want to see the rest of it.
 

RGM79

Member
I asked this earlier but I just wanted to ask it quick again before I pull the trigger this afternoon:

A EVGA 600W Bronze power supply is fine for a 980 ti, right? This is the rest of my build if you want to see the rest of it.

Yeah, 600 watts is fine. Why two 1TB hard drives and the expensive and old Z87 motherboard, though?
 
Yeah, 600 watts is fine. Why two 1TB hard drives and the expensive and old Z87 motherboard, though?

Those are all parts I already have in my current build from over a year ago. I'm just upgrading my GPU to a 980 ti and wanted to make sure my PSU would still cut it.
 

RGM79

Member
Those are all parts I already have in my current build from over a year ago. I'm just upgrading my GPU to a 980 ti and wanted to make sure my PSU would still cut it.

Oh, I see. So you haven't bought that MSI GTX 980 Ti yet, right? There are some slightly better deals around, like this EVGA GTX 980 Ti FTW edition for $635~640. It comes with a higher factory clock speed, although the cooler on the MSI model is slightly larger and potentially better for overclocking. There's the Gigabyte Windforce model as well for $613. It has a large triple fan cooler but lacks the MSI and EVGA models' semi-fanless mode and has a lower factory clock speed.
 
Oh, I see. So you haven't bought that MSI GTX 980 Ti yet, right? There are some slightly better deals around, like this EVGA GTX 980 Ti FTW edition for $635~640. It comes with a higher factory clock speed, although the cooler on the MSI model is slightly larger and potentially better for overclocking. There's the Gigabyte Windforce model as well for $613. It has a large triple fan cooler but lacks the MSI and EVGA models' semi-fanless mode and has a lower factory clock speed.

Yeah, haven't bought the 980 ti yet.

Thanks for the opinions! Unfortunately I'm in Canada though, so those prices don't apply to me. You can use the .ca version of pcpartpicker if you want to see our prices, they run at about $900 CAD up here. The EVGA FTW edition would run about $30 less than the MSI gaming card here, would you recommend that over the MSI? The Windforce is slightly too big for my case though! Even if it wasn't too big, I value the semi-fanless mode on the MSI and EVGA quite a bit.
 

DirtyLarry

Member
I know this is a Build You Own PC thread, and I am probably going to lean that route, but taking into account time is money, what do people think of this bundle for the new Asus Oculus Ready PC's on Amazon???

Link to Amazon
Link to Asus' Product Page

I like the idea of a smaller desktop, and it seems to be pretty powerful overall, so I have to say I am tempted to pick this up and cancel my preorder. I just wish it said what Motherboard was in it and if one could eventually SLi if they wanted to.
 

Bluforce

Member
I need some pretty specific upgrade advice. My son who is addict to Starcraft II has been disappointed by low frame rates since the last expansion. I think its his cpu that is a bottle neck. His current system specs:

AMD A10-5700
Motherboard with FM2 socket
AMD 7850 video card with 1 gig of memory.

Is there any upgrade for around $200 that would speed up starcraft II? I'm assuming that it will have to be a cpu motherboard combo as the FM2 socket is rather limited.

Suggestions?
You are assuming right. You can't really upgrade that PC, and StarCraft II is very CPU heavy.
I had a PC with an APU on a FM2 board.

Ah, guys, my new parts will arrive tomorrow.
 
I know this is a Build You Own PC thread, and I am probably going to lean that route, but taking into account time is money, what do people think of this bundle for the new Asus Oculus Ready PC's on Amazon???

Link to Amazon
Link to Asus' Product Page

I like the idea of a smaller desktop, and it seems to be pretty powerful overall, so I have to say I am tempted to pick this up and cancel my preorder. I just wish it said what Motherboard was in it and if one could eventually SLi if they wanted to.

What is going on with that tower.

Also thats a plain 980 not a ti and thats a non k processor. Not sure if you care about those things but I just figured I would point those out.
 
Should be starting my (1st) build tomorrow night and I have a question. I do not have Ethernet capability where the PC is going so I bought a wireless antennae. Not a big deal, though I have also purchased a video capture card. Both cards will use the PCI-E connectors on the motherboard. I purchased the Gigabyte GA-Z170XP-SLI so it should have plenty of connection ports for these two cards plus my video card.


