Standard list o parts:
CPU
Motherboard
GPU
PSU
Case
RAM
HDD
DVD-burner/blu-ray
Then throw in a monitor, OS, keyboard, mouse, etc if needed. Budget monitors I like Acer. Asus makes a nice monitor @ $160 too.
I probably would not have bought into the old tech of a 480, but it does perform quite well for the price of $220. It has the benefit of 1.5 GB of memory which is nice. Main negative is power consumption and overclocking. Not a great overclocking card due to the high temperatures.
There was a great 11 page thread http://slickdeals.net/f/4045574-EVGA...free-shipping? that went over all that. Basically it out performs anything in that price range even the 560ti that I was looking into getting. The power consumption was a concern but I saw a review on my power supply by a guy who is running a 2600k and a gtx580 both overclocked and his power supply was running them fine.
The hard drive prices are killing me. It's difficult for me to get excited about purchasing something that was basically half their price less than a year ago. I am really leaning towards a small SSD and a not as big hard drive as there seems to be more value in going that route than the original big hard drive. I do have a lot of storage that I need though. I save a lot of movies and tv shows and I wanted to have one big storage facility for them.
As for monitors, I trust the ASUS brand a lot, the Acer brand however I hate with a passion that I cant say about any other brand. A while back (my laptop is a gateway which is owned by acer) I got jobbed by one of their tech support that is really an arm of their sales staff. They told me paying 20 dollars for recovery disks (which shouldve come with the damn system to begin with) would absolutely fix my problem. Well I waited and got them and tried it out and it didnt work. I figured any decent company who claims somethign would work and then when that does not work would gladly refund my money..... WRONG. Not only that but there isnt a number to call, when I tried the customer service it was linked to my computer's serial number and thus would forward me to a pay tech support as by that time my computer had gone past the 1 year warranty timeframe where they give "free" tech support. So I couldnt reach them so I contacted Better Business Bureau. I filed a report and BBB then contacted Acer/Gateway and eventually someone called me but apparently they just wanted to dig their heels in and not give me a refund accusing me of makign copies of the disks. I then contacted my damn Senator as well as submitted a finalized report to BBB, I am not sure which one did the trick but I finally was notified that they would refund the money. This obviously wasnt just about 20 bucks, it was the principle of the matter that if you claim something would do something then you need to stand behind it. Why I will never buy one of their products and I will make sure to tell everyone I know is that if they do this over 20 dollar disks then what will they do over a much more expensive thing?
There was a great 11 page thread http://slickdeals.net/f/4045574-EVGA...free-shipping? that went over all that. Basically it out performs anything in that price range even the 560ti that I was looking into getting. The power consumption was a concern but I saw a review on my power supply by a guy who is running a 2600k and a gtx580 both overclocked and his power supply was running them fine.
Yeah it's not really a problem in terms of causing problems, just a problem of using more power than is actually required to get the job done by more efficient cards. I really do like the 1.5gb though. If you aren't going to overclock your 480 then it's really not a big deal. The heat on GTX 480's overclocked is significant.
Quote:
The hard drive prices are killing me. It's difficult for me to get excited about purchasing something that was basically half their price less than a year ago. I am really leaning towards a small SSD and a not as big hard drive as there seems to be more value in going that route than the original big hard drive. I do have a lot of storage that I need though. I save a lot of movies and tv shows and I wanted to have one big storage facility for them.
Half? I wish, try a third. Stupid flooding. I really want to buy a 1tb drive right now.
Quote:
As for monitors, I trust the ASUS brand a lot, the Acer brand however I hate with a passion that I cant say about any other brand. A while back (my laptop is a gateway which is owned by acer) I
Dunno about PC's/laptops. I've owned several Acer monitors and they are fantastic for the money. But just about no body includes recovery disks anymore. You usually have to burn them when you get the system.
When you figure out your whole build post up the parts
(i used the Heaven settings from the first post in that Techpowerup thread) ...
score = 1854 (73.6fps)
i'm getting the itch to upgrade my video cards to something newer ...something good in the Kepler line from Nvidia maybe.
i've had my gtx460 cards for pretty well a year and a half (the gtx500 cards weren't released at the time i bought them anyway) ....i wonder how long they'll continue to be relevant @ 1080p and high details @ 60fps.
This is the second WHQL-certified driver from the R295 family of drivers (versions 295.xx to 299.xx).
This driver is a recommended upgrade for all GeForce users, especially those playing the latest hot PC games like Battlefield 3, Blacklight: Retribution, Diablo III, Mass Effect 3, or The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and more. These drivers come packed with GeForce-exclusive performance and quality enhancements and are Microsoft WHQL-certified.
