PC Build Advice/Review Thread

[Guitarman]

So I'm going to be building a new computer in January, and I have a couple of questions, i'm not as tech savvy as I'd like.

My brother's friend is advising me on what pieces to get. I want Nvidia cards, but he's recommending 2x 560 cards vs a 570 or 580. Is this what I should do?

I'm also looking at around 12-16 GB of ram. As far as motherboards, anyone have any suggestions? I'm thinking i'd like an Intel i7 board, but the one he showed me seemed underpowered. Any suggestions?

Basically i'm looking at around 1k-1400 dollars to spend (give or take), and aiming to run newer games like BF3 or Skyrim as close to max settings as possible within that price point. Anything you guys can advise me on would be incredibly helpful.

[Isiolia]

- nVidia may have a more concrete timeline for their new cards by January (supposed to be early next year). I wouldn't make any definite plans around current cards...but a single card is generally preferable. Fewer compatibility issues and more consistent performance results along with simpler setup. It's win/win. A second card can be an appealing upgrade down the line too when prices come down, but if you start with two, that's not as much of an option.

- RAM is total overkill. Even 8GB is more than you need for gaming, it's just too cheap right now to really care.

- What's underpowered about the boards? Nine times out of ten, you aren't going to use all the bells and whistles you paid for a premium board to get.

[Fairy-Killer]

That amount of RAM is just beyond absurd. As Isiolia said, I'd stick with one card for compatibility sake. I'm confused on what you mean by underpowered boards... Asus always has a great selection of i7 boards to choose from. And for 1-1.4k, you should have no problem playing those games on max unless you completely mess up something like combining a 990X with a GTX270, lol.

[Arkanna]

Agree on the single-card sentiment, and on the no-concrete-decisions-now regarding video cards thing.

I have 16GB in my box, but only because it was so cheap. 8GB is plenty. 12GB isn't applicable to Sandy Bridge Core i7's (double channel memory = 4 GB, 8GB or 16GB).

I'd pick up an i5-2500k or i7-2600k, a nice overclocker's board, a decent aftermarket heatsink, and go to town. My setup is an Asus Maximus Gene-Z, i7-2600k (@4.8ghz), one of those Zalman radial coolers, and 16GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3. Still running a Radeon 5870, but I've not had a compelling reason to replace it yet. It can handle BF3 on High @ 2650x1440 just fine still, so I plan to wait for the next product cycle to upgrade it.

[Guitarman]

So single card, tone down the ram, any i7 board should be fine? Awesome. thank you much.

[Olo401]

So I'm going to be building a new computer in January, and I have a couple of questions, i'm not as tech savvy as I'd like.

My brother's friend is advising me on what pieces to get. I want Nvidia cards, but he's recommending 2x 560 cards vs a 570 or 580. Is this what I should do?

That's one way to go.. SLI'd 560ti's give you about 30% more performance than a single 580. You could also get a Dual 560ti card and save a couple card slots. If you're able to wait a few months the next gen cards from both nVidia and AMD will be coming out, meaning you can either get that, or take advantage of the price drops on the late models.

I'm also looking at around 12-16 GB of ram. As far as motherboards, anyone have any suggestions? I'm thinking i'd like an Intel i7 board, but the one he showed me seemed underpowered. Any suggestions?

You really don't need that much. 8 gigs is plenty. For the board & CPU, within a month or two Sandy Bridge-E/LGA 2011 will hit the market so I'd keep an eye out for that - if not then an i5-2500k will be fine. I'm not sure what you mean by the board being underpowered though..

[Caylene]

Hi! I could use some help.

This is my current computer (and i'm sorry for the wide width! I even resized it before uploading. >< )

Spoiler: show

It plays FFXI just fine, really; I shouldn't complain. However I feel like I experience a lot more lag than I should and thought I would start here to look for some advice.

I have cable internet through TWC and use the DLink 4500 router. I *think* I set it up to give FFXI priority; however there is of course always the chance that I missed something. All of my drivers are updated and nothing is set to auto-update. FFXI is giving task manager high priority and I don't have the settings so high that it's gorgeous, but it does still look nice.

Anyway, I'm looking for some advice- should I tinker more with my router and other settings to see if I can't just optimize what I already have; should I upgrade a few pieces here and there (I built this one myself); or should I just start from scratch and build something with a little more heft to it?

I play FFXI, and might play XIV if they ever finish fixing it.

ETA: I forgot that for these sort of things I should add some more numbers- if I do a re-build, I'd like to keep it under 1k USD. I will probably order from Newegg.com.

[Jojimbo]

If you don't plan on playing anything beside XI until XIV is decent then there is no need to build now, you can wait until new hardware is out or prices have dropped (even until after 2.0 is out and we know how well it'll run on what hardware, unless it becomes good enough before then).

What kind of lag are you experiencing? Is it stuttering/low FPS or delayed actions

[Caylene]

If you don't plan on playing anything beside XI until XIV is decent then there is no need to build now, you can wait until new hardware is out or prices have dropped (even until after 2.0 is out and we know how well it'll run on what hardware, unless it becomes good enough before then).

What kind of lag are you experiencing? Is it stuttering/low FPS or delayed actions

I'm getting low fps during fights, but i think everyone gets that. Sometimes people in shell will talk about what has happened before I see it on my screen.

