Customized computer?

[Animeniax]

Indeed, the overall score is silly. I only use the subscores.

And even then, only for kicks and not as an indicator for programs to run and stuff. Maybe if more programs picked this up it would have meaning, but it's pretty arbitrary at the moment.
Why is the max score a 7.9?? Should be on a 10 scale like everything else.

Also, have you heard of the Spire Thermax Eclipse II (http://www.frozencpu.com/products/11423/cpu-spi-28/Spire_TherMax_Eclipse_II_Five_DT_Heatpipe_Universa l_CPU_Cooler_SP984B1-V2_-_Sockets_77511561366939AM2AM2AM3.html) HSF? It's made by a small company from China, so it has low distribution rates (Big etailers like newegg don't carry it). But the few sites that have reviewed it have only good things to say about it. Probably the most tech savvy person I know recommended it.

[Buffalobiian]

Why is the max score a 7.9?? Should be on a 10 scale like everything else.

The max score actually used to be 6.9 when Vista came out. The idea is that the score is scalable. Old hardware will keep their old score, but newer hardware that are more powerful would also be able to be compared on the same system.


(*bumped to answer Ani's question RE Heatsinks*)
edit:

@ani: (sorry, missed the second part of your post), I can't seem to find much info on the cooler to come up with much of a researched opinion. If the reviews you found said it's good, and you're happy with the price too, give it a try. It'd be great if you found reviews where they compared the performance to other heat sinks. That at least will tell you how good it is.


You might want to try a very cheap usb card stick, with a 3.5 jack out. You should get them under US$10 or less. Normally, you should reduce, if not get rid of most of your comps electronic sound signature.

I bought one around 2 weeks ago for 15AUD and gave it a spin. It definitely cuts out any background noise. When it should be silent, it really is so. Problem is that when it's actually trying to reproduce sound, it's completely broken. I can't even begin to describe it. It's just.... shit. From memory, the tones were out, it skipped and muffled at times, cuts out etc etc. Anything that could go wrong, it pretty much did so. The other USB sound device I looked at was the one that looked like a hub from ASUS, but I decided that didn't really need it. Plus, it's not really portable like that, since I like to use my laptop on my lap away from a desk, and it means the entire thing would be dangling off my laptop in an unsafe manner.

[Animeniax]

Ended up getting the Xigmatek Dark Knight (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835233029)

http://www.frostytech.com/articleimages/200811/DKS1283_pspc.jpg

[Buffalobiian]

What's the mounting system like? I see it mentions "tool-less", but from the pictures of the accessories it looks like your spring-loaded 4-screws and backplate system - which is fine.

[Animeniax]

Yep, spring-loaded with backplate. This is one of the highest rated coolers out there, and with it being under $50, with a $20 rebate, and a free multi-card reader, it's a great deal. Only bad thing is it's not set up for dual fan push-pull, it only has mounting slots for one fan. But I can set it up for a second fan to get improved cooling and then OC my i7.

[Buffalobiian]

Yep, spring-loaded with backplate. This is one of the highest rated coolers out there, and with it being under $50, with a $20 rebate, and a free multi-card reader, it's a great deal. Only bad thing is it's not set up for dual fan push-pull, it only has mounting slots for one fan. But I can set it up for a second fan to get improved cooling and then OC my i7.

If you can find (or make yourself) and air duct to connect between the back of the cooler and the exhaust fan of your PC, you c an have the push/pull effect without a second fan. It'll also ensure the hot air gets completely expelled instead of circulating around your case.

But that's a minor thing, especially if you already have good chassis cooling.

[Buffalobiian]

I'm currently in the market for a ~250GB SSD to use as my primary drive (programs and OS).

So far, some of the ones that seem rather appealing are the Intel 510, OCZ Vertex II and OCZ Vertex III models. (I'm open to suggestion regarding other ones too). I'm putting less emphasis on sequential read/write speeds and more on both reliability AND longevity.

Even then, I haven't arrived at a clear-cut answer for those two categories regarding the Intel vs Sandforce controllers (well, the Intel 510 actuall moved off to use the Marvell controller in this latest edition..)

Any recommendations/opinions from thsoe who've been in the SSD loop? I've only just started.

PS: My system's doing a long-ass chkdsk run at the moment that will take ~20hrs, so I'll post the system specs later on for your convenience. The mobo's a P55 chipset with Sata II, off the top of my head.

[Animeniax]

I've been looking to switch to SSD for my boot drive as well. From what I've read, OCZ drives are both slow and unreliable. I'd recommend sticking with Intel, but hopefully we can get some more feedback from others. I'll probably go with the Intel 320 models, since I only care about quick OS boot times and maybe quick load times for one or two games.

[David75]

Regarding game load times, most of the time the are CPU limited. On rare occasions you gain like a couple of seconds. However, some games that constantly seek textures or data from the harddrive might see an improvement, like Flight Simulator.

As for which SSD to choose from?
OCZ cheat their customers. I write it when I have a 240Gb vertex II...
Intel is the choice for reliability and even if you're unlucky enough to fall in the 0.5% of failure, you do not have to pay for shipping for return (to be controlled before purchase).

The 510 range is only for benchmarking, the 310 is a more balanced drive.
Problem is that this new generation only have bigger storage versions as a bonus compared to the last.
Performance and prices did not improve that much.

I wouldn't really know what to buy right now. Maybe a Crucial M4, should I have a 6Gbps compatible motherboard. If not, a C300 would do the trick if purchased with a good rebate.

[Animeniax]

I'm pretty close to pulling the trigger on this SSD: Patriot Wildfire (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820220599&cm_re=patriot_wildfire_ssd-_-20-220-599-_-Product). It uses the new Sandforce controller and has read/write speeds up to 500MB/s.

[Buffalobiian]

I'm pretty close to pulling the trigger on this SSD: Patriot Wildfire (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820220599&cm_re=patriot_wildfire_ssd-_-20-220-599-_-Product). It uses the new Sandforce controller and has read/write speeds up to 500MB/s.

That's the sequential read/write max. What you really need to look at is 4kb random read/write performance since you'll encounter that more so than transferring movies in real life situations.

Thanks for the input David. I'm not tossing up between the Intel 510, Crucial M4 and Crucial C300 ~250GB models. The C300 is hard to find, and even when i do find it, its price isn't much of a bargain (if any) compared to the M4 at all. I don't know whether I should just jump on, or wait for a few weeks/months till price drops and reliability issues reveal themselves..

[Animeniax]

That's the sequential read/write max. What you really need to look at is 4kb random read/write performance since you'll encounter that more so than transferring movies in real life situations.

The Wildfire kicks ass at 4k random too, up to 85k IOPS which is twice most previous Sandforce models.

[David75]

That's the sequential read/write max. What you really need to look at is 4kb random read/write performance since you'll encounter that more so than transferring movies in real life situations.

Thanks for the input David. I'm not tossing up between the Intel 510, Crucial M4 and Crucial C300 ~250GB models. The C300 is hard to find, and even when i do find it, its price isn't much of a bargain (if any) compared to the M4 at all. I don't know whether I should just jump on, or wait for a few weeks/months till price drops and reliability issues reveal themselves..

Well, I mentionned the C300 because you sometimes have bargains due to its end of commercialisation, since the M4 is the replacement. The idea behind my answer to seek for good SSDs from last gen with 3Xnm nand flash, as 2Xnm nand flash seems to have performance and reliability problems...

The M4 is replacing the C300, should still be a good alternative, depending on customer service from Crucial.


The Wildfire kicks ass at 4k random too, up to 85k IOPS which is twice most previous Sandforce models.

The patriot still is a SF-2200 product, so I'm a little surprised they would get such high IOPS with the same controler/firmware unless they cheat somewhere (bench tool, or just a big lie?)
That also means you get the problems other SF based products get, so like for Crucial, you have to know wether Customer service is good when you have a problem and if they release firmwares once in a while...
SSDs remind me of the time when the HDD industry switched to PMR and reliability was sometimes poor (IBM GXP...)
It's very hard to know what products will be affected and how each firm will react.
I'm somewhat skeptical when with the same nand flash modules you see products from Intel perform 100 and SF products perform 200 for example... it's even more of a problem when you know that Intel manufactures those same modules...

So either there's a hidden truth, or there are reliability troubles coming... or both.

For example, just changing the sample size in a demanding SSD stress test shows that some SF products are tailor-made to do well in benchmarks... and their performance drops when you're out of the range of most benchmark tools. Behavior not seen on other products.

Example? 4kB random write with non compressible data at different batch size for the Vertex 3 240 GB:
- 1000 Mo : 72 MB /s
- 2000 Mo : 72 MB /s
- 4000 Mo : 52 MB /s
- 8000 Mo : 44 MB /s
- 16000 Mo : 44 MB /s

With the same test, the M4 is always at 58 MB/s
thing is, most benchmark tools use a small size batch...
(taken from the french site:http://www.hardware.fr/news/11462/ssd-attention-x-benchs.html)
I'm quite lucky we have a very good french forum with quite skilled reviewers who can pinpoint problems in benchmarks and go beyond the usual press conference like reviews...
I think some of them were the first ones to pinpoint the JMF602 stuttering problem...

Still talking about benchmarks, it's always very strange to see many SSDs with very high synthetic results, not having a clear advantage over some intel SSDs that are supposed to be much slower on paper.

Be careful, we're in a bad phase for the SSD market. It's in full bloom and everyone wants their share with any means possible.
But I know no one wants to wait another 5 years so that things get clearer.

So, if you find a SSD with a good price, and nice customer support, it might be a safer bet than going for the "synthetic bench" beast.

[Animeniax]

The Wildfire uses a SF2280 controller and has posted excellent reviews with all the major review sites. Of course, since it's still fairly new, long term reliability and owner impressions are hard to find.

I just ordered the OWC Mercury Electra 6G 120GB. The benchtest numbers aren't as good as the Wildfire, but it's $70 less and has excellent reviews. Most importantly, it was recommended by some tech savvy guys at work.

[Archangel]

I'm pretty uneducated about this sort of thing but, in average, how much would it cost to buy a decent prebuilt PC?

I'm counting on you to figure out what "decent" stands for in this day and age.

[Buffalobiian]

Even, I have to ask, 'decent' for the everyday Joe, or decent for a gamer?

[Animeniax]

Regional pricing would make it impractical to estimate a price for a decent PC. In the US, I'd say around $600 without a monitor or speakers.

I got the SSD in the mail. Unfortunately I forgot to get a mounting bracket with it so it's another reason I haven't bothered to install it. The main reason being that I just want a working computer to play BFBC2MP with and to get on the internet. Makes me feel like a bad nerd.

[Kraco]

I don't know just how much cheaper Portugal is compared to Finland, but I'd say at least 500-600 euros to get one that also runs games somewhat. If you go by DS's standards, any computer that turns on and boots when you press the power button is decent... Those you can find for little more than 200 euros. Without a screen, like Ani said.

[darkshadow]

What? I clearly remember saying 400, I even linked the whole 400 euro crysis pc thing ;/.

[Edort4]

I have been thinking about changing my pc it's going to make 4 years soon. What time of the year is best to buy a new pc? I have been recommended to wait until the end of summer, cause its a slow paced time with holidays, so september-october.

[Munsu]

I have been thinking about changing my pc it's going to make 4 years soon. What time of the year is best to buy a new pc? I have been recommended to wait until the end of summer, cause its a slow paced time with holidays, so september-october.

Wait for November and all the Black Friday deals, and Cyber (Mondays?).

[Archangel]

Is there any way Europeans could make use of those holidays? We don't really have any similar counterparts on my end.

[enkoujin]

Here's an up-to-date guide for computer parts and their price ranges in US/CDN currency. Use currency exchange and all your other factors that are applicable to where you live.

http://img833.imageshack.us/img833/7372/guideu.png

As for Archangel's predicament, I strongly suggest that you ask a local or regional forum in the country of your residence for consumer sales. Otherwise, if you're strictly looking at a "decent" pre-built computer (Microsoft Office, media and some "gaming"), you're probably looking at something like this that will last you at least five years:

HDD: 1 TB (5400 RPM usually default).
RAM: 4-6 GB DDR3 (bus frequencies shouldn't matter at this point).
Case: Not too important, but the bigger it is, the more fans you can put in for cooling and is easier to upgrade should you want to do so; make sure it dissipates heat well, though, that's very important (either water cooler or multiple fans).
PSU: 550 W+, with as many fans as you can and see if it's energy efficient of at least 80%+ for a smaller electric bill.
GPU/Video Card: Most older games (pre 2003?) can play perfectly fine on your chipset and often, the pre-built computers don't come with a video card, so you'll have to buy it separately yourself (512 MB is the minima these days).
Socket: AM3 for now...
CPU: You're probably looking at an Intel i3 or i5 processor.
Motherboard: Shouldn't matter what it is, but you should know what kind of specs it supports if you would want to upgrade your parts in the future to make the best out of your motherboard.

By pure currency conclusion, you're looking to spend about 500 Euros without the graphics card. From the looks of Europe and their economic policies, that might be somewhere in the mid 600 or low 700 Euros for the same computer in the US.

[darkshadow]

uhh no, computer parts are pretty much $=€, and in most cases the euro price is a bit lower; a 500 dollar pc would cost ~500 euros.

[enkoujin]

Ohshi-

Alright, thanks for clearing that up, darkshadow.

[Animeniax]

uhh no, computer parts are pretty much $=€, and in most cases the euro price is a bit lower; a 500 dollar pc would cost ~500 euros.
Yes but since 1€ = 1.42$, a 500€ PC costs you $710 for the same PC we get for $500.

[darkshadow]

Yeah, thanks for stating the obvious.

[Animeniax]

Sorry man, but you were trying to pass it off like 500 lbs of feathers =/= 500 lbs of stone. $500 will buy you about $350 in computing power if you live in Europe.

[darkshadow]

don't act like a freaking dumbass, USA's economic enviroment =/= any random EU country's economy. Just because you happen to have 500$ in spending power does not mean that spending power is equal to only $350 in any of the 27 different countries.
When it comes to electronics €=$. Now go troll somewhere else.

[enkoujin]

Oh, I also forgot to add, Archangel, you should definitely research all you can about computer parts as much as possible even though you're not buying a customized computer or its computer parts. You do not want to be misled by the sales associates at the retailer you will be purchasing from - they are only interested in meeting their store quotas and do not care about what you want (like any other retailer).

[Animeniax]

don't act like a freaking dumbass, USA's economic enviroment =/= any random EU country's economy. Just because you happen to have 500$ in spending power does not mean that spending power is equal to only $350 in any of the 27 different countries.
When it comes to electronics €=$. Now go troll somewhere else.
But since €=/=$, your claims of equivalency are faulty. And if you wanted to get specific about which of the 27 countries we're talking about, you already know Archangel is from Portugal so what's the use of you saying "€=$" if that doesn't help him price a PC build in his country?? When someone corrects you, it's not trolling. Don't take it so hard, you're not always right, and sometimes even you need help clearing things up.

[Buffalobiian]

Can anyone recommend a full-sized, pleasantly illuminated (read: not orage/red - preferably white or near-white blue), silent (or near so), wired keyboard - preferably with media keys?

Currently looking at the Logitech Illuminated Keyboard (wired version of the K800). My brother's got the K800, and the PerfectStroke build works well enough to be silent and have a nice touch. Illumination is nice too. Only real thing I dislike about it is that the media keys require pressing the Fn key to access instead of being truly One-Touch.


edit: and I'm really close to buying the Intel 510 250GB SSD now. The store that I've been looking at has just dropped the price by 40$.

[Animeniax]

Wow, good looking keyboard. When I was researching new keyboards a month ago, I decided against the K800 variants because of their laptop style keys. I prefer desktop full key type for better tactile response when playing video games.

I got this case:

805

[Kraco]

If that's the front of the case, it must be one big muthafucka, if you pardon my language. Twice the width of a normal case.

[Animeniax]

If that's the front of the case, it must be one big muthafucka, if you pardon my language. Twice the width of a normal case. It's not as big as it looks. It's about the size of 2 mid towers put together. Details can be found here, if you want to order one of your own: www.overclock.net/caselabs (http://www.overclock.net/case-labs/964288-magnum-case-comparisons.html), though shipping to Europe would be prohibitively expensive.

[Buffalobiian]

I decided against the K800 variants because of their laptop style keys. I prefer desktop full key type for better tactile response when playing video games.

I probably would have too if I didn't get to try one out first hand.

The touch and silence of that one is pretty good. I liked it. Better than my K200 atm.

[Buffalobiian]

David, are you, or did you have any problems with your OCZ Vertex 2?