New in Release 296.10
Adds support for the new GeForce GTX 560 SE GPU.
Updates PhysX System Software to version 9.12.0213.
Boosts SLI performance in the following games:
Blacklight: Retribution – up to 1.8x performance increase
DiRT 3 – updated DX11 profile to improve menu performance
Dishonored
Dungeon Defenders
F1 2011 – improves performance with game patch 1.2
rFactor 2
Adds 3D Vision support for the following games:
Dear Esther – Rated Good
Deep Black: Reloaded – Rated 3D Vision Ready
Includes numerous bug fixes. Refer to the release notes documentation for more details.
Highlight Summary for the R295 Family of Drivers
New features and performance since R285 WHQL-certified driver
Game-changing performance boost of up to 45% in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, “the fastest selling title in Steam’s history”
Up to 2x performance Mass Effect 3 with SLI technology.
GeForce-exclusive quality enhancements with ambient occlusion support for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, Diablo III, and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.
New 3D Vision and SLI profiles for over 50 titles.
New PhysX software for the best experience in top PhysX titles like Alice: Madness Returns and Batman: Arkham City.
Enables WHQL-certified support for NVIDIA Surround on Intel X79 SLI-certified motherboards.
Updates HD Audio to version 1.3.12.0.
Other Details
Supports multiple languages and APIs for GPU computing: CUDA C, CUDA C++, CUDA Fortran, OpenCL, DirectCompute, and Microsoft C++ AMP.
Supports single GPU and NVIDIA SLI technology on DirectX 9, DirectX 10, DirectX 11, and OpenGL, including 3-way SLI, Quad SLI, and SLI support on SLI-certified Intel and AMD motherboards.
the 7xxx AMD cards again dont seem to stack up too well against the Nvidia cards but I am guessing they will be cheaper?
Im sort of a noob at this but I am getting the idea that the 7xxx AMD cards are focusing more on power consumption and low temperature and thus efficiency rather than pure performance.
Is there really an advantage towards buying a new 6 series as opposed to getting a discounted 5 series? I just purchased a 480 for 210 dollars, how much farther ahead is the new 6 series?
I am no expert either but from what I can tell the 600 cards are more efficient then the 500 cards also. As far as how much better one is as compared to the other I guess one needs to look at his budget and benchmarks and decide what he really needs. A 580 series card and probably even the 480 series cards are plenty powerful enough to run any game out there with little problems.
The 480 may begin to slow down a bit at very high resolutions (assuming the CPU is powerful enough) but the 580 should have no problems at very high resolutions for some time still. Really, any of those cards should last a very long time and unless you are running a large screen with super high resolution the 480 is plenty for some time still imo.
Right now PC hardware is far ahead of the games/software (except a couple of exceptions) and I dont see that changing until we get a new gen of consoles that the game developers start to push the limits of.
Right now PC hardware is far ahead of the games/software (except a couple of exceptions) and I dont see that changing until we get a new gen of consoles that the game developers start to push the limits of.
Sadly this is where we are at. Your 480 will be good for a while yet.
As for nVidia having the lead, well they usually have the single card lead so that's not much of an issue. In the 5xx/6xxx I think AMD had a very good showing in the middle. Could be the same thing this time.
Also it would be worthwhile waiting for reviewer benchmarks before re-crowning nVidia just yet. Still an NDA.
Is there really an advantage towards buying a new 6 series as opposed to getting a discounted 5 series? I just purchased a 480 for 210 dollars, how much farther ahead is the new 6 series?
Nope, especially with the "GTX 680" at a rumoured MSRP of $550 USD. One can probably safely assume similar price gouging throughout the line-up.
I am getting nervous about the supposed noise the gtx480 generates. I was watchign youtube videos and they sounded like hair dryers. I am not sure how loud they are in a real setting. The computer is going to be in the bedroom and while my wife can sleep through me watching tv the noise of that card might just be too much for her.
I was looking at craigslist near me and people were trying to sell the 480 for 400 dollars, one guy was trying to get 600 dollars which prompted someone to create a second post chewing that guy out. Anyways, I wonder if push came to shove I could sell my card for a possible profit should the noise prove to be too much. Anyone here have that card?
I am getting nervous about the supposed noise the gtx480 generates. I was watchign youtube videos and they sounded like hair dryers. I am not sure how loud they are in a real setting. The computer is going to be in the bedroom and while my wife can sleep through me watching tv the noise of that card might just be too much for her.
