Gaming PC

[KuwaSanjuro]

Okay Escapists, I've previously posted about a buying a Gaming PC, so I have begun considering building my own, seeing its my first time I feel it might be a better experience and also cheaper. So far these are the specs I've got:

AMD Phenom II x4 965 AM3
Gigabyte AM3 AMD880G SB710 4xDDR3 Raid Dolby mATX Motherboard
8GB (2x4GB) PC3-10600 1333MHz DDR3 Memory
Seagate Barracuda 1TB SATA 6GB Hard Drive
Asus ATI Radeon HD6870 1GB GDDR5 (PCI-E) Graphics Card
600Watt PSU 120mm Red Fan
Samsung SH-5222L/BEBE 22x DVD-Rewritable

Okay so I also have a case picked out for consideration, but any recommendations based on the specs would be greatly appreaciated for a case. But I wanted to ask do these specs seem right, is there anything that won't work together, obviously I am hoping to be able to play most recent games, I always for some reason use StarCraft 2 as a benchmark, so about that. Also is there anything else that I need?. Thank you very much Escapists.

 

[Fooz]

thats pretty much my setup except i have an i5-760 that has been overclocked to 4.0GHz and i have a 650W PSU plus a different motherboard, but it looks like a good setup man, mine runs games such as Metro 2033, Batman Arkhum Asylum, Crysis all at max settings with no problems whatsoever so yours should be able to play games the same as mine

as for a case, i got a boring old black one because i didnt have the funds for a pimping case, if you have more money then i suggest getting a cool case, as thats what you will be seeing next to your monitor (i don't know where to start with cases as there are loads of cool ones but i know Xigamatek make good cases)

 

[KuwaSanjuro]

Thanks, now I know don't need anything else and all. Can't wait to become a member of the Glorious PC Master Race. I think I may get a cheap but good looking case nothing extreme.

 

[Kabutos]

Drop down to 4GB of RAM and switch the HDD to a Spinpoint F3.

EDIT: Also you can save some money by dropping down to a 6850 without too much of a performance hit.

 

[MrTub]

I would recommend buying Sandy bridge cpu or wait for bulldozer

(for Sandy bridge cpu you need a 1155 socket mobo)

 

[KuwaSanjuro]

thats pretty much my setup except i have an i5-760 that has been overclocked to 4.0GHz and i have a 650W PSU plus a different motherboard, but it looks like a good setup man, mine runs games such as Metro 2033, Batman Arkhum Asylum, Crysis all at max settings with no problems whatsoever so yours should be able to play games the same as mine

as for a case, i got a boring old black one because i didnt have the funds for a pimping case, if you have more money then i suggest getting a cool case, as thats what you will be seeing next to your monitor (i don't know where to start with cases as there are loads of cool ones but i know Xigamatek make good cases)

I'm thinking bout changing the processor to a Intel Core 17 950 do you think I would have to change any other parts.

 

[MrTub]

thats pretty much my setup except i have an i5-760 that has been overclocked to 4.0GHz and i have a 650W PSU plus a different motherboard, but it looks like a good setup man, mine runs games such as Metro 2033, Batman Arkhum Asylum, Crysis all at max settings with no problems whatsoever so yours should be able to play games the same as mine

as for a case, i got a boring old black one because i didnt have the funds for a pimping case, if you have more money then i suggest getting a cool case, as thats what you will be seeing next to your monitor (i don't know where to start with cases as there are loads of cool ones but i know Xigamatek make good cases)

I'm thinking bout changing the processor to a Intel Core 17 950 do you think I would have to change any other parts.

nooo do not buy that!

Where I live that cpu cost as much as i7 2600k and i7 2600k is much faster.
And if you are buying 2600k you need a 1155 socket mobo which is the newest and if you buy 950 you will need a 1366 mobo.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

I would recommend buying Sandy bridge cpu or wait for bulldozer

Sandy Bridge is probably a good bet because we already know that Ivy Bridge will use the same socket (or sockets, depending on if Intel release a successor for socket 1366 for it's planned top tier 'extreme performance' no on-die GPU CPUs). So that's 2 generations of CPU/APU that will stay the same socket. Good news if you plan on buying a quality mobo and getting a decent lifespan out of it.

Bulldozer is a different kettle of fish, though. We already know it will use AM3+ and, because they've been drag arse about the whole thing, there's no word on what Bulldozer's 22nm successor will use for a socket, so Socket AM3+ could be a single generation socket... as AM3 has proven to be.

