[Bretto]

This is a hardware post. I know.
But knowing that Mr Razor et al reside mainly here, and my other "gaming" thread hasn't been answered i'm wondering if anyone can help me in this forum.......

My current system is an old Athlon 939 - 4400. I brought it (rather stooopidly) right at the end of the great 939 days. It’s overclocked etc etc but at the end of the day it’s well past its retirement age.

My new home build is going to be 100% gamer.
I don’t really care for SLI/x-fire. I want to run a single high end 5870/50. When I was looking to SLI my last GPU it was faster and cheaper to buy a new gen card at the time (my current 8800GTS).
I would have gone x-fire with 2 5770s if eyefinity worked with that setup, but at the moment it doesn't

I technically have no price limit, but I’m a frugal bugger and want to:
a) Get great bang / buck
b) Longevity (easily plop a higher CPU in without changing motherboard later)

I reckon it’s going to be either an…
i5 750@2.6
or an AM3@3.4

After checking on their gaming performance in DCS Blackshark and NFS Shift I’ll be overclocking from the off, and coupling the winner with a 64GB SDD (+other HDDs), 4 (or 8) gigs of RAM and Windows 7.
Shopping around the AMD system SEEMS about £20 cheaper, which isn’t a big difference.

I’m NOT against the high end Intel1366 (about £115 more) if people INSIST on recommending , but the 6 cores will be pricy for quite a while when they come out and as stated I don’t need their much touted SLI supremacy over 1156 i5s.
I just have a feeling sneaky Intel are going to change chipset sooner rather than later.

Thanks for any thoughts on the subject, and….
Let the recommendations begin…


PS - YES, you DO need a powered display port to get eyefinity running on 3 monitors, and NO, a xfire setup doesn't work at the moment Thanks for nothing ATI.

[AnthonyG]

It has been a while since I have looked over the benchmarks but I believe if I remember correctly on tests it was shown that the AM3 Tricore 720 performed pretty much exactly the same as the CoreI7 920 for gaming.

The AM3 720 can be had for £92 which is a relative bargain, its also a black edition so you can easily overclock it

HDZ720WFGIBOX - AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition, Sok AM3, 2.8GHz, 7.5MB Total Cache, 95W, Retail - Scan.co.uk

So then just buy the 4GB DDR3 and a AM3 board and a 5870 and you will have a nice gaming setup.

Then just get an Indilix based SSD to go with it.

[Bretto]

Thanks for the quick reply. Never thought of an x3.....(guess the x4 would be even better)!

WAS going to post an ssd question in the HDD area, but since you seem in the know......
Can you point me in the right direction of one of those drives please?
I know some 1st generation drives had st-st-stuttering issues but SSDs are my only weak link in knowledge and I can't tell the difference between generations.

I guess THIS is a cheapo one (shame as it's......cheap!!)
Edit 2: mm, THIS looks like a good one maybe?


Thanks anyway, Bretto.

[booyaka]

Personally i would go i5 and a 5870 for the time being.

nothing against AMD but that's the route i would go do just now. A single 5870 will rip most things apart at the moment with GT300 on the way from nvidia end of the year/Q1 etc.

[Bretto]

lol, hopefully I'll be writing lots of thankyous

AMD 1 - Intel 1


Thanks booyaka. I reckon I'll flip the coin in a couple of weeks when it's decision time!

Nvidia are dead to me at the moment. Too expensive and for this gen, too late!
I'm not hanging around anymore. I should have got an i7 in January but "put it off". BAD BAD call for me

Can't wait any longer.

[namuk]

Intel i7

[Delvey]

Intel I7, as I doubt they'll change the chipset for a long while

[AnthonyG]

Originally Posted by Bretto

WAS going to post an ssd question in the HDD area, but since you seem in the know......
Can you point me in the right direction of one of those drives please?
I know some 1st generation drives had st-st-stuttering issues but SSDs are my only weak link in knowledge and I can't tell the difference between generations.

The Corsair Extreme series drives are their Indilix based ones.