My question is...due to the heat off the R9 390, do I need to be careful about other perifials that are installed immediately above and below the video card? The video card will be installed in the PCIEx16 slot. The wireless antennae will be placed in the PCIEx1_1 slot so the antennae prongs wont get in the way of the other ports outside the case.

Can the capture card (pictured below) fit into a PCIEx8 or a PCIEx4 slot? I ask not just because of the heat issue but the 390 takes up 2 slots so the PCIEx1_2 will be covered up.


Thanks for helping a first time builder.
 

LilJoka

Member
Should be starting my (1st) build tomorrow night and I have a question. I do not have Ethernet capability where the PC is going so I bought a wireless antennae. Not a big deal, though I have also purchased a video capture card. Both cards will use the PCI-E connectors on the motherboard. I purchased the Gigabyte GA-Z170XP-SLI so it should have plenty of connection ports for these two cards plus my video card.


My question is...due to the heat off the R9 390, do I need to be careful about other perifials that are installed immediately above and below the video card? The video card will be installed in the PCIEx16 slot. The wireless antennae will be placed in the PCIEx1_1 slot so the antennae prongs wont get in the way of the other ports outside the case.

Can the capture card (pictured below) fit into a PCIEx8 or a PCIEx4 slot? I ask not just because of the heat issue but the 390 takes up 2 slots so the PCIEx1_2 will be covered up.



Thanks for helping a first time builder.


You can fit your peripheral cards in any slots available, you'll want the GPU at a the top probably as heat rises. But shouldn't matter too much.
 
Should be starting my (1st) build tomorrow night and I have a question. I do not have Ethernet capability where the PC is going so I bought a wireless antennae. Not a big deal, though I have also purchased a video capture card. Both cards will use the PCI-E connectors on the motherboard. I purchased the Gigabyte GA-Z170XP-SLI so it should have plenty of connection ports for these two cards plus my video card.



My question is...due to the heat off the R9 390, do I need to be careful about other perifials that are installed immediately above and below the video card? The video card will be installed in the PCIEx16 slot. The wireless antennae will be placed in the PCIEx1_1 slot so the antennae prongs wont get in the way of the other ports outside the case.

Can the capture card (pictured below) fit into a PCIEx8 or a PCIEx4 slot? I ask not just because of the heat issue but the 390 takes up 2 slots so the PCIEx1_2 will be covered up.



Thanks for helping a first time builder.

Yeah, you can put a PCIEx1 card in a PCIEx8 no problem.
 
Should be starting my (1st) build tomorrow night and I have a question. I do not have Ethernet capability where the PC is going so I bought a wireless antennae. Not a big deal, though I have also purchased a video capture card. Both cards will use the PCI-E connectors on the motherboard. I purchased the Gigabyte GA-Z170XP-SLI so it should have plenty of connection ports for these two cards plus my video card.



My question is...due to the heat off the R9 390, do I need to be careful about other perifials that are installed immediately above and below the video card? The video card will be installed in the PCIEx16 slot. The wireless antennae will be placed in the PCIEx1_1 slot so the antennae prongs wont get in the way of the other ports outside the case.

Can the capture card (pictured below) fit into a PCIEx8 or a PCIEx4 slot? I ask not just because of the heat issue but the 390 takes up 2 slots so the PCIEx1_2 will be covered up.



Thanks for helping a first time builder.

We have almost the exact same build. I put the wifi card all the way on the bottom slot and have had no heating issues. My 390 is at the top.
 

DirtyLarry

Member
What is going on with that tower.

Also thats a plain 980 not a ti and thats a non k processor. Not sure if you care about those things but I just figured I would point those out.
K just means I cannot overclock it? Is that correct? If so, yeah I do not care about that.
And honestly if I build my own, I doubt I would spring the money for a Ti either.

The tower is atrocious, but I like the small factor and it will be underneath my desk so look is not really something I am concerned about. Just size and value and the fact to build my own will take time, which is a precious commodity for myself these days. So I do not mind spending an extra few bucks if it means I get the hours back from someone else doing it.
 

Ezalc

Member
Oh, there's no point in translating the prices into their USD equivalent. You don't need to do that. If the retailer you're buying from has a website, just link that.

