New PC

[brad.dude03]

Tell me what you think, my old PC is getting due badly for an upgrade (she's 6 years old) Im ordering individual parts and building myself. I'm taking some goods out of my old one though, so if parts aren't on the list thats where they're coming from.

Asus Motherboard. Pci Express, socket 775 supports up to core 2 extreme, usb 2.0 firewire, sli ready, all the bells and whistles.

Tuniq Symmetry Case. Damn is it nice looking. In mirror black

OCZ 2 GB DDR2 Ram. there's a really good deal on for the stuff

Ultra 600 Watt PSU, sli ready. Lots of juice.

Intel 2.4 GHZ Core 2 Duo processor. Not the best out there since the quad core monsters are out there now, but it is worlds better then my 2 ghz p4 that I have now

Finally: (I don't have the money for this yet, but getting later) eVGA Geforce 8800. 768 MB ram. DirectX 10. The real deal

 

[operator]

If it runs Warcraft 3 World Editor, then it's great : p

 

[brad.dude03]

It can run many world editors

 

[operator]

Well it's fine then

 

[Ham Ham]

I think then a Radeon is better to play games than the GeForce.

 

[Deleted member 126647]

/envy .

 

[Xarwin]

U should take a computer that fits with your activity on it.
Like : Are u a gamer? then get a good video card 'n stuff.
Do u only need it for chatting and lower works? Reduce the video card.

Thats what I have done.

 

[brad.dude03]

Yes, but I am gamer, that's why i'm making with the hardcore gfx card. And no, Radeon is not better in this case. NORMALLY Radeon and Geforce are evenly matched in every way because they have the same features with different names. HOWEVER, as of now, ATI has not released their DirectX 10 Video Card, so i'm switching to the Dark Side and going with Nvidia on this one.

 

[GST_Nemisis]

whoa whoa whoa whoa...hold on there....the dark side?!?! nvidia owns...i hear you all complaining, hmm what is that i see...oh yeh its SLI which WORKS for only £200 for both cards and whats more they arent the size of your house! and...and ....oh nos?!?! DX10?!?! yeh you see it DX10 is here and its Nvidia....ATI get skills kk?

alright the cooling is a little sketchy but what gamer these days doesnt have some fan-dangled water cooling kit??? well i dont, but thats because i got no money. still you got a spare dollar and you can grab everything you need. and drivers complaints?? huh?? drivers are fine! theyve only been around for 50 million years, in that time they have managed to make some decent ones!

my point is nvidia rock my world, ati rocks your grandma's world...and what does she know about games anyways

little tip, dont get this computer now. or at least dont get this computer until you really really need it because all of those components apart from the ram, which u said was on sale will, drop in price dramatically later this year because of amd competition with its new pin chip and 4x4 quad core and also the DX10 Ati cards. nvidia and intel are both gunna drop their prices so a top of the range ati or amd will be 2x the price of the current top hadware and this will make prices rock bottom.

also if you arent intrested in dx10 grab a 7000 series nvidia card or one of those silly X-900 things or whatever because they will be cheap soon too. cheap like they will be giving them away cheap

 

[brad.dude03]

Meh, like I said, I can't tell the difference between ATI and Nvidia and everyone in the Hardware biz will tell you: That's because there is no difference. ATI and Nvidia are almost exactly alike in every single way... but yeah, my hardware really needs updating... so i'll probably be getting this is as soon as possible, I don't mind the price, for what i'm getting it's alright to me, and the proc already dropped a ton with the core 2 extreme out now. And I am interested in the Dx10, that's the whole reason i'm willing to shell out so much money to get the card There are some onsale for like 500 bucks now though, so if you want the crappier version but still get the dx10 (which I do, and i'll probably end up getting) then one of those is the way to go... oh it has 640 mb of ram instead of 768... wahhh...

 

[Xarwin]

Remember that most games support Nvidia.

