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#3047497 - 07/07/10 09:18 PM Need help with a new PC build  
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Clydewinder Offline
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I am finally ready to move into the new century and build a new pc. My current box is an Athlon X2 6000 and an AGP video card of some kind. I really want to be able to run Black Shark, Arma II, and Rise of Flight at high detail levels. All of the other stuff I run is old and runs fine on what I have ( Falcon 4 AF, BF2, EECH, SH4, etc... ) The only peripherals I would need are my TrackIR and X45 HOTAS. I'm guessing it's probably time to get rid of the 85 pound CRT monitor that's grinding my desk into the foundation as well.

I haven't built a PC for several years and I really have no bearings on the performance levels of the different CPUs. It seems on a cursory glance that the Intel i5 are the bang for the buck choice right now. What about video cards? Which one is at the elbow of the price/performance curve? I assume at this point it would make sense to move off windows XP and go to a 64-bit windows 7 installation?

Thanks for any suggestions!


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#3047519 - 07/07/10 09:46 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: Clydewinder]  
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Apple Macbook Pro Generation 10.1 (Summer 2012)
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#3047565 - 07/07/10 10:48 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: JAS39]  
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Here are the basics of an economical system that should play anything for the next two or three years.

Phenom II 965 3.4 GHz OC to 3.7GHz $180

Gigabyte MB $140 (drops to $125 every other week it seems)

4GB Mushkin DDR3 $100

Sapphire ATI HD5870 $430

There are some $390 HD5870s that probably work just as well. Thing is, I own the similar Sapphire HD5830 -- so I know how well it works and overclocks. This card drops in price every so often. The GPU is the main thing -- so, its where one puts the money.

This is the system I would buy if money were no object. Its all one needs to spend -- but, one could spend a LOT more.

Just opinions on stuff I am familiar with and would buy myself FWIW smile


Sapphire Pulse RX7900XTX, 3 monitors = 23P (1080p) + SAMSUNG 32" Odyssey Neo G7 1000R curve (4K/2160p) + 23P (1080p), AMD R9-7950X (ARCTIC Liquid Freezer II 420), 64GB RAM@6.0GHz, Gigabyte X670E AORUS MASTER MB, (4x M.2 SSD + 2xSSD + 2xHD) = ~52TB storage, EVGA 1600W PSU, Phanteks Enthoo Pro Full Tower, ASUS RT-AX89X 6000Mbps WiFi router, VKB Gladiator WW2 Stick, Pedals, G.Skill RGB KB, AORUS Thunder M7 Mouse, W11 Pro
#3047833 - 07/08/10 02:05 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: Allen]  
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Interesting stuff about the Phenom II chip, seems like a lot of performance at a decent price. Are you running Arma or Black Shark or Rise of Flight on your system? If so, how do they run?


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#3048004 - 07/08/10 07:26 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: Clydewinder]  
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Clydewinder,

I have Arma and Black Shark and with my system, see specs below, I have no problem running them maxed out. Hope this helps.

Wired


Win 10 64bit Pro; Sys Info: Case Cooler Master 690; PSU Antec 900Watts; Motherbrd ASUS Sabertooth 990FX; CPU AMD FX 8350 4.2Ghz; 16GB G Skill DDR3 1600; HD 2TB Hybrid; VideoCard EVGA Superclock Geforce GTX 750Ti,2GB,PCIe X16; Display Drvr 353.06; SoundCard ASUS XonarDX; Logitech Speakers G51, 5.1; Logitech G35 7.1 Hdset; Saitek CyborgX Stick & CH Fighter Stick/Pro Pedals; TrackIR-5; Monitor 22" Widescreen SyncMaster Samsung 2233BW
#3048058 - 07/08/10 08:45 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: Wired]  
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Clydewinder, maybe a better question would be "what's your budget?"

If you want the cheapest you can get to run those games, the specs will be a lot different than if you want the "middle ground" specs but that will cost a bit more. The good news is that awesome levels of performance can be had without spending too much $$$ if you know where to look.

Still, everything is bound by how much you're willing to spend, so...


- Ice
#3048253 - 07/09/10 01:14 AM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: Clydewinder]  
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I suggest you start by choosing your new monitor, because that's going to be the biggest factor in determining what you'll need in the rest of your system.

I come down on the Intel side in the great CPU debate. Not because the processors are better, although right now they are. My reason is because Intel chipsets have been much, much more reliable than any chipset for an AMD that I've seen.