[Ramor]

I feel like there should be a general guideline post in the OP, things like people not needing 16gigs of ram just for gaming because these seem to be common issues, as well as maybe some BG user-voted components such as the general recommendations for CPUs and mobos as well as nvidia/radeon GPUs that seem to get the bump from people a lot, like 2x560 or 1x580, the popular CPUs being things like the 2500k/2600k and maybe more stuff like SSD vs. HDD?

just a thought anyway

[Arkanna]

The only problem with that is, PC hardware is a moving target. What's the best choice now probably won't be very soon. Maybe I'll work on whipping something up with the mods' approval.

[Ramor]

The only problem with that is, PC hardware is a moving target. What's the best choice now probably won't be very soon. Maybe I'll work on whipping something up with the mods' approval.

right, but i feel as though people are active enough in this thread and have fairly on-point and similar opinions on hardware for the most part, and as for a moving target it's maybe once every 6 months or so that things change, no? but that was the point of more generalities in the post, as to the advantages/disadvantages of SSD vs. HDD as well as the specific points of different current hardware choices for particular price brackets. i just thought it might be a real nice compact compendium of the general feelings of our tech nerds here on BG for the people who aren't so tech savvy

[Auspice]

I feel like a tard. I bought a Samsung Blu Ray drive for my new machine but I apparently don't have any software that will allow me to watch BR movies. The only thing I can seem to find online is Power DVD but I don't exactly wanna pay $50 on top of the $60 I paid for the drive just to watch movies. Are there any free options for players or am I completely boned? I handful of programs that google searching has yielded did not work so I don't know where to go other than hopping in my boat and sailing on the high seas to get some software.

[Ramor]

Not sure, seeing a few options but minimum seems to be about 30$ according to some forum:

You can get a copy of Cyberlink's PowerDVD 8 Ultra, which plays Blu-ray, at oem-soft.com for $16. But minimum order is $30, so you'll have to buy something else along with it.

Aside from that my general recommendation to anyone not wanting to get boned on stupid computer shit like that is to just torrent it.

[Crizto]

New build time coming close . Friend of mine works at Tiger Direct so I'll be getting everything at cost. Want to try and stick to buying the majority of things from there since it'll most likely be the cheapest route. I'm good to spend up to $2000 CAD, though I don't think I'll ever come close to reaching that.

Computer is primarily for gaming, browsing, some CAD modelling for school.

Case I've got the midtower case right now, and I love the way it looks. Sadly Tiger Direct doesn't carry Antec .
Antec Twelve Hundred V3 Black Steel ATX Full Tower Unbeatable Gaming Case

CPU I don't believe I'd do anything that warrants a 2600k
Intel i5 2500k

GPU
XFX HD Radeon 6970

MOBO Heard the Z68's are a solid choice
ASUS P8Z68-V

RAM
Corsair Vengeance 8GB

PSU Have the 650W version in my current PC, hasn't given any issues.
Corsair TX850W

HDD Not many SSD options at Tiger Direct. Might look into Newegg for that.
Western Digital 1TB

This only has me at $1500 CAD including taxes and shipping so I've got a lot of room to breathe. I'll probably buy a random Blu-Ray drive as well for around $100. I'm still missing a CPU fan; I've never shopped for one before.

[Ramor]

for CPU coolers, assuming you still want to run air and not some crazy watercooling,
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835103064

is hard to beat, for it's price it's definitely the best cost/work ratio and you can slap another 80mm fan on there if you really want, my boss at work OCs his 2500k with that cooler to about 4.8Ghz and it's prime95/24hr stable so it's pretty hard to beat if you ask me. Other than that everything else looks pretty on point, if you can manage to salvage an old HDD to use for the time you can save a bunch of money by waiting a little while for HDDs to come down in price (they're super inflated right now) if not what you've got is obviously fine. Personally I like nvidia, but the 6970 is definitely real good although I've heard rumor of Radeon releasing their new card line sometime in December/January? Again a waiting game to save some money, but if you've got the money to burn you might as well burn it and you can snag another one after the price drop and then just Xfire them for some real nice performance.

edit: woops, old cooler, that one is the same thing just fits 1155 sockets

[Tymon]

Antec cases, uuuugh.

The holy grail 5 years ago, not so much now.

I recommend the Corsair 500R. Cheaper, better, looks similar.

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applicatio...966&CatId=1842

[richardd]

http://www.amazon.com/Sapphire-DL-DV...1290506&sr=8-1

vs this

http://www.amazon.com/EVGA-GeForce-P...1290527&sr=8-1


i will be playing mostly console games on my PC, at 1080p. i dont care too much at running crysis 2 at ultra settings, but it would be nice if these cards could handle any future MMO for the next 1-2 years. my price range isnt that unreasonable, but idc about the latest and greatest anymore lol

im sitting on an old i7 920, and i will need to upgrade that eventually, as well

plus i plan on buying a 1080p 40' samsung with 120hz on black friday, hopefully if my money is right. would these be able to support a dual screen 22'' LED asus monitor and a 40" samsung, simultaneously ? i wanted to utilize my HDMI cable specifically for that

[Jojimbo]

I would go with the 6850, they seem about the same from a review I'm reading (and that's 6850 vs 460 OC), but 6850 is newer and probably runs cooler.

And you shouldn't have to upgrade a 920 for quite a while (should last year+ easily if OCed), especially if you aren't using top end GPUs.

[Caylene]

Is there a way to find out what kind of motherboard is best to go with windows7 and a g-keyboard? I spent about three hours yesterday trying to get it to work (including changing some settings in the bios after setting a restore point), but no dice. It's freezing up my computer completely.