OCZ Vertex is Indilix based.

Those are the two Indilix drive models really to chose between IMHO.

I chose the Corsair Extreme series as it was cheaper.

[GMC79]

I have that AMD BE and is cracking for that price, will always get people saying about the i7 and fair do's it's cracking and goes 4ghz easy apparantly and a few have it here, but at the price the AMD's gotta be an option. Mine wont go over 3.4ghz without restarting but 3.3 is stable. (bought my rig pre overclocked and have tried more)
Do want you wanna do but i'd also say the i7 is prob the best option for longevity, But price wise tho id go with the AMD.

[24 P]

AMD are cheap, does it make them better for budget? sure, but when $ is not a prob, you will find the Intel camp doing some pretty hardcore stuff...
They will eventually come down in $ and maybe we can all afford a razor badged PC, in 2011??
Didn't you hear the rumors? MS Xbox Razor....

[Bretto]

Thanks guys.

Looking like i5 at the moment.
Saw some great overlocking scores on various hardware sites.
Still got 2 weeks yet....so keep persuading
(edit, but now noticed a couple of i7 buggers!!!)

[Razor]

If you want longevity and the fastest cpu about it has to be the 1366 i7. It has hyper threading, triple channel memory and will also get 6 core cpus next year.

If you want to save yourself a few quid then go for an i5 1156. It has nearly the same performance as the 1366 socket minus triple channel memory and hyper threading. But it only has 8 x pcie 2.0 on the 2nd pcie slot, which isnt as good as the 1366 mobos which have 2/3 x 16 pcie 2.0 slots.

Triple channel memory doesnt make an impact these days but expect to see some apps and games use the extra bandwidth in the future.

Both solutions are faster clock for clock than the AMD cpus which is why I haven't recommended them. You will save yourself about £100 by going for the i5 route which in real terms isnt allot of cash if you want the best of the best and it will give you a path to 6 core cpus if you so wish later on.

As for gpus then it has to be 5870 at the present time. Also you can always add another 5870 gpu to the rig for crossfire later on when prices drop and you actually need the extra power. As you might be going with eyeinfinitely you will probably need the extra card to keep the settings high. Dont be put off by crossfire it works really well these days and I havent had any issues with my setup.

So intel for the cpu and AMD/ATI for the gpu.

[24 P]

And Xbox Razor for the console..

[Razor]

Originally Posted by 24 P

AMD are cheap, does it make them better for budget? sure, but when $ is not a prob, you will find the Intel camp doing some pretty hardcore stuff...
They will eventually come down in $ and maybe we can all afford a razor badged PC, in 2011??
Didn't you hear the rumors? MS Xbox Razor....

Originally Posted by 24 P

And Xbox Razor for the console..

PMSL....

[Bretto]

Can't give thanks Razor....think i've thrown too much about!!!

Yeah, had a feeling i7 was going to be persuaded upon me.

Best get that puppy then............

[24 P]

tis good stuff, I did some research for another d00d, he got a really good system for about 1300, 920, 6 gig of ram 1600, 4890, and the rest was spent on good HDDs and stuff..
750 PSU silverstone, no corners cut, but he wants it as an editor, I have tried to explain to him that he has a brilliant gaming rig, I think hes a closet gamer..

[Bretto]

Originally Posted by Razor

Dont be put off by crossfire it works really well these days and I havent had any issues with my setup.

So intel for the cpu and AMD/ATI for the gpu.

Thanks for that Razor, but I know x-fire is fine now.
For Eyefinity - from what I gather, I can't use BOTH GPUs to get for example 4 displays. I was hoping I could run 2 DVI from 1 GPU, and the other from the other GPU.
Eyefinity only runs from 1 GPU. (using the £100 display port adaptor at that)!!

[Razor]

Originally Posted by Bretto

Can't give thanks Razor....think i've thrown too much about!!!

Yeah, had a feeling i7 was going to be persuaded upon me.

Best get that puppy then............

I am really happy with my i7 rig, its also the easiest rig I have ever overclocked.

