The Ultimate 'Build-A-PC' Thread. Complete With Pricings & Recommendations (06/06/10)

elessar123 said:
Anything Corsair or Seasonic. Preferably modular, especially if you want a smaller case (smaller than mid tower). You shouldn't need more than 500W.

Non-modular

Modular
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I don't recommend those anymore. I highly recommend EVGA power supplies, the ones that have the 10 year full warranty. You pay a bit extra but what's great about them is they are dead silent when the computer is at idle and spin up proportional to the games you might play.

On the PC, actually if you can swing it, you should probably get a Nvidia GTX 760 or 760 ti for 200-250. Some of the GTX 770's are going now as cheap as $280. I probably would not waste money on a 6 series card anymore, unless you find something dirt cheap.

Also get a motherboard that has SLI. So in the future you can buy another video card and it's usually a lot cheaper than upgrading a single card and spending X more money for less performance if you just could do SLI.

So example first I got a GTX 670 FTW when they first came out (retail 399- but had a 30 mail in rebate). Then 1.5 years later I got the exact same card for $200.. Now I have performance better than a Titan. Most of my games play at ultra at 1920x1200 or 3 monitors at high settings.

 
Would definitely step up to a 770, the price difference between it and the 760 is fairly trivial given the entire cost of a new system.

 
Yea I just picked up a eVGA GTX 770 SC (the dual fan cooling) for a cool $245 at a B&M Microcenter on clearance.  It was cheaper than the 760's...and the thing can be overclocked a lot.

That's going into my other system now, replacing an aging ATI card.

 
Hi chaps,

(Regular CAG poster here, not been in this thread before though!)

I've been given clearance by She Who Must Be Obeyed to build a new PC. It's to serve as a HTPC which will also allow me to do some gaming in my living room.

Currently I have a PS3 and Xbox360 under my TV. The idea is to replace both (I barely use them, other than for Netflix) with a small low profile PC with a budget of around £500.

I've put together a proposed build here: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/Flowette/saved/msx2FT

Comments would be appreciated. (Please note that I already have the SSD)

Initially I want to play around with SteamOS so I won't need a Windows licence. However, I'll buy Win 7/8.1 if it defeats me.

I'm an intermediate PC user but this is my first fresh PC build. Have done several upgrades in the past so I have a reasonable idea of where things go but I'm not entirely down with all the jargon. :whee:

Cheers,

Flow

P.s. prices from Amazon UK can't be trusted today so ignore them. :(
 
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Flowette said:
Hi chaps,

(Regular CAG poster here, not been in this thread before though!)

I've been given clearance by She Who Must Be Obeyed to build a new PC. It's to serve as a HTPC which will also allow me to do some gaming in my living room.

Currently I have a PS3 and Xbox360 under my TV. The idea is to replace both (I barely use them, other than for Netflix) with a small low profile PC with a budget of around £500.

I've put together a proposed build here: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/Flowette/saved/msx2FT

Comments would be appreciated. (Please note that I already have the SSD)

Initially I want to play around with SteamOS so I won't need a Windows licence. However, I'll buy Win 7/8.1 if it defeats me.

I'm an intermediate PC user but this is my first fresh PC build. Have done several upgrades in the past so I have a reasonable idea of where things go but I'm not entirely down with all the jargon. :whee:

Cheers,

Flow

P.s. prices from Amazon UK can't be trusted today so ignore them. :(
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Here's my opinions on it.

You shouldn't need the separate CPU cooler; just use a stock for the i3, since it's only a 55W CPU.

Stock CPUs come with thermal compound on the heatsink as well, so you don't need the separate tube. You can remove the stock one and put a little dab of the new paste, but it won't benefit you much. And definitely not noticeably.

You may want a low profile version of the RAM you picked. I have a similar case and the RAM clearance is not a lot.

You don't need a 500W supply with a i3 and a 750 TI. You only need about a 300W supply for what you have there.

Get the newer Cooler Master 130 instead of the 120. Almost no price difference, but it's better ventilated with the front being mesh.

 
elessar123 said:
Here's my opinions on it.

You shouldn't need the separate CPU cooler; just use a stock for the i3, since it's only a 55W CPU.

Stock CPUs come with thermal compound on the heatsink as well, so you don't need the separate tube. You can remove the stock one and put a little dab of the new paste, but it won't benefit you much. And definitely not noticeably.

You may want a low profile version of the RAM you picked. I have a similar case and the RAM clearance is not a lot.

You don't need a 500W supply with a i3 and a 750 TI. You only need about a 300W supply for what you have there.

Get the newer Cooler Master 130 instead of the 120. Almost no price difference, but it's better ventilated with the front being mesh.
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Thanks man!

Will update my list shortly. However, I have spotted one problem already: the case is 238 mm high. It's going into a gap 240mm high. Oops.

