Bandwidth Place 2

Don't believe the specs on those fans, especially if they're from Silenx.

OCZ 700W was retardedly noisy for me :]

Ok so I've been rethinking the entire build again.

I really am thinking of going with a phenom II X4 build in favor of the i5 build. CPU will still be cheaper, the motherboard is cheaper and the ram is cheaper.

I somehow really can't justify having the bleeding edge. I have my Dell XPS M1530 hooked up to my 47" Sony Bravia through HDMI and I can tell you that I'm hooked. I was playing World of Warcraft earlier and at 1080p it runs 30 fps average (settings turned down albeit) and my GPU is a 8400M GS with only 128MB of ram.

My heart is now set on using my 47" HDTV as a monitor. At 1080p I effectively have a $2000 monitor and I paid only $700 for it.

But back to the computer build. I think building with an i5/i7 won't be justifiable. In all the benchmarks I've seen there really haven't been any substantial differences between a phenom 2 and the core i5/i7 series... at least none that will A) make a negligible difference to me and B) will warrant the few extra hundred dollars it will cost to make.

Phenom II build:

Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition (3.2 GHZ) 125 W AM3
and
OCZ GameXstream 850 W PSU for $215

ASUS M4N75TD AM3 NVIDIA nForce 750a SLI ATX AMD Motherboard $100

G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) $110

ARCTIC COOLING ACALP64 Pro 92mm CPU Cooler $17

Seagate Barracuda 7200.1 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s $80

LG DVD Burner Black SATA Model GH22NS50 - OEM $23

2 X Palit NE3TS25EFHD52 GeForce GTS 250 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready Video Card $109.99 each with $30 MIR (each) total cost each is $79.99

Shipping is $12

That brings the grand total for all the stuff I need for this build to $717.00


The Core i7 build

Core i7 920 $280

1TB HDD (same as last build) $80

Same DVD burner $23

Powercolor Radeon HD4850's @ $99.99 each

OCZ GameXStream OCZ850GXSSLI ATX12V v2.2 and EPS12V 850Watts Power Supply $75.00

CORSAIR XMS3 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model CMX4GX3M2A1600C9 $120.00

ASRock X58 Extreme LGA 1366 Intel X58 ATX Intel Motherboard $170.00

ARCTIC COOLING Freezer 7 Pro Rev.2 92mm Fluid Dynamic CPU Cooler $40.00

Shipping $11.00

Total for the i7 build : $999.00

Now at this point there are several things to consider...

The cost of the two systems is very similar when neglecting the combo deals and the MIR's from newegg (who knows if they will still be offered when I actually go to order this).

If I can get the Phenom II system for the price I have listed, I can actually scratch the two GTS 250's, add another $200 to it and get a good DX11 card that will be significantly faster ( and still spend less money then on the i7 build).

I believe the i7 build will offer longer longevity. I don't know how far the 2 4850's (or GTS 250's) will make it. The only games I really plan on playing in the next two years are WoW, Starcraft 2 and Diablo 3. I believe either system would be plenty.


Input ?

The GPU's for either system have changed lol

Two HD5770's in Crossfire ($130 each).... offers HD5850 price for $50+ dollars less and DX11 support.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6819103851
$205 6-core too much or what?

The i7 860 route can help lower the cost of the i7 system with a P55 based board instead of X58.

I'm wondering why you have two different but same-spec RAM for two different prices, where the more expensive one just happens to be placed in the system that you're saying costs more.
Also, 4GB isn't enough. My desktop spends at least 95% of its uptime with 5GB RAM usage or more and that isn't even when I'm running VM's. I easily surpass 4GB usage with AIM 7, Chrome, Word 2007, Excel 2007, and Photoshop CS4 open as my primary programs. During the couple times I took out half my RAM to allow proper testing of other systems, a mere virus scan can eat up my virtual memory and send my desktop performance back to the stone age.
I hate 4GB RAM, not enough.

For a point of reference, a 4850 will have studdering during close zoom/high action/high number of units on the screen in SC2 at 1080p with max settings.