[Sunshinewelly]

I went for the "happy shopper" approach and got a Phenom II X3 720 BE which once i got the right power supply for (cheers razor) overclocked easily to 3.4 htz.

I did read on some sites that most games were not taking advantage at that time of the 4th core and that for the price the X3 was unbeatable. Obviously with i5's out i assume the picture has changed somewhat.

[Razor]

Originally Posted by Sunshinewelly

I went for the "happy shopper" approach and got a Phenom II X3 720 BE which once i got the right power supply for (cheers razor) overclocked easily to 3.4 htz.

My pleasure mate.

[Jay]

Best bang for buck has to be amd, they give the best performance at the cheapest possible price.

As everyone knows though for sheer power you need to go for an i7 especially if moneys no object.

[Jay]

Originally Posted by GMC79

Mine wont go over 3.4ghz without restarting but 3.3 is stable. (bought my rig pre overclocked and have tried more)
.

I'm surprised at that, I thought you could get 3.6ghz out of that easy.

I take it you literally tired everyhting to push it more, vcore (obviously), increasing the fsb and lowering the multiplier (doing this should push it more than simply raising the multi), cpu-nb voltage, ram voltage etc

[24 P]

Sir Xbox Razor, quick q,

i5 750 with 8GB RAM will beat out an i7 920 with 6GB RAM due to the memory requirements of HD editing.

What do you think??
Posted else where, I would say I7, can never have enough CPU grunt for rendering and SFX etc.. At Hi Def, CPU is a major factor, Ram is important, but what will an extra 2 gig do??
Await your wisdom Sir Xbox Razor..

[GMC79]

Originally Posted by Indecisive Jay

I'm surprised at that, I thought you could get 3.6ghz out of that easy.

I take it you literally tired everyhting to push it more, vcore (obviously), increasing the fsb and lowering the multiplier (doing this should push it more than simply raising the multi), cpu-nb voltage, ram voltage etc

That was using amd overdrive, Just reset at near 3.4, cant get into bios for some reason so not learned that way of overclocking.

[Jay]

Originally Posted by GMC79

That was using amd overdrive, Just reset at near 3.4, cant get into bios for some reason so not learned that way of overclocking.

Ah that'll be why then.

AMD overdrive can be buggy at high overclocks. And overclocks should always be done in the bios ideally.

Have you tried all the usual ways of getting into bios, del, f2, f10?

It sounds odd that you can't get into the bios.

[GMC79]

Yeah tells u key at gigabyte screen at boot up but if i press it (del) get black screen and no boot up whatsoever and have to hold button for shutdown. Was told it was to do with the TV used has that anything to do with it?
Know nothing about overclocking so it's prob best that way.lol

[24 P]

GMC79, reset the bios by taking out your battery..
Should reset everything, including clock, calender etc..
Hopefully should fix your prob, bit trickey getting the battery out, bloodie harder getting it in..
Some say shorting across 2 pins, me personally, I would never do it..
Anyways, hope this helps..

[Jay]

Or you could have a little jumper cap.

On my motherboard I have to move a little cap across to 2pins and then back again.

The manual will tell you how to reset cmos etc

Either way getting into the bios is worth it, and with your cpu it is easy to overclock.

[GMC79]

Originally Posted by Indecisive Jay

Or you could have a little jumper cap.

On my motherboard I have to move a little cap across to 2pins and then back again.

The manual will tell you how to reset cmos etc

Sorry you lost me. Will look into it cos would be cool to notch it up a bit, wont notice any diff but be cool.

[Jay]

Originally Posted by GMC79

Sorry you lost me. Will look into it cos would be cool to notch it up a bit, wont notice any diff but be cool.

Yeah look in the manual if you have it, or a quick google will tell you, if not just whip the battery out.

You might be surprised, I've noticed a hell of a lot of improvement in games since overclocking the cpu.

It really is noticeable at lower resolutions, I play at 720p sometimes and I get a massive boost in fps.

Obviously in higher resolutions it's more gpu dependant though.