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Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Wed Nov 28, 2012 9:49 pm
by zombie@computer
id pick another psu. Not familiar with the brand, but the lack of decent reviews says enough. Also, its not modular, which can be really annoying.

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Wed Nov 28, 2012 9:53 pm
by KILLA-COW
zombie@computer wrote:id pick another psu. Not familiar with the brand, but the lack of decent reviews says enough. Also, its not modular, which can be really annoying.


Any suggestions for good ones?

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Wed Nov 28, 2012 10:34 pm
by Dives
By far the most reliable PSUs are Seasonic. Corsair and Antec PSUs are rebranded Seasonics as well.

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 3:11 am
by nub
KILLA-COW wrote:What's the best £800 ish 680 at the moment? The evga?

£800? That's like $1280. That's a SHIT load of money for a single component. But if you're really willing to pay that much for a GPU, then these are your options:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130781

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130790

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130803 <- Liquid Cooled

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814121636

Those are 690s, though. With 4GB of VRAM, you'd only ever need one of these fuckers to run games like Skyrim at super high resolutions with ultra res texture mods and shit. I'd kill to have one of those big bastards in my case (not that they'd fit). But to answer your question, generally-speaking, EVGA and ASUS are the better manufacturers of Nvidia GPUs. MSI is also a great choice for people trying to build on a strict budget (like me).


Dives wrote:By far the most reliable PSUs are Seasonic. Corsair and Antec PSUs are rebranded Seasonics as well.

I keep hearing this from others as well. I personally like Corsair as a company, so for my build I picked out a nice, budgeted PSU from Corsair. I'd at least get a PSU that is Certified PLUS Bronze. Efficiency is very helpful in saving you money on your power bill. If you're building a high dollar system, go for PLUS Gold and modular.

And yes, go for Seasonic/Corsair/Antec.

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Thu Nov 29, 2012 3:46 am
by joe_rogers_11155
corsair PSU with a modular setup, you will not be sorry.

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Sun Dec 02, 2012 7:25 pm
by Gary
So I'm upgrading my brother's computer. With a budget of ~300USD. I was just thinking a new graphics card. But do you guys think that his CPU or RAM might limit him?

What he has now:
OS: Windows 7 Home x86/32bit
CPU: AMD Athlon II X2 250
GPU: ATI RADEON HD 5770 (JUNIPER XT)
RAM: 2GB of PC3-10600 DDR3 SDRAM Micron Tech.
MOBO: Giga-Byte GA-MA770T-UD3P


And holy crap, I can't believe how low the 5770 is on the charts compared to the newer cards... good thing that when he gets a new card, I'll just run both my current one and his together in crossfire :D

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Sun Dec 02, 2012 8:03 pm
by zombie@computer
Gary wrote:So I'm upgrading my brother's computer. With a budget of ~300USD. I was just thinking a new graphics card. But do you guys think that his CPU or RAM might limit him?

What he has now:
OS: Windows 7 Home x86/32bit
CPU: AMD Athlon II X2 250
GPU: ATI RADEON HD 5770 (JUNIPER XT)
RAM: 2GB of PC3-10600 DDR3 SDRAM Micron Tech.
MOBO: Giga-Byte GA-MA770T-UD3P


And holy crap, I can't believe how low the 5770 is on the charts compared to the newer cards... good thing that when he gets a new card, I'll just run both my current one and his together in crossfire :D

Limit for what? Itll run Internet explorer at great speeds.

Also, crossfire an HD 5770? Is it really worth the hassle? The card is ancient.

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Sun Dec 02, 2012 8:58 pm
by Gary
zombie@computer wrote:Limit for what? Itll run Internet explorer at great speeds.


Sorry, forgot to mention, he plays games. But that CPU won't bottleneck anything right?


zombie@computer wrote:Also, crossfire an HD 5770? Is it really worth the hassle? The card is ancient.


Ancient? Huh... I didn't think it was too bad... And is crossfire really that much of a hassle?

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Sun Dec 02, 2012 10:13 pm
by zombie@computer
Gary wrote:
zombie@computer wrote:Limit for what? Itll run Internet explorer at great speeds.