Will need a "flatter" case.

:whee:

Just checked again, it'll fit with around 4cm to spare.

 
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ok, my 2008 system finally died last week.

It was having these strange issues like not powering up, or powering up then shutting down within 5 minutes or rebooting itself and so on.  There was this weird issue with the MB where if I disconnected the network cable it would boot fine...

At this point I am done with the machine.  It was a good long run but it's time to upgrade.

 2008 specs

1 LG 20X DVD±R DVD Burner w/ SecurDisc Tech Black SATA Model GH20NS15 - OEMItem #: N82E16827136149--Standard Return Policy $22.99
 
1 ZALMAN CNPS9500 AT 2 Ball CPU Cooling Fan/HeatsinkItem #: N82E16835118003--Standard Return Policy $41.99
 
1 Creative 70SB073A00000 7.1 Channels PCI Interface Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamerItem #: N82E16829102006--Standard Return Policy

 $90.99
 
1 SAMSUNG Spinpoint F1 HD103UJ 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Bare DriveItem #: N82E1682215210230 Day Return Policy $134.99
 
1 LG 25GB 2X BD-RE Single Disc Model BE252SV-01JItem #: N82E16817143001Consumable Items Return Policy $15.99
 
1 OCZ StealthXStream OCZ600SXS 600W ATX12V / EPS12V SLI Ready Active PFC Power SupplyItem #: N82E16817341010--Standard Return Policy
For Tech support call: 408 986 8400 or email [email protected]
 $79.99
 
1 EVGA 896-P3-1265-AR GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 896MB 448-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video CardItem #: N82E1681413039830 Day Return Policy
For Tech Support 888/881-EVGA (3842)
 $299.99
 
1 LG Black Super Multi Blu-ray Disc Burner & HD DVD-ROM Drive SATA GGW-H20L LightScribe SupportItem #: N82E16827136137Limited Non-Refundable 30-Day Return Policy $249.99
 
1 ASUS P5Q Deluxe LGA 775 Intel P45 Intel MotherboardItem #: N82E1681313129730 Day Return Policy
For Asus Tech Support, Please Call 502-995-0883 or http://helpdesk.asus.com/
 $199.99
 
1 Western Digital WD Blue WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Bare DriveItem #: N82E1682213621830 Day Return Policy
This item is serviced by the Western Digital. Please call 800 832 4778 for service.
 $84.99
 
1 Seagate SV35.2 ST3160815AV 160GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache IDE Ultra ATA100 / ATA-6 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Bare DriveItem #: N82E1682214826730 Day Return Policy
This item is serviced by the SeaGate. Please call 800 -732-4283 for service.
 $54.99
 
1 OCZ Diesel 4GB USB 2.0 Flash Drive Model OCZUSBDSL4GItem #: N82E16820227331--Memory (Modules, USB) Return Policy
For Tech support call: 408 986 8400 or email [email protected]
 $15.99
 
1 Intel Core 2 Quad Q9300 Yorkfield Quad-Core 2.5GHz LGA 775 95W Processor BX80580Q9300Item #: N82E16819115043--Processors (CPUs) Return Policy $259.99
 
1 OCZ Reaper HPC 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model OCZ2RPR1066A2GKItem #: N82E16820227239--Memory (Modules, USB) Return Policy
For Tech support call: 408 986 8400 or email [email protected]
 $59.99
 
Shipped from NJ, USA - Tracking #: 1Z00377R0308779211 
1 COOLER MASTER COSMOS S RC-1100-KKN1-GP Black Aluminum ATX Full Tower Computer CaseItem #: N82E16811119150--Standard Return Policy

Here is what I am come up with for the 2014 specs.  Now I am wondering if I should save money and get rid of the Sound Blaster Card and use that money towards buying a good 5.1/7.1 speaker system (any recommendations?), but then again how good is a motherboards internal sound chips compared to dedicated card?  Also wanted to look into a good internal memory card reader with maybe an LCD display to report internal temps or is that a waste of money ?

I am doing 1 hard drive for now instead of 2 and 1 disc drive instead of 2.  The reason for 2 disc drives the first time around was to rip my cd collection and it provided a faster way by doing 2 at a time.  Hard drive wise, although my 3 drives from the first configuration are still working, it's best to replace them as I know the primary drive is slow. 

I really like the case I picked as it's different the previous black ones.

2014 possible set up

Subtotal: $1,474.88

 Shipping: $7.11

CM Storm Stryker - White Full Tower Gaming Computer Case with Handle and External 2.5" Drive Dock

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EVGA 02G-P4-2763-KR GeForce GTX 760 2GB 256-Bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 SLI Support w/ EVGA ACX Cooler Video Card

 
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NVIDIA Gift - Watch Dogs
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Creative Labs Sound Blaster Zx soundcard

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CORSAIR CX series CX750 750W ATX12V / EPS12V SLI Ready CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC Power Supply New ...