No, I don't understand what model of motherboard that is. Gigabyte makes five different 8 series motherboards (H81, B85, H87, Q87, and Z87 chipsets) and at least one mini ITX model for each chipset, and all of them use DDR3. A model number would be good, like "GA-Z97N-WIFI" or similar.

Oh, if the price makes sense for the RAM, then go for it. Make sure the motherboard supports 1866MHz though, otherwise it'll just run the RAM at 1333 or 1600MHz instead.

Here is the motherboard I'm looking at buying.

It's also a general, amazon-like, site that I might buy some of the other parts from. I went to a few stores in my city and got them to make up a list with their prices, as well as from an acquaintance who has a computer hardware store himself. So depending on things I might just buy the parts piece by piece from various locations to get the best price.
 

Ally1987

Member
I don't know what picture you're looking at. The official specifications say 158.5mm height, which is usually rounded up to 159mm or 160mm when talking about the 212 Evo in general.

Hyper-212-EVO-measurement-600.jpg


That image is from the bottom of the official product page for the 212 Evo. You can also click on "specs" to see numerical stats.



Does it not do that in slot 1 for sure? Web browsers and video players can and do use the GPU for hardware acceleration. And what CPU cooler do you have that interferes with the graphics card?

If possible, I would recommend you keep it in the first/uppermost slot, that is usually the fastest slot for motherboards. This screenshot is from page 1-13 of your motherboard manual, it says the second PCI-E x16 slot is limited to PCI-E 2.0. While that's not a bottleneck for most graphics cards, it isn't the fastest slot either. Studies by HardOCP and Guru3D have shown that PCI-E 2.0 x16 will result in slightly less performance than running in PCI-E 3.0 x16.

I have Noctua NH D15 cooler. I putted the card in slot #3, and that did solve my problem.
 

mkenyon

Banned
I know this is a Build You Own PC thread, and I am probably going to lean that route, but taking into account time is money, what do people think of this bundle for the new Asus Oculus Ready PC's on Amazon???

Link to Amazon
Link to Asus' Product Page

I like the idea of a smaller desktop, and it seems to be pretty powerful overall, so I have to say I am tempted to pick this up and cancel my preorder. I just wish it said what Motherboard was in it and if one could eventually SLi if they wanted to.
Absolutely awful value.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-6600K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor ($248.89 @ OutletPC)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H60 54.0 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($59.99 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z170N-Gaming 5 Mini ITX LGA1151 Motherboard ($149.99 @ Amazon)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2133 Memory ($69.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Crucial MX200 500GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($154.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Silverstone RVZ01B Mini ITX Desktop Case ($78.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Power Supply: Silverstone 600W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular SFX Power Supply ($117.99 @ Directron)
Total: $880.83
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-02-16 17:15 EST-0500
Noob question:

Would I be OK using this MSI GTX 770 with my current power supply (FirePower ModXStream Pro 700MXSP)?

The MSI needs 2x8-pin and my power supply only has 1x6+2-pin and 1x6-pin. Would an adapter be enough? Would I have enough power for my hard drives (1xSSD and 2xHDD)?

Thanks!
Yeah, the adapter will be fine. It has two 12V rails @ 25A each. I'd assume each PCI-E connector is connected to a separate one.
 
I'd wait until a week or two before you plan to get everything together to come up with a final parts list. There's still 4~6 weeks until the end of March, so prices can change somewhat. There are some suggestions I can make:
  • You don't need a water cooler for a non-overclockable processor. The Corsair H60 isn't that much better than lower priced air coolers, anyway.
  • I highly recommend avoiding DDR3. You're buying all new parts, so there's no reason to go with older DDR3. It's not recommended to be used with Skylake anyway, as it runs at a higher voltage and you're not saving much money if at all.
  • That SSD is awful. Kingston was doing some shady and quiet parts swapping so the V300 is not the same drive that was reviewed when it first came out, performance has dropped considerably. Even if it's cheap, I highly recommend spending more for a better performing SSD from Crucial, Samsung, Sandisk, etc.
  • Paying $220 for an R9 380 is kinda pricey, there are very good 4GB models that start at less than $200 after rebate.
Overall, you could be paying less or at least getting more for your money's worth. Here's what I recommend as an example parts list for $900 after rebates:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-6600 3.3GHz Quad-Core Processor ($215.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: MSI B150M MORTAR Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($81.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill NT Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2133 Memory ($33.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Crucial BX100 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($69.00 @ Amazon)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($49.89 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: PowerColor Radeon R9 390 8GB PCS+ Video Card ($274.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Silverstone PS08B (Black) MicroATX Mid Tower Case ($34.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: EVGA 750W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($48.99 @ NCIX US)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM (64-bit) ($87.95 @ OutletPC)
Total: $897.77
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-02-16 01:31 EST-0500

Thanks for the response! Holy shit at the Kingston thing, that's pretty fucking ballsy.