Sorry, forgot to mention, he plays games. But that CPU won't bottleneck anything right?


zombie@computer wrote:Also, crossfire an HD 5770? Is it really worth the hassle? The card is ancient.


Ancient? Huh... I didn't think it was too bad... And is crossfire really that much of a hassle?

Bottlenecking... One can create a program that can force the most modern GPU's to crawl while allowing an atom processor to pick its nose. You can also do the exact opposite.

So, the correct answer, probably would be: The CPU will do, but games do exist that will demand more than the CPU can deliver. I can google reviews from 2009 that rate it an entry-model cpu that just manages to render crysis at high detail at 20-30 fps... An impressive feat... But even there the cpu is bottlenecking, as altering the cpu increases fps. How CPU dependent are the games your friend plays? Thats where the answer lies :)

Out of the two, I'd definiately upgrade the gpu first. But dont think youll be able to play everything once you do, in the near future you may have to upgrade that cpu as well.

As for the crossfire, you have 2*HD 57xx. Even if you can simply add up GPU power you still end up with average GPU power (passmark scores will rank 2*HD 57xx at around a Radeon HD 6970). The price you pay is of course electricity / noise / heat... do the cards even fit? How many games support crossfire fully? And exactly how likely is it that you can add up the cards? Wait, i just see the HD 67xx is also compatible. Thats a wee bit better. But still.

Im not saying you shouldnt do it, if its free, its free. By all means, go for it.

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Sun Dec 02, 2012 10:36 pm
by MELVIn
In a scenario like this, it's always a better idea to spend the same money on a high-end GPU, rather than getting two last-gen cards. The thing is that pretty much every single game handles Crossfire differently.
While you can get a 20FPS boost in one game by adding a second 5770, you might only get like a 4FPS boost in another game, and in a third game, it doesn't work at all or it actually performs worse.

But to stick to the topic at hand. Your brothers current rig is pretty well balanced for its time, meaning that by upgrading the CPU or the GPU would result in one bottlenecking the other. However, if you had to go with one, I'd say go with upgrading his GPU now, and CPU at a later point. (And RAM of course, but that's pretty much free these days.)
His CPU will still hold up somewhat for a while longer, because most games really only take advantage of two cores anyways, so I'd just overclock the absolute bangers out of it, buy a new GPU, add 2 gigajabbers of extra RAM, and call it a day. And like Z@C said; Free is free, so jam that exra 5770 into your machine to get a wee bit extra juice.

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Sun Dec 02, 2012 11:15 pm
by Gary
Ah, thanks for the explanation and advice guys!

I'll definitely get 2GBs of RAM for him. And a new GPU, any recommendations for one under ~250USD?


As for me... I'll try out two 5770s and see if it's worth it(it will be directly free). If not, maybe I'll upgrade my own GPU soon.

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Mon Dec 03, 2012 1:10 am
by Gary
This card looks nice; EVGA GeForce GTX 560 Ti (Fermi) 2GB 256-bit GDDR5 for 244USD.

I honestly don't care if it's ATI or NV. What ever is good for the price matters.

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Mon Dec 03, 2012 2:12 am
by MELVIn
I checked out some benchmarks and whatnot, and that card is scoring pretty much the same as mine (ATI 6950), and I'm very happy with what I've been able to cram out of it. Sure it's not in any way top of the line anymore, but I'm still able to get 60+ FPS in whatever game I can find, although with maybe a little less Anti Aliasing in some cases. (which the Nvidia cards handle better.)

Granted I rock a way faster CPU, but then again the only thing that matters is that he's got more 2 or more cores... after that it's all about them clockspeeds really.
But yeah, for that price and considering my own experience with this cards counterpart, I'd say he'll be one happy camper.

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Mon Dec 03, 2012 2:25 am
by Gary
Great to hear! I'll probably be ordering it in the coming weeks.

Re: New Rig Feedback.

PostPosted: Mon Dec 03, 2012 2:52 am
by Jangalomph
I have the 550 TI 2gb and its pretty amazing, though it does choke on a few games, but I can squeeze some really high graphics out of most games. Plus side for me is the Physx.