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Arctic Silver 5 High-Density Polysynthetic Silver Thermal Compound AS5-3.5G - OEM

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ADATA XPG V2 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model AX3U1600W4G9-DGV
 

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ASUS SABERTOOTH Z97 MARK1 LGA 1150 Intel Z97 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard

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Intel Core i5-4670 Haswell Quad-Core 3.4GHz LGA 1150 84W Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics BX80646I54670

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ZALMAN CNPS9900MAX-B 135mm Long life bearing CPU Cooler Blue LED

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Western Digital WD Green WD20EZRX 2TB IntelliPower 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Bare Drive
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Western Digital WD Green WD20EZRX 2TB IntelliPower 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Bare Drive

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LG Black Blu-ray Burner SATA WH16NS40 - OEM
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LG Black Blu-ray Burner SATA WH16NS40 - OEM

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What do you guys think?

 
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Dude, I know you live near a Microcenter, so you are overpaying by a lot.  First your cpu/mombo cost is way to high to begin with.  You should definitely check out Microcenter combo prices.  And their CPU prices are far better than anything online, even if you don't choose a motherboard from them, but why wouldn't you with $40 off any price.

I don't think you need a dedicated sound card, it's too much overkill unless you are going to produce music on your PC.  That sound card is not needed.  

You should not even begin with a video card less than a GTX 770 for gaming.  Just pay the little extra.  Totally worth it. And I could see that the price you list for the 760 should be really for 760 Ti.  Its too expensive.  I can hook you up with a deal on a 770 just PM me.

Omg those 2 TB hard drives way to much.  Microcenter is selling 3 TB drives for $99 WD green drives or the better ones are the Toshiba 3GB 7200 RPM drives for $99 each.  On sale this week.  I have two of the toshiba's in RAID 10 and man they fly.  6TB of storage goes fast too...i take way too many videos and pics with my phones and HDR camera.

Just PM me if you want to save a ton of $$$ man.  You should really look into Microcenter.  

 
I've been out of building for ages now but do you guys think it's reasonable to build a semi-decent i5 (a K model so I can OC) machine for around $500? I don't need to game on max or anything, I just want a decent processor for Dolphin emulator and a decent graphics card for some moderate quality gaming. 

I have the case, PSU, HDD and other stuff from my last build. I just need a mobo, processor, ram, and OS (Win 7). The processor and OS eat up about $325, which doesn't leave me much room and I have no idea what makes a good mobo these days.

I was also hoping for a 64-128GB SSD for OS install and to keep some Steam games on (ie, I'll move whatever I'm playing on to my SSD) but guess that's not happening. And my PSU should able to handle things. It's a Corsair HX 620 but it's kinda old... which might be an issue. 

The only plus side is that there is a Microcenter fairly close to me and I've heard they have decent sales. 

 
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Go with an Nvidia 750Ti -- those are around $150ish.  The next step up would be a 760 and I think those are still around $250.  Mother board wise you can't go wrong with Gigabyte, MSI, or Asus.  They should have entry-level OC capable models (you're going to want z87) for around $100-120ish.  RAM is still going to run you around $60 or so.  It'll be hard to go under $600ish total.

 
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Mooby said:
Didn't realize they were selling 270x's for $100 now, pretty good deal.

Re: ram prices, they probably aren't going down anytime soon.
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thats exatly right. a new format will be coming for 2015..no more ddr3 as the main stream memory. about 3 years ago was the best time to get ram...i got 32 gb ram for $90 new (gskill). i waited a bit more and prices kept going up so my 2nd system got 16 gb ram for $60. after that no more ram buying. way to costly these days.

i been eyeing ati video cards, they keep dropping prices on all their models, man must be killing nvidia...u can get a high end 280x for $240 if u look around (hint tigerdirect, newegg). i've seen r9 290's go for $320 on sale.

 
s0undwav3 said:
thats exatly right. a new format will be coming for 2015..no more ddr3 as the main stream memory. about 3 years ago was the best time to get ram...i got 32 gb ram for $90 new (gskill). i waited a bit more and prices kept going up so my 2nd system got 16 gb ram for $60. after that no more ram buying. way to costly these days.

i been eyeing ati video cards, they keep dropping prices on all their models, man must be killing nvidia...u can get a high end 280x for $240 if u look around (hint tigerdirect, newegg). i've seen r9 290's go for $320 on sale.
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That new format is DDR4 and it's already out now. It's expensive, not intended for desktops, and slow as hell. It will be some time before DDR4 is considered a viable desktop replacement.

ATI has been dead for years, you mean AMD. AMD isn't killing Nvidia in anything apart from the APU mobile and console front. Nvidia prices their desktop cards higher because enthusiasts are willing to pay more for the superior feature set and quality of an Nvidia card. If AMD was "killing" Nvidia, we wouldn't be headed for our 3rd product refresh in a row, the 8xx lineup that soft launches next month.