 

[brad.dude03]

Yes, and most game support ATI as well, if they support one, then they support the other. It would be rediculous for a game company to make a game that only supports a Nvidia card, but doesn't support the ATI equivalent, and vice versa.

 

[Xarwin]

Fine, but I still think that nvidia is better

 

[brad.dude03]

Yes, well you thought wrong, because THEY ARE EXACTLY THE SAME IN EVERY WAY. Really, the only way to choose between them is which Brandname you like better....

 

[GST_Nemisis]

you are kinda half right, they do use the same components, often from the same manufacturers but the main chipset itsalf, the one that need the massive heat sink, is always made by the induvidual company. this is the only thing that seperates them, however it is arguably the most important thing and nvidia with a larger backing of money was able to put more work in to produce a DX10 chipset before ATI, but when ATI releases theirs it will be 95% the exact same components.

so while yes they are similar, the differernt chips can make a big deal when it comes to bench marking.

 

[brad.dude03]

meh, they both get pretty close score sin bench marking anyway... it's just like amd and intel... 2 companies relatively the same in components and such, and they are constantly trying to upstage one another

 

[HappyTauren]

ur new computer sux brad and why the hell do you need 2gb ram ?

 

[Durgon]

Im in need of a new computer, with all these new games coming out im starting too see why you need up too date systems.

 

[Dr Super Good]

Nvedia geforce 8 8800 cards are THE BEST as of date for graphics that are non proffesional devices for work stations that cost 4000£+.

2 GB ram is a MUST for all games now days since medevil total war 2 easily uses 1.5GB+ to run and can extend right to 2 gb with loads of units everywhere and junk.
Also 2GB is the minimum for full dual core support, meaning you can run 2 programs at once without ram issues and have space incase eithor grow and leaks are less of an issue.

2.4 GHZ Core 2 Duo processor is the main slowdowner in your setup so you might need a better for running strat games like supreme commanders at 4v4 with 1000 unit cap with all sets on max but other wise you can expect atleast 4v4 with 250-500 unit cap.

also if you arent intrested in dx10 grab a 7000 series nvidia card or one of those silly X-900 things or whatever because they will be cheap soon too. cheap like they will be giving them away cheap

ARE YOU SERIOUS?
NO 7000 series (geforce 7) can even BOOT UP DX10 let alone run a game with it.
Only 8000+ series from nvedia support DX10, all others below DO NOT.
DX10 completly reworks how graphics are produced so that the makers can utilize the card to 100% instead of idle processing units (shaders) due to them not being required (like in DX9).

Nvedia is the best in my opineon since they are cheap and work well.
ATI is always behind since their DX10 cards are scheduled for this month while the 8800 series from Nvedia has been out since August last year.
So ofcourse their DX10 cards will be better but they have had 6 months to develop it more than Nvedia.

Also wait untill ATI realses their range since that will cause NVEDIA to drop it's prices of top range models by up to 100£ which can save alot.

 

[brad.dude03]

ur new computer sux brad and why the hell do you need 2gb ram ?

I need 2 gigs of ram because I like trying to do as much as possible at once

And anyway, the proc is costing me like 300 Canadian dollars, the next one up is like 7 or 800, which i'm not willing to pay. And that's just for a 2.6 I think 2.4 will do me plenty well, since I don't want to run everything at max and be bleeding edge. I'd be buying quad core and 2 8800's to run in SLI mode if I wanted to. But I don't. I just want to be able to play the latest games, and I want to be able to play them without much lag. I think this system can accomplish that for me

 

[GST_Nemisis]

also if you arent intrested in dx10 grab a 7000 series nvidia card or one of those silly X-900 things or whatever because they will be cheap soon too. cheap like they will be giving them away cheap

ARE YOU SERIOUS?
NO 7000 series (geforce 7) can even BOOT UP DX10 let alone run a game with it.
Only 8000+ series from nvedia support DX10, all others below DO NOT.
DX10 completly reworks how graphics are produced so that the makers can utilize the card to 100% instead of idle processing units (shaders) due to them not being required (like in DX9).

yes i know that, thats why im saying if you arent intrested in dx10 then dont get a dx10 card because they are expensive and the 7000s which cant run dx10 will be very very cheap.

for example, if you dont want to play crysis or alan wake or shadow run then dont get a dx10 card because the non dx10 cards are so cheap. by the time you will need a dx10 card they will be alot cheaper to. this is what i plan to do, when every game uses dx10 ill get a dx10 card for peanuts.

