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Official "I need a new PC!!" 2009 Edition
- Thread starter VictimOfGrief
- Start date
MWS Natural
Member
Thanks guys. I won't have money for a card till next month anyway so that gives me time to decide between the 4770, 4870 or 4890.
brain_stew
Member
yanhero said:
If you're wanting surround sound in games, then unless your motherboard has DDL support then, yeah your SOL. It'll only support DD, DTS or 2.0 LPCM.
I'd personally cancel the order and just use the analog outs, its definitely the best way to get audio from a PC. 5.1 multichannel LPCM over analog cables is hardly a compromise in audio quality.
letsbereasonable
Member
Anyone have any experience with the Fragbox-style cases? I'm speccing out a second machine and would like something a little more compact and portable.
Also, anyone have any quick impressions on gaming mice? I'm thinking about the G9, but I'm open to others if GAF thoughts dictate otherwise.
Also, anyone have any quick impressions on gaming mice? I'm thinking about the G9, but I'm open to others if GAF thoughts dictate otherwise.
brain_stew
Member
letsbereasonable said:
The MX518 actually offers better tracking despite the lower DPI, there was a link to an in depth article on the subject linked earlier in the thread and the MX518 came out on top but I'll be damned if I can find it. Much nicer pricetag as well.
I'm in love with mine, the perfect tracking, ergonomic design and extra buttons, make a world of difference. Download Uber Options and you can program it to your heart's content.
hey guys...weird problem. my Overdrive menu in CCC suddenly disappeared. i havent updated my graphics driver or anything. i turned on my computer THOUGHT that i checked my gpu temps (yesterday, though i may not have), and when i went to check today overdrive is suddenly missing. wtf?
oh and i love my mx518, its great.
oh and i love my mx518, its great.
So I've got my new pc up and running. I bought basically techreport's april "utility player". I haven't done any AMD overclocking in...a long time. So I want some tips on how to best go about it and what free software I can use to test the stability. Also, I went with the stock heatsink/fan (even kept the stock thermal layer instead of applying my own silver). So I'd reallly rather err on the side of caution as far as overheating goes. My last computer died to heat problems (largely dust-related).
I tried upping the multiplier from 14x to 15x (2.8 -> 3.0 ghz) but by the end of a 3dmark 06 run, it said nvdisp.dll was acting odd and I should restart. So I dropped it back down. I didn't want to mess with the FSB speed since I didn't know how that would affect the ram and pcie and stuff.
Should I not even bother without at least better cooling? I still get ~15fps in dalaran
but otherwise I'm very happy. Also I don't like the onboard audio for this motherboard at all. It installs so many devices, and pops up a dialog every time I plug in headphones or speakers or a mic. I don't want to go back to my 10 year old sblive! though...
I tried upping the multiplier from 14x to 15x (2.8 -> 3.0 ghz) but by the end of a 3dmark 06 run, it said nvdisp.dll was acting odd and I should restart. So I dropped it back down. I didn't want to mess with the FSB speed since I didn't know how that would affect the ram and pcie and stuff.
Should I not even bother without at least better cooling? I still get ~15fps in dalaran
but otherwise I'm very happy. Also I don't like the onboard audio for this motherboard at all. It installs so many devices, and pops up a dialog every time I plug in headphones or speakers or a mic. I don't want to go back to my 10 year old sblive! though...TheRagnCajun
Member
MWS Natural said:
It depends on your budget, obviously, but two 4770s perform about aswell as a 4890 and are cheaper. The performance drops off at higher resolutions with AA though. So, if you're looking to spend aobut $250, I'd say go with two 4770's in crossfire unless you have a 1920 x 1200 monitor.