 
Yeah, RAM prices are on the rise. I got my latest upgrade when the prices had just about bottomed out. If I built a new rig now, the RAM would be at least 25% more expensive.

It's going to be a while before I make a major upgrade or system build. My current rig is still quite capable, and I'm going to be really busy in the next couple of months. PC building is going to be pretty far down on my schedule. Perhaps next year.

 
Bruticis said:
That new format is DDR4 and it's already out now. It's expensive, not intended for desktops, and slow as hell. It will be some time before DDR4 is considered a viable desktop replacement.

ATI has been dead for years, you mean AMD. AMD isn't killing Nvidia in anything apart from the APU mobile and console front. Nvidia prices their desktop cards higher because enthusiasts are willing to pay more for the superior feature set and quality of an Nvidia card. If AMD was "killing" Nvidia, we wouldn't be headed for our 3rd product refresh in a row, the 8xx lineup that soft launches next month.
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This site is called CAG for a reason. I just don't get why people would pay for a 780 ti for around $6xx when you can get an R9 290X for $150 cheaper - retail price with very similiar benchmarks. That's on the high end of things. You're going to see a shift in PC gaming soon because the consoles are all using AMD (ATI) - even the next Nintendo console is rumored to use AMD. Being that Xbox One and PS4 are essentially mid tier PC's, the games (you see them now (cough Watchdogs, Titanfall) were written for the consoles. And the strange thing is that I own Watchdogs on PC and I played it on a Nvidia 770 - the game according to the devs - written for Nvidia - but my other PC has a 3 year old 7970 and it runs faster, smoother, better framerates - and people think it's all because the game is a port. All I want are cheap video cards to play the games the best and smoothest way. Not necessarily the fastest (input lag, screen tearing).

I just want to see how GTA V will play on PC when it comes out. I was so looking forward to The Division but Ubisoft has already said they are going to tone down the game for PC based on console abilities.. Here we go again with AMD. And I keep reading articles that the Nvidia 8xx series is really a mid 2015 launch.

 
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Hey all!

I was a big fan of ATI during the 90's with their All in Wonder series.  What erked me a lot was their buggy drivers.  I finally gave up on them around 2002/2003 and tried out EVGA/Nvidia and was impressed.  Ever since then I have been using EVGA cards in my system.  People (including Soundwav3) are recommending ATI again..... does that mean ATI/AMD have gotten their shit together and have stable drivers?

 
It's a tradeoff.  Nvidia still tends to have better drivers and support but, as mentioned above, you'll pay less on average for AMD cards.  And even with consoles using AMD hardware I don't think that's any indication that AMD is making gains or that you're necessarily better off with them for your PC.

As far as EVGA specifically I think they're overpriced.  They used to have excellent customer service and slightly superior products but for the last several years they've coasted on their reputation and you aren't any worse off buying MSI or Gigabyte for cheaper (sort of the same with ASUS and mother boards).  That said, I think EVGA tends to have its customer support located in the US whereas the other companies outsource but I'm not 100% certain.

 
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s0undwav3 said:
This site is called CAG for a reason. I just don't get why people would pay for a 780 ti for around $6xx when you can get an R9 290X for $150 cheaper - retail price with very similiar benchmarks. That's on the high end of things. You're going to see a shift in PC gaming soon because the consoles are all using AMD (ATI) - even the next Nintendo console is rumored to use AMD. Being that Xbox One and PS4 are essentially mid tier PC's, the games (you see them now (cough Watchdogs, Titanfall) were written for the consoles. And the strange thing is that I own Watchdogs on PC and I played it on a Nvidia 770 - the game according to the devs - written for Nvidia - but my other PC has a 3 year old 7970 and it runs faster, smoother, better framerates - and people think it's all because the game is a port. All I want are cheap video cards to play the games the best and smoothest way. Not necessarily the fastest (input lag, screen tearing).

I just want to see how GTA V will play on PC when it comes out. I was so looking forward to The Division but Ubisoft has already said they are going to tone down the game for PC based on console abilities.. Here we go again with AMD. And I keep reading articles that the Nvidia 8xx series is really a mid 2015 launch.
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You're an idiot that clearly doesnt know anything about PC hardware. I'm done with you, not worth my time.

Mooby said:
It's a tradeoff. Nvidia still tends to have better drivers and support but, as mentioned above, you'll pay less on average for AMD cards. And even with consoles using AMD hardware I don't think that's any indication that AMD is making gains or that you're necessarily better off with them for your PC.