[Animeniax]

Let me go ahead and post that getting an SSD for your system drive is the single best upgrade you can do for your personal computing experience, if you already have 4GB RAM and a decent video card.

I have the OWC Mercury Electra 6G 120GB. Best $220 I've spent on my PC besides the HD69(70).

Everyone should buy Nvidia though.

[Buffalobiian]

Let me go ahead and post that getting an SSD for your system drive is the single best upgrade you can do for your personal computing experience, if you already have 4GB RAM and a decent video card.

I have the OWC Mercury Electra 6G 120GB. Best $220 I've spent on my PC besides the HD69(70).

Everyone should buy Nvidia though.

Will my experience differ if I sleep instead of turn off my computer all the time and keep all my usual windows up? They extended the ETA for my SSD so I still haven't gotten it yet.

[Animeniax]

No, I sleep my PC all the time too. Everything runs faster on SSD. Programs load faster, videos run like you've got them set to fast forward, and all music sounds like its being sung by Alvin, Simon, and Theodore.

[David75]

I've had no problem with OZC other than the world wide teft they organized by replacing the nand flash modules in their top range without changing anything in the part number/name of the product.

However, it seems from a large french reseller that their failure rate is higher, 4% against 0.2% for intel SSDs.

Thing is, you should always have good backups and choose your SSD brand depending on their return policy too.

From memory, Intel has a worldwide free shipping policy in case of RMA.

I know It sound like I work for intel, but those facts can be checked for each brand ;)

Regarding the SSD accelerating everything, it's true for any disk bound task.
For example, lots of game loading need CPU processing, so the gain you get with a SSD is minimal in those games.

Some other games constantly refresh heaps of textures in real time causing jitter or other view glitches... it's not fluid on screen although the FPS number is good. In that case it might be that a conventionnal HDD can't cope with the multiple random accesses, where a SSD will just do it easily.

Another point to consider, a great part of the SSD acceleration feels totally normal. You take it for granted in a matter of minutes.
That means that you might wonder if it really was a great choice spending on such expensive hardware.

Then you boot anybody's comp with no SSD and you get a feeling of what hell on earth might be :D

[Buffalobiian]

Yeah, I've researched the article about the french reseller (and I've decided to take that as anecdotal evidence only), as well as Intel's return policy (emailed them about this one just to confirm as well, since I was planning on getting that in the US then shipping over here). I ended up ordering the Intel 510 250GB version, and am just waiting for it to come into stock at the supplier, then the retailer, then to me.

I was mainly asking, I guess, to see if you had any operational issues with your Vertex 2. But I've decided on going with Intel's one since they've got a migration tool instead of other manufacturers recommending a fresh install.

[David75]

I'm not in the 4% and do not have any other gripes than having a slower SSD than I should have had... because of the 25nm 64GB die flash nand switch.

Regarding system imaging, I have mixed feelings about it. It's true it might seem convenient, well it is when everything works perfectly after migrating.
But when it doesn't, it a lot more of a hassle than just doing a fresh install and retune your system.

So as usual, prepare good backups and be prepared for a full fresh install just in case.

[Buffalobiian]

Regarding system imaging, I have mixed feelings about it. It's true it might seem convenient, well it is when everything works perfectly after migrating.
But when it doesn't, it a lot more of a hassle than just doing a fresh install and retune your system.

I guess that comes down to how much we trust Intel.

You reminded me that I haven't looked up to see if anybody's been having issues after using Intel's SSD migration tool, so I"ll give that a look-up soon.

[Animeniax]

Intel and OCZ aren't the only players in the game. Might be worth it to give a company like OWC or Patriot a try, since they are releasing products that push performance envelopes and might be cheaper because they aren't big name companies. Bonus, you can contribute to the tech community by figuring out problems with these SSDs that others are stumped on.

[Buffalobiian]

We know that Ani. I've also considered others, but I named those two because I've come down to either:

Vertex II/III - performance, price
Intel 320 / 510 - reliability, support.

I wanted a 300GB Intel 320 model, but I couldn't find a seller in Australia (that was priced decently, if any), so I went for the 510 instead.

[Animeniax]

Nothing wrong with only considering the big names, and nothing to apologize about. It's a safe bet since you're a foreigner and wouldn't want to have to deal with shipping/support from a smaller company in the US.

[David75]

I guess that comes down to how much we trust Intel.

You reminded me that I haven't looked up to see if anybody's been having issues after using Intel's SSD migration tool, so I"ll give that a look-up soon.

My guess is that their imaging software comes from another company (or acquired one). I do not doubt the efficiency of the tool, after all as a buisiness company, intel does not want unnecessary troubles when offering tools.

So why did I react to this?
Well for example, SSDs work better with AHCI. It's a lot easier to turn your sata link to AHCI and then install a fresh OS, than making the changes to an already installed OS like windows 7...
Try searching for tutorials regarding AHCI for windows.

[Buffalobiian]

My guess is that their imaging software comes from another company (or acquired one). I do not doubt the efficiency of the tool, after all as a buisiness company, intel does not want unnecessary troubles when offering tools.

So why did I react to this?
Well for example, SSDs work better with AHCI. It's a lot easier to turn your sata link to AHCI and then install a fresh OS, than making the changes to an already installed OS like windows 7...
Try searching for tutorials regarding AHCI for windows.

I first have to change a registry setting in Windows 7, then change the setting in my BIOS. I've already done this once when I tried turning on AHCI to activate NCQ on my current HDDs. The drivers should be present on my system.

I did mention this because I've read comments regarding people having problems with their Vertex IIs, and were performing Secure Erases like that's what's needed to be done. I admit that I hate reinstalling OSes.

[David75]

Well, I bought that V2 only for my working laptop. The sata link seems to be caped in performance somewhere so I do not stress that much about it.
Those performing HDDerase and secure erase are people who might have some soft/hard configuration trouble they want to solve... or the ones feeling insecure because their SSD is 2 or 3 MB/s slower than what the reviews show :D

My take on this is:
Install with parameters fit for a SSD
Check if global performance is about what it should be just in case there's something wrong you'd have to deal with
Enjoy and forget about it.

Then, try to avoid any comp that does not have a SSD installed :D

[Animeniax]

My current (nearly finished) PC:

842

[IFHTT]

Man... I wish I had the room for one of those behemoth CaseLabs cases. :(

Care to take one of the inside? Looks nice.

[Animeniax]

They aren't really that big, slimmer than two normal midtowers side to side. It doubles as a table too so it's room well used. I'll eventually put my printer on top of it to clear up space on the desk. Eventually I'll tidy up the insides with wire loom and ties once everything is installed.

Left side:
843

Right side:
844

[Buffalobiian]

Why did you get that case Ani? I really can't see a reason other than mounting a water-cooling unit within it.

As for the remark that it functions as a table, I'll say it's more correct to say it functions as a box. Might sound nitpicky, but the fact that you can't put your legs and knees underneath it and sit upright when you're writing etc instead of leaning over it makes a big difference for me.

In other news, a few hours ago I was informed that my SSD's finally been shipped. While I'm at it, I'm going to put my F: and C: onto that drive, cut all my anime/music from F: (500GB HDD) onto a new drive (I: 2TB), so I"ll end up with a 250GB SSD (C, F), 2TB HDD (I) and a 1.5TB HDD (H).

I'm also going to drill some holes into the HDD cage of my P182 and suspension-mount the HDDs with Stretch Magic. I'll just have to let my SSD arrive and take a look at it before I decide whether I want to mount that too, or just tape it to the case somewhere.

[Animeniax]

I like all of the space and functionality available with this larger case. I got tired of cramming and rerouting wires in my old Antec case, and airflow was poor because of the limited space, so temps weren't great. Now I have more room to work inside the computer, and a lot of options for upgrades/customizations.

I count it as a table because I can set stuff on it, not sit at it. I guess it's more like a shelf.

[Buffalobiian]

Okay, Intel SSD has arrived and has been installed.

The difference is definitely noticable, though I'm not sure I can make the claim of "best upgrade you can get" right now. I'd agree with it in the sense that other PC parts don't (or shouldn't) bottleneck normal PC use anymore, so SSDs would bring out the most perceivable difference.

I changed over to AHCI mode, and shortly after I installed the SSD I noticed that music and sounds/keyboard/mouse was skipping a bit. DPC-checker confirms this with the highest latency recorded during the observation to be up to 5000 microseconds. It peaks whenever the SSD is moderately accessed. I nailed it down to the Intel Storage Matrix that I installed for my board's chipset, and uninstalling and replacing the AHCI driver with microsoft's default one fixed that. Maximum recorded in the last run was around 1000 microseconds. (<2000 is around the tolerable level). It normally hangs around the low 100s anyway. Reinstalling Intel's driver reproduces the problem, just to be thorough.

The reason I opted for the Intel driver in the first place is because they won't declare my HDDs as being inactive/unplugged if they don't spin up to full speed in 8 seconds when resuming from sleep (happens with large capacity, slow-spinning drives). If that drive was your primary, one would experience a hang or a BSOD soon after.

Microsoft does have a hotfix for the issue for anyone experiencing it though, which can be found at: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/977178

(I think I've talked about this the last time I played around with AHCI, but here it is again)

I replaced my Samsung F2 500GB drive with a WD20EARS 2TB as my media drive too, but the WD has much more vibration than the samsung, and I can hear the increased noise level even when it's mounted in the rubber knubs of the P182.

I've ordered the Stretch Magic from ebay already, so when it gets sent I'll have a play with suspension mounting my drives like this:

http://img717.imageshack.us/img717/8154/62gesqq.jpg

[Kraco]

I wonder if that makes any difference compared to the rubber mounts. But who knows. Even the rubber mounts still have screws. If you have only those elastic bands, in theory I guess it will only leave the HD's own noise. Plus the inevitable noise when those fail and the HD will drop and hit the chassis, followed by your loud cursing.

[Buffalobiian]

I wonder if that makes any difference compared to the rubber mounts. But who knows. Even the rubber mounts still have screws. If you have only those elastic bands, in theory I guess it will only leave the HD's own noise. Plus the inevitable noise when those fail and the HD will drop and hit the chassis, followed by your loud cursing.

Why inevitable? Those were chosen due to their endurance + bounciness. Clothing elastic would have been a less than ideal choice, while bungee rope would have been a bit thick.

They're way superior to rubber mounts in terms of the amount of vibration they can absorb. The only thing I have to do really is to stick a warning note on the back of the computer that says "Remove HDD Cage before moving", which I should hopefully see when I unplug the case prior to movement.

[Dark Dragon]

Just got all of the parts for new comp in.

Case: Cooler Master Storm Enforcer USB 3.0 Mid Tower ATX (http://www.coolermaster-usa.com/product.php?product_id=3038)
CPU: I7 2600k (http://ark.intel.com/products/52214/Intel-Core-i7-2600K-Processor-%288M-Cache-3_40-GHz%29)
CPU Cooler: Corsair Hydro H80 (http://www.corsair.com/cooling/hydro-series/hydro-series-h80-high-performance-liquid-cpu-cooler.html)
Motherboard: Gigabye Z68MA (http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3855#ov)
PSU: Corsair AX 850W (http://www.corsair.com/power-supply-units/professional-series-gold/ax850.html)
Video Card: Nvidia GTX 560 (http://www.geforce.com/Hardware/GPUs/geforce-gtx-560)
Memory: Patriot G2 PC3-12800 8gig (http://patriotmemory.com/products/detailp.jsp?prodline=5&catid=34&prodgroupid=196&id=1049&type=1)
Hard drive: 1TB Caviar Black (http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=100)

The motherboard isn't the greatest, but i got it for 20$ as a bundled deal with the CPU so it was hard to pass up. Still waiting for a good deal on a SSD before i finally pick one up.
I can't wait to put this thing together. Will post some pics after i'm done.

[Buffalobiian]

The PSU's a very solid performing one. Been very happy with mine.

Tell us how you find the CPU cooler, performance and noise-wise. I was going to get one of those, but it didn't seem like it was going to be as quiet as I would like it to be, so I opted for air cooling instead.

[Dark Dragon]

My friend has the H50 model and i don't know if these are significantly more quiet or anything. But from my experience, they sound like screaming banshees at max speed. It is shipped with a resistor cable that reduce the sound however, but i think it still won't be very quiet. I personally think the cooling it gives over standard air cooling is significant enough though so i'll deal with a little noise.

[Kraco]

Any specific reason why you got GTX 560 and not GTX 560 Ti?

[Animeniax]

It looks like you went pretty high end on everything besides the case. Any reason you got such a case to house such awesome components?

[Dark Dragon]

I am pretty lucky to have a Microcenter in Houston so i was able to get some pretty amazing deals. I got that 560 for 150$ US after rebates and it's EVGA, while the cheapest non-gigabyte TIs I've seen are at least 230$. The difference in performance isn't enough for me to justify the price increase.

As for the case, mostly because i don't have the space to support a full tower. As far as mid towers go, i generally didn't see anything that is significantly better than that case, just more expensive. I've been pretty impressed with most of the recent cooler master cases and this one is quite nice for the price (70$).

- It has great airflow
- Simple cables management
- Very roomy for a mid tower
- Designed to be mostly tool-less
- Has USB 3.0 build in
- It's very nice looking, the front cover really tie the case together (always a plus if it doesn't hinder performance)

The reviews for this thing have mostly been very positive, i really didn't see anything else that would've been significantly better.

@Animeniax: Did you have any case in particular that you would recommend over this one? Since i bought it from retail, it'll be a breeze to go return it if i find something better.

[Kraco]

I got that 560 for 150$ US after rebates and it's EVGA

That's certainly a good deal. I can see why you'd go for it.

[Animeniax]

As for the case, mostly because i don't have the space to support a full tower. As far as mid towers go, i generally didn't see anything that is significantly better than that case, just more expensive. I've been pretty impressed with most of the recent cooler master cases and this one is quite nice for the price (70$).

- It has great airflow
- Simple cables management
- Very roomy for a mid tower
- Designed to be mostly tool-less
- Has USB 3.0 build in
- It's very nice looking, the front cover really tie the case together (always a plus if it doesn't hinder performance)

The reviews for this thing have mostly been very positive, i really didn't see anything else that would've been significantly better.

@Animeniax: Did you have any case in particular that you would recommend over this one? Since i bought it from retail, it'll be a breeze to go return it if i find something better.No, as long as it's functional, then all that remains is personal taste as far as aesthetics. I like a more industrial look in a PC case.

Looking closer at the enlarged pictures, it looks larger and more spacious than I originally thought.

[Buffalobiian]

What defines an "industrial" look?

[Animeniax]

What defines an "industrial" look?Industrial:
916

[Buffalobiian]

Industrial:
916

I figured that. I meant for you to describe features in words:

-big exposed fans?
-grills?
-dials and displays?
-Black?


These days I prefer a minimalist look I think, though I wouldn't pass up on the Raven Evolution II (http://www.silentpcreview.com/article1002-page2.html) that looks like a Batmobile. Requirements for case must be: quiet, no lights (though I usually unplug the LEDs and any change the fans anyway), and no see-through side panels.

[Animeniax]

Any case that makes a PC look like a server/mainframe computer, and not like a kitchen appliance or console.

[Kraco]

I used to think like that, but nowadays I also think of the looks and comfort. Server/mainframe use would be all about ventilation, ease of use and maintenance, and durability. While those are important, I also wanted simple, smooth looks, and, like Bill, silence, no transparent panels or extra lights (I do appreaciate the operation leds unlike he, though). My current case, Fractal R3 (http://www.fractal-design.com/?view=product&prod=48) fulfills nicely enough my requirements.

[Dark Dragon]

I have to say, building this comp was a learning experience.

In my haste to purchase the CPU and Motherboard at a "great" price, i forgot to check and was unpleasantly surprised when i found out it only have 2 fan headers. I had to get creative with the wiring because i ended up running 4 fans and the CPU pump requires one slot for itself.

After putting it together, i had trouble installing Window 7. So i had to reinstall my old HDD and download a new copy and run the install from a USB. Finally got it to work after messing around with the BIOS for a while.

Then my GPU had trouble detecting my monitor and would identify as an HDTV, so it limited my max resolution so 1920x1080 and the color became blurry/washed out. It turn out the Nvidia driver was the culprit so i had to manually edit the registry to override the EDID bug.

It was a bit of a pain, but i'm finally done!


921922923

[darkshadow]

Aside from the insanely ugly corner desk setup, gratz on figuring it out; your cable management looks neat too.

[Dark Dragon]

Lol i'm stuck with that desk till i can figure out what to do with my gigantic bed frame.

[Animeniax]

I like the setup, but did we ever come to a consensus about the safety of placing the subwoofer that close to your PC and all it's magnetically sensitive devices?