 

[MrTub]

I would recommend buying Sandy bridge cpu or wait for bulldozer

Sandy Bridge is probably a good bet because we already know that Ivy Bridge will use the same socket (or sockets, depending on if Intel release a successor for socket 1366 for it's planned top tier 'extreme performance' no on-die GPU CPUs). So that's 2 generations of CPU/APU that will stay the same socket. Good news if you plan on buying a quality mobo and getting a decent lifespan out of it.

Bulldozer is a different kettle of fish, though. We already know it will use AM3+ and, because they've been drag arse about the whole thing, there's no word on what Bulldozer's 22nm successor will use for a socket, so Socket AM3+ could be a single generation socket... as AM3 has proven to be.

Actually some Mobos that is AM3 can use Bulldozer with an bios update but I honestly think Bulldozer is going to be a flop.. considering a leaked test says that i7 2600k performs as good as a bulldozer cpu with 8 cores
http://www.sweclockers.com/image/red/2011/05/04/3.jpg?t=original&k=068f07dd do not mind the the second part of the line considering that is graphic and AMD cheated.
and intel will relative soon release their Sandy bridge-E which is suppose to be up to 66% faster then i7 2600k.
http://www.sweclockers.com/image/red/2011/04/20/Intel_roadmap_sandy_bridge_e.jpg?t=original&k=c7cc8651

 

[Zantos]

I'm getting a weird sense of deja vu here, so I'll just go with it.

Bigger power supply, because bigger is better. Same logic with the motherboard. Actually there is some truth to that, bigger motherboards mean more space which means it's easier to put together and you can get a better airflow around the components.

Also get a CPU cooler, the ones that come with the processors aren't very good if you're intending to do high end processing stuff (like gaming). A decent cooler will extend the running life of your processor by quite a bit, making it a sound investment. For that matter have as many fans as the case will fit. If that's too noisy get a control so you can turn them down when you're not using them. Keeping it cool is keeping it happy.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

Actually some Mobos that is AM3 can use Bulldozer with an bios update but I honestly think Bulldozer is going to be a flop.. considering a leaked test says that i7 2600k performs as good as a bulldozer cpu with 8 cores
http://www.sweclockers.com/image/red/2011/05/04/3.jpg?t=original&k=068f07dd do not mind the the second part of the line considering that is graphic and AMD cheated.
and intel will relative soon release their Sandy bridge-E which is suppose to be up to 66% faster then i7 2600k.
http://www.sweclockers.com/image/red/2011/04/20/Intel_roadmap_sandy_bridge_e.jpg?t=original&k=c7cc8651

All of this is why when I built my new machine at the start of the year I went with a Phenom II X4 965 BE based system. Figured I'd go cheap(ish) this time, skip 32nm architecture completely, and wait to see how Ivy Bridge and whatever Bulldozer's sucessor ends up being called stack up against each other in the 22nm stakes.

The wildcard will be if/when Intel starts putting nVidia's Fermi GPGPU tech on their APUs and how that goes... make APUs more attractive to high performance users if instead of disabling it in favour of discrete GPU cards the on-die GPU could be repurposed to act as a secondary general processing unit when discrete GPUs are connected. That shit I could totally get behind.

 

[MrTub]

Actually some Mobos that is AM3 can use Bulldozer with an bios update but I honestly think Bulldozer is going to be a flop.. considering a leaked test says that i7 2600k performs as good as a bulldozer cpu with 8 cores
http://www.sweclockers.com/image/red/2011/05/04/3.jpg?t=original&k=068f07dd do not mind the the second part of the line considering that is graphic and AMD cheated.
and intel will relative soon release their Sandy bridge-E which is suppose to be up to 66% faster then i7 2600k.
http://www.sweclockers.com/image/red/2011/04/20/Intel_roadmap_sandy_bridge_e.jpg?t=original&k=c7cc8651

All of this is why when I built my new machine at the start of the year I went with a Phenom II X4 965 BE based system. Figured I'd go cheap(ish) this time, skip 32nm architecture completely, and wait to see how Ivy Bridge and whatever Bulldozer's sucessor ends up being called stack up against each other in the 22nm stakes.

The wildcard will be if/when Intel starts putting nVidia's Fermi GPGPU tech on their APUs and how that goes... make APUs more attractive to high performance users if instead of disabling it in favour of discrete GPU cards the on-die GPU could be repurposed to act as a secondary general processing unit when discrete GPUs are connected. That shit I could totally get behind.