TheRagnCajun
Member
timetokill said:Hey,
Going based off the feedback I got, I put together what is hopefully a better system
CAS: CoolerMaster Centurion 590 RC-590 Mid-Tower 420W Case
CS_FAN: Extra Case Cooling Fan
POWERSUPPLY: Sigma Shark SP-635W PSU - SLI Ready
CPU: AMD PhenomTII X4 945 Quad-Core CPU w/ HyperTransport Technology
FAN: AMD ATHLON64 CERTIFIED CPU FAN & HEATSINK
MOTHERBOARD: MSI AMD 790GX-G65 AM3 DDR3 1666+ CrossFire Chipset Mainboard
MEMORY: 4GB (2GBx2) PC1333 DDR3 PC3 10666 Dual Channel Memory (Corsair or Major Brand)
VIDEO: NVIDIA GeForce GTX260 CORE 216 896MB 16X PCI Express
HDD: Single Hard Drive (320GB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 16MB Cache 7200RPM HDD)
CD: LG 22X DVD R/RW + CD-R/RW DRIVE DUAL LAYER
FLASHMEDIA: INTERNAL 12in1 Flash Media Reader/Writer
Price: $923.00
Once again, my plan is to use XP for now until I feel good about going to Win7 (mostly when enough software I need to use is 64-bit and stable) -- and then I'll get probably another 4GB of RAM or something.
If I can get the GTX280 for $60 more, should I get that instead? Or should I keep the 260 and just upgrade when I eventually go for the Core i7 or something similar?
I have that board. It has some great OC features and a decent on-board sound card.
As for the GPU. The extra money will make the difference between playing games on high settings or highest. Depends if thats worth it to you. You can compare the two cards on tomshardware but unless you want to play games in 1900 x 1200 with AA, the 260 is probably the better way to go.
Very elementary question about Raid.
So I want to make two of my sata drives into one raid 0 array and have my third primary drive just by itself for the OS (windows 7 rc).
My mother board has plenty of sata ports, so if I just plug both of those sata drives in for the array, can I setup an array using Windows 7? I was always under the impression that you needed to have an add-on card or a controller built in the motherboard, but I heard about software raid. Am I understanding that properly?
So I want to make two of my sata drives into one raid 0 array and have my third primary drive just by itself for the OS (windows 7 rc).
My mother board has plenty of sata ports, so if I just plug both of those sata drives in for the array, can I setup an array using Windows 7? I was always under the impression that you needed to have an add-on card or a controller built in the motherboard, but I heard about software raid. Am I understanding that properly?
BravoSuperStar
Member
Phatcorns said:
It's possible, but not recommended. Havent done it in windows 7, but in XP/vista you have to go into disk management under admin tools to set it up. One of the drawbacks I've heard is the added CPU overhead to maintain the raid array. Most new motherboards have the ability to RAID disks through a hardware controller chip, I would suggest doing it that way if possible.
Minsc
Gold Member
Phatcorns said:
I'd think you need to format the drives when putting them in RAID0, and they need to be the same drives (capacity, model #) afaik too.
Setup would be configured through the motherboard's bios I believe. I think most motherboards these days support RAID 0 & 1 at the very least.
Keep in mind, especially with mechanical HDDs, if one of your drives in a RAID0 setup fails you lose everything. Forget recovery software, you are never getting anything back from a failed RAID0 setup. Never. So if you do RAID0, make sure you back up your data well.
Depends how old they are, if they are over 2 years I'd get a new one for OS.Hugbot said:
Speed difference depends on the make and tech of the drive, most 500GB used 3 166GB platters or even 4 125GB, now we have 250GB platters for 500GB drives and 320GB platters for 640GB drives, so you get much much faster speeds from them.
MWS Natural
Member
TheRagnCajun said:
I have a SFF PC setup, no room for crossfile. All of ATI's cards are so close in price it's hard to decide. The high end version of one is so close to the lower end version of another lol.
brain_stew
Member
Ashhong said:
Well its a shitty way to OC your card anyway, use Riva Tuner instead, much more flexible.