The wiring looks clean even without tubing, and I love the placement of the PSU at the bottom of the case instead of at the top.

[Buffalobiian]

I like the setup, but did we ever come to a consensus about the safety of placing the subwoofer that close to your PC and all it's magnetically sensitive devices?

The wiring looks clean even without tubing, and I love the placement of the PSU at the bottom of the case instead of at the top.

I hear all about that on the internet, but I wonder at how much backing those comments really have regarding subwoofers and all.

As far as I know, PC cases have to conform to some level of EMI shielding.

[Animeniax]

I dispute that. A subwoofer has a giant magnet in it. Placing giant magnets next to your magnetically-sensitive computer devices is bad news. You can provide some EMI shielding with the case (that's debatable btw, as some manufacturers advertise "EMI shielded" models of cases), but is it enough to safely shield devices from a giant magnet? Doubt it.

[Dark Dragon]

I've had that subwoofer next to my old computer for about 4 years and the only thing that died was a cheap power supply that came free with the case after about 2 years.

[Buffalobiian]

I dispute that. A subwoofer has a giant magnet in it. Placing giant magnets next to your magnetically-sensitive computer devices is bad news. You can provide some EMI shielding with the case (that's debatable btw, as some manufacturers advertise "EMI shielded" models of cases), but is it enough to safely shield devices from a giant magnet? Doubt it.


For venerable floppies, this statement holds true. We placed a 99-cent magnet on a 3.5-inch floppy for a few seconds. The magnet stuck to the disk and ruined its data. Fortunately, most modern storage devices, such as SD and CompactFlash memory cards, are immune to magnetic fields. "There's nothing magnetic in flash memory, so [a magnet] won't do anything," says Bill Frank, executive director of the CompactFlash Association. "A magnet powerful enough to disturb the electrons in flash would be powerful enough to suck the iron out of your blood cells," says Frank.

The same goes for hard drives. The only magnets powerful enough to scrub data from a drive platter are laboratory degaussers or those used by government agencies to wipe bits off media. "In the real world, people are not losing data from magnets," says Bill Rudock, a tech-support engineer with hard-drive maker Seagate. "In every disk," notes Rudock, "there's one heck of a magnet that swings the head."
Want to erase data from a hard drive you plan to toss? Don't bother with a magnet. Overwrite the data that is stored on the media instead. For flash, fill up the drive with anything, like pictures of your beloved dachshund. Unlike with magnetic media, from which experts can usually recover at least some overwritten data, once new data is written to flash media, the old data is gone forever. To overwrite the contents of a hard drive, try Eraser (http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file_description/0,fid,22963,00.asp) from Heidi Computers.

Extracted from Busting the Biggest PC Myths, PCWorld (http://www.pcworld.com/article/116572/busting_the_biggest_pc_myths.html).

[Buffalobiian]

My soundcard can resample audio signals with a fidelity of THD+N of -140dB. I "shouldn't" be able to hear the difference.. but I think I can when I set the card to 44.1KHz vs 48KHz when listening to 44.1KHz sound.

Placebo? I think I'll get my brother to help me do a blindfold test.

[Kraco]

Are you basically saying it doesn't just resample up but does something else to the sound as well?

[Buffalobiian]

Are you basically saying it doesn't just resample up but does something else to the sound as well?

Well by resampling the sound it introduces distortions into it as well. Filters will attempt to correct.

I did the test with my brother, but he didn't listen to my full instructions regarding how to do it, which was had one or more flaws in it anyway.

Basically I got him to pick a frequency, then play back this 44.1KHz tune that I had on my computer until I feel like I've identified the setting. One problem is that I had to take off my headphones in between so I don't hear the "pop" that indicated a filter change.

Another one was that "hearing the difference" isn't the same as "being able to identify it without a comparison". While a person may not be able to tell you exactly what shade of grey (or even whether it's the darker or lighter of two predetermined greys) if you simply showed it to them, but could still be able to tell the difference if you put them side to side.

I wouldn't be able to perform a blind test using my setup in such a manner (this is 44KHz > this is 48KHz > now which one is this?), since the filter change would give it away. I guess I could tell him to randomly change filters 2 times, so that I won't know if the final one has been changed back or not.. meh.

He also forgot to write down which frequency he was testing in each run so I can't identify if I produce errors in any particular manner.

Anyway, I ended up getting 6 correct out of 10 runs (was 30, but he got bored). He did mention that my errors consisted mostly of mistaking 44.1KHz for 48KHz, but with this small sample, it hardly means anything. Statistically speaking, getting half of it right might as well be chance and nothing else.

[Kraco]

Half should be what you would get with a coin, so yeah, it doesn't really prove anything.

Why don't you just keep the card at 44.1kHz if that sounds better? Is 48kHz even used in any final products? And if it was, would it be such a product that it would matter? Games and movies have so much stuff going on that you'd hardly notice, and as far as I know, music is released typically in 44.1kHz following the CD legacy.

[Buffalobiian]

I was thinking of that too, but then was more interested in finding out whether I really could hear a difference or not.

Ended up reading up about it, and seeing if upsampling to 192KHz actually does anything to more accurately reproduce the original 44.1KHz as a waveform, but that hasn't really gone anywhere.

The card's manual says to select the sample rate that matches my source, or higher.. and I haven't found too much information regarding the quality of upsampling vs downsampling.

[Buffalobiian]

http://img851.imageshack.us/img851/6809/15102011201.th.jpg (http://img851.imageshack.us/i/15102011201.jpg/)http://img11.imageshack.us/img11/668/15102011198.th.jpg (http://img11.imageshack.us/i/15102011198.jpg/)http://img191.imageshack.us/img191/7203/15102011199.th.jpg (http://img191.imageshack.us/i/15102011199.jpg/)

Finally got around to the mod. The sonic signature changed, but I'm not sure if it's more pleasant or not.

I think it's softer, but also seems higher in frequency and less smooth, which is actually rather weird.

[Animeniax]

Am I wrong to think that suspending them instead of locking them down can't be good for the life expectancy of the drive? I'd think suspending them like that would allow all the kinetic energy (vibration) to make the drive basically shake itself to a premature death, instead of having full metal contact with the chassis to dissipate more of the energy. The plastic strands will transfer less of the energy into the chassis and more will be reflected back into the drive itself.

Of course, I failed physics twice so my understanding of energy transfer may be way off.

[Kraco]

It's not like the HDs wouldn't produce any noise inherently. And in fact it makes sense that by not anchoring them to a larger body, you might get higher and more inconsistent noises that otherwise might disappear.

[Dark Dragon]

The PSU's a very solid performing one. Been very happy with mine.

Tell us how you find the CPU cooler, performance and noise-wise. I was going to get one of those, but it didn't seem like it was going to be as quiet as I would like it to be, so I opted for air cooling instead.

I know it's a bit late, but i wanted to test it for a while and see if the result changes.

I am never going back to air coolers. I don't know why people complain about the sound problem on these, because i can't even hear my computer turn on. It might be the 2 dampening cable i used while installing to reduce the voltage to the fans, but it still function wonderfully. My CPU is a consistent 30c during regular use and maybe as high as 45-50 during gaming (Total War Shogun 2, Skyrim) with both games running on ultra settings.

I mentioned a while back that my friend owned the H50 and those were terribly loud, but i think he just forgot to use the dampening cables that came with the cooler.

While it is still a bit more risky than using conventional fan coolers, but the lack of noise and high performance makes up for it. It's significantly safer than going with a full water cooling kit.

Edit: I forgot to mention that the Hydro series all comes with Shin-Etsu thermal compound already applied, definitely the best stuff on the market and much better than Artic Silver. They kinda slapped a huge chunk on to it though, so you might want to do some scraping to make sure there are no air bubbles.

[Kraco]

I am never going back to air coolers. I don't know why people complain about the sound problem on these, because i can't even hear my computer turn on. It might be the 2 dampening cable i used while installing to reduce the voltage to the fans, but it still function wonderfully. My CPU is a consistent 30c during regular use and maybe as high as 45-50 during gaming (Total War Shogun 2, Skyrim) with both games running on ultra settings.

I doubt I'll be going back to air from water cooling any time soon. I have Antec 620, though I got rid of the Antec fan (that was about as silent as a jet engine) and replaced it with a Scythe Gentle Typhoon that I hooked directly to a mobo fan connector. So, the speed is constant, not varying. My slightly overclocked Phenom II now idles at ~25 and goes up to the 45 you mentioned when fully stressed (Prime95). Though when gaming, the factory overclocked GTX 560 Ti effectively masks any other noise...

[David75]

I was considering building a mini-itx HTPC without case as it will be enclosed in a hidden (yet accessible) place in my apartment.

I will have no troubles with cooling, a huge dissipator and using the flow the PSU provides will be enough.

My main concerns are idle power and which software I should use.

I've been extensively reading about Hi10p and even have a Hi444p sample (usagi drop episode 3) working flawlessy with the Lav Cuvid+madvr+mpchc combo but only on a win7 box.

I've tried to see if I could modify a geexbox 2.0 live usb distro, which is quite a good basis. Thing is, the community seems to be dead or in a deep coma and I do not have sufficient skills to alter the linux and XBMC parts so that everything works fine and remains simple to use.

I do not wish to go atom+ion(2) or amd E350 routes as they do not have enough power for software+filter decoding.

But then, I'm faced with idle power consumption that can be quite high and base price that quickly goes around 500€ (without peripherals) when it really only is a media PC.

I wanted to go:
H67 mini-itx motherboard with HDMI out
I5 2500k
some ram 4GB would be fine, but 2 should be enough.
some big passive cooler
diskless
good PSU

It might be I'm just wanting too much power for the real needs. It's just I don't want to change this when a new format
arrives and I need more software decoding power.

[Kraco]

If you build it around 2500K, I don't think you need to ever worry about the muscles for decoding video unless you plan to permanently keep it underclocked. But on the other hand, that's exactly why you should build it around something which gives enough power. Otherwise you might face the need to upgrade sooner than necessary, wasting money, if the video world comes up with something else even more stupid than Hi10p.

[David75]

well Hi10p isn't stupid per se, it's just that nobody ever thought of using the standard for computer coding/decoding hardware...
So people wake-up to the simple truth it has always been there ever since the avent of the H264 norm.
But it's true that a simple i5, although quite expensive, should give me some headroom for 3-4 years and then a simple GPU of the time might be able to extend the lifespan another 3 years. It's too much of a time period to guess what the video world might come with. Although 4k and 8k standards are there already. But for anime that will clearly be overkill, as is 1080 for screens up to 42 inches.
Since I can wait some months, January rebates will come in handy I guess.
Thanks

[Kraco]

It's not stupid as technology, yes, but I'll be calling it stupid as long as video cards capable of decoding h264 can't decode it as well. It's somewhat counter-productive in my opinion to switch to a new format right when you could state most people (worth their skin), could hardware decode video. Also keeping in mind BDs are based on the 8-bit h264 and only a techno freak would call BDs obsolete at this point.

[Buffalobiian]

http://img838.imageshack.us/img838/9965/30112011003.jpg

Mods over the xmas holidays:

-Bought the fanduct for the thermalright heatsink.
-took out the fan on the cpu heatsink
-applied accoustic foam to the inside of the case
-de-rivetted part of the case and took out the HDD drive cage and housing
-Placed my two HDDs into some of these 5.25"-mountable noise-cancelling enclosures
-Placed sorbothane discs between the HDDs and each other, the case floor
-Placed SSD on top with blu-tak underneath it.

http://img560.imageshack.us/img560/1601/07012012015.jpg

I wasn't comfortable with the heat build-up of the CPU (hits the low 90C range), so I put a fan back on the front of the CPU heatsink. Having a push-pull config across it didn't do it any good compared to the original setup though, so I just got rid of the tube alltogether. There was also some HDD noise that I didn't like, and concluded that I wasn't using enough sorbothane to absorb the vibrations with. I ordered a big slab online but found a cheaper workaround after that. I migrated all the original discs to slip in between the two HDD enclosures, then supported the entire thing with a giant slab of foam.

Also took the opportunity to replace the cut-up rubber bands that I have sat in between the heatsink fans (CPU and GPU) and the heatsink to reduce vibrations. Rubber bands harden, dry up and go shitty so I applied the same concept with some nylon wire I had left over from the previous suspension mount idea.

http://img41.imageshack.us/img41/1975/05012012013.jpg

I can't say any of the acoustic foam or the HDD enclosures are effective enough to recommend. They cost a shitload too. Doesn't mean I won't consider it again in a new build though. (won't buy the enclosures though.. reusing is as far as I'd go.)

[Animeniax]

I have an ATI HD6950 unlocked to 6970 that runs games on high settings with no problem and on ultra settings with some lag. Assuming I can find another 6950 to unlock at around $300 and crossfired them, would the performance be better than with a single 6990 or 7000 series card?

[darkshadow]

Most certainly not.

[Killa-Eyez]

Remember this (http://forums.gotwoot.net/showthread.php/13153-Customized-computer?p=484896&viewfull=1#post484896)?

To explain further what had happened with the old PC; the rust stains spread over the chassis, onto the Creative X-Fi soundcard and the motherboard had to go also. It came with a presumably faulty HDD so I had to replace that too.

The List:

Coolermaster Centurion 534 Chassis
Coolermaster iGreen Power 500W PSU
Abit Fatal1ty FP-IN9 SLI Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo E6420 Processor
Coolermaster Hyper L3 Cooler
Corsair XMS2 TWIN2X1024-6400C4 RAM
Corsair XMS2 TWIN2X2048-6400C4DHX RAM
Asus EN9600GT/HTDI/512M Graphics Card
Creative Soundblaster X-Fi XtremeMusic Sound Card
Hitachi Deskstar T7K500 500GB HDD*
Lite-on LH-16D1P (Black) DVD-Rom
Lite-on LH-20A1H (Black) DVD-RW
TEAC 3,5" Diskette Drive 1,44MB (Black) / 8 in 1 Cardreader

Replacements:

Cooler Master Elite 430 Window (Black) Chassis
Asus P5QC LGA775 Intel P45 DDR2/DDR3 Motherboard
Western Digital Caviar Green WD10EZRX, 1TB HDD

A total cost of €187.99 with the WD HDD costing most.

*It seemed after formatting, the Hitach HDD was working fine after all. 1.5TB up and running.

A couple of photos:

1274
1275
1276

[Animeniax]

I have an Intel Q6600 I could ship you for free, but international shipping is beaucoup dollary doos. I'm not entirely sure it works though.

[Kraco]

TEAC 3,5" Diskette Drive 1,44MB (Black) / 8 in 1 Cardreader


Yeah, a 3,5" diskette drive is a must in this day and age.

[Killa-Eyez]

I have an Intel Q6600 I could ship you for free, but international shipping is beaucoup dollary doos. I'm not entirely sure it works though.

Lolwut? Shiii-, I'll pay int. shipping fees, if the offer still stands and you're willing to test it still works.


Yeah, a 3,5" diskette drive is a must in this day and age.


TEAC 3,5" Diskette Drive 1,44MB (Black) / 8 in 1 Cardreader


It's all-in-one. See last pic.

[Animeniax]

Lolwut? Shiii-, I'll pay int. shipping fees, if the offer still stands and you're willing to test it still works.

The computer that this CPU was the heart of stopped POSTing, and I couldn't determine if it was the CPU or the motherboard that caused the problem. I sent the mobo back to Asus and they supposedly found no problems with it, but when their support returned it there were some damaged pins in the socket that I hadn't noticed before (might have been there or they might have caused the damage). I don't have another LGA775 motherboard to test the CPU with. I'll fire up the computer this weekend and see if I can say for sure that the CPU is good.

[Killa-Eyez]

Allright. You could also sent the mobo back again now you know there is something wrong with it.

[Buffalobiian]

Allright. You could also sent the mobo back again now you know there is something wrong with it.

That's assuming it's still under warranty after all this time. But even still... it won't do him much good if he's sending the CPU to you..

[Killa-Eyez]

That's assuming it's still under warranty after all this time. But even still... it won't do him much good if he's sending the CPU to you..

Goes without saying that he'd keep his set up. But indeed, assuming it's still under warranty.

[Animeniax]

Allright. You could also sent the mobo back again now you know there is something wrong with it.

Nah, not worth it. As good a company as Asus is product-wise, their support is pretty shitty. You have to pay for shipping the part to them and like I said, I think they damaged the board themselves. Also, I think it's out of its 3 year warranty.

I searched for a replacement mobo on ebay but they all cost ~$100. I upgraded an i7-930 setup instead.

[Killa-Eyez]

Aight. Keep in touch bro.

