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"I Need a New PC!" 2016 Plus Ultra! HBM2, VR, 144Hz, and 4K for all!

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LilJoka

Member
Well it's a pretty small list:

-Windows 10 automatic updates
-Nvidia Geforce Experience
-Latest Nvidia drivers (currently on 376.19)
-CPUID HWMonitor
-Chrome
-Intel Driver Utility update (ran and downloaded the latest drivers)
-League of Legends

Peripherals:
-These Amazon speakers
-This Razer keyboard
-Wireless Logitech G502 mouse
-Benq monitor
-Wireless USB adapter

And that's it.

Download Latency Monitor
http://www.resplendence.com/latencymon

Run this and monitor, see if you have a latency spike.

Remove that Intel Driver utility thing.
If possible remove the Wifi card.

See if that makes any difference.
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
What is the general consensus on prebuilt PCs that are heavily discounted?

It depends how discounted it is and how much it matches what you want. They can be (but aren't necessarily) hard to customize depending on what they are since they rarely use parts that are amenable to adding much.

Sometimes its just a way better deal than you could ever hope to DIY unless you can get parts at cost, e.g. I would probably go over by a hundred or two on something like this (which isn't much), although it was like $1,299 at one point, I think, at which point it was substantially cheaper than the parts.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...27687&cm_re=6700k_1080-_-83-227-687-_-Product

Intel Core i7 6th Gen 6700K (4.00 GHz)
8 GB DDR4 2 TB HDD 120 GB SSD
Windows 10 Home 64-Bit
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 8 GB GDDR5X

(Good god is this case hideous)
 

mkenyon

Banned
Do you guys think there will be sales on mobos and cpus this month?
I've never ever seen deep discounts on CPUs, even after the new stuff hits. You'll see motherboards dip down in price, generally, but they slowly drop in price through the life of the chipset, so don't make any huge changes when the new stuff comes out.

I wouldn't expect much other than your typical sales.
 

GlamFM

Banned
Smart GAF! I need your help!

Just booted Forza Horizon 3 and was greeted with a "can´t check for updates" message.

Went to the Microsoft Store to check for updates aaaaaand nothing.

Don´t get an error message or anything - there´s simply nothing happening although I know there are updates.

Rebooting the PC AND the router did nothing.

What could be my problem?

Is there a different thread I should post my question in?
 
I've been out of the PC scene for a long time, but I'm trying to buy some gifts for my brother in law who is building a PC. I want to spend under $600, preferably under $500.

I've narrowed it down to:

1) CPU - Core i7 6700k
2) GPU - MSI GTX 1070 8G
3) Monitor - ??? What's the best Gsync monitor I can get for this price range?

Suggestions on Monitor and which of these 3 would be the best? (NOte that he doesn't have *any* pieces yet for his PC, and I assume that for whatever I don't buy, he will buy mid to high end parts himself.
 
I've never ever seen deep discounts on CPUs, even after the new stuff hits. You'll see motherboards dip down in price, generally, but they slowly drop in price through the life of the chipset, so don't make any huge changes when the new stuff comes out.

I wouldn't expect much other than your typical sales.

Qq

Is there a different thread I should post my question in?

Brad on the bombcast mentioned a similar issue with Forza not fetching updates from the Windows store

He had to reinstall Windows :X
 

mkenyon

Banned
Troubleshooting lets me know that "Windows store cache may be damaged" and that it´s unable to fix it.

Just great.
Just in my experience, things like this are more quickly resolved with a reformat.

Once you get used to reformatting, it really is a super quick and excellent experience. If you partition your drive (or have a secondary drive) to keep downloaded games (like steam), then it's even quicker.

Just keep all your drivers on a USB, and it's like a 30-60 min process.
 

LordCanti

Member
Anyone happen to have a suggestion for a 4:4:4 @ 4k/60hz HDMI cable that is 15 feet or longer? I've tried two so far with my new 4k monitor with no luck. Each of them artifacts and fails at 4:4:4.

Am I out of luck for a cable run that long?
 

GlamFM

Banned
Just in my experience, things like this are more quickly resolved with a reformat.

