I'm not sure how well this fits in with the topic at hand, since the PC in question is anything but current, but I was wondering if there's anything I could do with a Dell Dimension 4200 I have. >_> It used to be my sister's, but she completely abandoned it for a laptop a short while after she bought it.
Not where I live, unfortunately. I'd love to get one, but it costs twice the 3650 (and almost as much as I spent on my PC so far). DDR3 cards just aren't meant for 3rd world country dwellers without fat disposable income.
Some guy on an overclocking forum. I don't know exact details but these guys seem to be some of the best out there. I've seen enough crazy PC setups than I can handle.
The Q9450, a 9800GX2, 8gb of DDR2 PC8500 ram, 790i motherboard and 700-1000+ PSU. You can easily get for less than $2000 if you're building. It'll run DX10 Crysis at 1080p averaging 30-40 high/very high and let you mess around with all your programs and multitasking.
Yes you can in a little bit. A majority of the settings will be high with a few very highs. Take off any AA and AF since you don't really need it for that high res. And run 174.74 with a certain tweak cfg for Vista 64. You'll average 30-40 and with the crazy parts in the 20s.
Yes you can in a little bit. A majority of the settings will be high with a few very highs. Take off any AA and AF since you don't really need it for that high res. And run 174.74 with a certain tweak cfg for Vista 64. You'll average 30-40 and with the crazy parts in the 20s.
heres someone playing on a e8500@4ghz and overclocked 8800gtx sli, he ran the benchmark at a lower resolution (1680x1050) and no aa or af on 174.70 drivers, also the benchmark is just a simple flyby with no ai or physics and its early on in the game which is the least demanding part and he gets 32fps average, so no you cant
heres someone playing on a e8500@4ghz and overclocked 8800gtx sli, he ran the benchmark at a lower resolution (1680x1050) and no aa or af on 174.70 drivers, also the benchmark is just a simple flyby with no ai or physics and its early on in the game which is the least demanding part and he gets 32fps average, so no you cant
You missed the part where I said mix of high and very high settings. Everything on very high by default is going to kill any system but on default (meaning no custom cfg and just 1.2 patch, everything in natural state) and a GX2 is consistently getting 35 on high 1920x1200. You can turn a few settings to very high and still maintain that framerate and it becomes even more apparent with the custom drivers those nuts messing around with international drivers come up with.
So I've just ordered a PC from Arbico, a UK builder. They seem to have good press. Does this look OK for running TF2 at 16:10 res with a decentframe rate? Cos that's really all I want...
Code:
PC Case: Coolermaster ELITE 330 Case - included in price
Power Supply: 500W standard PSU
Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E4600 CPU
Heatsink & CPU Fan: Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro CPU Heatsink & Fan
Motherboard: ECS G33T-M2 Motherboard (no onboard graphics)
DDR2 Memory: 2GB (1 x 2GB) Kingston 667Mhz DDR2
PCI-E Graphics: 1GB (1024MB) nVidia Geforce 8600GT PCI Express Graphics Card
I can run TF2 with a 256MB 8600GT and a Pentium D (lol) on 1920x1200. All settings maxed except no AA + only Trilinear filtering nets ~40fps.
I've been surprised to see it do many modern games on highest settings (no AA though) provided the resolution is not too high. Usually have to go down to 1440 or 1650 though.
The Q9450, a 9800GX2, 8gb of DDR2 PC8500 ram, 790i motherboard and 700-1000+ PSU. You can easily get for less than $2000 if you're building. It'll run DX10 Crysis at 1080p averaging 30-40 high/very high and let you mess around with all your programs and multitasking.
You heard it from me first. (unless you already heard elsewhere first but unlikely)
Nvidia is set to unveil the GT200 series this July and the upcoming cards thus far are the 9900GTX and 9900GX2. Perhaps these are the fabled 1 TFLOPs cards.
I'm waiting for the Geforce 10 series. I can't come in terms with the fact that the 9 series uses the same GPU as the 8 series. It doesn't sit very well with me :-/
I have a bad feeling about this, but here it goes:
The ol' Duron 1600 (I know, I know) blew up and I had to make an unexpected upgrade (as usual) under a tight budget. Now I'm riding an AMD X2 4000+, 2GBs of 667 RAM (of the cheap variety and single channel because I couldn't match the darn sticks).