[Animeniax]

Alright, the motherboard is messed up, as the socket pin damage makes it impossible to test the CPU. I can't get a new mobo to test it with, so it you want it let me know and I'll check shipping prices. Sorry to get your hopes up.

[Killa-Eyez]

Alright, the motherboard is messed up, as the socket pin damage makes it impossible to test the CPU. I can't get a new mobo to test it with, so it you want it let me know and I'll check shipping prices. Sorry to get your hopes up.

It's okay. If the CPU doesn't show any burnmarks from short circuits you can check shipping fees. I'll decide then if it's worth it (it probably will).

[Buffalobiian]

Crucial has some mSATA SSDs going for cheap. When you're looking at the bigger 256GB model, it's running for less than $1 per GB. Just slap the drive into an adapter or use some mSATA->SATA cables and it should be good to go for anyone wanting an SSD but has been put off by the price.

http://www.crucial.com/search/searchresults.aspx?keywords=msata

edit: while the above's the regular price for the Crucial, Amazon is also discounting the samsung 830 at the moment.

http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-830-Series-MZ-7PC256N-Internal/dp/B005T3GPXY

[Animeniax]

I'm not fully sold on SSDs. I have one and it's great for boot speed, but not much else that makes it worth the cost. Read/write access times are better but hardly noticeable except with benchmark programs. And the biggest problem is the controllers available for SSDs. I have both a Marvell and Intel controller and both cause random lockups from loss of detection of the SSD. It's a known issue, particularly with the Marvell controller. So far, firmware and driver updates haven't fully resolved the problem.

[Buffalobiian]

My intel 510's been working fine since I sorted out the corrupting RAM that had been causing it to write incorrectly. I believe it's a marvell controller. I'm certainly sold on SSDs and boot speed is the least of my priorities since I reboot like once every 2 weeks or a month. Installation speeds, parrallel access and game loading times are just so much better. I could live without it, but I certainly wouldn't like to.

I'm tossing up between whether I want to upgrade my samsung 128 to a crucial 256 mSATA for my new laptop, but I think I'll wait till I run into space issues to see if I really need it. There's 40gb to spare on it right now and I can just use an external drive for media storage.

The bigger headache right now is whether I want to encrypt the entire system drive, or just some/all of the external one.

[Raven]

Hoping to get your opinions guys!

Deciding on a build for a new gaming PC after lots of reading of benchmarks, various forums and some conversations with friends.

I think I'm going mini:

CPU: Intel Core i5 3570K
Mobo: ASRock Z77E-ITX
RAM: G.Skill 8GB Kit (2x4GB) 2133Mhz DDR3
GPU: Gigabyte Geforce GTX670 Overclocked, 2GB
PSU: Corsair HX650
HDD1: Samsung 830 Series 128GB SSD
HDD2: Samsung 830 Series 256GB SSD
Cooling (CPU): Cooler Master Hyper 212
Cooling (case): Nexus Real Silent White LED 120mm Case Fan x 4
Case: BitFenix Prodigy Mini-ITX (white) (http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=25_1171&products_id=20366)

Things to think about:

- Is 8GB of RAM still enough these days, or should I be considering 16GB?
- PSU powerful enough, and "future proof" enough? The cost vs wattage increase doesn't hold up well as it goes higher than 650, IMO.
- Will all this hardware physically fit into the smaller case? Heatsink? PSU? From what I've read all signs point to yes.
- Single GPU solution - will it be powerful enough to run games at max settings at 2560*1440, if I decide to go down the path of a new monitor (http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=221126199631&ssPageName=ADME:X:RTQ:AU:1123#ht_8413wt_1163)? Probably not all games, but I'll see how I go and maybe try out my friend's monitor on the machine before I buy one and do some tests. Can continue to run 1920*1200 in the mean time.
- This won't allow me to ever run SLI until I upgrade again entirely in a few years (new mboard and case at the very least). Am I OK with this? I suppose I can continue to upgrade the single GPU.

Decisions, decisions.

[Kraco]

I might end up building a new system soon as well, and the first thing I noticed when reading your post are the two Samsung SSDs. I intend to get those two as well, the smaller for system, the bigger for games. The CPU is the same as well, not that there were lots of realistic choices present at the moment. Different mobo, though, I'm considering ASUS P8Z77-V LE PLUS.

I'm looking at OCZ Fatal1ty Series 750W PSU, though. My current is 550W and I think 750W is the next logical step.

My current machine already has Antec KÜHLER H2O 620 closed water cooler for the CPU cooling and there's no way I'm ever going back to air cooling as long as CPUs require strong cooling.

I doubt I will go as high as you with the memory, though. Just 1600 with CL8 might be enough for me, although I still have to consider the options.

Edit: Maybe I should aim a bit higher with the memory as well, since it looks like a moderate price increase could buy speedier memory while still keeping CL under 10.

[Raven]

I've been reading a lot about RAM and it's apparent to me now that 1600 will be enough so I'm dropping it down a bit and saving some money.

I'm also going for an 80 plus PSU for more efficiency - looking at the OCZ ModXStream Pro 700W Modular.

This machine will hopefully be great for portability and going to LANs - the small light case with its carry handles and 2 SSD drives should make for an easy trip.

[Buffalobiian]

Are you going to have some other drive (network or external) for media storage?

It's not ideal to store GBs of movies on an SSD, and your set-up doesn't provide enough space for that anyway.

I might have gotten close to using 8GB of ram, but never over.

I'm not entirely sure how "future-proof" the PSU is.. but it'll be enough for now. Depends on how badly graphics cards suck up juice in the future. The capacitors do age in PSUs, and I remember something like up to 20% loss by around 5 years or something.

edit: I'm also highly skeptical about trying to run max settings at Super-HD resolutions.. but I can't tell you exactly. My own monitor is small.. and for better or worse that means my graphics cards last for ages. :P

[Raven]

I'll have a second PC (my current one) for storage that I'll stream over my network (for watchable media, at least). This new box will be primarily for gaming, and after checking my gaming habits over the last couple of years 256GB should be enough. If necessary I'll just have to be more diligent about uninstalling things I'm not playing, keeping backups, etc. but hopefully it won't come to that.

[Buffalobiian]

I meant your current set up not having enough for using the SSD as media drives, but as you've said if you're streaming across networks and stuff, the two SSDs would be enough for programs and games. Hell.. I've still got a bit of room left on my 240GB SSD and it's got all my programs on it. :)

[Kraco]

I've been reading a lot about RAM and it's apparent to me now that 1600 will be enough so I'm dropping it down a bit and saving some money.

That's interesting. Your first post made me think, against my initial gut feeling, that the speed gain might be significant after all, but if studying the issue brought you down to 1600, then I think I'll also stick to it. And only put a bit more money in to get the lower CL. I was always more of a memory latency person than a memory MHz person anyway. For no particular reason. Thanks for the heads-up!


I'm also going for an 80 plus PSU for more efficiency - looking at the OCZ ModXStream Pro 700W Modular.


ModXStream Pro 700W indeed seems to be 80+. I decided to get 80+ Bronze this time. My current Corsair PSU is 80+, and it makes sense for me to always go up in level. It's not like the Bronze certificate would increase the price that much, but it will mean slightly better components/optimization resulting in a few percents more efficiency (82% -> 85%).

[Xelbair]

my sound card is dieing(rear output for 5.1 audio isn't working) and its out of warranty and i can't decide which card should i get to replace it...
requirements:
Digital IN(optical, not coax) <- total must for me
Digital out(optical, not coax)
7.1 output

would be nice:
support for Front panel (http://apcmag.com/images/apc/news/Creative-Fatal1ty-ChampionSeries_p.jpg) from creative fatality champion series.

positioning of sound is more important than sound quality, but it would be nice if quality was great too.

I would get Xonar card... but not even of them one has digital in, out and 7.1 output...


also - my headphones are getting close to death too - i'll try to fix them but cable is broken in most annoying spot to fix..

[Buffalobiian]

The Xonar HDAV1.3, when paired with the accessory card, seems to have what you're after.

http://www.asus.com/Multimedia/Audio_Cards/Xonar_HDAV13_Deluxe/#specifications

It doesn't support the front panel though.

edit: It has a front-panel header for connection to front panels of PC cases. I don't know if the Creative front panel devices require anything extra in order to run. If they don't, then this card at the very least can provide input to the front header. I couldn't manage to find the manual to download from Creative so I can't actually see what the connection options look like.

Dolby Headphone DSP on that card will let you use virtual surround sound via stereo headphones too. I've used it with a pair of Audio-Technica AD900s, and performance was superb. (Those headphones, along with the cheaper AD700 are totally suited for competitive gaming under virtual surround. The large drivers have the best separation and positioning I've heard, and the lower emphasis on bass means footsteps and reload sounds are heard over explosions far more easily).

[Kraco]

also - my headphones are getting close to death too - i'll try to fix them but cable is broken in most annoying spot to fix..

I have switched the cable of my MBQuart headphones twice (the first replacement wire I bought turned out weird by starting to bleed green alien blood like liquid after a year, not funny). I had to pretty much completely disassemble the headphones, which is kind of annoying but also highly understandable. It's not like headphones would have too many parts anyway, though, so it's not such a big deal in the end.

[Xelbair]

if it was just dissasembling the headphones i would've done it already.

in the middle of the cable i have control for volume, mic mute, mic jax for xbox and few other things.
it connects to DAC(pretty meh one) via midi/ps2 connector, and it has 2 jack outs for headphones(mic and stereo)... and jack-ins are in rubber-like plastic shell(cone shaped 2cm*0,5cm base with 2 cm height)... cable broke 1mm into the plastic shell(no idea why - must've been faulty from beginning because i keep the cable on my desk).
checking out the card right now.

[Kraco]

Hah. Today I ordered the parts for my new machine, including the two SSDs. And today I read that Samsung will begin shipping new models, 840 series, of their SSDs from mid-October. Oh, well. It's not like the old 830 wasn't good enough for me.

[David75]

The 840 pro seems to be a beast. But the 830 has a very nice history, has great performance/reliability and is less expensive.

For lurkers, beware, the 840 "non" pro will probably be a bad SSD due to the new TLC nand Samsung plans to use.

So forget the 840, be sure you have a "840 pro" if you get a next gen Samsung SSD.

[Raven]

So who's good with case cooling and setting up fans? I'm pretty noobish. Advice?

My plan is to have 4 x 120mm:
-one intake at the front
-one exhaust at the rear
-one exhaust on the top panel
-one attached to the CPU heatsink

Currently looking at the Nexus Real Silent 120mm x 4, which runs at 1000RPM.

From what I've read at SPCR, it seems to be a reliable unit with a good balance of performance/cost. However I want to avoid powering any of the fans directly by the PSU molex connectors as I'll have no control over them. The CPU fan can be powered by the motherboard of course, and my chosen board has a slot for one other. But the other two will go uncontrolled.

So, I'm also looking at the BitFenix Recon fan control system to allow me to maintain the speed of each fan to find a balance between performance and noise.

Am I approaching this correctly?
Is this model of fan recommended for my setup?
Is the Recon overkill for my needs? I'm interested in making use of its temperature monitoring capabilities but I'd have to research how to set that up properly. I like the idea of manually setting each fan speed and monitoring the temperature all in the one place.

[Buffalobiian]

My plan is to have 4 x 120mm:
-one intake at the front
-one exhaust at the rear
-one exhaust on the top panel
-one attached to the CPU heatsink

that would work. Whether or not it's redundant is something you'll have to find out with trial error. According to SPCR, my Antec P182 doesn't actually benefit from having a 2nd exhaust at all. I'm also using Nexus 120mm fans.

Below is my setup just for reference, but I think you're aiming more for performance while I'm heavily biased towards low nosie:

-1x120mm Rear fan, 7v
-1x120mm CPU fan, 7v
-1x120mm GPU fan, controlled via fan controller and ramps up after a temp threshold is reached.
-1x80mm Nexus fan cooling the graphics card's VRM. I think they're at 7v.. or maybe 5v. I forgot this part.


Note that the nexus fans produce a soft clicking sound when mounted horizontally (as do all conventional sleeve bearing fans I believe). I wasn't blown away by their performance, and have wondered whether I want to give Noctua and Scythe fans a try in my next build. Things is.. I kinda went and bought these fans in bulk and still have like 5 sitting in my cupboard unopened, lol.


You sound like you want good airflow (my system runs REALLY hot, just within specs to not burn up pretty much), I'd definitely start with 1 front, and 1 back fan. Consider adding the extra fan if cooling isn't satisfactory. I remember reading that building a positive pressure (more intake fans) performs better than creating a negative pressure (more exhaust fans). What does the layout of your case look like?

I've got a Scythe Kaze fan controller of some description (I don't think it's sold by pccasegear anymore). I don't regret buying it. It doesn't get tweaked at all after the initial setup - where I set the minimum speed of the fan, along with the temperature threshold at which it should start spinning up. (currently only applied to my graphics card, though I should expect better cooling if I hooked every fan to it as well.)

And that's how it should work IMO. Everything should be automated after you set it and forget it. The option's still there if you like tweaking I guess.


Is the Recon overkill for my needs? I'm interested in making use of its temperature monitoring capabilities but I'd have to research how to set that up properly.

I'm going to assume that the Recon functions similarly to my own fan controller. Each dial is associated with a fan (each profile for yours I guess since it's all touch screen?), and each of those is also associated with a temperature sensor. The sensor is a metal strip attached to wires that will lead back to the controller. You use tape to secure the metal strip to something (heatsink, case etc).

When the temperature there heats up, the sensor will notice it and apply actions as per your profiles. I don't know if you can associate all fans with one single sensor, or if each fan must have their own. In my case, each fan must have their own sensor (I think).. which is why I didn't bother creating a mess with cables all over the place.

Once you physically stick the sensor on the heatsink, you'll need to fire up something like Furmark or Prime to see how the core temperature correlates with the measurements taken on the surface.

[Kraco]

You should use 140mm fans if possible, since they will move more air at lower rpm than 120mm. If I looked correctly at your case's specs, 140mm is possible. Although that means you'd need to leave unused the 120mm fans shipped with the case (why they included 120mm instead of 140mm in the first place is anybody's guess).

Another thing is that optimally you shouldn't have more exhaust than intake because otherwise the case will draw air in from all the holes instead of through the filters. You'll get more dust inside the case. The filter also hampers airflow, so it's not a simple 1-1 situation in any case.

I plan to start with two 140mm fans intake (though I might drop their voltages a bit) and one 140mm exhaust also driving the CPU cooler's radiator. I'll have to see how the temperatures react to that. Currently I have a top fan as well, but it really does wonders to make the machine more loud, so if it'd be nice to survive without it. Still, I plan to overclock, so who knows, I might need to put a low voltage 140mm top fan in the new system as well. It'll be Noctua. Noctua and Scythe are brands I trust, though especially Noctua is quite premium. The case comes with two Fractal's own 140mm, which I will leave in, though. At least their 120mm weren't too bad.

[Raven]

Thanks guys, good advice. Makes sense to have 140mm pushing more air at a lower speed. Yes Kraco, the case can take that size. I always planned to replace the stock case fans regardless.

So I want to blow in more air than is exhausted? Makes sense again. The reason I wanted the top exhaust in addition to rear is that my CPU heatsink will be very close to the roof of the case (just below where the top fan sits) so it seemed right to me to have something there directly above it to draw air, as well as behind it.

Noctua and Scythe are also my favoured brands, they're also quite expensive. In this particular instance someone recommended Nexus but I've never used them. It's probably worth it to put more money into this just for that guaranteed quality.

So with the temperature sensor, take the CPU for example, does it actually sit in-between the CPU and heatsink, or just near it? Never done it before, hence the reason for researching how to do it properly.

[Buffalobiian]

So with the temperature sensor, take the CPU for example, does it actually sit in-between the CPU and heatsink, or just near it? Never done it before, hence the reason for researching how to do it properly.

No, don't put anything in between the CPU and the heatsink (except thermal paste). The sensor (if you want to use the fan controller and not the mobo's CPU controller) can sit on a fin of the heatsink, or on top of the base like this:

http://imageshack.us/a/img198/1359/thermalrightvenomousxbl.jpg

I've never actually touched the base while the CPU is running, but I'm assuming that spot gets quite hot. ;)

For my GPU I've just put the sensor on a fin. Putting it closer to the heatpipe rather than further should let it detect changes in temperature more sensitively.

As for your comment about having two fans at the top to try to increase airflow of the CPU, the main reason it doesn't work on some cases is that the intake is bottlenecking the pull anyway.

What does work rather well for CPU cooling, is to have one of those fans being an intake fan, blowing fresh air directly over the CPU, while the other is the exhaust fan that takes the air straight out again. The compromise is that the air doesn't flow from one side of the case to the other.. so you'll have to think about how you'd want to cool any other parts such as the GPU or the RAM.