Maybe wait for a mature Lucid Hydra motherboard?

The systems look fine otherwise lol.

EDIT:


lulz <3 Fry's

EDIT2:
For the sake of Adobe CS5, you might want to go with a nVidia route just so you can see the performance boosts of CS5 using CUDA. This would have to depend on when or whether or not people hack CS5 to allow you to run CS5's CUDA stuff on any CUDA compliant card (its currently locked to literally like 5 cards, all but one are Quadro).

I can't afford 8GB of ram right now... and to tell you the truth my laptop has never used more then 2GB of ram at any one time. I think 4GB will be plenty and the board I've chosen (lol new build featuring a core i7 860) has 4 DDR3 slots so I can pick up another set of 2GB sticks a little later when I can afford it.

Still going with the two 5770's as in crossfire mode they will be able to handle any game I'm going to play just fine at 1080p.

I just found out money is going to be tighter then what I figured on friday. I'm only going to be making $230 a week over the summer instead of $250...

So for now I've cut out the 1TB HDD (I'll re use my 320GB drive) and the upgraded cooling. I won't overclock this thing for a while as I'm sure even at 2.8ghz it'll be nutty fast compared to the Core 2 in my lappy.

I can part out my old build and sell a few other things and have about $400 to put towards the new build. I have to re go over my finances but I'm pretty sure this is what I'll be doing.


I've been heavily contemplating going with just a Phenom II X4 and spending the extra money on good GPU's.... there are a lot of pro's and con's either way.

Vista/7 pretty much use up 1GB on their own (or about 750MB with 1GB RAM, but thats just because the OS will always have a free space buffer), so WOW uses <1GB RAM running? I find it hard to believe you can keep the usage under 2GB.

What about that ever popular WD 6400AAKS? :]

Awesome that you're so serious about multi-card now, I remember you speaking against it in previous builds (of mine).

Are you sure you want to be prioritizing that amount of money (not really the money, but what you're doing to get the money) to building a PC?

I just loaded up WoW, Microsoft word and firefox.... it uses about %60 of my 3GB of ram. So around 1.7 GB out of 3 still leaves me plenty.

I really do think I'll be fine for at least the next year on 4GB.

If I spend $65 on the WD I'll take the plunge on the segate 1TB... it has a 32MB cache

We'll there are cons to dual card setups... but there are also pro's as well. In this case it will be saving me money.

I'm not sure what you mean about your last question. This will probably only wind up costing me about $500 out of my pocket which fits easily into my summer budget.

I will still make plenty of money to save for my last year of college, have money to pay my bills, money to burn on my woman and money for the computer.

My old desktop was built over 4 years ago now... its time.

I don't know what you do.. my laptop with 4GB RAM running Win7 x64 with JUST AIM 7 (87MB) and Chrome (700MB) has 1.8GB used.

I guess you should have built your system during your originally planned timeline lol. December 2008, 4GB DDR2 = $15 AR. I understand RAM prices are horrible right now and I probably wouldn't spend for more than 4GB either. However, that doesn't change the fact that 4GB isn't enough *stares at the 5691MB usage I have ATM*.

If you said you wanted the 1TB for the extra storage then sure, but choosing the Seagate 1TB for the cache, or in other words for the performance, would mean you should be getting the AAKS. The AAKS(and AALS for that matter) drives are popular because they have high performance, low heat, and low noise. If I remember correctly, those traits are thanks to the drive having a single platter.

IMO, the ideal is that you should have enough of a money buffer for "money is going to be tighter" to not actually influence your current purchasing plans ("So for now I've cut out ___"). This ideal is as opposed to what I'll just call "living by the paycheck."
Then again... screw the money buffer, 4 years with one PC is too long!

My money is always tight lol...

I don't use chrome and actually I rarely ever have more then two or three things open at once. Usually a game, a browser and rarely aim too.

I know from last time that the CPU out lived the GPU by far and that with either choice (Phenom II or Core i7) that they WILL overclock like beasts and outlast the GPU's again.