 

[brad.dude03]

Yes, but I'll have it now (soon actually... sometime this year anyway lol probably after the summer after I've made more money) and it will be for teh pwnage

 

[Xarwin]

Yeah for teh pwnage, u need to test much maps with me, noob!

 

[brad.dude03]

Indeed, noobtoast.

 

[Samuraid]

nVidia and ATi are not the same in every way, not by a long shot. Comparing the two depends completely on which specific cards you are using for the comparison.

For example, any ATi card before the X1000 series has an outdated shader model (2.0), while nVidia has had shader model 3.0 since the 6000 series of GeForce cards (nVidia supported SM 3.0 far soon than ATi did)

Basically, here's how things stand:
- If you want to run Windows Vista, ATi is the best choice right now. nVidia is experiencing a myriad of driver problems in Vista.
- If you are running anything else (Windows XP, and especially Linux) nVidia has the fastest cards out and nearly all of their cards are more power efficient than similar ATi cards.
- ATi has both in the past and currently offered inferior driver support, especially within Linux and other operating systems besides Windows.

That said, getting a new ATi or nVidia card (one recently released) will work fine for just about anyone wanting to play good games in Windows.

As for the other parts of your computer: -----

Intel Core2 Duo 2.4GHz
Great choice! It is not only one of the most cost effective chips to buy, but it is also the cheapest model with a 4MB L2 cache. If you are up to the challenge, you could also overclock to a higher speed as the Core2 chips overclock really well.

2GB of RAM
Good, it should be sufficient to run the latest things. Don't waste your money on 4GB of RAM though as you would want a 64-bit operating system to be able to fully address that much memory. Unless you are running huge professional 3d graphics, an enterprise database server, or a large research/optimization/matrix project, you probably will never need 4GB.

600W Power supply
Make sure you buy a really good brand, one with a really high MTBF and high efficiency (at least 75%) and UL listing. I cannot stress this enough. What most people don't realize is that you don't need tons of wattage for most computers, you really need high quality and efficiency.
A 400W-continuous high-quality power supply will easily outperform a cheaper 600W-peak power supply.

As for the motherboard, get one with either an nForce 600 series or Intel 965/975 series northbridge chipset.

All in all, it sounds like you will be getting a very nice machine.

 

[Dr Super Good]

- If you want to run Windows Vista, ATi is the best choice right now. nVidia is experiencing a myriad of driver problems in Vista.

Wrong answer.
ATI has NO vista feature support (DX10) untill latter this month when their "new DX10" cards come out (well atleast it is said).
The entire point of vista on a gaming pc is DX 10 and so far only nvedia 8000+ (geforce 8) support that.
So if you want ATI cards with no DX10 support then go XP since games run far better on XP than on vista.
I say a 8800 is good enough since the only better cards (which will come from ATI) will cost 100-200£ more which is alot of money.
Also ATI most lightly will experience the same driver problems as nvedia since getting a DX9 card to work is totaly different from getting a DX10 card to work.

The only core better than dual is quad which is VERY pricy and so is mostly used in servers, company systems or pro gamers.

But WARNING, older games might give you difficulty to run due to not being made to use your system to it's full.

 

[Samuraid]

ATi does not have DX10 support, true. They won't have it until R600 which may be out early April. I guess if you want DX9, either brand is fine.
I was referring to ATi's slight performance edge with respect to a number of current games.