I was looking at craigslist near me and people were trying to sell the 480 for 400 dollars, one guy was trying to get 600 dollars which prompted someone to create a second post chewing that guy out. Anyways, I wonder if push came to shove I could sell my card for a possible profit should the noise prove to be too much. Anyone here have that card?
You can turn down the fan speed on the card using MSI afterburner. Assuming the temperatures stay in range anyway. Also different manufacturers fans will have different noise levels. Which exact model did you get?
You could always get an aftermarket cooler, maybe even a water cooler since you have one on your CPU.
You can turn down the fan speed on the card using MSI afterburner. Assuming the temperatures stay in range anyway. Also different manufacturers fans will have different noise levels. Which exact model did you get?
You could always get an aftermarket cooler, maybe even a water cooler since you have one on your CPU.
It's an EVGA one. I looked at some youtubes where they are changing the heatshield out for a different one and that is beyond my capabilities, or at least what I am comfortable doing. Maybe adding a second stand alone type cooling system is something I could look into, as long as it isnt too costly.
It's an EVGA one. I looked at some youtubes where they are changing the heatshield out for a different one and that is beyond my capabilities, or at least what I am comfortable doing. Maybe adding a second stand alone type cooling system is something I could look into, as long as it isnt too costly.
Given that it's back up to $250 i bet you could sell it for profit or at least even money when you factor in shipping if you don't open it.
The only thing that would really cool it much better is directly replacing the cooler on the card. But it won't be too loud when idle either. Another possible option is underclocking it to get lower temperatures. A funny thing about under clocking video cards is you tend not to lose a ton of performance.
I'd bet the fan noise isn't too bad when left on "auto" though. And since your primary concern is noise, not heat that seems best. Most video card fans are turbine like when the speed is turned up. But from the factory they rarely hit over 50%. My power color won't even touch 40% on default settings. You just have to carefully monitor how your temperatures are reacting when messing with fans speeds, especially on a notoriously hot card like the 480.
Drop the clock rate and voltage on the card a tad and I bet it runs a lot cooler while still performing better than the 560 ti.
Given that it's back up to $250 i bet you could sell it for profit or at least even money when you factor in shipping if you don't open it.
The only thing that would really cool it much better is directly replacing the cooler on the card. But it won't be too loud when idle either. Another possible option is underclocking it to get lower temperatures. A funny thing about under clocking video cards is you tend not to lose a ton of performance.
I'd bet the fan noise isn't too bad when left on "auto" though. And since your primary concern is noise, not heat that seems best. Most video card fans are turbine like when the speed is turned up. But from the factory they rarely hit over 50%. My power color won't even touch 40% on default settings. You just have to carefully monitor how your temperatures are reacting when messing with fans speeds, especially on a notoriously hot card like the 480.
Drop the clock rate and voltage on the card a tad and I bet it runs a lot cooler while still performing better than the 560 ti.
I def plan to open it and put it in my build to see how it is. Maybe I am being naive but I believe I got a well ventilated case and with the liquid cooler on my cpu it should take even more heat out of the case rather than have that contribute to heating the air in there even more. At least this was my line of thinking when I was planning this. At idle the card doesnt seem to make any noise, it's just when it really cranks up that it starts the turbine like sound.. and thats just from youtube videos so I have to see if it decides to do that while I am playing a game. I don't know if I like the idea of turning it's abilities down, I think if I get to that point I might just try to sell it and get a different card. I do like how it apparently will play every game out there right now and do so well based on the settings I am likely to play on. I can't remember if I have ever had that experience with a computer and I am really looking forward to experiencing it.
I def plan to open it and put it in my build to see how it is. Maybe I am being naive but I believe I got a well ventilated case and with the liquid cooler on my cpu it should take even more heat out of the case rather than have that contribute to heating the air in there even more. At least this was my line of thinking when I was planning this. At idle the card doesnt seem to make any noise, it's just when it really cranks up that it starts the turbine like sound.. and thats just from youtube videos so I have to see if it decides to do that while I am playing a game. I don't know if I like the idea of turning it's abilities down, I think if I get to that point I might just try to sell it and get a different card. I do like how it apparently will play every game out there right now and do so well based on the settings I am likely to play on. I can't remember if I have ever had that experience with a computer and I am really looking forward to experiencing it.
My main point is those people on youtube are probably using custom fan profiles where they manually set the speed to 80% or higher for cooler temps. So that's when the noise really starts to come through. If you leave it on auto you'll get hotter temps but that noise shouldn't be too bad. A lot of reviews I read said it runs up to 90C on auto, but when they manually set it to 100% fan it runs at more like 75C. So that tells me auto isn't going anywhere near 100%.