I believe Intel will be a few steps ahead of AMD for quite some time considering they have invented a new transistor which will make everything more effective. Problem with APUs is that they will never be top end considering top end cards produce a lot of heat.. Only way I see it being effective if you allow it to work with an discrete gpu.

I think its pretty bad of intel to release Sandy bridge with Apu considering most of those people that bought it will never use it so it just sits there and doing nothing.. I do not even have a mobo that can use the Apu.. which is kinda fail imo..

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

I believe Intel will be a few steps ahead of AMD for quite some time considering they have invented a new transistor which will make everything more effective. Problem with APUs is that they will never be top end considering top end cards produce a lot of heat.. Only way I see it being effective if you allow it to work with an discrete gpu.

I think its pretty bad of intel to release Sandy bridge with Apu considering most of those people that bought it will never use it so it just sits there and doing nothing.. I do not even have a mobo that can use the Apu.. which is kinda fail imo..

The APU is what really turned me off Sandy Bridge. It's a neat piece of tech, conceptually anyway, but it's an added cost and something I won't use. Doing that with 'Performance' level gear just seems... well, daft. Sandy Bridge-E (hey, is that a NEW socket type I see?) looks more promising if the earlier rumours of it being CPU instead of APU are at least partly true (say the 'extreme' level models, for example).

Fermi GPGPUs could also help... but they're hot little bastards so they might make shit worse overall. OTOH, nVidia already has Hybrid SLI tech to combine integrated and discrete GPUs so it shouldn't take much to push that for APUs as well. There's also their Optimus tech which switches between integrated and discrete GPUs depending on required workload (which is a very tempting piece of tech for laptops)... so I suppose even if Intel don't go with Fermi GPGPUs for their APUs paying nVidia a large chunk of change will eventually work in their favour (both companies' favour, really) with those 2 techs coming online... and that's ignoring the simple fact that Intel graphics tech is just flat out shit.

I think AMD has the right idea for APUs - target them at lower end systems like small laptops, pure office machines (email/word/internet) and HTPCs.

Pity about Bulldozer looking the dud but I'll wait until the desktop CPUs start shipping before I write them off.

Like I said, though, I'm skipping 32nm architecture entirely. Gonna wait for all the 22nm stuff to come around before I even think about upgrading.

 

[MrTub]

I believe Intel will be a few steps ahead of AMD for quite some time considering they have invented a new transistor which will make everything more effective. Problem with APUs is that they will never be top end considering top end cards produce a lot of heat.. Only way I see it being effective if you allow it to work with an discrete gpu.

I think its pretty bad of intel to release Sandy bridge with Apu considering most of those people that bought it will never use it so it just sits there and doing nothing.. I do not even have a mobo that can use the Apu.. which is kinda fail imo..

The APU is what really turned me off Sandy Bridge. It's a neat piece of tech, conceptually anyway, but it's an added cost and something I won't use. Doing that with 'Performance' level gear just seems... well, daft. Sandy Bridge-E (hey, is that a NEW socket type I see?) looks more promising if the earlier rumours of it being CPU instead of APU are at least partly true (say the 'extreme' level models, for example).

Fermi GPGPUs could also help... but they're hot little bastards so they might make shit worse overall. OTOH, nVidia already has Hybrid SLI tech to combine integrated and discrete GPUs so it shouldn't take much to push that for APUs as well. There's also their Optimus tech which switches between integrated and discrete GPUs depending on required workload (which is a very tempting piece of tech for laptops)... so I suppose even if Intel don't go with Fermi GPGPUs for their APUs paying nVidia a large chunk of change will eventually work in their favour (both companies' favour, really) with those 2 techs coming online... and that's ignoring the simple fact that Intel graphics tech is just flat out shit.

I think AMD has the right idea for APUs - target them at lower end systems like small laptops, pure office machines (email/word/internet) and HTPCs.

Pity about Bulldozer looking the dud but I'll wait until the desktop CPUs start shipping before I write them off.

Like I said, though, I'm skipping 32nm architecture entirely. Gonna wait for all the 22nm stuff to come around before I even think about upgrading.

Actually Sandy bridge was never performance gear, it was released as mid range. Sandy bridge-Extreme will be the high end cpu with 6 cores for around 4600kr which is around.. 720$.

But what I've read they will also release cheaper versions.

Tbh if I had a fermi apu aswell as my i7 at 4,6ghz I would probably have to buy watercoling and get 2x360 & 1x240 radiators... Hybrid Sli has never really worked that great (as far as Ive heard)
I would have waited for ivy/SB-E aswell but I felt that my q9550 was a bit outdated.