Depending on your GPU cooling system, that may or may not be a problem. Conventional cooling modules on GPUs that use the small, high RPM, noisy fans have the advantage of pushing hot air straight out the back, while generally "custom" cooling solutions that sit a huge heatsink and fan on top toss the air back into the case and are more reliant on good circulation.

[Raven]

Awesome Bill, thanks. I'll keep all that in mind.

My GPU doesn't have an exhaust, and will definitely circulate hot air back into the case so a good overall efficient airflow system is a must.

I've been reading today about different fan bearing types and now I'm leaning towards hyrdodyamic even though it'll cost more. Jeez there's waaaay more to this than I thought, I clearly had no idea about cooling in my last build. :confused:

[Raven]

This is starting to become more trouble than it's worth - it's really difficult to find a CPU heatsink that will fit, without crushing capacitors either with the heatsink itself or the backplate.

I'm starting to think about throwing in the towel and grabbing an H80 instead.

[Buffalobiian]

This is starting to become more trouble than it's worth - it's really difficult to find a CPU heatsink that will fit, without crushing capacitors either with the heatsink itself or the backplate.

I'm starting to think about throwing in the towel and grabbing an H80 instead.

I'm using an old 1156 i5 at the moment, but I have wondered at how the newer boards with all their heat dissipators and micro-fan modules would fit in with them. Is it really that hard to find a CPU cooler with enough clearance? Or is it the board that's particularly chunky?


edit: Just actually looked up your board.. didn't occur to me at first that you're building a mATX system. Guess that explains why.

[Raven]

Yep. Less surface area. Stuff is generally more cramped. It's the price you pay unfortunately.

I have to choose between sticking with this board and moving to water cooling, or getting an alternative Asus board and having a wider range of large heatsinks. The downside to the latter is that the Asus board is about $100 more expensive.

[Kraco]

The downside to the latter is that the Asus board is about $100 more expensive.

I don't think you'd be paying for air, though. But then again, like I said earlier, I think closed-circle water cooling is splendid, so don't make it sound like it's only a tragic conclusion you'd be facing.

[Raven]

Oh you're absolutely right Kraco, it's a great alternative, but it'll cost me and possibly send me over the limit of my budget. :)

[Raven]

I think I've settled on a build – quite a lot has changed since I last posted. I've been researching a hell of a lot.

CPU: Intel Core i5 3570K
Mobo: ASUS P8Z77-I-Deluxe
RAM: Corsair Vengeance 8GB 1600 low profile 1.35v
GPU: Asus Geforce GTX670 DirectCU II
PSU: Seasonic X-660 80Plus Gold 660W
HDD1: Samsung 830 Series 128GB SSD
HDD2: Samsung 830 Series 256GB SSD
Cooling (CPU): Noctua NH-C12P SE14
Cooling (case): BitFenix Spectre Pro 230mm, Scythe Gentle Typhoon 1850RPM x 2
Case: BitFenix Prodigy Mini-ITX (white)
Fan Controller: BitFenix Recon

What do you think? Apart from some sleeved extensions and some cable management I'm just about ready to put through an order.

[Kraco]

I have no experience with Seasonic PSU's, but since they seem no cheaper than OCZ or Corsair, I reckon they must be quality.

Scythe GT 1850rpm probably isn't the most silent thing ever, but I guess you are going to undervoltage it. Although even so it ought to be remembered that the high quality fans are almost without an expection optimized for their nominal rpm and thus they may produce more noise per moved air volume when rotating slower than a fan originally designed for the lower rpm. My only Scythe is the 1450rpm one driving the CPU cooler's radiator, and I like it very much. The new machine won't have even that, though. I wish Scythe made more 140mm models.

You should go forward unless you already have. I have been waiting for my parts (the case is the only thing I have so far) for a week now, and only today sorted out some mistake they had made with the memory - or at least I hope so. I think I picked the most airheaded clerk of the bunch to handle my order...

[Buffalobiian]

Yeah, that looks like a pretty neat build.

[Raven]

Yes, from everything I've read the Seasonic X-series are pure quality and I'm yet to read anything bad about them. It's expensive, just under double what I was originally going to pay, but I have been advised not to cheap out on two things: power and cooling. That's the reason I've gone for the Noctua CPU heatsink; again, about double what I was originally going to pay for a cheaper brand.

I do plan to undervoltage all my fans according to noise and performance. My fan controller should automatically turn them up at pre-set temperature limits, and if it gets too noisy I can manually adjust it down. I'll just have to wait and see how it goes. Like you said earlier Kraco: you can slow a faster fan if it's noisy but you can't speed up a slower fan. And oh yeah, I agree about Scythe making more 140mm models.

Here's a copy of my potential airflow setup, it's quite important to get this right in a case this size:

1359


230mm front intake
120mm rear intake
120mm top-rear outtake


The red box is where I envision the CPU heatsink to sit, pulling hot air up.

Although this might intake some of the PSU's ventilated heat at the rear of the case where it drifts up.

I could make the rear the outtake and the top-rear another intake. Hmmm. It will be an easier decision once I have the case and the fans all in front of me.

[Animeniax]

You should read up on airflow patterns in PC cases before deciding on a plan. I don't think it's recommended that you have two intakes opposing each other. From what I've read when I used to build PCs, you want a constant stream of airflow in one direction.

I think it was said earlier in the thread that you want more intake fans than outtake, which is also contrary to what I recall. Supposedly it's better to have more outtake fans to remove hot air from the case. Pulling in air doesn't do as much to cool the internals as removing the hot air does.

[Raven]

But if you're trying to suck more air out than is being pushed in, it will attempt to suck air in through every little orifice and it effectively becomes a dust magnet, a problem that exists in my current PC. It's trying to pull air that isn't there.

[Buffalobiian]

Although this might intake some of the PSU's ventilated heat at the rear of the case where it drifts up.

That should be minimal. Good quality, efficient PSUs these days barely have to spin during normal use, and the air blown out during load isn't anywhere close to hot (from memory).



I could make the rear the outtake and the top-rear another intake. Hmmm. It will be an easier decision once I have the case and the fans all in front of me.

Having a top-intake might drawn in more dust, but that's just myself thinking. It might not actually draw in any more than a rear exhaust would. At the same time, a top-intake might also extend the fan's life if it's a sleeve-bearing type. Mounting sleeve-bearings into top-blowing position stresses the fans since the blades plus gravity combine together into a downward vector, pulling the fan from the rest of the mount.

^ That's the theory anyway. All I've actually confirmed myself is that there's a clicking noise to be heard when I mount mine horizontally like that.

Regarding the airflow Raven, you can actually try that config without turning on one of the rear intake fans (with your fan controller) to see if the extra fan even has an effect, or even a counter-productive effect. Sometimes just having the vent open for air is enough to deal with any intake-bottlenecks without the potential to stall airflow like Ani was worried about.

[Kraco]

To be honest I find your planned configuration strange, just like Ani. I'm not saying it wouldn't work, because potentially it could be imagined the hot air will be pressed between the fans and then flow out upwards, but I reckon it will still kill off a portion of the airflow by having opposite directions. Besides, does the rear vent have a filter? From what I've seen of cases, the filters are in the front and bottom fan slots, rear and top being open for exhaust. If you draw air in with a fan without a filter, that's the real dust magnet.

Your front fan is humongous 230mm, so it should draw in lots of air in any case.

In my current setup I have two filtered front fans (in), one rear and top fan (out), plus the video card pushing out. I have virtually no dust getting in, even though I've I have had a habit of cleaning the machine with compressed air a few times a year just to be sure. Though my cooling is a bit overefficient at the moment, but I thought better that than an oven. Time will tell how the new machine will turn out since I will try it initially with two filtered front fans in and only one rear fan out.

[Buffalobiian]

Though my cooling is a bit overefficient at the moment, but I thought better that than an oven.

My oven is doing fine thank you very much. :D

[KrayZ33]

shouldn't a normal airflow look like this

f -----------------
r ////////^-->-->b
o ///////^/////// a
n ///////^/////// c
t --->--^/////// k
--------------------

everything else should only create weird circulations and hinder warm air from getting out

[Buffalobiian]

The traditional model is best for overall case cooling, but if you're looking at increasing cooling of something at the expense of something else (xpu cooling at the expense of ram, let's say), I would say "it doesn't hurt to try". That's particularly the case when chassis dynamics aren't reflected in the theoretical models (unseen blockages etc).

Arctic Cooling's website has a few diagrams that illustrate those concepts, from memory.

[Buffalobiian]

The traditional model is best for overall case cooling, but if you're looking at increasing cooling of something at the expense of something else (xpu cooling at the expense of ram, let's say), I would say "it doesn't hurt to try". That's particularly the case when chassis dynamics aren't reflected in the theoretical models (unseen blockages etc).

Arctic Cooling's website has a few diagrams that illustrate those concepts, from memory.

Said diagrams. Note that the VGA components are hybrid water-cooled blocks with radiators

http://img339.imageshack.us/img339/8527/accelerohybrid04.png



Talking about cases, 2 cases have caught my attention of late. The first is one that Kraco got recently, the Fractal R4 (http://www.fractal-design.com/?view=product&prod=99), and the second is the NA-DS1 (http://www.quietpc.com/na-ds1)

Both would be ideal if I was to build a computer right now. I wouldn't be able to use the chimney in the DS1 though since that's where I put my DAC and headphone amp. I'll need different furniture sets to do that.

[Kraco]

When I had a top fan in my previous case (in addition to the rear fan obviously), the temperatures were a solid few degrees lower when I put the top fan not in the middle like in those pics but near the back. Although since those pictures use some ancient case with the PSU not at the bottom but up there, I guess it's not relevant.


Talking about cases, 2 cases have caught my attention of late. The first is one that Kraco got recently, the Fractal R4 (http://www.fractal-design.com/?view=product&prod=99), and the second is the NA-DS1 (http://www.quietpc.com/na-ds1)

I also noticed the Nanoxia Deep Silence case the other day (although after I bought mine). It looks really interesting, and it costs only a little more than R4. If I had noticed it earlier, it could have been really tough for me to decide between the two.

[shinta|hikari]

I am looking for a good mechanical keyboard. It would be great if it is fairly cheap. Do you guys have any suggestions?

[Buffalobiian]

I am looking for a good mechanical keyboard. It would be great if it is fairly cheap. Do you guys have any suggestions?

I'm guessing you mean the older, "deep" ones?

I don't have any branded ones to recommend.. only that the older beige coloured ones were almost always nice to use.
The only thing I can say is to consider whether you'll find media keys and backlighting/wireless handy as features you're looking for.

[Kraco]

I have also been considering a mechanical keyboard, and likely my next keyboard will be such, although I'm finding hard time justifying getting one as long as this current bulk keyboard is working. However, cheap and mechanical is not a combination I'm so sure of. If you go to a store and test them, the noise they make is really spectacular. That's why I'd be likely to go not for the cheapest but the mid-range ones that can have some sort of noise dampening. Plus I'd choose switches without the intentional click sound.

I used to scoff at Bill's backlighting, but I have turned my coat on that subject and think it might actually be a useful feature. Lots of mechnical keyboards have no extra keys and the media keys, if present, are behind Fn. Of course there are exceptions like the Logitech G710+, which boasts a bunch of extra keys, like you'd expect from Logitech. Although to use the macro keys, you'd need Logitech's bloatware.

In short, I can't give you any suggestions, since I haven't been looking at the keyboards with the mind of an acute buyer. I have just read reviews here and there out of academic interest.

[Animeniax]

I researched mechanical keyboards a few months ago and came to the conclusion they weren't worth the price (cheapest decent one I could find was around $70). They tended to have average reviews, probably because the people reviewing them were the discerning tech crowd. Supposedly they help with reaction time via the feedback they offer, but I think that's questionable. The click-clack is a bit obnoxious, unless you wear headphones most of the time.

[Kraco]

Ho... The reviews I have read have been mostly very positive. Although I wouldn't be surprised if the reviews had been written by existing owners of mechanical keyboards, so they would have swallowed all the drawbacks a long time ago. I'm not much of a gamer, a competitive gamer even less, so reaction time differences would be a very marginal reason for me. But if you try a decent mechanical in a store, the feeling of the keyboard is clearly superior to the bulk rubber dome keyboards. I won't even mention the infernal flat keyboards normally used in laptops, but also sometimes sold separately for desktops for God knows what reason.

But yeah, I would definitely not buy the worst examples of the click-clack syndrome. It would drive me crazy.

[Animeniax]

Like I said, the type of people who would buy a mechanical keyboard and then post a review about it are a biased self-selected sample of the community, so you can't really rely on their reviews. You should read reviews of people who thought of the benefit to price ratio of a mechanical keyboard to the other keyboards.

When you say they are superior, how do you mean that? Do they feel better under your hands, do they allow you to type faster with more accuracy, does it provide quicker response in games?

[Kraco]

Tactile feeling, like they call it in those reviews. How it feels to press down a button and how easily you discern when it's pressed enough. Simply if the force needed for the press is just the right one. It does lead to increased accuracy and reaction times as well if the switches suit your tastes. I'm sure there are plenty of people who don't fall into that category, though. After all, there are people who insist on using a flat laptop style keyboard even with their desktops, so it's clearly a matter of personal differences. I don't write particularly fast and definitely not using all of my fingers, so my writing speed would only be affected by lessened need to correct errors.

I'm not really an elitist and I was in the benning dubious when I started to read about mechanical keyboards, especially since there was a period of several years when they weren't even made at all (for casual consumer market, anyway) and thus people used ancient IBM keyboards that used to be mechanical. That sounded like pure idiocy. But when I happened to notice some keyboards on display in a store and tried them out of curiosity, I immediately realised it's not all empty talk and nerdy bias. But yeah, I wouldn't recommend them unless you have a chance to test them somewhere. They are expensive for dust collectors.

[Buffalobiian]

Mechanical keyboards type the best. The key travel makes the biggest difference as it leads to increased feedback to your fingers/brain to tell you you actually pressed something. I've also found the gentle curve (vertical curve) of the keyboard with differing, staggered heights for each row of keys to be more ergonomical. Slanting a flat keyboard isn't quite the same.

The keys you find on older, thick notebooks aren't bad. They've got less travel, bit it's enough. My biggest problem with those is that due to their large, flat keys my fingers can get caught on the corners as I drift from one key to the next (doesn't happen with the more elevated, pyramidal-shaped mechanical keys).

The there's the mac-style, tiled keys. They're flat and thin. If you need portability/low profile, go for it. I see no real reason otherwise.

While differences exist and it's always good to use what's the most comfortable, I personally don't differentiate between the first two categories much (though I will try tp avoid the 3rd for a desktop keyboard). Even though I'm a touch typist, I hardly think at my max typing speed.

Talking about comfort, I did move to type-2 due to their lower noise output. The space-bar sounding like a cash register at 3am isn't a nice.

[oyabun]

When speaking about brands, which of them should I go with? This is the first time I'm gonna buy a mech keyboard and I can't really decide what to choose. On a personal note, I want a silent mech keyboard although that can be waive depending on the overall look and feature of the keyboard. I only know one silent type which is the Razer Ultimate silent edition. But I'm not sure if it has an extra USB and audio port on the side like the Razer Black Widow 2013 ultimate edition. Are there anymore Silent type mechs?

[Xelbair]

So i finally built my new machine.

Radeon Sapphire HD7970
I7 k3770
16GB ram DDR3 1600MHz
128 SSD drive - samsung 840 pro
2TB drive + old 1TB drive
Asus Maximus V Formula motherboard
Coolermaster Silencio 650 chassis

I've built the machine on monday, installed all soft on next day, and started cleaning my old one for my father.. then yesterday i've finished installing stuff on older one.

Photos(sorry for crappy quality, but i've only had my cellphone at hand):
1487
inside the chassis - i've moved the cable running above the video card to the back of the chassis so it looks more clean.

1488

1489
PC placed under the desk - i've spent 2h fighting with cables to make it look like this..

[Kraco]

inside the chassis - i've moved the cable running above the video card to the back of the chassis so it looks more clean.

You should move as many cables as possible to the cable space in the back. Not only it makes the inside look cleaner, but it also helps wirh the airflow. I put also my HDs with the cables facing the other way.

I don't know if your case is similar to mine in the way that you could remove completely that upper HD cage, only leaving the smaller, lower one in place. Since you don't have too many HDs in, if that's a possibility, you should go for it. I did that, and I bet it helps the airflow immensely.

Very cool machine judging by the components in any case. It ought to serve you long.