As far as EVGA specifically I think they're overpriced. They used to have excellent customer service and slightly superior products but for the last several years they've coasted on their reputation and you aren't any worse off buying MSI or Gigabyte for cheaper (sort of the same with ASUS and mother boards). That said, I think EVGA tends to have its customer support located in the US whereas the other companies outsource but I'm not 100% certain.
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No, AMD drivers are still a complete shitfest. I wish they would pull their heads out of their asses and get back to being competitive so Nvidia would be forced to innovate again. Head to your newest hardware forum (hint, not this one) and see what folks are still bitching about with AMD. Having said that, AMD is just fine if you're looking for a budget card with good performance vs dollars. If you want a far more feature rich platform with polished drivers, you'll have to pony up a good 50-100 bucks more vs the AMD equivalent.

 
It's always been Nvidia for me, and I always got deals on cards. Everything would pretty much pay for itself.

I paid 300 for my 780 vs paying 250 for a mining r290 that would shit the bed in a day.
 
wow...still a lot of hate for ATI/AMD.  I was really wondering why the next gen systems were gravitating towards ATI/AMD for their GPU considering how bad it is on the PC driver wise.  But like others said it was a cheaper solution. 

Does anyone think I should continue with a two optical drive set up like my last system set up?

The old system had a dvd w/r drive and the second drive was a HD/BR/DVD writer drive.  This was my first BR drive before I bought my first BR player in 2008.  I like the fact that I can insert a BR disc into the drive , go to VUDU.com and get a digital copy of my library for cheap but only with me having a BR disc drive.

Once the system is here, I am going to work on dumping every single cd I have into MP3 format (440+ cds).  Doing this before made things quick and easy with two drives goings.

I just thought of something.... if I do this with the drives writing to an SSD...will this go faster or will it be limited to the speed of the extraction/read speed of the optical drives themselves?

 
Bruticis said:
You're an idiot that clearly doesnt know anything about PC hardware. I'm done with you, not worth my time.

No, AMD drivers are still a complete shitfest. I wish they would pull their heads out of their asses and get back to being competitive so Nvidia would be forced to innovate again. Head to your newest hardware forum (hint, not this one) and see what folks are still bitching about with AMD. Having said that, AMD is just fine if you're looking for a budget card with good performance vs dollars. If you want a far more feature rich platform with polished drivers, you'll have to pony up a good 50-100 bucks more vs the AMD equivalent.
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Clearly your not really a CAG and also play some of the modern games on PC and those games were suppose to have Nvidia backed support and ended up completely shitty. Watchdogs is a complete crapfest and for months before release, there were at least 4 developer videos trumping Nvidia this and Nvidia that and the game can't even play smooth on a 780 ti (which I have). There's even an optimization guide on Nvidia's site for this game (they admit issues) yet no one can get it stable running on nvidia hardware.

http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/guides/watch-dogs-graphics-performance-and-tweaking-guide

Just look at some of the comments (one guy posted 9 days ago about his 690 and he should never have these problems with that card - like ever) yet it's Nvidia shiity drivers and a game that was built for Nvidia that is clearly not optimized. It's actually Nvidia's fault. They admit it. (this is going to affect The Division - same developer, and they have already said PC port will be de-optimized).

The Worstmod came out to unlock the graphic options that were suppose to be shipped with the game, but even ubisoft has admiited they completely took out pc optimization for PC. Then there's Titanfall - playing that since beta. Promise of SLI drivers from Nvidia. Recent patch of the game should have had SLI support. No luck there. Nvidia is holding back. Then of course there's Battlefield 4 (aside for all the EA patches and server mess) - Mantle is optimized for that game (and probably will only be for Battlefield from the looks of it). The 7970 can run circles around the 780 Ti with Mantle.

Nvidia isn't all the best in seriousness. Their drivers are far worse the last couple of iterations, causing Remote Desktop to corrupt the entire video display when it's closed Go back to archive drivers at 327.23 fixes a lot of crap they've introduced once the drivers started supporting in game video capture. Geforce experience craps out a lot and started introducing needless popups during game play (at default settings) which any overlay graphic driver program should not do.

Seriously I have both vendors, not even sure why you're getting upset. I've found AMD drivers have gotten a lot more stable the last 3 versions vs anything else that they had released in the last 3 years with my 7970.

 
ITDEFX said:
Hey all!

I was a big fan of ATI during the 90's with their All in Wonder series. What erked me a lot was their buggy drivers. I finally gave up on them around 2002/2003 and tried out EVGA/Nvidia and was impressed. Ever since then I have been using EVGA cards in my system. People (including Soundwav3) are recommending ATI again..... does that mean ATI/AMD have gotten their shit together and have stable drivers?
Click to expand...
All I can say is that I own both vendor cards. 7970 (3 years old) and a 780 Ti (I had dual 670's for a long time the but complete lack of SLI support for a lot of games that were announced by Nvidia that never came out, waste of money). I'd say 70% of PC games are optimized for Nvidia, have the launch logo of Nivdia etc. Up until 6 months ago AMD started releasing drivers about every 90 days. The 14 series drivers are very stable, no game crashes and no studdering anymore. I went back to play Tomb Raider and it was like playing the game on an upgraded system (and I haven't done anything with the PC). Turned on Tress FX and all and was like - this game looks incredible.