But Vista does not require DX10 by any means. nVidia's latest WHQL driver (100.65 at this time) fixed issues with their previous driver for DX8 and DX9 support, but still, as of this post time, does not fully support DX10 in all card configurations yet.

Another note: quad core has almost no performance boost over dual core for most games, even for "pro gamers". In fact, non-overclocked quads are only up to 2.66GHz which Core2 Extreme is up to 2.93GHz, in which case, the dual core will outperform the quad core noticeably in pretty much any game.

I don't mean to be argumentative with this post, I'm just trying to keep things more accurate.
Please don't just say I'm wrong without researching your claims and making sure everything is correct.

 

[brad.dude03]

Thanks for the info Samuraid. I have been looking at the Nforce boards, but they are quite expensive (at least here in Canada anyway, although they may come on sale sometime soon). As for the Core 2 Duo, yes, I choose it specifically because it had the 4MB L2 Cache. Also, one reviewer said that he managed to overclock it up to 3.2 GHZ! Mind you, I wouldn't want to go that high for fear of running into problems, but it is supposed to be extremely flexible in terms of overclocking, so I could always performance tune it And as was said by Gst_Nemesis, I think i'm going to stick with Nvidia on this one, but only because the Geforce 8's price will drop even more when the R600 comes out, but the R600 will still be top shelf price because it just came out. I could probably save a good deal of money because of this I picked my power supply specifically because it has SLI support, which assures me that it will be quality enough to run my currently non-sli system, and then it will be up to the challenge if I ever do go SLI. Quad Core is far too expensive for me, even if it did offer superior performance.

 

[Dr Super Good]

Quad core is better in preformance since almost ALL modern games support quad core since if it suports dual core it supports quad.

Quad cores still have an advantage over dual cores with older games or pros.

It allows them to run the game while having a video capture program and have other programs running at the same time.
Also so you know, over clocking them INTEL Core2Duo X6800 (Conroe) has been clocked to 5717.49 MHz

And an INTEL Core2Quad QX6700 (Kentsfield) has been over clocked to 5304.79 MHz

The result is the quad can have the power of nearly 2* that of the core2duo

And even though a quad core is slower clock speed, it still is faster in total power so thats why servers and buisnesses use them more than private people as of now.

Want to see the worlds fastest cores? look at http://www.ripping.org/database.php?act=records for really fast OCs

Also note the cooling methods, some use liquid nitrogen.

 

[Samuraid]

Also, one reviewer said that he managed to overclock it up to 3.2 GHZ!

Sounds about right. THG got one of the entry level Core 2 chips (1.86GHz) to overclock to 3.4GHz and run stably.
http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/11/core-2-duo-overtakes-core-2-extreme/index.html

And as was said by Gst_Nemesis, I think i'm going to stick with Nvidia on this one, but only because the Geforce 8's price will drop even more when the R600 comes out, but the R600 will still be top shelf price because it just came out. I could probably save a good deal of money because of this I picked my power supply specifically because it has SLI support, which assures me that it will be quality enough to run my currently non-sli system, and then it will be up to the challenge if I ever do go SLI. Quad Core is far too expensive for me, even if it did offer superior performance.

Sounds like good decisions.

Quad core is better in preformance since almost ALL modern games support quad core since if it suports dual core it supports quad.

Not necessarily true at all. True multi-threaded game programming is often not the easiest of things to do efficiently. Go find some performance charts and see for yourself. Better yet, I'll find some for you:
http://www23.tomshardware.com/cpu.html?modelx=33&model1=430&model2=464&chart=167

Quad cores still have an advantage over dual cores with older games or pros.

Not true at all. The only advantage with older games would be that the quad core could multitask more applications while playing a game, but the game itself would see basically no improvement.

It allows them to run the game while having a video capture program and have other programs running at the same time.

Yes, but as I said above, this is not improving the game performance itself. It's just offloading threads of a different program onto a different core.

Also so you know, over clocking them INTEL Core2Duo X6800 (Conroe) has been clocked to 5717.49 MHz

I don't see how this is completely relevant to the conversation; however, this sounds possible, especially with high-grade liquid cooling.