TheRagnCajun said:
Two slower cards is never a better solution than one fast card, micro stutter, lower minimum framerates, incredibly unpredictable performance, the restriction of a 512MB framebuffer (Wholly inadequate for a 1920x1200 monitor these days), higher power requirements (especially at idle) and the sheer fact you're at the mercy of drivers if you want to use more than half your investment makes it an altogether bad idea. Stick with a $200 4890, its a much more elegant and practical solution.
brain_stew
Member
Hugbot said:
If you've already got the drives its a non issue but if you're buying a new drive 640GB and 1TB drives are the way to go for the higher platter density. The difference isn't night and day or anything, but considering the difference in cost, its a no brainer.
Oh and on the subject of HDDs, my personal favourite the 1TB Samsung F1 can be had for a ridiculous £60 delivered at Ebuyer right now, insane considering its one of the fastest drives on the market:
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/143288
MWS Natural
Member
Anyone know of a HDD cooler that doubles as a fan controller and fits in a 5.25 bay? I have been looking for a couple of day and can't find anything that hasn't been discontinued.
brain_stew
Member
MWS Natural said:
HDD cooler? Just stick a 120mm fan infront of them surely? Not got mounting holes for one next to your HDDs?
Dealextreme.com is always a good place to look for obscure stuff like that.
brain_stew
Member
Ashhong said:
It usually severely restricts the OCs you can manage, if you're not trying to push the thing very much it wouldn't really matter but the point still stands. No idea why its not working for you, have you tried poking around in the options?
brain_stew
Member
aktham said:
4890 would be my choice, quite a decent upgrade, especially at higher resolutions where the bandwidth and memory starved G92 tends to faulter.
MWS Natural
Member
brain_stew said:
The Sapphire Atomic 1000mhz GPU finally hit newegg. Damn I wish I had some money, sweet OC'd card and Vapor X tech.
Wow all 4770's sold out on newegg. :lol
a coworker of mine is building a beast of a new PC and is trying to sell off his old one. Here are the specs copy and pasted pretty much from his system info
------------------
System Information
------------------
Time of this report: 5/19/2009, 18:31:24
Operating System: Windows XP Home Edition (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 3 (2600.xpsp_sp3_gdr.090206-1234)
Language: English (Regional Setting: English)
BIOS: Phoenix - AwardBIOS v6.00PG
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E6850 @ 3.00GHz (2 CPUs)
Motherboard: Asus P5N-E SLI
chipset: nforce 650i sli spp
Memory: 4096 ocz ddr2 800mhz ram
Page File: 431MB used, 4778MB available
DirectX Version: DirectX 9.0c (4.09.0000.0904)
---------------
Display Devices
--------------
Card name: EVGA GeForce 8800 GTS SSC 640 (i have two of them for sale if you want to sli them)
Manufacturer: NVIDIA
Chip type: GeForce 8800 GTS
-------------
Sound Devices
-------------
Description: SB X-Fi Audio [AC00]
---------------------
Sound Capture Devices
---------------------
Description: Realtek HD Audio Input
------------------------
Disk & DVD/CD-ROM Drives
------------------------
Drive: C:
Free Space: 30.0 GB
Total Space: 38.1 GB
File System: NTFS
Model: WDC WD400BB-75CAA0
Drive: E:
Free Space: 426.7 GB
Total Space: 476.9 GB
File System: NTFS
Model: WDC WD5000AACS-00ZUB0
Drive: D:
Model: LITE-ON COMBO SOHC-5236V
he says I can have it for $500. Is this a good deal or should I pass?