The i5/750 has a huge amount of bang for the buck. Turbo boost raises the chip speed when you don't need multiple cores, like on some games, and you can overclock the snot out of it. You can spend a lot more money on an Intel CPU, but there really isn't any good reason to. The best motherboard depends on the features you're looking for. My recommendation would be an Asus, Gigabyte or eVga in the $150 range. (I picked up an Asus P7P55D Evo for my new build.)

The best video card totally depends on the monitor you're going to use. Since you're replacing your monitor, you might want to think about buying three inexpensive monitors and using the Eyefinity feature on the new Radeon 5xxx cards.

AMD/ATI has the upper hand on video cards right now. They run cooler/quieter than the new nVidia cards, the performance is great, and the Eyefinity feature is the coolest thing I've seen from a video card in years. nVidia's new GTX4xx cards came out late and they run hotter than the AMD cards, but now they're making a game of it. nVidia cards still run hotter but they are really challenging AMD on price and performance. The Radeon 5850 has been the sweet spot in the high(er) end video card market since last fall. But if you were buying today you can get an nVidia GTX470 for the same money and it's a notably faster video card. Next week nVidia is launching a new GTX460 card that is rumored to match the performance of the 5850 but it's going to cost at least $50 less.

Hard drives are another hot area. Platter drives are incredibly cheap for the performance you get. I just got a WD Caviar Black 640GB that is faster than my old 80GB two-drive RAID0 array. (I'm also updating from a stone-age system.) But solid state drives are amazingly fast even compared to those, at least in tasks like booting the system and loading a program. SSD's don't improve performance in most games.

If you haven't shopped for a power supply in a while, you're in for a shock. You can now buy a power supply with output measured in kilowatts and it's ridiculously easy to spend more than $200 just on a PSU. It's mostly a joke. A 500w PSU is more than enough for any system with one video card. An Antec, Corsair or Seasonic 550w PSU is perfect and it will cost around $70.

Cases are a matter of taste and preference, but the Silverstone Raven RV02 is the most inventive case I've seen in a long time and its cooling and noise control works remarkably well.

HTH

#3048507 - 07/09/10 02:52 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: baldheadeddork]  
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Originally Posted By: baldheadeddork
If you haven't shopped for a power supply in a while, you're in for a shock. You can now buy a power supply with output measured in kilowatts and it's ridiculously easy to spend more than $200 just on a PSU. It's mostly a joke. A 500w PSU is more than enough for any system with one video card. An Antec, Corsair or Seasonic 550w PSU is perfect and it will cost around $70.
On PSU's: Do yourself a favour and give your PSU room to breathe. A quality PSU is a very important factor in system stability. Over time their performance degrades too. If a system comes to 400W, I'd buy a 650W PSU or higher.

I only buy Seasonics for it's built quality and quiet operation, but many other brands have their PSU's manufactured by Seasonic too. Like Corsair's HX650 or VX450W, designed by Corsair, but built by Seasonic. HX1000, 850, 750 and VX550 are from CWT though. (Channel Well Technology)

#3048554 - 07/09/10 04:13 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: JAMF]  
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They regularly build systems with different price points at Tom's Hardware and that is simply the best place to go to see what is the newest, most powerful or best bang for the buck parts. As JAS39 has already stated.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/build-your-own-pc,2601.html

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/balanced-gaming-pc-overclock,2625.html

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/overclock-cpu-gpu,2643.html

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/overclock-cpu-gpu,2655.html

#3048764 - 07/09/10 09:57 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: Clydewinder]  
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Originally Posted By: Clydewinder
Interesting stuff about the Phenom II chip, seems like a lot of performance at a decent price. Are you running Arma or Black Shark or Rise of Flight on your system? If so, how do they run?


I run virtually all my games at 1920x1200, max in game settings with these adjustments -- 0AA, 8AF, normal shadows (when those can be adjusted).

They all run smoothly -- including ARMA2, Black Shark, Rise of Flight, Crysis. Note, I say "smoothly". I go by what I actually see and feel -- not by frame rates.

The exception is MSFSX when loaded down with the aftermarket 9m terrain, roads, streams, and traveled highways (I'm sure I see 1000 cars in motion when taking off from our local airport). When loaded down, I have to cut back slightly on the traffic (from max to "normal") and a couple other changes -- still keeping max draw distances, etc.

Note that I use an HD5830 OC ($200) -- which is much weaker than the suggested HD5870. It probably will not run all new games to the max for the next 2 or 3 years as the suggested HD5870 probably will. Also, ATI cards are usually considered better for video (which I watch often).

It was mentioned above regarding AMD/ATI chipsets. I've been using AMD/ATI for years. No such problems in many years. In fact, I think an advantage of an AMD/ATI with AMD/ATI chipset motherboard is that they work together synergistically. In fact, they are designed to do that according to AMD.