Once you get used to reformatting, it really is a super quick and excellent experience. If you partition your drive (or have a secondary drive) to keep downloaded games (like steam), then it's even quicker.

Just keep all your drivers on a USB, and it's like a 30-60 min process.

As someone who is fairly new to PC gaming this sounds like a nightmare to me.

I thought we were past this kind of stuff.

Might do this if I don't find anything else that works.

Or give up on PC gaming again.
 

sn00zer

Member
This is going to sound a bit odd, but I'm a little disappointed the only videogame benefits to having a new super-de-duper PC is IQ and framerate.....super IQ makes some games look real rough as the geometry stands out a lot more.
 
This is going to sound a bit odd, but I'm a little disappointed the only videogame benefits to having a new super-de-duper PC is IQ and framerate.....super IQ makes some games look real rough as the geometry stands out a lot more.

Just crank up the motion blur to console levels

Unless you are being paid by Nvidia or AMD, your game isn't going to have anything new for pc besides those things.
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
I've been out of the PC scene for a long time, but I'm trying to buy some gifts for my brother in law who is building a PC. I want to spend under $600, preferably under $500.

I've narrowed it down to:

1) CPU - Core i7 6700k
2) GPU - MSI GTX 1070 8G
3) Monitor - ??? What's the best Gsync monitor I can get for this price range?

Suggestions on Monitor and which of these 3 would be the best? (NOte that he doesn't have *any* pieces yet for his PC, and I assume that for whatever I don't buy, he will buy mid to high end parts himself.

The CPU is the cheapest one of those three options, and its also probably the best option since you can't get anything better than a 6700K in Skylake.
 
The CPU is the cheapest one of those three options, and its also probably the best option since you can't get anything better than a 6700K in Skylake.

I just found out he's planning to keep his old monitor, apparedntly he doesn't know about the godliness of G-Sync. Is there any G-Sync 144Hz monitor under $600 that is decent?

Edit: Is Acer Predator XB241YU any good? It's the only one I can find that has G-SYNC and 144Hz for less than $600
 

Megabat

Member
This is going to sound a bit odd, but I'm a little disappointed the only videogame benefits to having a new super-de-duper PC is IQ and framerate.....super IQ makes some games look real rough as the geometry stands out a lot more.

I'm going to second that. Subjective diminishing returns.

I started playing PC games on a 2002 HP Pavilion with a 2.6GHz Celeron, 512MB of RAM and a GeForce MX 440 AGP (64MB) in 2010. I did my best to optimize it for Minecraft. I tried and failed a million times to run Half-Life 2 and BioShock. I hooked the composite output to an old CRT TV and played SNES games with a 360 pad. I played tons of stuff from FreeIndieGam.es.

In late 2013, I upgraded to a 3GHz dual-core and a 1GB discrete card. It was incredible. Almost everything (Just Cause 2, XCOM:EU, Dark Souls, Team Fortress 2) at 1080p and 30FPS - an almost-literal breath of fresh air after years in musty darkness.

It's all downhill from your first discrete card. In early 2015, I got an SSD and made a marginal CPU upgrade - the minimum for a GeForce 960 2GB. I went from 1080p/~30FPS to 50-60FPS. I ran into a CPU bottleneck early on, and completely rebuilt later that year.

Compared to that old HP, my current PC has four times the CPU core count at nearly double the clock speed, thirty-two times the memory, one hundred twenty-eight times the GPU memory, and (hilariously) ~60% more storage. The primary benefit in games: image quality.

So, yeah. Eventually, the pursuit of speed and capability outruns reason. Especially now that you can build a fantastic, effectively-no-compromise system for $600.
 
so my PC been flipping out, turn it on and its would just reboots, screen freeze...sometime and sometime not able to bootup, the power button just light up and shut off it would happen for a few min.....thinking my GTX 980 video card crap out ...whats my best option ...
 

MrFlooD

Member
so my PC been flipping out, turn it on and its would just reboots, screen freeze...sometime and sometime not able to bootup, the power button just light up and shut off it would happen for a few min.....thinking my GTX 980 video card crap out ...whats my best option ...