And an INTEL Core2Quad QX6700 (Kentsfield) has been over clocked to 5304.79 MHz

Same as I said previously. The lower overclock does make sense though: the quad has twice as much L2 as the dual.

The result is the quad can have the power of nearly 2* that of the core2duo

You only can in programs that can truly take advantage of parallelization. Unfortunately, the extent of programs that can do so is not as extensive as you assume.

And even though a quad core is slower clock speed, it still is faster in total power so thats why servers and buisnesses use them more than private people as of now.

Yes, the reason is that enterprise computing has already been using massive parallelization and multiple CPUs for years now, so business applications are much likelier to be efficiently multi-threaded. (such as 3d rendering, DBMS's, and matrix/optimization systems)
Very few non-business applications even use 2 cores efficiently.

Want to see the worlds fastest cores? look at http://www.ripping.org/database.php?act=records for really fast OCs

Also note the cooling methods, some use liquid nitrogen.

Looks like an interesting site, thanks for the link.

 

[brad.dude03]

I'll check it out, they must be crazy clocked... liquid nitrogen... the only problem I heard about that is that sometimes it tends to actually freeze your components... I looked on that site, and yes there is an entry for a 2.4 GHZ Core2Duo being clocked to 3.4 GHZ. This excites me in the extreme xD I can't wait to start clocking mine to see where I can get it

 

[Dr Super Good]

NOTE THE COOLING METHODS!

Do not attempt to overclock to what that site has since alot of the dual cores use liquid nitrogen and so not even water cooling could cool them fast enough.

A dual core at 3.4 GHz will give out a high amount of heat. And to reduce this heat you spend money on cooling and a good water cooling system can not be cheap.

Its always good to get the odd 100-300 MHZ if possiable or even 500MHz but anymore and you must be very carefull with your tempratures and stability since a core can get hot and fast.

Do it slowly and watch temprature with the core being fully loaded.
If it starts to rise past 60 (70 at most) you might consider down clocking since temprature can really damage your pricy cores.

Just be carefull since otherwise you can end up having a not working at all core instread of a fast core.

Also that processor comparision site I do not trust since it is missing modern games like supreme commanders which was made to fully use multi core systems.

 

[brad.dude03]

WEll obviously i'm not gonna attempt to go against the records I don't have that much money for cooling. But my CPU stays around 26 degrees celcius atm, so I don't think i'm doing too bad

 

[GST_Nemisis]

cooling is cheap and efficient these days, fans are quiet and cost pennys, water cooling is the future but can be more expensive. keep a spare £50 for fans and cooling.

 

[brad.dude03]

Yeah, but I was reading in PC Magazine, the problem with water cooling is that it is known to form condensation on your parts. And i'm sure you all know that water + electronics= bad medicine.

 

[Dr Super Good]

Record tempratures when your cpu has been loaded to maximum for 30 mins.
Since my graphic card runs at aproximatly 50°C when on desktop but it rises to 60°C when ingame.

Since what you think will be cool enough you may find overheating when playing supreme commanders or other CPU mega loading games.

I recomend you test tempratures constantly sice dust can also cause your tempratures to rise over weeks as the layer thickens, well im sure you know what will happen.

 

[brad.dude03]

Yeah I had that problem about a year ago actually. There was so much dust caught up in my fans that my CPU would hit about 39 celsius then my PC would lock up. Doing menial tasks like borwsing the internet and such, my cpu doesn't go any higher then 28, with a game going, it usually stays in between 30-32 but sometimes it might go higher, around 35 at most. It usually never goes to 36, 37, or 38 but it has jumped to 39 and my pc would freeze soon after. Thankfully my PC resides in my basement, which is cold no matter what season it is, so I think that helps things a tad

 

[Daminon]

My computer is finnaly ready to get at the mail thing place. Too annoingly long time though. First own computer.