------------------
System Information
------------------
Time of this report: 5/19/2009, 18:31:24
Operating System: Windows XP Home Edition (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 3 (2600.xpsp_sp3_gdr.090206-1234)
Language: English (Regional Setting: English)
BIOS: Phoenix - AwardBIOS v6.00PG
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E6850 @ 3.00GHz (2 CPUs)
Motherboard: Asus P5N-E SLI
chipset: nforce 650i sli spp
Memory: 4096 ocz ddr2 800mhz ram
Page File: 431MB used, 4778MB available
DirectX Version: DirectX 9.0c (4.09.0000.0904)
---------------
Display Devices
--------------
Card name: EVGA GeForce 8800 GTS SSC 640 (i have two of them for sale if you want to sli them)
Manufacturer: NVIDIA
Chip type: GeForce 8800 GTS
-------------
Sound Devices
-------------
Description: SB X-Fi Audio [AC00]
---------------------
Sound Capture Devices
---------------------
Description: Realtek HD Audio Input
------------------------
Disk & DVD/CD-ROM Drives
------------------------
Drive: C:
Free Space: 30.0 GB
Total Space: 38.1 GB
File System: NTFS
Model: WDC WD400BB-75CAA0
Drive: E:
Free Space: 426.7 GB
Total Space: 476.9 GB
File System: NTFS
Model: WDC WD5000AACS-00ZUB0
Drive: D:
Model: LITE-ON COMBO SOHC-5236V
he says I can have it for $500. Is this a good deal or should I pass?
brain_stew
Member
Case/PSU?
Are you getting two of those 8800GTS 640MBs?
Considering what you can get for $500 brand new, I think $500 is really pushing it tbh and its not a particularly great deal considering its second hand. Obviously you'd need an OS if you were buying new but then XP 32 bit is some archaic shit so you'd be replacing that with Windows 7 before long anyway.
The parts aren't particularly ideal either, I mean that Raptor drive may have seemed great at the time, but considering its much slower than a sub $100 1TB now, its lost an awful lot of its appeal. Getting an X-FI card thrown in is cool, I suppose, but then getting saddled with an Nvidia chipset based motherboard most definitely is not.
He'll probably be able to fetch $500 for it, but I don't think the buyer would be getting a great deal, I'd pass tbh.
Are you getting two of those 8800GTS 640MBs?
Considering what you can get for $500 brand new, I think $500 is really pushing it tbh and its not a particularly great deal considering its second hand. Obviously you'd need an OS if you were buying new but then XP 32 bit is some archaic shit so you'd be replacing that with Windows 7 before long anyway.
The parts aren't particularly ideal either, I mean that Raptor drive may have seemed great at the time, but considering its much slower than a sub $100 1TB now, its lost an awful lot of its appeal. Getting an X-FI card thrown in is cool, I suppose, but then getting saddled with an Nvidia chipset based motherboard most definitely is not.
He'll probably be able to fetch $500 for it, but I don't think the buyer would be getting a great deal, I'd pass tbh.
TheHeretic
Banned
aktham said:
I'd wait for the next generation of cards to be honest. The 8800GTS 512 should be able to play anything right now or in the near future on med-high.
brain_stew
Member
TheHeretic said:
Well it depends on what resolution you're playing at tbh. If you're rocking 1080p or above a 4890 is going to give you a very significant boost in frames and can already be had for as little as $200.
Gully State
Member
When do you guys think we'll get mainstream budget components capable of running Crysis with everything turned up @60FPS?
brain_stew
Member
Gully State said:
What resolution? At 720p that's pretty much in the bag if you've got $200 to spend and the CPU grunt to match it.
Gully State
Member
1920x1080
brain_stew
Member
Gully State said:
Even the bleeding edge is struggling with that, so it'd be silly to put a timetable on it. Crysis is just so far beyond everything out there, its a bit of an anomaly. Though for what its worth I've found no game to feel smoother at lower framerates as Crysis does, it must be something to do with the motion blur and some very clever coding.
I'm more than happy with the performance I'm getting from the game at 1080p with my GTX 260 (a $160 card) using a custom config that gives very high equivalent visuals.
If you don't want a hassle for anything I'd say it's not a bad deal.hwateber said:
The X-Fi is nice, the HDD is fine, GPU is a bit old but that's all relative to what you are coming from.
I'd say it's worth $500 together.
*If you can and or are interested in putting together your own I'd go with that however.
Indeed, I can somehow stand 22FPS in Crysis while I can notice a framedrop in FO3 from 60 to 58 :lolbrain_stew said:
Gully State
Member
Hazaro said:
I had the same stuttering issue with Fallout 3 (2GB -> 4GB) until I added more RAM and got a bigger HDD with a larger cache.