I figured out I could risk playing (post-2004) PC games after so many years stuck with an unusable rig, but I need a videocard (the onboard X1200 is worthless for anything beyond Source forced to DX81). Since I'm still on a budget (and will remain like that for a long time), don't plan gaming at more than 1024x768 and don't care about Crysis in particular, I've narrowed down my options to two: the 8600GT and the HD3650, which cost roughly the same around where I live.
At first I fell for the FUD spewed by both PC and console camps at GAF and was wary of both cards, but watching youtube videos of them in action revealed nice framerates and pretty graphics, not the choppy mess GAF made me expect. I even found some videos of a 8600GT on same CPU as mine, and they look very nice (even the Crysis ones looks acceptable).
The benchmarks on the 3650 are hard to come by, but it seems to be the case. After digging a little I found some 512MB 8600GT cards by the same price as the 3650, so I'll go Nvidia this time then, thanks.
Also the youtube vids I found use the same setup as mine (8600GT + Athlon X2 4000) while the 3650 ones might be using a faster CPU, so I have a good idea of what I'm getting myself into (I won't be going further than 1024x768 anyway).
So I'm thinking about upgrading my RAM, anyone have any experience with this? Someone commented on it only working right with 64-bit versiosn of Windows, is that just for Xp, or Vista too?
Posted my cases' interior last page, here's the outside. Lian Li PC-A05B - I'm never buying another case brand ever again after building a rig with Lian Li. Fantastic build quality (no sharp edges), easy to dissemble (all tool less), light and damn good looks.
PC Case: Antec P182 Performance Series Gun Metal Black
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS3R
Processor: Intel E8400
Heatsink: ARCTIC COOLING Freezer 7 Pro 92mm CPU Cooler
Memory: G.Skill 2x2gb 2Gx2|GSK F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ
Hard Drive: 500gb Western Digital WD5000AAKS
Video Card: EVGA 512-P3-N841-AR 8800GTS
DVD Burner: Samsung SH-S203B
Also I have another question... Right now I have 3GBs of system memory and 1GB of video memory, would it even make a difference if I upgrade my system memory to 4GB? I heard 32bit versiosn of Windows pool RAM together and will only use up to 4GBs...
Also I have another question... Right now I have 3GBs of system memory and 1GB of video memory, would it even make a difference if I upgrade my system memory to 4GB? I heard 32bit versiosn of Windows pool RAM together and will only use up to 4GBs...
Thats a ****** nice casing. So smooth. Do want for my next PC.
SlaughterX said:
Also I have another question... Right now I have 3GBs of system memory and 1GB of video memory, would it even make a difference if I upgrade my system memory to 4GB? I heard 32bit versiosn of Windows pool RAM together and will only use up to 4GBs...
Also I have another question... Right now I have 3GBs of system memory and 1GB of video memory, would it even make a difference if I upgrade my system memory to 4GB? I heard 32bit versiosn of Windows pool RAM together and will only use up to 4GBs...
yes it will make a difference if you use a 32-bit OS, the cap of all physical memory combined is 4GB unless you use a software solution to increase it....regardless, it will actually slow your computer a little by exceeding this cap. I'd say either upgrade to a 64-bit OS, or get some fast 2GB system RAM. I would do the latter.
Just have a quick question on a new PC I am about to build. I can get a EVGA 122-CK-NF68-T1 LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 680i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard from a coworker extremely cheap. According to EVGA the board can have its bios updated to support Intel's E8400. My question is will I be able to flash the bios with the E8400 plugged in, or will I have to get a hold of an older CPU that the mother board supports to be able to access the bios to update them?
Just have a quick question on a new PC I am about to build. I can get a EVGA 122-CK-NF68-T1 LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 680i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard from a coworker extremely cheap. According to EVGA the board can have its bios updated to support Intel's E8400. My question is will I be able to flash the bios with the E8400 plugged in, or will I have to get a hold of an older CPU that the mother board supports to be able to access the bios to update them?