I would love to get a z68 1155 mobo tho.. really clever use of ssd & hdd with it.

 

[Death Prophet]

Okay Escapists, I've previously posted about a buying a Gaming PC, so I have begun considering building my own, seeing its my first time I feel it might be a better experience and also cheaper. So far these are the specs I've got:

AMD Phenom II x4 965 AM3 Intel Core i5-2400 Sandy Bridge 3.1GHz

Gigabyte AM3 AMD880G SB710 4xDDR3 Raid Dolby mATX Motherboard GIGABYTE GA-P67A-UD4-B3 LGA 1155 Intel P67 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard

8GB (2x4GB) PC3-10600 1333MHz DDR3 Memory G.SKILL Ripjaws X + Turbulence II Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2133 (PC3 17000)
Seagate Barracuda 1TB SATA 6GB Hard Drive

Asus ATI Radeon HD6870 1GB GDDR5 (PCI-E) Graphics Card EVGA SuperClocked 01G-P3-1563-AR GeForce GTX 560 Ti (Fermi) 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card

600Watt PSU 120mm Red Fan COOLER MASTER Silent Pro Gold Series RS800-80GAD3-US 800W ATX 12V v2.3 / EPS 12V v2.92

Samsung SH-5222L/BEBE 22x DVD-Rewritable ASUS Black 24X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 12X DVD+R DL 24X DVD-R 6X DVD-RW 12X DVD-RAM 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-R 32X CD-RW 48X CD-ROM 2MB Cache SATA 24X DVD Burner

ADD TO YOUR LIST
COOLER MASTER V6 GT RR-V6GT-22PK-R1 120mm DynaLoop CPU Cooler w/ Universal bracket & Dual Fan
COOLER MASTER HAF 932 Blue RC-932-KKN3-GP Black Steel ATX Full Tower Computer Case
Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound - OEM
Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-bit English 1-Pack - OEM


Okay so I also have a case picked out for consideration, but any recommendations based on the specs would be greatly appreaciated for a case. But I wanted to ask do these specs seem right, is there anything that won't work together, obviously I am hoping to be able to play most recent games, I always for some reason use StarCraft 2 as a benchmark, so about that. Also is there anything else that I need?. Thank you very much Escapists.

Ok I put together this list using a mild comparison in price range based off what you listed or left out. And yes if these people weren't so busy argueing about your processor they might have noticed your original hard drive listed was a 6 gb/s Sata with the motherboard you picked out not supporting that. Secondly you picked out a micro motherboard, not sure if this was on purpose but when building a gaming tower bigger is better, mostly for cooling reasons. If building a gameing PC I always use a full tower like the one I listed for you, it is easier to navigate and cools a hell of alot better.

Next I exchanged your AMD for a comparably priced i5, trust me you dont need an i7 and you'll save money this way. If you decide you need the i7, one can fit this motherboard I picked out also at a comparative price. Pretty sure everyone here will agree that the i5 will outperform the Phenom by a long run. Next the motherboard supports 32gb ram, but I only listed a 8gb 2x4gb package to start you off that comes with its own cooling fans, leaveing the possibility for you to expand later. After that I changed your graphics card to a comparable Nvidia mainly because the vast majority of games coming out are built off nvidias chipsets and then ati can make for some pain in the ass scenarios dealing with drivers updates etc. plus EVGA and Nvidia have fantastic customer support.

Moving on you would need a bit more power than anticipated so I bumped to an 800w Coolermaster, which I have never had any problems with, guess you can call me a fanboy. DVD drive I go with ASUS as they have never done me wrong so I added one to your list. Another point when building a gaming PC it is essential to have proper CPU cooling so I added a cooler to the list. COOLING, COOLING, COOLING, I can't say it enough. That being the reason I listed a COOLERMASTER tower with plenty of large fans channeling air at yet a reasonable price, also its a full tower so you have room to manuver, also important as I gather this is your first build. The thermal compound is for the CPU as well to facilitate efficient cooling, see instructions for use. And lastly you didnt have an operating system on your list so I just put the basic Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit on the list.

One final note if this is your first build do not feel the need to solo it, have someone with experience and training assist you. If you mess up it can be a very very costly mistake.

EDIT: I forgot to mention that everything I listed can be purchased from www.newegg.com for very reasonable rates.

 

[viranimus]

Not a big fan of AMD personally, but it definitely looks solid.

Only real suggestions I could make is you might want to edge up with a slightly stronger PSU. Beyond that just make sure your going to be using a 64bit OS or 4gb of your ram will go to waste.