[Buffalobiian]

I am most impressed by the long powerboard at the back of the desk. :p

I don't happen to have one of those, so I've got 4 powerboards linked up instead.

I agree with Kraco, if you can squeeze your HDDs into that lower bay and completely remove the top rack it'll give you more room to play with. Nice choice of components, and happy gaming. ;)

[LaZie]

Just upgraded my PC from an AMD Phenom II 965 BE @ 4.0 GHz to an i5 3570k @ 4.4 GHz coupled with a new mobo and 8gb DDR3 ram and it is leaps and bounds faster than my previous computer.

[Kraco]

Just upgraded my PC from an AMD Phenom II 965 BE @ 4.0 GHz to an i5 3570k @ 4.4 GHz coupled with a new mobo and 8gb DDR3 ram and it is leaps and bounds faster than my previous computer.

A new mobo, you say? I guess it could have been a bit hard to jam the Intel CPU into the AMD socket, so it was probably a good choice to change the mobo.

I never ended up overclocking my 3570k, even though I got the "k" version so that I could. But my case hasn't got enough cooling to really allow much in the way of generating extra heat. I reckon I'd need to add another exhaust fan (I only have one at the moment, slowed down by the CPU water cooler's radiator to boot), and right now I value less noise over more GHz. Not that I'd need the extra speed anyway. In games my GPU is the bottleneck, no doubt, and the rare video encoding I do wouldn't justify anything.

[LaZie]

Managed to get my 3570k up to 4.7GHz @ 1.21v. Max it hit when priming was 78c. I think I'll stop there as it shouldn't hit that high when gaming. Unless I decide to "delid", it was worth the upgrade.

[Buffalobiian]

Managed to get my 3570k up to 4.7GHz @ 1.21v. Max it hit when priming was 78c. I think I'll stop there as it shouldn't hit that high when gaming. Unless I decide to "delid", it was worth the upgrade.

I find that my temps are highest when I run both prime AND a video-card benchmark so that every heat-producing component in my tower is fired up. The CPU's temps are at least 10C higher than when prime is running alone. My set-up is ultra-low noise and minimal ventilation though with the graphics card dumping hot air into the chassis instead of outside it, so it may not impact on yours that much.

[Animeniax]

I have an ATI 6970 (6950 unlocked). Does anyone know if the Geforce GTX 770 is enough of a performance difference to be worth the upgrade? I typically upgrade every 2-3 years and it's been that long since I installed the 6970. I'd like to be able to play Metro Last Light in all its glory so a new vidcard would go towards that.

[Kraco]

I have an ATI 6970 (6950 unlocked). Does anyone know if the Geforce GTX 770 is enough of a performance difference to be worth the upgrade? I typically upgrade every 2-3 years and it's been that long since I installed the 6970. I'd like to be able to play Metro Last Light in all its glory so a new vidcard would go towards that.

It's consistently twice as powerful as 6970, so yeah, it leaves 6970 to eat the dust. It ought to run any game at max settings (provided the game itself doesn't have issues not related to video cards, which Last Light might have).

GTX 770 is apparently a factory tweaked GTX 680 with just a little more power.

My info is from Guru3D. Obviously you should check it or your preferred site before jumping to conclusions based only on what I said. Not to mention it's quite an expensive card, yet still not from the upcoming generation technology wise.

[Animeniax]

It's consistently twice as powerful as 6970, so yeah, it leaves 6970 to eat the dust. It ought to run any game at max settings (provided the game itself doesn't have issues not related to video cards, which Last Light might have).I went with the GTX770 on my new i7-4770 system.

On my older system I installed a Corsair H110 on my i7-930 (long backstory, but it was either that or spend another $50 for another cooler, so might as well use the H110 since I can't return it). I removed the cooling block to replace the stock TIM with some MX-4.

Since then, my system wouldn't resume from sleep and the power supply would do this weird cycling thing where it powered on then off twice before the system would boot, and I'd get an error that the overclock settings failed and needed to be reapplied in the BIOS. I cleaned off and reapplied the TIM and tried some other things, same problem. Then I checked the pins on the socket on the motherboard and found that some of the pins were bent and touching each other. I used a piece of index card and a small screwdriver to bend the pins back into place (a pain in the ass, need a magnifying glass and a very small screwdriver). Now it boots normally and everything works fine. Cooling performance of the H110 on the i7-930 is nothing special, worse than the Xigmatek Dark Knight II I had on there before. It's also not much quieter since you have two fans on the radiator instead of the one fan on the HSF.

Lesson is to be careful when installing/removing the CPU from the socket, as you can easily bend the pins and ruin the motherboard or get weird behavior from your PC.

[Buffalobiian]

Since you've had both an aftermarket air cooler as well as the pre-packaged water cooler (aka Corsair H110), what can you say about the noise of the pump, Ani?

[Animeniax]

No noise from the pump, though with the 6 other system fans it's hard to tell. One of the fans in particular is old and makes a lot of noise and the PSU fan isn't quiet either. I need to replace the noisy fan and the PSU.

The thing with AIO pre-packaged water coolers (from what I've read and experienced) is that their performance isn't going to be better than a high-end HSF. Like I said, the Dark Knight II did a better job of cooling my oc'd i7-930. If I could do it over, I'd have bought a second DKII instead of the H110 and gotten better cooling and saved $60.

[Kraco]

If the case has super cooling otherwise, the difference might indeed not exist or even be negative. But if the case has less cooling, then the fact the water cooler pushes the heat right out of the case ought to make a difference. At least according to my own experience. I have the same water cooler model in my current build that I also had in my previous build, although the CPU is different. The case isn't much different, basically just a slightly updated model. However, the previous build had all the fans from my pre-water cooler days, whereas this current one has reduced fans. There are no heat problems, which I largely credit to the water cooling not leaving the CPU's heat hanging inside the case.

As we all know, Bill likes to bake bread inside his computer case (that is, keep is as hot as the components can stand), so I could see water cooling being an option. At the same time I have to note that you should choose the cooler carefully, because they do produce distinct sound. Unfortunately, I guess due to liquid circulating inside a closed loop (unless you build a real custom water cooling), the noise can be uneven and most of all it varies between the individual coolers. So, when you get your cooler, if luck favours you, it might be very nicely silent, but if you haven't sacrificed enough at Fortuna's altar, you might get one with strange extra noise. My luck wasn't perfect. But then again, I didn't even study the models of different manufacturers too much, which probably was a mistake.

[Animeniax]

Yeah that's the main reason I went with a pre-packaged AIO cooler instead of buying each part separately for a custom water cooling setup. I really didn't want to do all the research for which pump is most reliable and quiet, which fans have the best noise to cfm ratio, which radiator/tubes/fittings to use. I'm not that serious into overclocking (my 2.8 930 is running at 4.0).

[Buffalobiian]

The Samsung Evo SSDs became available through an online retailer here, and damn they're cheap. Inside myself I have a small voice shouting "Damn it!" since I bought a 840pro not too long ago, but overall I don't regret it since I didn't know. Cheaper SSDs is also a good sign for my future purchases, though I sure hope it won't have to be soon.

[Animeniax]

I installed a Samsung 840Pro on my newest build, it's the best component of a system that includes an i7-4770 and GX770 4GB. System boots to login screen in 20 seconds and fully into desktop at 35 seconds.

[TwisT]

I got a Corsair Force GT Series 3 120 GB over a year ago and it's been working awesome. And i only have Sata-300. But i have been thinking of getting a OCZ Revodrive 3 PCI-E x4 SSD 120 GB. A guy said he booted up Win 7 in 7 seconds. Any of you have any experience with PCI-E SSDs? Would it be worth the 3x price to get the speed upgrade? Or should i just keep with my Force GT and wait for when i upgrade CPU and MB so i get Sata-600?

[Animeniax]

7 seconds from power on to Windows? Or 7 seconds from POST completion to Windows? Considering the pricing is lower than SATA SSD drives, I'm surprised at the performance. Is it because of modularity/flexibility of the standalone SATA drives?

[Kraco]

When I turn on my computer, I bet I need to look at the bios info screens for longer than 7 seconds... After that Win7 boots and all the programs launch so fast even with my older generation Samsung 830 that I wouldn't really need anything more. Waste of money, I'd say, for a home computer. Some enterprise solutions would of course be a different story. If the 120GB is your only SSD, you should, instead of the fancy PCIe thing, get another, bigger regular SSD so that all of your games and such would also run from SSD. That Samsung EVO would probably be a perfect and cheap solution for a secondary SSD. I wouldn't personally use it as the primary disk of my desktop, although in my laptop it would do, considering the laptop sees far less use.

[Buffalobiian]

Considering the pricing is lower than SATA SSD drives, I'm surprised at the performance. Is it because of modularity/flexibility of the standalone SATA drives?

Where are you getting these prices? Of the old-gen OCZ PCI-E cards, or their latest ones? Their latest ones are around 3x more expensive than a SATA drive of comparable storage size, like Twist said.


I got a Corsair Force GT Series 3 120 GB over a year ago and it's been working awesome. And i only have Sata-300. But i have been thinking of getting a OCZ Revodrive 3 PCI-E x4 SSD 120 GB. A guy said he booted up Win 7 in 7 seconds. Any of you have any experience with PCI-E SSDs? Would it be worth the 3x price to get the speed upgrade? Or should i just keep with my Force GT and wait for when i upgrade CPU and MB so i get Sata-600?

Not all motherboards support booting from a PCI-E storage device. You'll have to check if yours allows it first. Do you do a lot of heavy file transferring with your drive, or does it benefit mostly from the snappiness and IOP?

If you do use the drive for lots of large file transfers (sequential reads/writes), then you'll benefit from SATA3 upgrade later since it'll raise your cap from around 250MB/s to 500+.

If you're after snappiness (IOP and random writes), there is a theoretical upgrade there going from SATA2 to SATA3 as well, but I don't think you'll notice it much. It won't wow you.


My opinion is the same as Kraco's. With the money I'd look for a larger SSD to put more things on, rather than having something really (but marginally noticeably) fast.

@Kraco: Have you tried to make your BIOS load faster by skipping RAM checks and all? You can also skip the windows logo screen, because by default that icon stays on screen for a certain amount of time, even if your computer is ready for the next step. I used to keep the RAM-checks on, but it has never found a problem anyway, so I ended up getting rid of it for a faster boot. It doesn't matter either way since I use sleep a lot, and when I did have a ram problem back a year ago, the RAM check didn't pick up anything anyway.

edit: Just timed my own boot.

00.00 - pressed button, black screen
15.23 - black screen shows white words from BIOS
24.73 - the words "Starting Windows" is shown on the screen (W7).
45.80 - Start Bar appeared

[Kraco]

@Kraco: Have you tried to make your BIOS load faster by skipping RAM checks and all? You can also skip the windows logo screen, because by default that icon stays on screen for a certain amount of time, even if your computer is ready for the next step. I used to keep the RAM-checks on, but it has never found a problem anyway, so I ended up getting rid of it for a faster boot. It doesn't matter either way since I use sleep a lot, and when I did have a ram problem back a year ago, the RAM check didn't pick up anything anyway.

Hmm... The Windows logo has such a minimum time? Although even the default time can't be that long since it shortened considerably after moving from HDD to SSD. I might have a look at that, and disabling some bios stuff at some point (I'm not sure I even have the RAM check on, though. It might be UEFI bios simply is slower). However, as it is now, the loading is already fast enough, after all the HDD years, that ever since I built this new machine I haven't actually felt like I was waiting for the computer to boot. Even the reboots of updating video card drivers don't feel like much.

[Animeniax]

Where are you getting these prices? Of the old-gen OCZ PCI-E cards, or their latest ones? Their latest ones are around 3x more expensive than a SATA drive of comparable storage size, like Twist said.

edit: Just timed my own boot.

00.00 - pressed button, black screen
15.23 - black screen shows white words from BIOS
24.73 - the words "Starting Windows" is shown on the screen (W7).
45.80 - Start Bar appeared

Yeah I think I was seeing prices for older model Revos. The Revodrive 3 is ridiculously expensive. I'm surprised they cost so much more than a regular SSD. Definitely not worth it in my book.

You have an 840Pro and it takes 45.8 seconds to just get the taskbar in Windows? Must be an older gen 840 because that seems slow. My 35 second full boot on an 840Pro includes a Windows password.

edit: I just timed boot on my i7-930 with OWC Electra 6GB SSD:
30 seconds to Starting Windows (includes entering a 6 character system password)
45 seconds to login screen, followed by entering my Windows password
60 seconds fully booted

[Buffalobiian]

Yeah I think I was seeing prices for older model Revos. The Revodrive 3 is ridiculously expensive. I'm surprised they cost so much more than a regular SSD. Definitely not worth it in my book.

You have an 840Pro and it takes 45.8 seconds to fully boot to Windows? Must be an older gen 840 because that seems slow. My 35 second full boot includes a Windows password.

I'm under the impression that it's rather new stock. The model number is MZ-7PD256BW (http://www.samsung.com/us/support/owners/product/MZ-7PD256BW). How long does it take for the screen to go from black to words when you boot? I suspect that the long wait time on mine is either due to the BIOS/mobo, or it's due to the the fact that the mobo is waiting for all the HDDs to spin up, which includes two 5.4Krpm drives. The boot drive is on my intel 510 SSD, so there may be some variances there as well.

I'm not at all worried about it either way though. I use sleep all the time, and reboot when the prompts to do so annoy me enough. By far the biggest slow-down in my system is Comodo Internet Security. The HIPS behaviour blocker gets stuck in a loop sometimes when it tries to think about whether or not to flag an unknown process as questionable.


The Windows logo has such a minimum time? Although even the default time can't be that long since it shortened considerably after moving from HDD to SSD.

I think my ultrabook said something about that, but this site also mentions it (http://techsplurge.com/3384/decrease-pc-boot-time-upto-50/). It's only 2-5 seconds, if they're credible.

edit after reading Ani's edit: hmm.. we're about even then. I've skipped the ram check in mine, mind you. Scanning 12GB of ram does take a while longer.

edit2: nvm, just saw that it's a different system you tested, heh. Maybe I should swap my boot drives around then...

edit3: eh, ultimately it won't matter since both drives contain programs that are necessary for running anyway. The samsung does seem to have a lower write endurance compared to the intel however, and it also has encryption... so it may still be the ideal drive to run the OS off, if you discount reliability being an issue.

[Animeniax]

I'll have to wait until I'm at work to time my 840Pro again. If you're booting from the Intel SSD then that explains why it's slower. I guess you reserve the 840Pro for applications and games? If so, then having a slower boot time on the Intel SSD is worth it. Also, my 840Pro is 128GB, but I doubt that matters vs the 256GB model.

[Buffalobiian]

I'll have to wait until I'm at work to time my 840Pro again. If you're booting from the Intel SSD then that explains why it's slower. I guess you reserve the 840Pro for applications and games? If so, then having a slower boot time on the Intel SSD is worth it. Also, my 840Pro is 128GB, but I doubt that matters vs the 256GB model.

The intel has the OS, documents, pictures and a handful of programs. The 840pro has a majority of the programs and nearly all the games. BF3 is the only one on the Intel.

Booting isn't affected by 128/256 models. Their only real difference is in the sequential write:

Seq. read: 530/540MB/s
Seq. write: 390/520MB/s
Ran. read: 97K/100K IOPs
Ran. write: 90K/90K IOPs

These are max SATAIII stats, so my SATAII machine would benchmark differently. I don't expect to see much of a practical difference in boot time even if all other variables were controlled however.

[Animeniax]

I still rely on a regular HDD for storage but OS and all applications are on the SSD. I do have to uninstall games to free up space, but it's not like I'll ever play those games again and I can always just dl them from Steam/Origin/uPlay.

Just tested it again and it's like clockwork, 20 secs to Windows logon screen and 35 to full desktop (Spotify and RealTemp are the only apps that load on startup).

[Kraco]

Just tested it again and it's like clockwork, 20 secs to Windows logon screen and 35 to full desktop (Spotify and RealTemp are the only apps that load on startup).

From pressing the power button 35 secs to full desktop for me a well. That is, the mouse icon isn't anymore indicating loading and the probably slowest part, F-Secure virus scanner/firewall is loaded as well. I tried to type in my rather short password as fast as I could for this measurement. So, without the password prompt my currently single profile setting would obvious be a few seconds faster still.

I should note that my clock was already around 17 secs when the Windows logo finally deigned to appear. So, I reckon tweaking bios settings might make a big difference. For some reason I see the bios advertising itself two times when the machine boots, with a brief black screen between, a behavior I always assumed to be related to uefi somehow.