Some boards allowed you to boot up with the E8400 but underclocked certain aspects of the processor and some boards wouldn't boot up at all. Your best bet would be to check out the EVGA support forums and look to see whether some posts exist that talk about using an E8400 before a bios upgrade. Of course the board could have also supported the E8400 without a bios upgrade and you may not have to worry at all about it.
PC Case: Antec P182 Performance Series Gun Metal Black
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS3R
Processor: Intel E8400
Heatsink: ARCTIC COOLING Freezer 7 Pro 92mm CPU Cooler
Memory: G.Skill 2x2gb 2Gx2|GSK F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ
Hard Drive: 500gb Western Digital WD5000AAKS
Video Card: EVGA 512-P3-N841-AR 8800GTS
DVD Burner: Samsung SH-S203B
That's almost the exact same build I've been looking at for my new rig. The metal black P182 is especially sexy as hell, but I feel kinda bad dropping that kinda dough on a case. It doesn't have a PSU either, right? Probably get one of them Corsair ones..
Also, you might want to keep an eye out for this bad boy as an alternative upgrade to the WD5000AAKS: http://anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=3269
No PSU with the p182 and you have to be careful with your selection because it mounts on the top of the case and often the CPU power won't make the run to the motherboard.
I picked one up for $89.99 care of Newegg and and Antec rebate. They're going for $109.99 after rebate right now. Really nice case.
Some boards allowed you to boot up with the E8400 but underclocked certain aspects of the processor and some boards wouldn't boot up at all. Your best bet would be to check out the EVGA support forums and look to see whether some posts exist that talk about using an E8400 before a bios upgrade. Of course the board could have also supported the E8400 without a bios upgrade and you may not have to worry at all about it.
Alright guys, throwing together a rig to replace my 4-5 yr old POS that I have lived with for a while now. Mind you I'm coming from a P4 3.2E, 2GB of DDR and 8X AGP 6800 GT :lol
oh and also....
keep it on the DL that I'm selling my 360 to build this.... :lol
Anyways, here are the specs :
GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS3L LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX All Solid Capacitor Intel Motherboard Rev 2.0- $90
OCZ StealthXStream OCZ600SXS ATX12V / EPS12V 600W Power Supply - $90
Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 3.0GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor Model EU80570PJ0806M - $190
A-DATA 4GB(2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model ADQVE1B16K - $70
ASUS Black SATA DVD-ROM Drive Model DVD-E616A3T OEM - $19
SAMSUNG 20X DVD±R DVD Burner Black SATA Model SH-S203B - $27
ZALMAN 9500A 92mm 2 Ball CPU Cooler - $45
Total $531.00
Absent of course is a video card. I'm torn between getting the 9600GT or the 3870.
To narrow it down further :
ATI - SAPPHIRE 100225L Radeon HD 3870 512MB 256-bit GDDR4 PCI Express 2.0 x16
Now here's my perspective of the two cards. ATI sounds like is head the curve (slightly) as they are offering GDDR4 on their cards and the NV cards are still using GDDR3 on their "budget" cards. I've never bought an "Ultra card" nor will I ever so the higher price of the cards cards don't seem worth it (to me).
From what I've read, the ATI cards have solid frame rates, good AA and nice overclocking. The 9600 series seems to have higher frame rates than the 3870, ok AA and better overclocking.
Overclocking aside..... Games I play are : Company of Hereos, Team Fotress 2, Gears of War, PES, etc.
Also worth note, I've got a Raptor drive I'm taking from my old box to use as my primary drive. And my case is a LIAN LI PC-60USB B2 Silver Aluminum ATX Mid Tower. god I love both of those things....
I used to be an avid Q6600 advocate but honestly..... there's no point when parallel processing is *maybe* able to use 2 Cores right now if that. 4+ cores is a waste of overhead and unneeded cost.
Besides the new wolfdales are KILLER overclockers--- if you're looking for that.
If you're sold on getting 4 cores, get the Q9xxx series (Yorkfield) instead of the Conroe Q6600.
I know a bunch of people who sold their Q6600 to get an E8400. The Q9450 is out now and in the same price range as the E8400, I'd get that over the Q6600 if I had more use with quad.
