Hardware PC Hardware Buyer's Guide - March 2010

I upgraded from Fenrir to H50. . .

Fair advice, the H50 does leave more space in the case. After tweaking and tests I found the H50 only lowered my temps on the CPU by 1-2 degrees (HAF922 case). It is also much quieter than the Fenrir on full CPU load as the H50's fan maximum is about 1600rpm compared to 2200rpm on the Fenrir. I value quieter computing but I was disappointed at the small improvement in temps.

 

Rollo - in a way you're right because that's why we recommend it for the Affordable Allrounder, however in terms of future proofing and having people run torrents/leave other things like MSN running in the background while they game - a quad certainly helps.

Some people religiously close everything, while others (like me) leave everything open and run a game anyway.

 

Interestingly the H55 chipset board from Gigabyte is cheaper than the P55 at Novatech (my local store)

Considering I dont plan on overclocking huge amounts and I'm looking at the i5-750, Is it worth spending the extra £8 for P55 considering I dont need the sata ports that the P55 adds?

 

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/motherboards/2010/01/28/gigabyte-ga-h55m-ud2h-review/3

That's how well it works.

 

Well naturally I read that Bindi

To me those stats look pretty reasonable for H55 with an i5-750 but there is only 1 gaming performance test which I tend to use as my "Real world" tests as they will actually be visible, where as things like memory latency, I probably won't notice unless im bench marking all day.

The other thing with the "points" system for H.246 encoding is that it doesn't tell me what the reference material was and just how long it took to encode. Time is a measurable I would be able to actually see during use. You wouldn't by chance have the raw data surrounding that kind of thing perchance?

I both love and hate upgrade time because of things like this

::edit::

Oh yeah, and on the article page: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/motherboards/2010/01/28/gigabyte-ga-h55m-ud2h-review/6
The HDD Stats dont make any sense.. there are 2 sets of numbers for the P55M-UD2, which are right?

 

"fanning me gently..."

I read that wrong for a moment.

 

The reference system (set to 1000) is a Core 2 Duo E6600, 2GB DDR2 800 and an Asus P45 motherboard. A score of 1333 is 33% faster, 2000 is 100% faster etc.

Those HDD stats show the effect of overclocking on SATA throughput - if there's not much difference then CPU performance does not affect SATA. It should be both fast and consistent, however many BIOS engineers have made SATA throughput directly linked to CPU frequency so it suffers when the CPU enters the power saving states, lowering the clock speed.

 

Ah right. Cheers Bindi. Now it makes a bit more sense.
I guess that's actually listed in the article but in my haste I managed to miss it.

 

Would you build a system around the i5-750 in this case?. Or would I be better off sticking with i3-530 with integrated graphics? How about an i5-661/660? Does the extra 166Mhz graphics freq make a difference i.e worth the extra money?

I can't decide :-(

 

Try:

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2010/01/25/intel-gma-hd-graphics-performance/1

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2010/01/04/intel-core-i5-661-core-i3-530-cpu-review/1

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2010/03/03/overclocking-intel-core-i3-530/1

and check:

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2010/01/21/silverstone-grandia-gd03-review/1

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cases/2009/11/26/lian-li-pc-c32-htpc-case-review/1

too

And for £700 we recommend: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/buyers-guide/2010/03/09/pc-hardware-buyers-guide-march-2010/3 the 750 with P55.

 

I ended up deciding to get the i5-750, P55m-UD2, and 4GB of 1600Mhz 9-9-9-24 G.Skill Ripjaw ram.
Yay new PC. My trusty E6300 lasted 3 years odd though!

Once again my new build owes it's thanks to BIT

 

Useful read as I will be putting a rig together soon.

With all the suggestions for other builds I did have an idea for one final rig to add to the series - "BiTs from the Marketplace". Have a browse over the last months postings and pick your best value build fromt he prices of items sold there. It would show the alternative for those who fancy a bit of recycling.

 

Apart from GTA 4, all UT3 titles, Left 4 Dead 1 and 2, Dragon Age :Origins. Duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh

 

Worlf of Warcraft and Counterstrike: Source should not be on a list of games on a "ZOMG my quad is not used" list. They're ancient games.

CPU power can be factor in some games. Crysis IS one of them. Especially Warhead. Although it and gta 4 are the only games i can think of that makes use of very #very# heavy streaming. Farcry 2 isn't such a title though. Ive taken my Q6700 down from 3.4ghz all the way to 1.6ghz, and it was only under 2 ghz that the fps was really affected.

This article is very illustrative for the general topic:

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2009/05/19/real_world_gameplay_cpu_scaling/

 

I've just built a system for my daughter using the affordable all rounder as a base. I already had a Asus PK5 board spare, Core 2 Duo, 2GB 800 DDR2 and an 8400GS Nvidia card.

So I had delivered from Aria today, Antec Three Hundred case, Corsair 400CX, Arctic Cooling Freezer Pro, Sony 24XDVDRW and a Samsung F3 500GB Spinpoint. All cost £151.51

Must say its a very quiet setup and looks bloody good as well. It will also be perfect for the usual email, internet, facebook, Sims3 and Football Manager attached to the 1080p LCD and a wireless keyboard.

I'm so impressed I think I'll build another one.

 

I've ordered my bits for a tweeked "Enthusiastic Overclocker", but have a couple of questions.

- Have I screwed up on the PSU (Corsair 450VX i.l.o. OCZ ModXStream Pro 500)
I got impatiant as neither Scan nor Dabs had the OCZ

- No one has the Gelid Tranquillo
Do I hang on for Tranquillo with Scan, or is there a just as good alternative at Scan?

Other changes made are i3-530 i.l.o. i5-750 and CM690 II i.l.o. Fractal R2 case

Thanks from an impatiant Newbie

 

With the i3-530 you really need a H55 motherboard. We explained in the text that the chipset is better suited to overclocking if you pair them. P55 will work, but it won't overclock nearly as well.

Alternatives to the Gelid include the Akasa NeroS. We've literally just tested this in the last 2 days and the performance is very similar.

The VX450W is fine, although you will be limited by what graphics card you can use because it only has 1 PCI-E connector. The HD 5770 spec'd in the Enthusiast Overclocker will work with this and the whole PC should use less than 300W under load. Obviously you won't have that much future upgradability options.

 

^_^ Great to hear!

 

I went for the P55 as "I" don't plan to overclock and my boy won't be fiddling about for a year or two, by then we can upgrade to the i5 or i7 and unless I've got it wrong, I thought the P55 was better for overclocking the i5/i7.

Re: the cooler. Scan want £37 for the Akasa NeroS and only £32 for the Titan Fenrir ("Gaming Workhorse" what to buy), so I assume I'd be better off with the Titan?

Thanks for replying.

 

I know someone else has already beaten me to it, and that there is only time to correlate so many pieces of info, but how about including the HTPC/Jukebox. It was in last months mag, so it should be no hardship to publish via the forums....

I'd also like to see a link on configuring each system optimally - ie, the settings used in the bios for the enthusiast overclocker rig. The folding details set up on the folding rig etc.

Otherwise, keep up the good work!