Sounds like power supply to me. Recommend swapping with a spare if you can.
 

Megabat

Member
so my PC been flipping out, turn it on and its would just reboots, screen freeze...sometime and sometime not able to bootup, the power button just light up and shut off it would happen for a few min.....thinking my GTX 980 video card crap out ...whats my best option ...

Try resetting the BIOS - either with the CMOS jumper or CR2032-removal methods.

Of course, that depends on where the screen is freezing I suppose.
 

vector824

Member
I know this wasn't for me, but I do appreciate you composing this list. I keep saying all the time, that I am going to stop buying consoles. I am just going to build a gaming PC, but then I go buy a PS4, and will probably buy the Nintendo Switch. However, I am saying it again, LOL. The Switch is the last console that I am going to buy. I just rather invest in a gaming PC!!

I've built PCs before, just never for myself. This is a good starting point, but I can invest a higher budget around the $1500-$2000 range. I would like to run to run 4K on the highest settings. The thing is that I am not going to buy parts all at once. It'll probably be one part or two a month, you know family and bills, so I can't justify spending all at once. I'll use this list as a base, and upgrade where I see fit. I'll keep GAF posted, and ask for help when I need it.

If you're going to piece meal it like that get the MOBO, CPU and GPU last. RAM doesn't change that often, SSDs and HDDs don't either. Stuff like the case is based on your preference, not really what's new.

Wait until Kabylake is released and then start looking at Intel's Optane SSD and MOBO's that support it. Next year VEGA for AMD is releasing along with NVIDIAs Ti GPUs at some point. For $2k you'll be running an insane rig, good for 5 years at least.
 

Primus

Member
That said, the videos I saw suggest that M.2 drives are fiddly as fuck on practically every mobo. I suspect its kind of wave of the future stuff that will get worked out in future generations to be less of a hassle. But I want those sweet, sweet startup times, so I bit the bullet and went with a 950 Pro (there's supposed to be a 960 Evo/Pro coming out sometime soon but god knows when and I haven't seem much that suggests its a big enough performance increase to bother with).

That rig I built for a friend I mentioned earlier uses a Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming 5 mobo, and it had no issues with the 950 Pro M.2 except for me putting it in the wrong slot the first time and losing half the SATA bus. (Which is what happens when you use the wrong M.2 slot, it takes up SATA ports *and* still doesn't run at full speed.) Had experience with a couple other in the Z170X-Gaming line, and those at least seem to be good with the M.2s.
 
Ok, so I installed the new ssd and it's not showing up. So, dumb question. The SATA cable that connects to the power supply has 3 connectors for the SSD at certain lengths. I plugged the one on the end into my first SSD (It was always plugged into this) and then I skipped a connector and plugged the new SSD into the 3rd from the end on the same cable. Can I only have one drive connected to each SATA cable even though it has multiple connectors? Or is something not seated right?
 
Ok, so I installed the new ssd and it's not showing up. So, dumb question. The SATA cable that connects to the power supply has 3 connectors for the SSD at certain lengths. I plugged the one on the end into my first SSD (It was always plugged into this) and then I skipped a connector and plugged the new SSD into the 3rd from the end on the same cable. Can I only have one drive connected to each SATA cable even though it has multiple connectors? Or is something not seated right?
Power supply is fine, it can handle multiple drives on a single cable. Did you plug in the SATA cable from the ssd to the motherboard too? If so, does your ssd show up in disk management? You have to format a new drive before using it. Or make a partition or whatever.
 

Megabat

Member
Ok, so I installed the new ssd and it's not showing up. So, dumb question. The SATA cable that connects to the power supply has 3 connectors for the SSD at certain lengths. I plugged the one on the end into my first SSD (It was always plugged into this) and then I skipped a connector and plugged the new SSD into the 3rd from the end on the same cable. Can I only have one drive connected to each SATA cable even though it has multiple connectors? Or is something not seated right?

SATA power connectors might be objectively poorly designed. I would re-seat it.
 
Power supply is fine, it can handle multiple drives on a single cable. Did you plug in the SATA cable from the ssd to the motherboard too? If so, does your ssd show up in disk management? You have to format a new drive before using it. Or make a partition or whatever.