The bad thing about AMD. Never get the high end reference boards. The inverted fan fins are horrible. 50% fan speed makes the PC sound like a jet engine. Totally totally not worth it for the noise alone.

I have to agree with another poster about eVGA. They used to be a great company. RMA"s were never charged (extra fees). They used to honor lifetime warranties. - I owned the 670's from them, a 560 as well. Both 560 and one 670 had issues which they took care of without any issue. Then comes the 780 Ti. 3 year support only. Must pay for RMA, no hardware buy back etc. Support won't email / call back if you miss speaking with someone live. They used to do that and pretty timely. It's too bad.

 
ITDEFX said:
wow...still a lot of hate for ATI/AMD. I was really wondering why the next gen systems were gravitating towards ATI/AMD for their GPU considering how bad it is on the PC driver wise. But like others said it was a cheaper solution.

Does anyone think I should continue with a two optical drive set up like my last system set up?

The old system had a dvd w/r drive and the second drive was a HD/BR/DVD writer drive. This was my first BR drive before I bought my first BR player in 2008. I like the fact that I can insert a BR disc into the drive , go to VUDU.com and get a digital copy of my library for cheap but only with me having a BR disc drive.

Once the system is here, I am going to work on dumping every single cd I have into MP3 format (440+ cds). Doing this before made things quick and easy with two drives goings.

I just thought of something.... if I do this with the drives writing to an SSD...will this go faster or will it be limited to the speed of the extraction/read speed of the optical drives themselves?
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Nothing faster than the read speed of the optical drives. That's the bandwidth limitation. The only way I've increased speed is copy the raw audio format files to the SSD then do the conversion. It goes a hell of a lot faster and direct from SSD to RAM is really really fast. So I move the files during the day, then let the conversion happen when I sleep and everything is done. No need to sit and wait for both extraction and conversion at the same time. Total waste of time.

I don't know I have two optical drives. One Bluray in the PC and one writer externally. My external pioneer has out lasted 3 internal writer drives. It's nearly 6 years old but it seems to have the best build quality of anything - I had samsung, LG and Sony/Hitachi optical drives.

 
s0undwav3 said:
Clearly your not really a CAG and also play some of the modern games on PC and those games were suppose to have Nvidia backed support and ended up completely shitty. Watchdogs is a complete crapfest and for months before release, there were at least 4 developer videos trumping Nvidia this and Nvidia that and the game can't even play smooth on a 780 ti (which I have). There's even an optimization guide on Nvidia's site for this game (they admit issues) yet no one can get it stable running on nvidia hardware.

http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/guides/watch-dogs-graphics-performance-and-tweaking-guide

Just look at some of the comments (one guy posted 9 days ago about his 690 and he should never have these problems with that card - like ever) yet it's Nvidia shiity drivers and a game that was built for Nvidia that is clearly not optimized. It's actually Nvidia's fault. They admit it. (this is going to affect The Division - same developer, and they have already said PC port will be de-optimized).

The Worstmod came out to unlock the graphic options that were suppose to be shipped with the game, but even ubisoft has admiited they completely took out pc optimization for PC. Then there's Titanfall - playing that since beta. Promise of SLI drivers from Nvidia. Recent patch of the game should have had SLI support. No luck there. Nvidia is holding back. Then of course there's Battlefield 4 (aside for all the EA patches and server mess) - Mantle is optimized for that game (and probably will only be for Battlefield from the looks of it). The 7970 can run circles around the 780 Ti with Mantle.

Nvidia isn't all the best in seriousness. Their drivers are far worse the last couple of iterations, causing Remote Desktop to corrupt the entire video display when it's closed Go back to archive drivers at 327.23 fixes a lot of crap they've introduced once the drivers started supporting in game video capture. Geforce experience craps out a lot and started introducing needless popups during game play (at default settings) which any overlay graphic driver program should not do.

Seriously I have both vendors, not even sure why you're getting upset. I've found AMD drivers have gotten a lot more stable the last 3 versions vs anything else that they had released in the last 3 years with my 7970.
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I'm a CAG but not when it comes to PC building, which I'm quite sure I've been doing since before you were born. I'm not upset in the slightest, you simply aren't worthy of my time to discuss PC hardware.

 
Listen to you all banging on about your high end cards. It's like being down at the golf club with everybody waxing lyrical about how their Callaway Big Bertha gives them an extra 15 yards of the tee.

I'll just happy to get round the course with my ebayed unwanted Christmas present half-set, a Gainward 570 GS (picked up last week for £70).