As for Crysis, maybe the demo isn't a good benchmark but I was getting 25-29 FPS and it was on the unbearable side. This is coming from someone that played through bioshock at that same framerate.
brain_stew
Member
Gully State said:
The engine has been optimised quite a bit since the demo, and custom configs really help a lot, so you'd definitely have a much nicer framerate now. Though its strange that you find it jerkier than other games at that framerate, as I've seen many others share my same sentiment and I'm often I stickler for framerates myself, maybe it was something to do with the demo, I honestly can't say.
evil solrac v3.0
Member
it's weird but even at 20-25 frames i can still play crysis no prob.
guys i need some help. on the heels of my missing Overdrive menu (which was fixed with a restart :lol ) my internet is being retarded.
i can only browse some sites like wamu, paypal, and hotmail. the majority of sites say "the connection to the server has been reset" etc etc. ive been trying to figure it out with Hazaro but we couldnt solve it. i cant even access google.com, even though i can ping it in cmd fine.
im using Vistax64 and this just started happening out of nowhere. its also not my wireless card because i switched to another and same problem, and no i cant try hardwiring it...any ideas?
he says its DNS problems maybe but we tried OpenDNS and it didnt fix it either...
i forgot to mention that it is ONLY this one computer.
edit: ok wtf, i fixed it by exiting trend micro -_-. why would this problem come up? ive never had this before. i even tried disabling everything in trend micro and my net was still broken. i have to completely exit it.
i can only browse some sites like wamu, paypal, and hotmail. the majority of sites say "the connection to the server has been reset" etc etc. ive been trying to figure it out with Hazaro but we couldnt solve it. i cant even access google.com, even though i can ping it in cmd fine.
im using Vistax64 and this just started happening out of nowhere. its also not my wireless card because i switched to another and same problem, and no i cant try hardwiring it...any ideas?
he says its DNS problems maybe but we tried OpenDNS and it didnt fix it either...
i forgot to mention that it is ONLY this one computer.
edit: ok wtf, i fixed it by exiting trend micro -_-. why would this problem come up? ive never had this before. i even tried disabling everything in trend micro and my net was still broken. i have to completely exit it.
TheHeretic
Banned
brain_stew said:
Well sure, 512 of Video Ram isn't going to handle 1080 well. Still, most people are still building rigs around a 10 hour game, the big releases aren't pushing the hardware all that much. I have an 8800 GTS 512 and i'm still playing everything on high. I just don't see the imperitive to rush out and spend money to make a game i've already finished look even better.
brain_stew
Member
Ashhong said:
When my Mam had a similar problem it turned out it was her ISP that was causing the fault. It was sorted before long.
tahrikmili
Member
Newegg has the Phenom X3 8450 for $59 and I'm thinking of replacing my Athlon X2 5400+ with it. How dumb would that be? I know the clockspeed is lower (2.1GHz vs 2.8 GHz) but it should easily overclock to at least 2.6GHz or so and has a 3rd core + L3 cache. How bad could it be?
And would my X2 5400+'s stock cooler be enough for the Phenom X3?
And would my X2 5400+'s stock cooler be enough for the Phenom X3?
Diablohead
Member
Unless you always want to be up the top with excess power I never see the need to upgrade every year, my old machine was long past it's gaming expire date but that was more of a money thing, though you should upgrade when you feel the need or can't bare sub 20 screen rates or something. I played a lot of pc games at 30 without AA before I brought this new pc and never had much of a problemaktham said:Thanks for the input, I play even crysis at 1920x1200 on high at 30 fps. Everything else runs pretty much maxed out at that resolution. I think i'll wait 1 more year before I upgrade my GPU. I bought it last year and it has served me well
With today's market pc gaming is only expensive if you want it to be, a little more then a ps3 seems to buy you a gaming rig with the basics to last the same time lengh.
Xisiqomelir
Member
Anyone tried out WD's 2TB drives? They just dropped $50 on Newegg and if they go to $200 I'd be sorely tempted. I could definitely use more storage.