Another tech assistance thread: Upgrading my PC

[hazabaza1]

Let's skip the long stories and get right to the point.

Right now I've got a fairly decent PC, but I'm looking to get an upgrade, particularly in the processor part.

Right now I'm sitting on these specs (Basically copy pasting from DxDiag so I might miss a fair amount of info):
GTX 670
Intel Core 2 Quad CPU Q8400 2.66 GHz
8 gig ram
P5Q DELUXE motherboard
And a shitty 250gb harddrive because the one I was using broke.

At first I only wanted a procesor upgrade, but after I spoke to my more tech oriented cousin it seems like to get a good processor I would need a better motherboard, and the Ram I've got is fairly outdated and won't work with most modern motherboards. So I figure while I've got the cash I'd try and get some new parts. What I want is you smarty-smart people to tell me if this stuff is good for general vidjagame playing and the occasional video render (but that's not quite as important).

Here's the list of what I'm looking to get on Amazon. If it looks good I'll probably scope around for cheaper prices. [http://www.amazon.co.uk/registry/wishlist/2XFSBYL9Q3O6V/ref=cm_wl_sb_o?reveal=unpurchased&filter=148&sort=date-added&layout=standard&x=7&y=6]

So, good? Bad? Catastrophic? Amazing? Would everything fit together? I'm really bad at this whole computer thingy so any input would really be appreciated.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

You've got a big problem there. You've got a got socket 1150 (Haswell) motherboard and a socket 1155 (Ivy Bridge) CPU.

My advice would be to get a socket 1155 motherboard and possibly get an i5 3570K over the i7. For desktops Haswell offers very little over Ivy Bridge and unless you're planning on doing a lot of stuff that's more processor intensive than gaming you're wasting money with an i7... also, the i5 3570K overclocks like a dream.

 

[Griffolion]

-snip-

May I recommend [a href="http://www.scan.co.uk/products/gigabyte-ga-z77mx-d3h-intel-z77-s-1155-ddr3-sata-6gb-s-sata-raid-pcie-30-d-sub-dvi-hdmi-micro-atx"]this motherboard[/a]. You're only using one graphics card, so you're not going to need a full ATX board. Saves money. Your choice of ASRock is not good, they are not a good board manufacturer.

Put this [a href="http://www.scan.co.uk/products/29-4intel-core-i5-3570k-s-1155-ivy-bridge-quad-core-34ghz-5-gt-s-dmi-650mhz-gpu-6mb-smart-cache-34x-"]processor in it[/a]. You're primarily a gamer, and not doing much in the way of Adobe or 3D modelling things. Therefore you don't need the hyperthreading that the I7's give. Saves you money, but also gives you the ability to OC.

I can't recommend a SSD that small. You'll fill it in no time, trust me. Try [a href="http://www.scan.co.uk/products/120gb-samsung-840-basic-25-ssd-7mm-3-core-mdx-toggle-nand-read-530mb-s-write-130mb-s-256mb-cache-85k"]this one[/a]. It's got a nice bit of storage and is nice and cheap. It will serve you well, for just Windows, drivers, AV, etc. Games, and everything else, can go on the 1TB

Seagate drives have better MTBF's than Western Digital ones. [a href="http://www.scan.co.uk/products/1tb-seagate-st1000dm003-barracuda-720014-sata-6gb-s-7200rpm-64mb-cache-8ms-ncq-oem"]Try this[/a].

Ivy Bridge has good thermal details. You won't need a huge cooler to OC. Also, you may run into problems with a cooler of that size hitting the cooling fins on your RAM sticks. Personal experience. [a href="http://www.scan.co.uk/products/titan-skalli-ttc-nc05tz-npw(rb)-100mm-pwm-fan-hdt-cpu-cooler-(1156-1366-775-am2-am3)"]Have a look at this cooler[/a]. [a href="http://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/titan_skalli/5.htm"]Reviews say[/a] it can hang with the big boys, even for such a small cooler. Don't worry about it not listing socket 1155 as supported. 1155 is identical to 1156. Any cooler that support 1156 can also go into a 1155 without a problem. I should know, I've got a 1156 cooler on my Ivy Bridge board.


Lastly, please tell me what your power supply is like. You haven't mentioned it, which is worrying. How old is it? What wattage is it? What brand is it?

I am currently in the process of updating my PC Building for Beginners guide. When I re-publish it, I'll link it to you.

 

[hazabaza1]

-snip-

May I recommend [a href="http://www.scan.co.uk/products/gigabyte-ga-z77mx-d3h-intel-z77-s-1155-ddr3-sata-6gb-s-sata-raid-pcie-30-d-sub-dvi-hdmi-micro-atx"]this motherboard[/a]. You're only using one graphics card, so you're not going to need a full ATX board. Saves money. Your choice of ASRock is not good, they are not a good board manufacturer.