But i know once college is back in I won't have the time to play a lot of games and the only games I'll be playing are WoW, SC2 and Diablo 3.

I'm not so sure about CPU's outlasting GPU's.. I also used an Opteron 165 and was nothing but shocked after seeing what my 7800GT was actually capable of when run with a Q6600.

As for charts like this:
http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/2009 ... ,1401.html
You can take one important observation from it - CPU's make a significant difference. Right at stock you'll already have a 22% performance hit choosing the X4 955 over the i7 920.
http://www.neoseeker.com/Articles/Hardw ... 955/8.html
38.8% performance hit in the RTS World in Conflict.

Then again, looks like Blizzard failed to even make SC2 benefit from quad cores.
http://www.pcgameshardware.com/aid,7053 ... /Practice/
lol this would support my belief that SC2's AI is retarded compared to actual modern RTS.

EDIT:
http://bensbargains.net/deal/140371/
holy shit of wtfness

So yet again the build has changed as is I think the most expensive one yet... however I like this one perhaps the most.

Western Digital Caviar Blue WD6400AAKS 640GB $70.00

GIGABYTE GV-R585OC-1GD Radeon HD 5850 (Cypress Pro) 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.1 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support $310.00

Rosewill Xtreme Series RX750-D-B 750W Continuous @40°C ,80 PLUS Certified, ATX12V v2.2 & EPS12V v2.91, SLI Ready CrossFire Ready, Active PFC "Compatible with Core i7, i5" $80.00

G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory $105.00

MSI P55-GD65 LGA 1156 Intel P55 ATX Intel Motherboard $150.00

Intel Core i7-860 Lynnfield 2.8GHz LGA 1156 95W Quad-Core $279.00

ARCTIC COOLING Freezer 7 Pro Rev.2 92mm $40.00

LG Black 10X Blu-ray Burner - Bulk SATA Model WH10LS30 LightScribe Support $150.00

Verbatim 25GB 4X BD-R 10 Packs Disc Model 96769 FREE with burner

Grand total : $1,192.47


I'll have about $500 from the stuff I'm about to ebay. That will leave me needing $692.47



I'm debating about dropping the blu-ray burner and saving the $150. I really do think I can hold off on it for now.... I see those being sub $100 by christmas time.

I opted for the MSI board... the only other boards I was considering were by ASUS and none of them had the proper PCI X slot configuration for 2 of the two slot bigger GPU's... I plan on another 5850 next summer.

I'm a little sketchy on the Rosewill PSU but the reviews were ok and the customer support is supposed to be good.

Yeah I'm liking these specs a lot more. Other than the questionable brand PSU and mediocre CPU cooler. The CPU may "overclock like beasts", but not really with that cooler.

The freezer 7 pro is anything but junk... if its ANYTHING like the freezer 64 pro was then it will be champ.

I got one of the "good" amd heat sinks the ones with the dual copper tubes running to the copper block. The freezer 64 pro out performed the good amd heat sink by atleast 10C if I remember correctly.

I had my 165 OC'ed to 2.6 and at load my CPU never went above 55C after switching to MX-2. Idle it was down around 31 or 32C


I do agree that I don't like the name of the PSU... I'm trying to find an affordable antec or OCZ power supply.

Be careful, the i7 860 has a STOCK clock well above your OC clock and has double the cores of your 165. It would be foolish to think a cooler is going to replicate its dual core cooling ability on a quad core... and you still plan to OC the i7??

200 mhz ? I really don't see 2.6 vs 2.8 being that big a deal... I guess maybe when you factor in double the cores.

I did notice something though.... my chipset fan wasn't working.. I tried to clean it when I parted my machine out to pack up for ebaying and it wouldn't spin at all. I had to really force it to turn it.

I popped the fan off and it was like rust or something lol... wouldn't move at all. I wonder how long it was like that




So what cooler do you recommend to OC a i7 860?

I'm considering a different PSU as well... I know I preached in the past that the PSU is one thing you do not skimp on.