Now, assuming I want to stay with my original case (I am going to be a bit stubborn on this because I really want that case), what would you recommend for an ATX board, or does it not matter if I put a MicroATX mobo in there? I know you can use MicroATX in a full case, but it is better to use an ATX board for any reason?

Also, even though liquid cooling isn't needed, I still want something beefier than a stock CPU cooler because my house gets very hot in the summer. What would you recommend?
 

bomblord1

Banned
Hey guys, can someone spare a moment to help out a console gamer with a PC issue?

So I have a Sony Vaio laptop with an Intel Core i5 CPU 3rd gen, with 8GB of RAM, a 1TB hard drive and an NVIDIA GT 735M GPU. As you can tell, I don't do a lot of PC gaming but I know my laptop should be MORE than capable of running a game I wish dearly to play from back in the day, which is Summoner.

Now I bought it on Steam, set up the initial settings but when detecting video hardware, the game only finds the Intel HD graphics and won't let me select the option to add anti-aliasing.

Random I thought, so I went into Dxdiag and on the display tab, it only shows the Intel HD 3000, yet on the NVIDIA GeForce Experience program I have installed, under my rig, it clearly says NVIDIA GT 735M GPU.

It would also explain why UDK has been running like shit.

Please GAF, will someone help my identify what the fuck is going on here and how I can convince my laptop that it DOES in fact have a GPU, I just want to replay a beloved game and enjoy the feels.

Check your Nvidia optimus settings and whitelist the game in it if you have to.
 

bomblord1

Banned
No worries, thanks man.



Uhhh, what is that? >.<

Search for Nvidia Optimus it is a program that automatically disables your dedicated GPU when its not needed to conserve battery life. If a game isn't automatically using your dedicated GPU you need to add iy to a list of games that are allowed too.
 

RayStorm

Member
Well, already bought the seagate one. It's being tested so I am not worried.

What do you mean by "it's being tested"? Also it's not like they arrive DOA, but rather that a large amount of Seagate HDDs fail within the first 2 years.

Absolutely awful value.

Honestly, I don't think that's true. Also your comparison list is quite unfair, considering that you left out the GPU, Oculus and OS. I wouldn't call it that much worse value than other pre-builts.
 

mkenyon

Banned
Honestly, I don't think that's true. Also your comparison list is quite unfair, considering that you left out the GPU, Oculus and OS. I wouldn't call it that much worse value than other pre-builts.
That's because I left out GPU choice.

980 Ti + Win License + Oculus = Slightly less than the ASUS bundle in the link with better everything.

With a 980, it's $200 less with better everything.

Change it to a non-ITX build, and it'd be ~$150 less than what I quoted.

The previous gen ASUS systems released with that form factor had notorious heating issues as well, not sure if that's been fixed or not in the newer release. Just look at the reviews

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA57X2WJ4726&cm_re=asus_g20-_-83-220-838-_-Product
 

RayStorm

Member
That's because I left out GPU choice.

980 Ti + Win License + Oculus = Slightly less than the ASUS bundle in the link with better everything.

With a 980, it's $200 less with better everything.

Change it to a non-ITX build, and it'd be ~$150 less than what I quoted.

The previous gen ASUS systems released with that form factor had notorious heating issues as well, not sure if that's been fixed or not in the newer release. Just look at the reviews

I would call it at least debatable whether a i5 6600K is better than a i7 6700. Also changing it to a larger form factor seems... well a bit of an apples to oranges comparison. But just to get back to my initial point again, it does not seem that awful a value compared to other pre-built systems. I simply took a bit of an issue with calling it "awful" value as that seems a bit sensationalist language and wanted to point that out. But granted, if you were to take potential issues like a lack of cooling or operating noise into account this might still be an apt choice of word(s). But just by specs, which was what you initially pointed out, I feel you used way too harsh language.
 
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