Put this [a href="http://www.scan.co.uk/products/29-4intel-core-i5-3570k-s-1155-ivy-bridge-quad-core-34ghz-5-gt-s-dmi-650mhz-gpu-6mb-smart-cache-34x-"]processor in it[/a]. You're primarily a gamer, and not doing much in the way of Adobe or 3D modelling things. Therefore you don't need the hyperthreading that the I7's give. Saves you money, but also gives you the ability to OC.

I can't recommend a SSD that small. You'll fill it in no time, trust me. Try [a href="http://www.scan.co.uk/products/120gb-samsung-840-basic-25-ssd-7mm-3-core-mdx-toggle-nand-read-530mb-s-write-130mb-s-256mb-cache-85k"]this one[/a]. It's got a nice bit of storage and is nice and cheap. It will serve you well, for just Windows, drivers, AV, etc. Games, and everything else, can go on the 1TB

Seagate drives have better MTBF's than Western Digital ones. [a href="http://www.scan.co.uk/products/1tb-seagate-st1000dm003-barracuda-720014-sata-6gb-s-7200rpm-64mb-cache-8ms-ncq-oem"]Try this[/a].

Ivy Bridge has good thermal details. You won't need a huge cooler to OC. Also, you may run into problems with a cooler of that size hitting the cooling fins on your RAM sticks. Personal experience. [a href="http://www.scan.co.uk/products/titan-skalli-ttc-nc05tz-npw(rb)-100mm-pwm-fan-hdt-cpu-cooler-(1156-1366-775-am2-am3)"]Have a look at this cooler[/a]. [a href="http://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/titan_skalli/5.htm"]Reviews say[/a] it can hang with the big boys, even for such a small cooler. Don't worry about it not listing socket 1155 as supported. 1155 is identical to 1156. Any cooler that support 1156 can also go into a 1155 without a problem. I should know, I've got a 1156 cooler on my Ivy Bridge board.


Lastly, please tell me what your power supply is like. You haven't mentioned it, which is worrying. How old is it? What wattage is it? What brand is it?

I am currently in the process of updating my PC Building for Beginners guide. When I re-publish it, I'll link it to you.

Well damn, that's a lot of info, thanks.

Power supply is Corsair TX750 [http://www.ebuyer.com/257233-corsair-tx-750w-v2-psu-80plus-bronze-certified-cmpsu-750txv2uk]. The current build is less than a year old and the supply was recent around that time so (even though I still know basically nothing about computers) I think it could probably do. Hopefully.

 

[Griffolion]

-snip-

Glad I could help. That's good. You've got a Corsair PSU (the best there is), it's only a year old, and it's well above your power requirements. I have no worries there, then. Feel free to make these upgrades at any time.

 

[SnowyGamester]

Personally I'd go for Haswell since while it only offers a slight advantage over Ivy Bridge at the same time it is only slightly more expensive. Honestly I'd recommend more or less exactly what you have on your initial parts list, replacing the incompatible processor of course, probably with an i5 4670 (because i7s are disproportionally expensive compared to i5s, at least from a gaming performance standpoint), or alternatively the 4670K if you're interested in overclocking, cutting out the third-party cooler if not since the included cooler will more than suffice at stock speeds. Nothing wrong with your SSD size either since you needn't put much other than your operating system on it.

Nothing wrong with ASRock either. They're certainly somewhat of a budget manufacturer but there's nothing wrong with their build quality. I'm actually currently running what is essentially the H77 equivalent of that board you listed and it hasn't given me a bit of trouble.

 

[eBusiness]

Snip.

Quick note, the chosen motherboard is equipped with an H87 chipset, for overclocking you would on top of a K model processor need a motherboard with a Z87 chipset.

 

[Laughing Man]

My advice would be to get a socket 1155 motherboard and possibly get an i5 3570K over the i7. For desktops Haswell offers very little over Ivy Bridge and unless you're planning on doing a lot of stuff that's more processor intensive than gaming you're wasting money with an i7... also, the i5 3570K overclocks like a dream.

This, stick with Ivybridge for now, the third gen chips have resolved the bugs that the early chips have and the K series are some good overclockers especially the 3570K. The new Haswell chips have already hit a few issues, they have a bug that disables USB ports when the system is placed in to sleep, this has already been confirmed as being unresolvable at software level and will require a new stepping on the chip to fix, they are also running in to a heat issues and a few power issues with the chip itself being a worse overclockers, using more power under certain circumstances and running hotter than the Ivybridges that came before not only that the K series chips, the ones that are sold as OC friendly cost more and have limited functionality compared to their no K brethen.

Only issue is that 1150 is on Intels roadmap and I think 1155 is going to be phased out, you're a bit stuck you could wait for Maxwell and see how that pans out, you could wait for the 2nd Gen Haswells to hit or you could go with Ivybridge but you really need to upgrade that CPU cause a Q8400 is going to be bottlenecking that 670 pretty badly.

I planned on going Haswell but after seeing the issues with it I fell back to Ivybridge, luckily I am running a watercooled I5 750 so I have serious head room for overclocking and have decided to wait.

Depending on what games you're running I would go Ivybridge, if you can wait I would wait until the 2nd gen Haswells show up and see what they offer.