I bet Bruticis can't putt to save his life.
 
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Quick question I figured I would ask here. I am buying a new laptop but don't want to shell out the price for a copy of Microsoft office is Open Office a free version of word basically? I am applying for jobs/trying to go back to grad school and for right now I need to be able to send resumes and type documents to be able to send to employers/professors

 
It's Libre Office now, I think. But yes, it's a free, and less functional MS Office. It's somewhat compatible with MS Office, and is totally fine for simple documents, as long as you don't switch back and forth between which one you edit with.

 
As mentioned in the yard sale thread, I picked up an Acer (AX1420G-U5832) for a sweet price. It's got a PCI Express slot, but it also has a limited power supply (220W), and its small form factor prevents me from replacing it cheaply. I've asked around, and was told that I could put up to an HD7750 into the system with its current power supply. Is that realistic? Could I damage my computer by inserting a video card it can't fully power? What's the best course of action for me to take, considering my limited budget? I'd like to keep this to eighty dollars or less.

Note that while I don't demand cutting edge performance from this computer, I do intend to play games on it, and they ought to be at least Xbox 360 quality. 720p and medium settings are fine.
 
ArugulaZ said:
As mentioned in the yard sale thread, I picked up an Acer (AX1420G-U5832) for a sweet price. It's got a PCI Express slot, but it also has a limited power supply (220W), and its small form factor prevents me from replacing it cheaply. I've asked around, and was told that I could put up to an HD7750 into the system with its current power supply. Is that realistic? Could I damage my computer by inserting a video card it can't fully power? What's the best course of action for me to take, considering my limited budget? I'd like to keep this to eighty dollars or less.

Note that while I don't demand cutting edge performance from this computer, I do intend to play games on it, and they ought to be at least Xbox 360 quality. 720p and medium settings are fine.
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That's probably realistic, on paper the HD7750 uses a max of 55 watts. In fact this test shows a max of only 43 watts at full load. You might want to look at some of the game benchmarks on that same link to get an idea of your performance.

 
Is power draw consistent across all HD 7750 models? Some have fans and some don't, which I suspect would change the wattage requirements.

I'm thinking of cheaping out and buying an HD 6670, but its performance is considerably lower than the 7750, and I'm not sure it would make sense to buy a graphics card that's already bordering on obsolete. I've heard that will work with power supplies as low as 150W, so it's tempting.

 
To whoever I told to buy a 770 in the last month or so.  Ooops.  Anyway, yeah 970's are out now and started at the same price of $320ish.

 
Yeah, the 970 looks pretty impressive.

Keeping it on my radar until price point drops (gonna be a long wait, I know) and I start taxing my present system.

Find it curious I'm willing to shell out $300+ to upgrade my video card but won't splurge on a next gen system.

 
evildeadjedi said:
I'm happy to this topic is still going after all these years.
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Some of us are PC builders for life!

I'm between jobs right now, so I won't be upgrading any time soon. Perhaps when I land a new contract I will celebrate with a bit of a tune-up for my gaming rig. I have a spare mobo in my closet that is actually pretty cherry. I would just need to get the processor for it. It takes an Intel Socket LGA 2011. It's not exactly standard for home PC builds. It's usually used for servers. I picked it up in a processor bundle that I got from an Intel employee. If I could just get a decent CPU to go with it, I could assemble a really kick-ass SLI rig. LGA 2011 is better for multi-threading and handling multiple GPUs. It can run two PCI-Express cards at 16x simultaneously. My current rig can only do 8 x 8.

 
Ugh I so want a 980.

Yes I have since changed my mind seeing these crazy over clocks on air.
 
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If I don't play above 1080p resolution, is it worth getting a 970?

I'm tempted to wait for a 960 in the hope it'll be closer to my budget. Cheapest 970s over here have been ~£250ish. Hoping for something sub-£200 from the 960 range.

 
Well the 760's weren't that much cheaper than the 770's, around $50-60ish so I don't know if the difference between the 900's will be that significant price-wise.  If you could cut the cost somewhere else (no SSD, sacrilege I know) to go with the better graphics card I would.

 
[quote name="Flowette" post="12134550" timestamp="1412290863"]If I don't play above 1080p resolution, is it worth getting a 970?

I'm tempted to wait for a 960 in the hope it'll be closer to my budget. Cheapest 970s over here have been ~£250ish. Hoping for something sub-£200 from the 960 range.[/quote]
Also think in terms of a lot lower wattage. Way better performance, and they seem like beast overclockers.

I would save a little bit longer then uograde.
 
Mooby said:
Well the 760's weren't that much cheaper than the 770's, around $50-60ish so I don't know if the difference between the 900's will be that significant price-wise. If you could cut the cost somewhere else (no SSD, sacrilege I know) to go with the better graphics card I would.
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I consider a SSD for the boot drive to be one of The Untouchables. It cannot and will not be cut!