Also, ATI comes out with a new WHQL graphics driver every month. I my reading, ATI has had fewer major driver problems than Nvidia for a long time now -- though people often say otherwise. I personally never have problems. But, then, I have an all AMD/ATI system and I keep it simple and clean.

The reason to go AMD/ATI is excellent cost effective performance, reliability, and low cost easy upgrade ability (AMD keeps their newer CPUs compatible with older motherboards much more so than Intel). Throw the system together and it works very well.

For flat out speed at usually significantly higher cost (prices and performance for price vary month by month), go Intel/Nvidia. Some folks have fun playing around with OC and so forth to squeeze out the last ounce of FPS -- Intel is best for overclocking as one can get some really high CPU speed numbers (usually don't translate to proportionally higher FPS -- and very rarely to a "visible" FPS increase).

Just my personal opinions. We have a lot of Intel/Nvidia folks here with different opinions to share smile


Sapphire Pulse RX7900XTX, 3 monitors = 23P (1080p) + SAMSUNG 32" Odyssey Neo G7 1000R curve (4K/2160p) + 23P (1080p), AMD R9-7950X (ARCTIC Liquid Freezer II 420), 64GB RAM@6.0GHz, Gigabyte X670E AORUS MASTER MB, (4x M.2 SSD + 2xSSD + 2xHD) = ~52TB storage, EVGA 1600W PSU, Phanteks Enthoo Pro Full Tower, ASUS RT-AX89X 6000Mbps WiFi router, VKB Gladiator WW2 Stick, Pedals, G.Skill RGB KB, AORUS Thunder M7 Mouse, W11 Pro
#3048773 - 07/09/10 10:30 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: Allen]  
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AMD has some compelling hardware now. With some of these newer boards letting you unlock cores on the AMD chips and turning tri-cores into quads, that would be fun in my book.

#3049453 - 07/10/10 11:08 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: speedbump]  
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Personally I've stuck with AMD for a while now. Sure it's not as bleeding fast as Intel can be, but man you can't beat their prices.

I mean Newegg has AMD Six Core processors in stock

6x 2.8ghz for $200
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103851

or

6x 3.2ghz for $295
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103849


They can still overclock pretty well, I've had my Quad 2.8ghz up to 3.3ghz without any issues, but I'm generally more GPU limited than CPU limited so unless I'm re-encoding video I stick to 2.8ghz. :-/


-Edit
Since you mentioned core unlocking, it's obviously not a guarentee, but I picked up a 2.7ghz Sempron Single core for my PVR for $25 on sale, unlocked and I now have an incredible stable Dual Core 2.7ghz. Can't beat $25 for that. smile

Last edited by Blackphoenix; 07/10/10 11:10 PM.

My Current Rig:
-AMD Phenom II x4 2.8ghz
-8gb of DDR2
-Geforce 9600 GSO (768mb 192bit bus)
-24" 1080P LCD
-HOTAS, looking for suggestions
#3051394 - 07/13/10 06:48 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: Blackphoenix]  
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Clydewinder Offline
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after some digging i'm leaning towards a Phenom II X4 955 and an ASUS motherboard. Still torn on the video card though. I picked up a monitor that has a max res of 1600x900 so I'm unclear if there's any benefit going to one of the highest-end video cards - seems like most benchmarks they are running on those cards are at significantly higher resolutions than I need. kind of leaning toward a 1GB radeon 5830 at this point

those items with 4 gb of ddr3 add up to around 520 bucks give or take, pretty much in line with what i wanted to spend. probably need to pony up for a bigger power supply as well. i can't remember what the one i have is rated at. 500 or 550 watts probably.


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#3052128 - 07/14/10 05:10 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: Clydewinder]  
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A 5830 will probably run most games at max or near-max-that-your-eyes-can't-tell-the-difference even at 1920x1080. I have a 5770 and a 1920x1080 monitor and it rocks!

4GB is a nice comfortable figure for RAM, and I bet most would recommend a good, named powersupply at the 600-700w level. As they say, the PSU powers your entire rig and so it is not a good idea to scrimp on that one.


- Ice
#3052186 - 07/14/10 06:29 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: - Ice]  
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I can't see building a new gaming rig with anything less than at least a 600W PSU. So many problems are caused by an inadequate or undersized power supply. Including hardware failure.

#3052248 - 07/14/10 08:02 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: speedbump]  
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Originally Posted By: JAMF
On PSU's: Do yourself a favour and give your PSU room to breathe. A quality PSU is a very important factor in system stability. Over time their performance degrades too. If a system comes to 400W, I'd buy a 650W PSU or higher.