2077-20160208-ThankYouIdiot.gif
 

Celcius

°Temp. member
I'm going to upgrade to a 7700k in January because I have the itch for new hardware and then I also plan to update my parents' rig with my old parts (I built their current pc back in the Athlon 64 X2 days). I use my PC for gaming 90% of the time. I currently have a 4.6ghz 2600k and I normally overclock every cpu used in my personal rigs as far as I can but I just had a crazy idea... what if I ran the 7700k at the 4.2ghz stock speed and then focused on making the system as quiet as possible instead of overclocking it? I would think that the higher IPC + faster DDR4 would make up for the 400mhz difference right? I most likely won't do this but it's not insane to run a 7700k at stock right? Stock speeds are getting so high these days...
 

Megabat

Member
I'm going to upgrade to a 7700k in January because I have the itch for new hardware and then I also plan to update my parents' rig with my old parts (I built their current pc back in the Athlon 64 X2 days). I use my PC for gaming 90% of the time. I currently have a 4.6ghz 2600k and I normally overclock every cpu used in my personal rigs as far as I can but I just had a crazy idea... what if I ran the 7700k at the 4.2ghz stock speed and then focused on making the system as quiet as possible instead of overclocking it? I would think that the higher IPC + faster DDR4 would make up for the 400mhz difference right? I most likely won't do this but it's not insane to run a 7700k at stock right? Stock speeds are getting so high these days...

If I remember correctly (from Skylake launch reviews) a stock-clocked 6600K (3.5GHz) is a bit faster than a 4.6GHz 2500K. So the IPC gains would more than make up for the clock speed delta.

Here is some of my highly opinionated, I'm-honestly-probably-trying-to-live-vicariously-through-you-over-the-internet advice:
- Start at an even lower speed (3.4-4.0GHz) and clock up as performance drops off
- Air-cool, as long as you aren't willing to invest in a custom liquid loop (liquid is probably overkill anyway - for anything lower than HEDT parts and sub-250W GPUs)
- Get a Noctua D15 - they don't make the D14 anymore, and the stock fans don't do pulse-width modulation
- You no longer own mechanical hard drives.
- Use a silent case like the Fractal Design Define R5 or (-->) SilverStone FT05 (<--)
- And, most importantly, use a high-quality silent power supply. The Seasonic X-Series is (in some ways, literally) the gold standard.

So, uh, yeah. I have done lots of research on silent PCs. I don't claim any serious authority. I'm just enthusiastic.
 

Celcius

°Temp. member
Now if only it wasn't so hard to get your hands on a Samsung 960 Pro :(
What's your opinion on high-end videocards (like a Titan X or 1080 Ti) in a fairly quiet air-cooled rig? The traditional blower cards would blow heat outside the case but run louder whereas a non-blower style cooler would run quieter but dump heat into the case.
 

Megabat

Member
What's your opinion on high-end videocards (like a Titan X or 1080 Ti) in a fairly quiet air-cooled rig? The traditional blower cards would blow heat outside the case but run louder whereas a non-blower style cooler would run quieter but dump heat into the case.

That would be a pretty tough call if you weren't playing games most of the time. If you're only using one graphics card (which is definitely the best way to go in any situation), get a big old dual-or-triple-fan card - one that stops its fans below 50-60C.

In any other situation, reference-style is always best. There is a reason the Titan X doesn't come any other way. They work perfectly with almost any case cooling model; they keep to themselves. Semi-passive cooling and prodigious sinks redeem open-air cards in gaming PCs.

The Silverstone FT05 moves air so well (its intake fans take up the entire bottom surface) that you could even take the fans off the CPU cooler. The manual for that enclosure recommends using blower-style cards, but I've seen it done with open-air. You could get away with a pretty shallow fan curve.
 

knitoe

Member
That would be a pretty tough call if you weren't playing games most of the time. If you're only using one graphics card (which is definitely the best way to go in any situation), get a big old dual-or-triple-fan card - one that stops its fans below 50-60C.