[Archangel]

Would this work for a good pc screen?

http://www.samsung.com/uk/support/model/LS24EMDKU/EN

[Archangel]

PCPartPicker part list (http://pcpartpicker.com/p/25BUM) / Price breakdown by merchant (http://pcpartpicker.com/p/25BUM/by_merchant/) / Benchmarks (http://pcpartpicker.com/p/25BUM/benchmarks/)

CPU: AMD Athlon II X4 750K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor (http://pcpartpicker.com/part/amd-cpu-ad750kwohjbox) ($80.97 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: ASRock FM2A85X Extreme6 ATX FM2 Motherboard (http://pcpartpicker.com/part/asrock-motherboard-fm2a85xextreme6) ($110.98 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: Kingston HyperX Blu 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (http://pcpartpicker.com/part/kingston-memory-khx1600c9ad3b1k22g) ($25.00)
Memory: Kingston HyperX Blu 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (http://pcpartpicker.com/part/kingston-memory-khx1600c9ad3b1k22g) ($25.00)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (http://pcpartpicker.com/part/seagate-internal-hard-drive-st1000dm003) ($59.98 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 650 Ti 1GB Video Card (http://pcpartpicker.com/part/msi-video-card-n650ti1gd5v1) ($129.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Corsair 200R ATX Mid Tower Case (http://pcpartpicker.com/part/corsair-case-200r) ($59.99 @ Microcenter)
Power Supply: SeaSonic S12II 430W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (http://pcpartpicker.com/part/seasonic-power-supply-s12ii430b) ($69.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $561.89
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-11-20 16:07 EST-0500)

Thoughts?

[Kraco]

I didn't even know they still sell Athlon II's... But I guess they are cheap. Much cheaper than your mobo of choice, it seems.

You should go for 2x4 memory, though. I won't say much about the other stuff. The CPU is going to be pretty weak, so the GPU is probably a good match. And you might not be upgrading it with that PSU anyway.

I can't help but wonder about the free shipping to your country if you order from the USA. Not to mention you might end up paying tolls and VATs since it's from outside of the EU. Be sure to find out how the warranty works as well.

[Animeniax]

Depends on what you are building this system for. How much is everything with shipping (to Portugal?), and could you find the same parts for around the same price from the same vendor?

[Archangel]

You guys are assholes >_>

[darkshadow]

Bunch of weird outdated shit.


You're welcome (http://pcpartpicker.com/p/25IR6)

[Animeniax]

You guys are assholes >_>

Nah, I've just never priced out a budget system before. At that point you should just get a laptop.

[Kraco]

DS's suggestion certainly looks a whole lot better, and I'd have nothing to add to it, save perhaps the fact I prefer pairs of memory modules for the dual-channel functionality. Although tests have shown it matters far less in practice than in theory, so you'd lose or gain very little, whichever way you went.

[Archangel]

You're welcome (http://pcpartpicker.com/p/25IR6)

Thank you


Nah, I've just never priced out a budget system before. At that point you should just get a laptop.

For all the little i get about this stuff you still manage to be dumber.

[Animeniax]

For all the little i get about this stuff you still manage to be dumber.

You probably get a kick out of telling your doctor, "doc, I don't get much about this medical stuff, but heart surgery for my coronary heart disease sounds dumb."

You never answered the question about the purpose of this PC, which goes a long way to deciding what parts it should have.

[Archangel]

How does this build look?

Caixa
Nox NX200
Fonte
1Life 600W 120MM
Motherboard
Asus M5A97 EVO R 2.0
Processador
AMD FX 6300 3.5GHZ Six Core
Memória
DDR3 8GB 1600Mhz
Disco
1TB 7200Rpm
Placa Gráfica
Asus Radeon HD7770 1GB DDR5
Drive
DVD+/-RW Caixa
Nox NX200
Fonte
1Life 600W 120MM
Motherboard
Asus M5A97 EVO R 2.0
Processador
AMD FX 6300 3.5GHZ Six Core
Memória
DDR3 8GB 1600Mhz
Disco
1TB 7200Rpm
Placa Gráfica
Asus Radeon HD7770 1GB DDR5

Around 500 euros

[Edort4]

Hey guys Im thinking about getting an update for my pc, mostly for gaming, streaming and surfing the net. Here is what I have been thinking to get:

i5 4670k
Asrock z87 extreme4
2x4gb g.skill ripjaws ddr3 1600 cl7
395€.

Im not too much onto extreme OC, looking for some soft tweaking, but I leave the door open (I have and old scythe ninja 2 with 2 extra fans). Also I have an old GPU HD 4870 that I plan on upgrading on jan-feb 2014. I have been reading that AMD CPUs may be better for next generation games what do you think about that?

[Archangel]

Here's my build by the way

http://i.imgur.com/uvKLNKo.png

[Edort4]

Why take the 1333Mhz ram one? 1600 is a bit faster (can be oc to 1700 without much effort). Also is the 8 gb only 1 module? are you planning on upgrading? I read that getting 2 modules is better cause most mobos have dual channel access that grant some performance improvement even if its marginal (1-2%) unless you are using an APU wich supposedly makes a huge difference.

[Buffalobiian]

What's the default MHz that matches up with a CPU's bus speed these days anyway? Or is that not a thing anymore?

I got my 1333MHz ram in 2009 because my computer only used that amount of throughput anyway (last time I checked). Higher ram would have only been useful if I wanted to increase the bus to gain higher clocks on the CPU.

[David75]

I'm about to change my late 2008 laptop for an Ativ 9+ from Samsung.
The only fear I have is with the ethernet adapter.
There are no precise description of what it is exactly.
My guess is that it's some kind of external network card. From what somebody told me, there are 11 pins. I know mhd is 11 pins too, but maybe it's different. After all that detail only tells me this is not a passive adapter and only increases doubt.

Why is that important?
Well, I need a laptop to program some automatons. Said machines use protocols like tftp, netbios and other ways of communications all included in the standard network protocols. Thing is, since these protocols are seldomly used, I always fear some smart guys at Samsung decides to slash those protocols because he can save 10s of work and 1ct every 100 dongle...
Maybe I should try to create an account at newegg and post my question there.

But I might be lucky and have some help here ;)

Thanks

[Kraco]

Why don't you ask Samsung itself? I bet they have a good office in a country as big as France. Asian companies in general are notorious for arrogance and bad customer service, but since you would be contacting people in France, it might make all the difference. Assuming they would know or get the answer from their headquarters. But I reckon they would have more luck than you contacting Koreans directly.


Here's my build by the way

Guru3D (the site I mainly browse for hardware news and excellent reviews) recommends 550W PSU minimum for 7870. For 7850 it would have been the 500W minimum. It will still work, of course, but you might not be anymore within the PSU's most efficient operation area (where it's that 80+ bronze).

[Buffalobiian]

I'm about to change my late 2008 laptop for an Ativ 9+ from Samsung.
The only fear I have is with the ethernet adapter.
There are no precise description of what it is exactly.
My guess is that it's some kind of external network card. From what somebody told me, there are 11 pins. I know mhd is 11 pins too, but maybe it's different. After all that detail only tells me this is not a passive adapter and only increases doubt.

Why is that important?
Well, I need a laptop to program some automatons. Said machines use protocols like tftp, netbios and other ways of communications all included in the standard network protocols. Thing is, since these protocols are seldomly used, I always fear some smart guys at Samsung decides to slash those protocols because he can save 10s of work and 1ct every 100 dongle...
Maybe I should try to create an account at newegg and post my question there.

But I might be lucky and have some help here ;)

Thanks

I've got an NP900 notebook with that sort of adapter. I'm not sure what it is, but if I can perform some sort of test that will give you an answer, let me know.

[David75]

@Kraco:
When I wrote that, I had already contacted samsung's french hotline. The questions and hotline process was so awkward with so many inconsistencies, unability to properly understand my question and failing to come with the right SKUs that I could get nothing useful out of the answer... I did try ;) Now I know my question is a little unreasonable since the product is so young.
I'm just a little mad at all those reviewers that do not think a dongle adapter is worth a little note stating whether it is fully compatible or not... I could take that these are mere infomercials.

@Buff
Well, I've had a chat with customer who's got one and tried to take pics and follow my lead for some tests. It's nice because it seems ok, but since his technical level was average, I can't be 100% sure.

The more I write about it, the less I think it's a good choice in the end.
I'll try my luck and go to the Samsung Store we've got in Paris. Lucky as I am, they won't have their flagship yet... We're in a country were smartphones for demo at stores do not even have a working wifi connexion available....

Thanks guys!

[Janice]

I ordered a GTX 780ti yesterday. Been wanting this particular one and managed to catch it in stock: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814487003

BF4 ultra at 2560x1440 will be awesome :)

[Buffalobiian]

I ordered a GTX 780ti yesterday. Been wanting this particular one and managed to catch it in stock: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814487003

BF4 ultra at 2560x1440 will be awesome :)

Ah, nice. I have to run BF4 on medium without ambient occlusion(?), but with high texture quality and filtering at 1280x1024 (my default resolution, currently sporting a HD5870). I was thinking about getting a Geforce 670 with the Asus DirectCUII cooler for quietness, but was also fearing that my CPU (i5 760) would bottleneck it all anyway, so I'm saying to myself that I'll make do with my rig for one more year before giving it a more complete upgrade.

[Animeniax]

I ordered a GTX 780ti yesterday. Been wanting this particular one and managed to catch it in stock: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814487003

BF4 ultra at 2560x1440 will be awesome :)

Wow, did you save up for it or did you find some extra money in the budget? That's a pricey card. I've got the GTX 770 4GB and BF4 plays great with high settings. Bit of regret since I got it 3.5 months before the price drop, so I didn't qualify for the EVGA trade-up program.

Question: does anyone know if having a second monitor connected while playing fullscreen on your main monitor causes framerate drop and weakened gpu performance? That used to be the case with older cards, but I don't know if it still applies to the newer gen cards.

[Janice]

Nah I just happen to have a lot of disposable income. The second monitor shouldn't cause any difference. I've had two for the past 3 years with no issue.

[Animeniax]

Nah I just happen to have a lot of disposable income. The second monitor shouldn't cause any difference. I've had two for the past 3 years with no issue.

Well it's not a critical issue, but previously it did reduce performance (framerate) of your GPU. Considering we buy nice powerful cards for the best quality possible, it would be silly to lose some of that simply because you have two monitors connected when you only play games on one screen.

[Buffalobiian]

Well it's not a critical issue, but previously it did reduce performance (framerate) of your GPU. Considering we buy nice powerful cards for the best quality possible, it would be silly to lose some of that simply because you have two monitors connected when you only play games on one screen.

What framerates are you getting anyway? If it's higher than your monitor refresh rate then it doesn't matter.

[Janice]

The power required to simply display a desktop on a second monitor isnt enough to cause a drop in fps.

[Kraco]

Naturally it also depends on what you are playing, even if you used both screens for the game. Or even three screens. Not all games are such resources hogs, though I don't know what your favourite game types are, Janice and Ani. I have never had more than a single screen, so I haven't tried them myself with any game, but I have some more serious gamers as friends and they play games on multi-screen with lesser cards than a monster like GTX 780 Ti.

[Janice]

Got my QNIX q2710 from Amazon yesterday. It's one of the cheap Korean brands that uses imperfect high quality panels. Paid a little extra to ensure no dead pixels. It's perfect aside from some back light bleed that is expected with these panels. 27 inches @ 2560x1440 is pretty awesome. I overclocked the refresh rate from 60 to 96hz. Gaming with vsync on at 96hz is SO smooth! I didn't realize the difference it would make. I get some red horizontal lines at 120hz but I suspect that's due to the cheap DVI cable that came with the monitor. Very impressed for $350. It has no OSD and zero features except for brightness control but you can still load custom color profiles through some hacks.

Still waiting on my 780ti. Newegg is being slow as shit. :(

[Animeniax]

Got my QNIX q2710 from Amazon yesterday. It's one of the cheap Korean brands that uses imperfect high quality panels. Paid a little extra to ensure no dead pixels. It's perfect aside from some back light bleed that is expected with these panels. 27 inches @ 2560x1440 is pretty awesome. I overclocked the refresh rate from 60 to 96hz. Gaming with vsync on at 96hz is SO smooth! I didn't realize the difference it would make. I get some red horizontal lines at 120hz but I suspect that's due to the cheap DVI cable that came with the monitor. Very impressed for $350. It has no OSD and zero features except for brightness control but you can still load custom color profiles through some hacks.

Still waiting on my 780ti. Newegg is being slow as shit. :(

Very nice choice. I'm been considering getting one of these inexpensive Korean made monitors with an S-IPS panel, the Yamakasi Catleap in 27". The Qnix has some very positive reviews on Amazon. Good to know eBay isn't the only place to get one of these cheap.

[Janice]

Stick with the ones you can force a higher refresh rate on. I don't think the Catleaps can be overclocked.

[Buffalobiian]

I've got:

i5 760 - stock clocks at 2.8GHz
ASUS - P55-LE mobo
2x4GB ram @1600MHz
4gb ram @ 1333MHz (all currently running at 1333?)
HD5870

I game at 1280x1024 at the moment, and I don't foresee upgrading that any time soon.

Should I bother upgrading to a GTX 670? I can get one for around 250$ I think (used). The only thing I'm worried about is that the CPU is the limiting factor (besides potentially the limited 1GB VRAM on the 5870), which would make my GPU upgrade a waste of money.

I've been thinking about overclocking it for some time now, but I don't think I have the cooling capacity for it. My HR-01 Plus runs it quietly but also hotly. Cleaning and reseating the cooler might help since I don't think I did a proper job last time, but I don't think it's going to make a world of difference.

edit: FYI, with my current setup, BF4 runs with the CPU at near-full capacity. VRAM is also always sitting at around 930MB or more usage. Frame rates on medium setting are between 90 and 30. It fluctuates, which leads me to think that it's either because its CPU limited, or because of texture swapping in and out of the video card.

[Kraco]

In my opinion a used GTX670 for 250$ isn't an awesome deal, even if not horrible either. How much does R9 280X go for in your parts? R9 280X offers probably the best price-power ratio of video cards at the moment, so it's a good reference point. In any case, keep in mind that GTX670 is hardly any beast anymore, so think carefully if you wouldn't rather add a little more money to the sum and get a modern card instead, so that it will still be jolly good when you upgrade the CPU, mobo, and memory later.

[Buffalobiian]

In my opinion a used GTX670 for 250$ isn't an awesome deal, even if not horrible either. How much does R9 280X go for in your parts?


400AUD or so for the most basic models. It goes higher for the premium ones.

That's the noisy one that I commented on I think. I had my eye on the Asus DCII GTX670 because it's really quiet (load noise is only 16dbA). That said, I suppose I'm only interested in idle noise, so I can always do something about that via driver/software.

[Kraco]

400AUD or so for the most basic models. It goes higher for the premium ones.

That's the noisy one that I commented on I think. I had my eye on the Asus DCII GTX670 because it's really quiet (load noise is only 16dbA). That said, I suppose I'm only interested in idle noise, so I can always do something about that via driver/software.

I failed to realise you are of course talking about AUD, not USD. Ignore my earlier reply.

[shinta|hikari]

Can someone build me the best PC for gaming and graphics I can get with only a 700-800 dollar budget? No monitor needed. I'm shipping within the US.

[Animeniax]

If I was going to build a budget gaming system:

i5-4570 $200
MSI Z87-G45 $145 (-10)
EVGA SuperClocked 760 w/ACX $250
Corsair HX650 $120 (-20)
Corsair Vengeance 8GB RAM $87
Corsair 200R $60 (-10)
----------------------------------------------
$862 (-40)
$822

The negatives are current gift card rebates at Newegg.

[Buffalobiian]

Do you need HDD/SSD/Optical drive/Operating system?

Animeniax's build doesn't include those.

[darkshadow]

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/2XEtx
$868,93 ($837,91 after rebates)
remove the HDD to bring that even further down to $786,94 ($748,93); which kinda allows up to upgrade to a 770 (http://pcpartpicker.com/p/2XELV) and still be at $866,94 ($833,92)
You're welcome.

[Animeniax]

Do you need HDD/SSD/Optical drive/Operating system?

Animeniax's build doesn't include those.

Oh yeah forgot about the HDD. Add a WD Black 1TB for $80. Hopefully he can reuse the OS key from his current system.

The two items from ds's list are also available from Newegg without the shipping cost, making them slightly cheaper than ordering from Superbiiz.

[Kraco]

Do you need HDD/SSD/Optical drive/Operating system?

Animeniax's build doesn't include those.

If he has an older build he could cannibalise, he should use the OS, PSU, and case from it, if possible, in addition to the optical drive and possibly memory. All the saved money could be put to raise the level of the video card. I wouldn't personally anymore run a machine without an SSD, I recently replaced the HDD of my laptop with one as well, but in the end one can still run games from an HDD if there's a decent video card, but an SSD won't help if the video card is lousy.