And you'd be surprised how little effect underclocking may have. I had my 9800 GTX turned down 200MHZ off the stock clock of 700mhz. It still ran UT3 on full blast @80FPS. And this is a 4 year old card.
Another thing you'll really have to wait and see with the noise level is how well your case insulates that noise. Some do much better than others.
There were other probably better deals out there like an asus 24" monitor for 150 (new) but when I was at Microcenter buying the 2500k and my motherboard I took a look at the monitors and just really liked how a 27" looked.
Right now I just hate the price of mechanical hard drives and will most likely go with a solid state drive in the 60-128gb range to hold me off and then strike when I see a really cheap deal on a 2tb internal drive in the future.
There also is: http://www.microcenter.com/single_pr...d=0364779#tabs
OCZ Agility 3 60gb for 59.99 after rebate but then there is 6 dollars shipping, or I get hit with tax if I pick it up in store and the hour and 15 minute drive each way which isnt worth it.
The Mushkin one is a front page slickdeal which means it's considered a really good deal. The brand seems reliable and the speeds seem fast. I am leaning towards that.
Right now it's a battle between the 60gb ones and the 120gb ones. I have been seeing deals for around 1 dollar a gb and I am just wondering how others with a 60gb SSD find it in regards to being able to store enough for it to be effective to where they arent constantly wishing they had a larger one.
There were other probably better deals out there like an asus 24" monitor for 150 (new) but when I was at Microcenter buying the 2500k and my motherboard I took a look at the monitors and just really liked how a 27" looked.
Right now I just hate the price of mechanical hard drives and will most likely go with a solid state drive in the 60-128gb range to hold me off and then strike when I see a really cheap deal on a 2tb internal drive in the future.
There also is: http://www.microcenter.com/single_pr...d=0364779#tabs
OCZ Agility 3 60gb for 59.99 after rebate but then there is 6 dollars shipping, or I get hit with tax if I pick it up in store and the hour and 15 minute drive each way which isnt worth it.
The Mushkin one is a front page slickdeal which means it's considered a really good deal. The brand seems reliable and the speeds seem fast. I am leaning towards that.
Right now it's a battle between the 60gb ones and the 120gb ones. I have been seeing deals for around 1 dollar a gb and I am just wondering how others with a 60gb SSD find it in regards to being able to store enough for it to be effective to where they arent constantly wishing they had a larger one.
FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DON'T GET AN OCZ.
Okay its not really that bad, but seriously don't. I know from experience.
If you are going to be using the SSD exclusively for a while I'd go for the 120. Unless you have some other storage you will be using till you get your 2tb drive. I have the 60gb SSD and it's enough for the OS, main programs, and a couple games. So I think it has enough capacity assuming you have some other storage to use.
Were I buying an SSD right now I'd get a Crucial M4. Haven't heard one way or the other about Mushkin SSDs but their RAM has always been good. My honest to goodness opinion about SSD's is don't buy them on price. It's one of the only parts I say this on. Maximum reliability is far more important than speed in an SSD because even slow SSD's are stupid fast. And an SSD is a complete luxury item right now so I don't like the idea of buying one on price.
Honestly I think the way to go is to bite the bullet on the 2tb now. It sucks but I don't think prices are coming down for at least a year.
Okay its not really that bad, but seriously don't. I know from experience.
If you are going to be using the SSD exclusively for a while I'd go for the 120. Unless you have some other storage you will be using till you get your 2tb drive. I have the 60gb SSD and it's enough for the OS, main programs, and a couple games. So I think it has enough capacity assuming you have some other storage to use.
Were I buying an SSD right now I'd get a Crucial M4. Haven't heard one way or the other about Mushkin SSDs but their RAM has always been good. My honest to goodness opinion about SSD's is don't buy them on price. It's one of the only parts I say this on. Maximum reliability is far more important than speed in an SSD because even slow SSD's are stupid fast. And an SSD is a complete luxury item right now so I don't like the idea of buying one on price.
Honestly I think the way to go is to bite the bullet on the 2tb now. It sucks but I don't think prices are coming down for at least a year.
I am addicted to getting deals on things, I just cant force myself to buy something at full retail or at an overly inflated price... I just cant.
I was also interested in the crucial SSD's, there were some deals in the past where you could get them for 1 dollar a gb. From reviews and message board talk elsewhere the mushkin is considered a solid ssd in roughly the same class as the crucial. Right now there is a Samsung 256mb for 290 or something like that, way out of my price range but apparently it's one of the top shelf ones.