In any other situation, reference-style is always best. There is a reason the Titan X doesn't come any other way. They work perfectly with almost any case cooling model; they keep to themselves. Semi-passive cooling and prodigious sinks redeem open-air cards in gaming PCs.

The Silverstone FT05 moves air so well (its intake fans take up the entire bottom surface) that you could even take the fans off the CPU cooler. The manual for that enclosure recommends using blower-style cards, but I've seen it done with open-air. You could get away with a pretty shallow fan curve.

That's wrong. Reference coolers are the worst. Only buy them if your case has hardly any airflow. Otherwise, aftermarket coolers are the way to go. I have the previous 2 Titan version and they also quickly hit their thermal limits with the reference coolers. Slap on aftermarket and they perform better / more quiet.
 

Megabat

Member
That's wrong. Reference coolers are the worst. Only buy them if your case has hardly any airflow. Otherwise, aftermarket coolers are the way to go. I have the previous 2 Titan version and they also quickly hit their thermal limits with the reference coolers. Slap on aftermarket and they perform better / more quiet.

I don't disagree as far as gaming PCs go. But in a video workstation, for example, CPU temperature matters just as much - if not more than - GPU performance. You'll never see a professional workstation system ship with custom-cooled GPUs.

Videogames are a unique use case: the CPU(s) only have to work hard enough to feed the GPU, so you can afford the excess waste heat.
 

knitoe

Member
I don't disagree as far as gaming PCs go. But in a video workstation, for example, CPU temperature matters just as much - if not more than - GPU performance. You'll never see a professional workstation system ship with custom-cooled GPUs.

Videogames are a unique use case: the CPU(s) only have to work hard enough to feed the GPU, so you can afford the excess waste heat.

The person you responded to doesn't seem to be building a workstation. His main criteria is quietness. For that and also better performance, a aftermarket cooler is the correct answer.
 

Megabat

Member
The person you responded to didn't seem to be building a workstation. His main want is quietness. For quietness and also performance, aftermarket cooler is the correct answer.

He asked my opinion. I wrote back, weighing the benefits of each type. I recommended the type you prefer, and told him why and where one might prefer the other. I enjoy talking about computer hardware. If you paid me to tell you what to do (which you shouldn't do; I am not an expert (I assume almost no one here is (and I consider members of this forum friends by default))), I would tell you what to do without also telling you what other people do.
 

knitoe

Member
He asked my opinion. I wrote back, weighing the benefits of each type. I recommended the type you prefer, and told him why and where one might prefer the other. I enjoy talking about computer hardware. If you paid me to tell you what to do (which you shouldn't do; I am not an expert (I assume almost no one here is (and I consider members of this forum friends by default))), I would tell you what to do without also telling you what other people do.

Yes. He asked your for your advice. I just said that your response was incorrect. Not sure why you are getting so agitated and defensive. Seeing how everyone gets things wrong. Anyway, let's just move on.
 

Dmax3901

Member
Cross posting from the new AMD driver thread, having trouble and not getting a response there:

Ok I'm sorry for the double post but I need some help. I uninstalled MSI afterburner cause this new driver was causing my PC to hardlock upon getting the desktop.

But now the Wattman thing seems to be doing something wrong, my temps are way up (I'm only playing WoW), and my fan speed doesn't seem to be going anywhere.

Am I missing something? Anyone have any suggestions?

With MSI I had it set up so that fan speeds would be low but would then increase as the temps did, can I do that with Wattman?

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Every time I try to fiddle with Wattman I'm stumped within 5 minutes, it just does not seem user friendly.
 

Megabat

Member
Yes. He asked your for your advice. I just said that your response was incorrect. Not sure why you are getting so agitated and defensive. Seeing how everyone gets things wrong. Anyway, let's just move on.

I'm re-reading my posts now; I agreed with you before you responded to me. I suppose that was not clear.

Celcius is interested in a quiet PC. Quiet PC cases are often not well-ventilated; they rely on positive pressure. With directed airflow, you can overcome the disadvantages of an open-air card while keeping to a low noise profile. If you run multiple high-end (250W+) open-air cards in an enclosed space, it is likely that you will end up with more fan noise than if you'd chosen a highly ventilated enclosure. At that point, you are better off with multiple reference cards that won't interfere with overall heat dissipation. In non-gaming scenarios, the concern is that the heat from an open air card will adversely impact other components such as one or two high-end CPUs, memory, and solid state storage. You will often see blower-style cards recommended in many PC case manuals.