[Animeniax]

From what I've seen, the GTX 760 2GB is the best price:performance GPU available right now, so it wouldn't be worth it to spend any more on that component. I'd spend more on an SSD as you recommended, but the WD Black 1TB is fine for a gaming PC. Or maybe upgrade the CPU to a K series and get a nice cooler to overclock it.

[Edort4]

If you ask me it would depend in a few things. If you want a "cheap" gaming pc not thinking about upgrading anytime soon (one use only pc like) I would go with amd 8350 FX instead of intel. The performance is lower but the price is way much lower. Obviously that chip is at the end of his life so its a non upgradeable config. Mobo + chip is a dead end.

If you want something for the future (I mean doubling ram and new graphics in a 3 years span) I would go 4670 but its quite expensive. So might want to go back to a 3350p that its still very capable at a way lower price. 3350p is probably the best price/performance chip.

CPU comparison:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-cpu-review-overclock,3106-6.html

The ssd is a pleasure to use but wont get you almost any FPS. I have a samsung evo and I coudlnt imagine my life without it but it didnt grant me any performace boost on gaming and even if its 256gb it could get full with games really fast. Lately they are becoming very fat.

About graphics, I think Ani is right, gtx 760 is the best choice right now (thanks to bitcoin) but if you in some kind of miracle find an r9 270x 2gb for less than 220$ I would go for that one. And if you need a cheap solution go for 260x

Graphic comparision:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-graphics-card-review,3107-8.html

[Kraco]

The ssd is a pleasure to use but wont get you almost any FPS. I have a samsung evo and I coudlnt imagine my life without it but it didnt grant me any performace boost on gaming and even if its 256gb it could get full with games really fast. Lately they are becoming very fat.

If it's a game that needs to load stuff during the gameplay, then there's a very clear performance boost. Instead of waiting for half a minute you wait for five seconds. But if you only play games that load a map and then you play the same limited map for an hour, I guess it's not such an issue (until you get used to SSDs, anyway, and wouldn't want to wait even once an hour).

But for now a gaming PC with a budget less than 1000 dollars is hard pressed to include an SSD. Getting a subpar video card is a tragic mistake, though. You can always add an SSD later with absolutely nothing lost, but if you get a lousy video card first and then upgrade later, the first one will be wasted money that could have been used to get a decent one to begin with. Yeah, I've been there myself.

[Edort4]

If it's a game that needs to load stuff during the gameplay, then there's a very clear performance boost. Instead of waiting for half a minute you wait for five seconds. But if you only play games that load a map and then you play the same limited map for an hour, I guess it's not such an issue (until you get used to SSDs, anyway, and wouldn't want to wait even once an hour).

But for now a gaming PC with a budget less than 1000 dollars is hard pressed to include an SSD. Getting a subpar video card is a tragic mistake, though. You can always add an SSD later with absolutely nothing lost, but if you get a lousy video card first and then upgrade later, the first one will be wasted money that could have been used to get a decent one to begin with. Yeah, I've been there myself.

Yep thats true it helps with loading times. Although the only game that I clearly noticed difference with is Skyrim. If you are doing lots of fast travel+location changes it saves years of loading screens. If you have the money go for it hands down. But I would put the ssd as the cherry on the cake.

And yeah getting a lousy card could be fatal, but getting an overpriced card could be even worse. It depends completely on the person and budget but I always try to chose the best performance per $ + good performance (only choosing performance per $ can get you a 30$ card). Lately things in the graphic cards world have slowed down. The performance increase in each new generation has decreased, not really sure if its because of a tech ceilling or the effect of having game consoles guiding the gaming market now.

Anyway top tier cards dont even double the performance of medium-low tier ones when we are talking about 3x 4x 5x price difference. This means that todays 1000$ card is probably gonna be surpassed by the 3 years from now 250$ card.

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/high_end_gpus.html

Also the future seems to be quite unstable. Lots of new APIs and new DirectX versions on the corner of the street. Dont know if things are going to speed up but right now I wouldnt look for a graphic to last longer than 3-4 years.

[Buffalobiian]

AMD card pricings are interesting, since they've actually gone up from launch now I think thanks to the Mantle hype I gather. As far as SSDs go, all games load faster pretty much for me. Battlefield 4 loads under 20 seconds instead of 2 minutes.

I agree that it gets full fast, I just ran out of space on there and had to back up a whole bunch of games that I've downloaded but not yet played onto the HDD for retrieval later on.

PS: just bought a second hand Asus DC2 GTX670 for 250AUD here with 22months or so of warranty left. First time buying a 2nd hand graphics card so I'll see how it works out for me.

[Edort4]

AMD card pricings are interesting, since they've actually gone up from launch now I think thanks to the Mantle hype I gather. As far as SSDs go, all games load faster pretty much for me. Battlefield 4 loads under 20 seconds instead of 2 minutes.

Actually is mostly because of this:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/geforce-gtx-750-ti-review,3750-17.html

I never trusted 2 hand products. It some kind of phobia. Tell us how it works for you cause I was thinking about upgrading my card cause its making 4 years in may. Cant even play directx 11 :(.

[shinta|hikari]

I actually gave up on buying a PC for now. Lots of new VNs are getting translated, and those uh, don't require good hardware.

[Kraco]

And yeah getting a lousy card could be fatal, but getting an overpriced card could be even worse. It depends completely on the person and budget but I always try to chose the best performance per $ + good performance (only choosing performance per $ can get you a 30$ card). Lately things in the graphic cards world have slowed down. The performance increase in each new generation has decreased, not really sure if its because of a tech ceilling or the effect of having game consoles guiding the gaming market now.

Yeah, the suggestions given by a couple of people in this thread had probably the best possible card for the price range Shinta gave, but it was still a good chunk of the total, leaving little extra when the CPU was also counted in. To go down from that in order to add an SSD would have been fatal. Without the SSD there was just the right amount of budget to get a good card.


I actually gave up on buying a PC for now. Lots of new VNs are getting translated, and those uh, don't require good hardware.

Come on, man, after all the trouble people (other than me) went through to look for the parts for you! I was looking forward to seeing you post a list totally different from the suggestions, haha.

[Animeniax]

I think if you just upgraded one or two components you could have a much better experience than what you are running now. Either a newer videocard ($200-250) or an SSD ($150-250) and your machine could run much faster. These two components can be upgraded without additional expense of upgrading other parts, and they can be reused with future upgrades to the CPU/motherboard in most cases.

[Buffalobiian]

http://i.imgur.com/hI6FBU0.jpg

The Alienware Graphics Amplifier: Finally, desktop quality graphics on your laptop


The Alienware 13 laptop — announced this morning — will go down in history as the first ever laptop allowed into the vaulted, blustery, and mythical halls of True PC Gaming. While the laptop itself is just an upgraded version of the Alienware 14, it has a new peripheral that will blow your mind: the Alienware Graphics Amplifier, an external enclosure that allows you to attach a full-length desktop graphics card — such as the Nvidia GTX 980 or Radeon HD R9 295X2 — to your laptop. The price of desktop-like performance on your laptop, though, is steep: The Amplifier itself, without a graphics card, is $300 — and, sadly, it (currently) only works with the Alienware 13 laptop.

http://www.extremetech.com/computing/193000-the-alienware-graphics-amplifier-finally-desktop-quality-graphics-on-your-laptop

-------------------------






Hopefully a standard gets developed for this technology. It's been in the talks for a while, but this is the first commercial product with the appropriate amount of bandwidth I think. I wouldn't even need to buy extra graphics cards - I'd just stick my hand-me-downs from either my desktop or from other people's into this.

[Kraco]

I have seen stupider things, but can't immediately name any.

[Buffalobiian]

I have seen stupider things, but can't immediately name any.

What? This is exactly what's needed to make laptops beefy enough to use as a primary gaming PC. I can work and travel with a laptop, then when I get home I can just plug this guy in and play games properly. No need to own multiple sets of computers just so I can travel with one and game with the other.

It fixed the other problem with laptops in that they're not very upgradable.

[Animeniax]

I think it's a great idea, except that it only works with that one model of laptop and it's very pricey.

[Kraco]

then when I get home I can just plug this guy in and play games properly.

You plug this in, plug a real keyboard in, plug a gaming mouse in, plug some external storage in because the laptop SSD probably doesn't have them all, plug a bigger screen in, plug some sound system in... Between all that plugging in, you'd already be playing with your desktop PC. Not to mention the laptop CPU still won't be as good as a desktop CPU, likely the laptop memory neither.

I suppose for somebody who travels a lot and only occasionally wants to play heavier games this might work, assuming he wants to haul around one of those gaming laptops. It's a vast oversimplification to say the only good thing about a desktop PC would be the video card.

[Buffalobiian]

Laptop CPUs can be quite adequate, and with up to 8GB ram from what I've seen I'm not too worried there. I'd be happy with the laptop keyboard and screen, and mSATA SSDs are in the order of 1TB now anyway.

The only thing I'll need is a mouse, some headphones (or to plug the laptop into a sound system via SPDIF) and the above graphics adjunct.

I don't actually want ^ that laptop, which is why I'm hoping for it to become a standard so I can use it with the laptop of my choosing.

[Edort4]

I can see it as a renewal for someone who has a good overall laptop but wich graphics have become obsolete. You can buy this + the card and still keep going for a few years, but I believe that its too expensive to be a value choice. Appart from that only case (or someone that lives in 3 or more different places) I really think its stupid to get this.

If you really are a gamer and have money get a true laptop like the aorus X series that will do the work for 4 years easily.

[Buffalobiian]

The GTX960 with 4GB vram is about $30-40 more than the 2GB version. The 4GB GTX970 is about $70-80 more than the 4GB GTX960. I guess I'll wait until the next gen architecture comes out since there aren't any games I really want to play that my 770 can't handle.

One thing this current generation does very well is being efficient with power, so you can run 2-way-SLI with these cards on something like a 700W PSU quite comfortably.. maybe even less.

[Buffalobiian]

A few toys have joined me since the last update:

Eizo FG2421 (Monitor): 120hz is nice. VA colours are nice. 5000:1 static contrast is nice. Motion-blur reduction is nice. Shit's so fluid.

What's not so nice? Being a VA panel, some colour transitions are crazy slow. Black-to-near-black takes some 44ms, even though the average is something much lower in the single digits. That this ultimately means is that some materials can be disappointing to look at with this monitor. Anime is one such medium because everything is outlined with black lines - making any sort of panning pixel lag very evident. The monitor has very good contrast, but the reds are wrong. There's also some stepping errors in dark colours can can resemble blocking. This monitor also dislikes anything other than 120Hz input. (60fps is fine under 120Hz, but 60Hz looks like shit.. so consoles don't look that amazing on it).

Would I recommend it? You'd have to know what you're getting into. It's a niche in that it's a 120Hz VA panel. There are now some 120Hz+ IPS screens out there that are good alternatives. You won't get the nice deep blacks though. Not OLED nice, but it's as good as you can get to that from LCD.





Nvidia GTX970 (graphics card): Nice card. That's all. There's some coil whine, but otherwise it's very quiet. This is the Asus Strix model so 0db (ie fan off) at <60C core temp means minimal idle noise.





Zowie FK1 (mouse): 1000Hz feels smooth on this mouse. I tried 500Hz for a few days because the polling rate may be more stable on some computers but it feels like shit. It's not so much the 1ms vs 2ms difference I think. The mouse just behaves differently. Lift-off-distance of 1.5-1.8mm is pretty great in that your cursor/aim doesn't move while you reposition your mouse. The downside is that the mouse is a bit more picky about the type of mousemat you use. I've heard the steelseries Qck series works, and I'm using a Perixx pad without any real trouble.

edit: oh, and said mouse pad too I guess. It's black. It's 90cm. It works.

[Animeniax]

A few toys have joined me since the last update:

Eizo FG2421 (Monitor): 120hz is nice. VA colours are nice. 5000:1 static contrast is nice. Motion-blur reduction is nice. Shit's so fluid.

What's not so nice? Being a VA panel, some colour transitions are crazy slow. Black-to-near-black takes some 44ms, even though the average is something much lower in the single digits. That this ultimately means is that some materials can be disappointing to look at with this monitor. Anime is one such medium because everything is outlined with black lines - making any sort of panning pixel lag very evident. The monitor has very good contrast, but the reds are wrong. There's also some stepping errors in dark colours can can resemble blocking. This monitor also dislikes anything other than 120Hz input. (60fps is fine under 120Hz, but 60Hz looks like shit.. so consoles don't look that amazing on it).

Would I recommend it? You'd have to know what you're getting into. It's a niche in that it's a 120Hz VA panel. There are now some 120Hz+ IPS screens out there that are good alternatives. You won't get the nice deep blacks though. Not OLED nice, but it's as good as you can get to that from LCD.





Nvidia GTX970 (graphics card): Nice card. That's all. There's some coil whine, but otherwise it's very quiet. This is the Asus Strix model so 0db (ie fan off) at <60C core temp means minimal idle noise.





Zowie FK1 (mouse): 1000Hz feels smooth on this mouse. I tried 500Hz for a few days because the polling rate may be more stable on some computers but it feels like shit. It's not so much the 1ms vs 2ms difference I think. The mouse just behaves differently. Lift-off-distance of 1.5-1.8mm is pretty great in that your cursor/aim doesn't move while you reposition your mouse. The downside is that the mouse is a bit more picky about the type of mousemat you use. I've heard the steelseries Qck series works, and I'm using a Perixx pad without any real trouble.

edit: oh, and said mouse pad too I guess. It's black. It's 90cm. It works.

I've been waiting to purchase a GTX970 for about 6 months now, thinking the next gen would arrive and make my $300 purchase a waste of money, same as what happened when I got the GTX770-4GB. From what I'm reading the next gen will come out mid 2016 but blow away the current generation in some performance benchmarks. What GPU did you upgrade from?

[Buffalobiian]

I upgraded from a GTX670 because it broke for 3D games. 2D applications still worked, but that's no good.

The next gen had some stuff that was really advanced that had to do with AI and learning, but I wasn't sure that it translated to rendering performance.

[Kraco]

Maxwell's lack of async computing is crippling it what comes to wholesome dx12 games. Now some say Nvidia is sweating blood to try to fix it for Pascal (but since nobody knows anything about Pascal and Nvidia has been free to steal AMD's open secrets for years, I kind of doubt the situation would be bad for them). That would then leave Maxwell to get outdated in record speed (they might anyway since the next GPU generation will shift to 14nm technology and likely better memory). But naturally at this very moment Maxwells of 970 and above are beasts with the current dx11 games. They will likely play many first dx12 games just fine, but who knows how it will be in the future. In any case it's a huge bother for developers that Maxwells suck at parallel processing when dx12 is all about parallelism.

I'm no expert, though. I'm merely repeating what I have read much wiser people writing. The bottom line is that I wouldn't buy right now an Nvidia GPU (unless the price was too good to resist). A year ago when 970 appeared it would have been a different story. This is merely my opinion, naturally, nothing more.

[Animeniax]

Woohoo, Newegg has the highest end GTX 970 for $280 (plus a $10 discount offer I got via email). $270 for the GTX 970 4GB SSC GAMING w/ACX 2.0+. What a bargain!

Also comes with a coupon for Rainbow 6 Siege or Assassin's Creed Syndicate, neither of which I care to play. If anyone wants the code let me know, first come, first served.

[Kraco]

Woohoo, Newegg has the highest end GTX 970 for $280 (plus a $10 discount offer I got via email). $270 for the GTX 970 4GB SSC GAMING w/ACX 2.0+. What a bargain!

Also comes with a coupon for Rainbow 6 Siege or Assassin's Creed Syndicate, neither of which I care to play. If anyone wants the code let me know, first come, first served.

Haha. Despite what I wrote up there, if such an offer appeared over here, I would probably go for it. Only 270 dollars for 970 is just crazy.

[Animeniax]

Haha. Despite what I wrote up there, if such an offer appeared over here, I would probably go for it. Only 270 dollars for 970 is just crazy.

It makes me worry that the prices will drop across the board for the Maxwell cards, but even so most places still have this card for $315+ so it's a significant savings. I wasn't really in the market for one but with Fallout 4 and SW Battlefront coming out next month, decided I might as well. Now I need to upgrade the CPU and mainboard and I'll be set.

[Edort4]

Holy... thats a crazy price. I havent seen the msi below 325$. Only some zotec at 290$. Amazing buy there. Dunno whats going on with those cards in EU they are selling at 340€ (375$).

[Buffalobiian]

Please forward me AC Syndicate :)