I only buy Seasonics for it's built quality and quiet operation, but many other brands have their PSU's manufactured by Seasonic too. Like Corsair's HX650 or VX450W, designed by Corsair, but built by Seasonic. HX1000, 850, 750 and VX550 are from CWT though. (Channel Well Technology)



Originally Posted By: speedbump
I can't see building a new gaming rig with anything less than at least a 600W PSU. So many problems are caused by an inadequate or undersized power supply. Including hardware failure.



I was an evangelist for PC Power and Cooling PSU's for years, so I'm in total agreement about the importance of a quality power supply. I've seen some systems killed by junk power supplies when they fail, but I've never seen a system that was undone by an underpowered PSU.

I do disagree about the need for 100% (or more) excess capacity. Yesterday I posted a link to a HardOCP video test in another thread and the power consumption results of that test bear repeating it here.



Their testbed is an i7/920 overclocked to 3.6GHz and the most power-hungry single video card on the market today - the GTX480 - pulled just under 500w while running GPU-Z and Furmark. This is a 99th percentile gaming system, overclocked and running benchmarks that will work the video and CPU more than any application at the same time, and it still didn't get over 500w. The 5850 in the same system didn't top 320w under 100% video and CPU load.

If you have an overclocked i7 and a GTX480, a 600w PSU will still provide 20% overhead when you're running multiple benchmarks. For the 99.99% of time that you're not benchmarking, there's at least 50% untapped capacity.

And that's just at the listed capacity. In the bad old days most PSU's were rated by perfect condition peak output, while real world capacity could come in 20-30% below that. There are still cheap power supplies that do that but any decent PSU (80 plus certification is a good way to tell) is rated for sustained output and can supply peak outputs above its advertised rating.

Unless the customer was going to do a lot of benchmarking, I have no problem putting a 600w Corsair, Seasonic or Antec into a system with a GTX480 or 470. For any single-chip Radeon 5xxx card, any 80 plus certified 500w PSU is still going to have at least 150w of headroom. For typical gaming use it's going to be running over 200w below its sustained capacity.

About degradation, that occurs when the caps and resistors become overheated. If you're running at least 20% below the sustained output, overheating should never be a problem as long as you don't obstruct the airflow. A cap or resistor will eventually fail, but it should still be performing at at least 95% of its rated capacity until it does fail as long as its not overheated.

#3052287 - 07/14/10 08:45 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: baldheadeddork]  
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Originally Posted By: baldheadeddork
I do disagree about the need for 100% (or more) excess capacity.
I hope you're not implying I said so!?

#3052353 - 07/14/10 09:53 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: JAMF]  
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The old rule of thumb on electronics components was to derate 50 percent on everything (power, voltage, etc) -- it allowed headroom and slower deterioration. That corresponds to 100 percent excess capacity.

Having said that, I think the PSU should be a brand name. 600 or 650 Watts -- which may not be a full 50 percent derate. Pick the wattage and the brand name based on what's cheapest that day. You should be able to get a good PSU for well under $100 by shopping a special sale. For example, here's one marked down from $120 to $80.

Corsair 650W 80Plus Rated

My Sapphire HD5830 OC to 875 and runs everything at 1920x1200 -- so, no sweat with your monitor resolution -- I notice dropping the resolution speeds thing up significantly. Thus, I can't fault the HD5830 decision. The one I bought is currently only $180 (on special sale) and the prices are falling in general:

Sapphire HD5830 OCs Well $180

The AMD Phenom II 955 will probably OC to 3.7GHz just like the 965 (though OCs are never guaranteed). So, again, not a bad choice.


Of course, the sale prices usually only hold for a few days -- or over a weekend. So, one must check daily.


Sapphire Pulse RX7900XTX, 3 monitors = 23P (1080p) + SAMSUNG 32" Odyssey Neo G7 1000R curve (4K/2160p) + 23P (1080p), AMD R9-7950X (ARCTIC Liquid Freezer II 420), 64GB RAM@6.0GHz, Gigabyte X670E AORUS MASTER MB, (4x M.2 SSD + 2xSSD + 2xHD) = ~52TB storage, EVGA 1600W PSU, Phanteks Enthoo Pro Full Tower, ASUS RT-AX89X 6000Mbps WiFi router, VKB Gladiator WW2 Stick, Pedals, G.Skill RGB KB, AORUS Thunder M7 Mouse, W11 Pro
#3052381 - 07/14/10 10:54 PM Re: Need help with a new PC build [Re: Allen]  
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Sign up for the egg's email updates. They have some good sales and usually include a code for another five or more dollars off certain items like hard drives or power supplies.


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