If I have to save a month or two longer I will do, but there's no way I'm skipping a SSD in the build.

Just hoping we see some meaningful discounts before Christmas. Time is at least on my side here.
 
[quote name="Flowette" post="12135276" timestamp="1412319979"]I consider a SSD for the boot drive to be one of The Untouchables. It cannot and will not be cut!

If I have to save a month or two longer I will do, but there's no way I'm skipping a SSD in the build.

Just hoping we see some meaningful discounts before Christmas. Time is at least on my side here.[/quote]
I think you can't skimp on a good psu, ssd, and mobo.

I usually get the case I want so I don't have to move things ever again lol.
 
Ok, story time.

In the UK we don't have Microcenters, we don't have mail-in rebates, we don't have particularly great special offers, but we DO have 20% sales tax called VAT. Woo! :whee: So sourcing a deal can always be a pain in the arse. Thankfully, if you're patient enough, Amazon UK will fuck up eventually and you'll grab something way cheaper than you should've done (the last glitch was an ASRock Z97 Fatality mobo for £47.10, RRP £110).

This morning Baby Olaf woke me up at 6am. I scan PCPartPicker every day to see if anything interesting pops up on the "Price Drops" tab. Today a Silverstone ATX case popped up at 71% off (this one here: link), down to £41.11. Do I want an ATX case? Not really, I was hoping to go small. Am I a CheapArse*? Absolutely.

The case turned out to be a windowed silver Temjin TJ10. It was released in 2007 but still sells today for silly money on some retail sites. Here's a TJ10:

A3477_I1.jpg


The thing is, the listing shows this pic:

21q68crStEL.jpg


That's a TJ07. Similar pricing, slightly different looks. Still a bit oldish but highly regarded case. Both retail at £morethanmybudget (£150-£200 depending on where you look).

I love Amazon UK. It's the gift that keeps on giving. Who knows what you'll get when it arrives but it's a fun little game all the same. :)

* - the official UK denomination

p.s. Stay tuned to find out whether this listing turns out to be a £48.86 top-of-the-range mobo, or a three-year-old ASRock piece of crap (experience says the latter!).

p.p.s There's a few messed-up listing on AmazonUK at present (mostly motherboards). If anybody in the UK wants a heads up, send me a PM and I'll forward you some links. Worst case scenario is that what you order isn't what you wanted and you send it back free of charge.

 
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Let us know how it turns out! I love glitches!

I got a evga 3gb 580 when they first came out for $400 because of AMZ.
 
Well the first of three Amazon lucky dips has arrived.

Supposedly it was an ASRock Mod 1155 B75 Pro3 ATX Motherboard (worth £57). However, the pic showed a Gigabyte Z97N Gaming 5 mini ITX board, so I took a gamble. It's worth £115 brand new.

The package that came this morning contained the Gigabyte mobo. Happy happy happy, joy joy joy.

:whee:

Still undecided as to whether or not I'll keep it. Can probably turn a £40 profit on eBay or Gumtree. It really is a very nice board.
 
Hello fellow CAGs, just found this topic and wanted to ask a question since looks like you guys are pretty well versed.  I'm not sure if there's a better topic already for this or not.

I've been wanting to either just buy a PC and convert it to an HTPC or create one.  I only plan on using the computer for putting movies in the HD, attaching external HDs and using Playon/PlayTV to record OTA shows.  I tried using Playon on my older laptop and that's a fail as it just makes my laptop run very hot.  I want to put the PC downstairs next to my router and have it connect to two TV's, 1 through Roku and the other TV is a Samsung Smart TV in the bedroom.  

My question for you guys, I've been seeing alot of deals on Bens Bargains & Tech Bargains for PC's with Intel Quad Core I5 (~$500) and I7's  (~$650).  And even at Costco, I saw some with 12GB and 16GB (i think) RAM respectively for a little more $$$.  With what I am trying to do, should I just buy these pre built computers?  Do you guys see any problems?  I'm leaning towards the I5 configuration b/c of the price. 

Also, software wise, do you guys think just having Playon/PlayTV would be good?  I see it my Smart TV & Roku, there's Plex.  Another software that I'm very interested in after seeing some Youtube videos is XBMC.  But looks like that's a higher learning curve and not sure if XBMC can connect to smart tv and roku or if it needs to be plugged in using HDMI to a specific TV. 

Any other software that I'm missing?  Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.  Thank you guys. 

 
Use PCpart picker and make a couple custom builds.

We can help you tweak them.

Also do you ssd/no ssd, integrated gpu? Discrete?

I'm not a huge HTPC user since I am running UVerese. Also if you are sure you are going DDR3 then buy RAM (8gb is what I would do) when you see an excellent sale price. It's only going to get more expensive.
 
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