Edit: Yeah, never mind. Arguing on a forum feels terrible. I also referred to Celcius as "he," knowing nothing about them. That makes me feel like an idiot.
 
Looking to build a rig for a friend for light video editing and Twitch/YT streaming. Does having a powerful GPU help w/ streaming? What is the best budget GPU that's not massive you guys would recommend?
 
Looking to build a rig for a friend for light video editing and Twitch/YT streaming. Does having a powerful GPU help w/ streaming? What is the best budget GPU that's not massive you guys would recommend?

Yes, streaming is mostly offloaded to the GPU these days. But both Nvidia and AMD drivers can reduce the workload quite a bit through hardware encoding, you'll see around 3-5% framerate drops.
 

Megabat

Member
Looking to build a rig for a friend for light video editing and Twitch/YT streaming. Does having a powerful GPU help w/ streaming? What is the best budget GPU that's not massive you guys would recommend?

The GeForce 1050 is pretty good, and most of those boards don't extend beyond he PCIe slot. Should be good enough for games, and great for accelerating video editing.
 
OK, I need some help with a new build.

Specs:

CPU: i7 6700k
Motherboard: ga-z170xp-sli
RAM: gskill ripjaw 3000
PSU: Thermaltake 750watt CPU
SDD Harddrive

So, everything is set up in the tower, but when I boot the system it restarts and goes into a continual boot loop. The machine doesn't even make it to the bios, it just restarts. All of the connections are in place, everything looks correct, but I can't troubleshoot this.

This is a recommended motherboard in the OP and I would like to know if anyone has had this same issue?

Thanks.

Follow up question about this system...

The person whom I am building this for wants me to install Windows 7 Professional 64bit on it. But I have never tried to install Windows 7 on a UEFI machine.

I built this machine and gave it to the person who paid me money to make it. That person was going to install an OS on the machine himself, So I guess he chose Windows 7 Professional. He came back to me and told me that he has issues installing the Windows 7 OS from a USB Drive to his SDD, but it gives him an error that reads: &#8220;Windows cannot be installed to this disk. The selected disk is not of the GPT partition style&#8221;. Now I would imagine that I would have to repartition the SSD to GPT, but I guess Windows 7 cannot partition the drive to GPT, because of how old it is. So I would have to possibly reformat this drive from a another tool? or reformat from another version of Windows?

Has anyone ever installed a copy of Windows 7 to UEFI like this? I guess it can be done. But I do not quite know the steps to go in. Any help?

Nevermind. Got it to work.
 

iosa

Member
Hey guys, I just built my first PC, it took a while but I didn't encounter problems and the PC seems to work well.

The only thing that I'm worried about is that the PSU (corsair VS550) makes an annoying noise. I think it's coil whine
I tried it without anything on it and the noise is still there (a little less though).

Is it still safe for the computer or do I need to return it asap ?
 
so i have currently a

Intel Core i7-3770 @3.4ghz
ASUS P8Z77-V LX
2x 4GB of DDR3 SDRAM 800.0 MHz (DDR3-1600 / PC3-12800)

and i want to upgrade to a GTX 1060.

there was a thread that i could keep my old CPU and not lose much. But i probably have to upgrade the RAM right? If i do, do i need a new Motherboard too? Would the old CPU fit on the new MB?
 

hoserx

Member
so i have currently a

Intel Core i7-3770 @3.4ghz
ASUS P8Z77-V LX
2x 4GB of DDR3 SDRAM 800.0 MHz (DDR3-1600 / PC3-12800)

and i want to upgrade to a GTX 1060.

there was a thread that i could keep my old CPU and not lose much. But i probably have to upgrade the RAM right? If i do, do i need a new Motherboard too? Would the old CPU fit on the new MB?

I'm confused here.... you don't need anything new to add a gtx 1060 to your computer.
 
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