The benchmarks on the 3650 are hard to come by, but it seems to be the case. After digging a little I found some 512MB 8600GT cards by the same price as the 3650, so I'll go Nvidia this time then, thanks.
Also the youtube vids I found use the same setup as mine (8600GT + Athlon X2 4000) while the 3650 ones might be using a faster CPU, so I have a good idea of what I'm getting myself into (I won't be going further than 1024x768 anyway).
A 3650 has equal performance to the radeon 2600 pro, they are basically the same thing if you talking about performance. the 4000+ and an 8600Gt is a great combo and one that i someday hope will be able to afford. Anyway if you need more info about the performance of each card here is a link with benchmarks of a 2600pro and a 8600gt.
I keep wondering if I should upgrade my Maingear order to a Q9450. It's coming with an E8400 OC'D, but I am curious if Q9450 would be all around a better cpu to have for longer term. Next gen cpu's (Nehalem/etc) are going to need new mobos, so it will be a long while before I decide to do a full upgrade again. But paying $150.00 more for the 9450 is sort of steep.
But eh, either way I go is better than the 1.6ghz P4/512 mb ram combo I have right now.
I'm mostly going to be running 1280 x 1024 or lower (when hooked up to my 720p tv).
Q6600 with the G0 steppings is a much better overclocker than the E8400 (its 45nm BTW). Both are good choices, and if you OC the Q6600, you won't be able to tell much of a difference performance wise against the E8400.
Wow simply wowsy, I never imagined that the cheap E2180 (around 50 bucks) would have so much bang for the buck, even with more than usual multitasking (web browsing, extracting files, torrent use, watching hd content etc...) it never breaks a sweat. Just for fun I OCed the cpu from 2GHz to 3.2GHz and increased my 3D 2006 Benchmark from 7500 to about 10500 (without OCed 9600GT and steady 95F CPU temperature).
I run the PC now with the normal 2GHz and have no problems to play games at high (or highest settings except Crysis of course which runs pretty good on mixed settings), I tried C&C 3 with highest settings @ 1680*1050 and it's creamy smoothy, also Gears of War same settings easy 60 FPS.
If you're looking into a new "budget" rig and decide for a Intel 4x00 and a 8600GT or 3650 safe the 50 bucks for a better GPU like the 9600GT or the 3850.
I can run TF2 with a 256MB 8600GT and a Pentium D (lol) on 1920x1200. All settings maxed except no AA + only Trilinear filtering nets ~40fps.
I've been surprised to see it do many modern games on highest settings (no AA though) provided the resolution is not too high. Usually have to go down to 1440 or 1650 though.
I keep wondering if I should upgrade my Maingear order to a Q9450. It's coming with an E8400 OC'D, but I am curious if Q9450 would be all around a better cpu to have for longer term. Next gen cpu's (Nehalem/etc) are going to need new mobos, so it will be a long while before I decide to do a full upgrade again. But paying $150.00 more for the 9450 is sort of steep.
But eh, either way I go is better than the 1.6ghz P4/512 mb ram combo I have right now.
I'm mostly going to be running 1280 x 1024 or lower (when hooked up to my 720p tv).
Spend the extra money on the GPU, your CPU is plenty for at least another year or so(gaming wise IMO)
I would spend the extra money on a 9800gx2 or 3870x2 or 2x 9600SLIvs a CPU upgrade
Is $209.00 for a Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 Wolfdale 3.0GHz 6MB L2 Cache LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor a good price? I have an fx-60 right now and I'm not sure if it's a big enough jump or not.
Is $209.00 for a Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 Wolfdale 3.0GHz 6MB L2 Cache LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor a good price? I have an fx-60 right now and I'm not sure if it's a big enough jump or not.
People would kill to get it for that price. Certain places are marking it up near the $400 mark.
And the 9800GTX just came out yesterday. $350 and basically the same performance as the 8800GTX with differences in being more clockable but having less ram which makes it actually worse in SLI and for certain games when you up the AA and AF.
People would kill to get it for that price. Certain places are marking it up near the $400 mark.
And the 9800GTX just came out yesterday. $350 and basically the same performance as the 8800GTX with differences in being more clockable but having less ram which makes it actually worse in SLI and for certain games when you up the AA and AF.