I think you're right about the 120gb as that looks to be the direction I am going since I am likely to be putting off the mechanical hard drive purchase. It would probably be a bit too difficult to operate exclusively on a 60gb in the meantime.
On some side news. I opened up my old computer that I built back in 2005. I think I told the story how I was playing it on a seemingly hot night and it just all cut off followed by a burning smell. I assumed that was the power supply and since my cx600 came in the mail already I figured I'd test it out in there and see if that did the trick. I hooked it up to the board, cpu, and the hard drive. It powered on for about 45 seconds or so, no beeps and no video out at all and then it all cut off. It stopped seeing power from the power supply as it wouldnt even turn the led light on the board. I came back a half hour or so later and flicked the power supply back on and saw that the led light went back on so the power supply seemed to survive that. At this point I don't know what is left working on that computer. If it can be fixed or components replaced at say a price point around 40 dollars I think I might op to do that to keep a spare. What do you think is the issue? I originally thought my cpu was dead but woudl it even power on if thats the case? I think my motherboard is toast but I don't want to get into a situation where I buy that and then find out that isnt the problem and then have to buy a cpu and then find that isnt the problem and next thing I know I have basically bought all the parts again to an already far obsolete system.
As far as scrapping it and going with something else, all of the components in there are old tech, even the dvd burner uses that ribbon cable thing connector (IDE?).
At this point I don't know what is left working on that computer. If it can be fixed or components replaced at say a price point around 40 dollars I think I might op to do that to keep a spare. What do you think is the issue? I originally thought my cpu was dead but woudl it even power on if thats the case? I think my motherboard is toast but I don't want to get into a situation where I buy that and then find out that isnt the problem and then have to buy a cpu and then find that isnt the problem and next thing I know I have basically bought all the parts again to an already far obsolete system.
As far as scrapping it and going with something else, all of the components in there are old tech, even the dvd burner uses that ribbon cable thing connector (IDE?).
If the power supply went out causing the smell it could have fried other components if the PSU was crappy enough. Most likely the motherboard.
Probably not worth fixing. I'd buy a cheap-o $250 laptop as a backup before fixing it.
There is most definitely nothing in that system you could put on a new one other than the case, and it wouldn't be a good fit either.
Video Card: EVGA GTX480 219.99 (I bought it for 10 dollars more through TD when newegg went out of stock and I didnt know if they were getting more at the 210.00 price point, which they did)
These are all my complete costs factoring in shipping or tax when applicable. The grand total is 1274.86. It certainly is a lot to swallow right now but when I look back to what I originally was goign to go with which you talked me out of (the costco computer) that was 800 but was going to end up being around 885 after tax, it needed a new power supply, video card and wireless card, if I had used these same parts regarding power supply, monitor and video card it wouldve been 1388ish. I wouldve had the blu-ray burner but I wouldve had inferior most everything else and no aftermarket cpu cooler. I couldve skimped on the monitor to drop that price (and mine) down by another 75 dollars but I really loved that 27" screen. I have to say though the price is a lot scarier when it's all combined.
These are all my complete costs factoring in shipping or tax when applicable. The grand total is 1274.86. It certainly is a lot to swallow right now but when I look back to what I originally was goign to go with which you talked me out of (the costco computer) that was 800 but was going to end up being around 885 after tax, it needed a new power supply, video card and wireless card, if I had used these same parts regarding power supply, monitor and video card it wouldve been 1388ish. I wouldve had the blu-ray burner but I wouldve had inferior most everything else and no aftermarket cpu cooler. I couldve skimped on the monitor to drop that price (and mine) down by another 75 dollars but I really loved that 27" screen. I have to say though the price is a lot scarier when it's all combined.
Are you including the monitor in that 1274? If so that's throwing your calculations quite a bit since you would have needed one with the costco box too.
Also the costco pc was not overclockable. Seems to me that it only cost you about $75 more to get that PC over the upgraded costco one. Given that the costco one cost $800 to start, add $50 for a psu and $220 for your GTX 480 I'm probably under selling it.
I think $1274 for all those parts is quite good. Also you went WAY higher end on the case than the costco one.
EDIT: oh and I didn't talk ya out of nuthin . I just laid out the options
you look to have a pretty nice pc on your hands ...but i question going with a 600watt psu.
the recommended minimum for a gtx480 is 600watts. i'd have gone with a 750watt since you could want some headroom for overclocking ...not to mention that a psu degrades over time.
it'll degrade even quicker if you're running the psu at or near its max output all the time.
so, myself, i would have gone with a better psu ...especially since the gtx480 was notorious for being a power hog.
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