lol...you shoulda just kept quite...disappeared from the thread... you've probably never stepped foot inside a pc repair shop as a customer, never mind an employee. if you have, then that must have been one lousy repair shop...no socket has failed from cpu heat...ever...and the fact you would say that shows how little you know what you're talking about. it may have been damaged from the power coming through the pins, but no cpu would be able to reach the temps required to damage a socket from the cpu's heat before the cpu went out, not to mention, again, the damage to the pins from the voltage didn't kill the socket well before the cpu could even reach those temps... gimme the name of that cpu repair shop you work at...lol...i need to make sure no one ever goes there... good news is you are fairly new to the forum. you can create a different account and start fresh...no one knowing you have no idea what you're talking about. hopefully this round you research things before posting. and avoid topics you have no clue on...good luck.
Way too harsh, trig, way too harsh. We don't bash forums members here - old or new. It's just rude and uncalled for. EDIT: That said, I have to agree he's probably on a wrong forum with his stock HS and stock speed love.
Looks great - I'd definitely go for an SSD, it would benefit your system massively. Personally I don't like the "RAWR LOOK AT ME" looks of the 900, but if it's the case you like, do go ahead, it's a great case for aircooling. My only real change would be to drop the Arctic Cooling Freezer 13, and get a Gelid Tranguillo or a Titan Fenrir instead
Same, better cooling and and SSD gets my vote. To stay within budget you could consider dropping to the non-pro motherboard. UNless you are definitely going to go down the dual Gfx card route the Pro doesn't really offer much advantage and iirc the non-pro actually has more PCI slots which (in my case anyway) is a plus. <Just checked its has 1 more PCI slot> I am not a fan of the case either but thats purely down to individual taste, for something more subtle the bit-tech recommended Fractal R3 looks nice. For cooling i favour the Corsair H50 or the Antec Kuhler H20 over the really big air coolers due to he space and weight but again thats a matter of personal preference It'll be a nice machine, good luck with your build. Chunks
Good point. I'd happily trade in the possibility of a performance increase via SLI/Xfire for the certainty of an massive speedboost via SSD Hopefully this all goes together to help the OP (it's also useful to me personally, but I'm not quite ready to splash out... yet). it's fair to say that you get quite a decent system for around the 1k mark these days, at UK prices anyways.
Harsh certainly, Digerati and I have already had this out on another thread already but i agree that he maybe on the wrong forum. Digerati, its going to get pretty tiresome if you pop up in every overclocking thread with portents of doom. A lot of people here overclock, and even more people come here looking for overclocking advice, you may have your own opinions on the practice but I don't think they really apply to people on this forum
well, i respect your opinion...but there's plenty of bashing on this forum from time to time...so by we i assume you mean you, although if i had the time, i seem to remember a thread not too long ago that you jumped in on someone pretty good...but oh well...sometimes you just have to call people out to shut them up... personally, i don't think it was that harsh at all...definitely seen ... harsher
You can look in the link in my sig and decide if there is any credence to what I say. I assure you, the scrutiny I get as an MS MVP ensures, and forces me to verify my facts as there are many MS bashers, naysayers, and wannabe experts that just love to attack anything MS - even though MVPs don't work for MS - we've just been recognized by MS and others for providing quality help to folks with their computer issues. What I find sad here on this forum is the apparent goal of many of the regulars to ENSURE readers don't get all the information they need to make an informed decision. It is true, I have brought this topic up several times because none of you did. But all I did was point out the information - and you guys attacked - not the information, but the messenger. That's sad. To illustrate, this time, all I said was one simple line, The OP was then told to ignore what I said and I was accused making a big issue out of nothing and not knowing what I am talking about ever since. What I find most disturbing, considering the purpose of technical forums is to exchange information and promote learning, is instead of debating the facts in a mature manner, the typical reply is to bash the messenger with personal attacks. And yet, in each case, it was not my opinion that I posted when first posting the information, but a simple statement of the facts, as written in our warranties so the OP can make an informed decision! And NEVER, not once, have any of you bashed Intel or AMD for their policies, but instead, attack me, as the messenger, for informing posters of official policies, of something you don't want them to know! Or you think they should ignore. Or because "no one will know anyway" if you screw it up. Really sad. You are right. This is not the site for me. I much prefer warm and friendly sites the promote mature discussions of the facts and promote the exchange of information, not stifle it. @ The_R_Man - I apologize for the distractions. As you are now aware of the terms of the warranty agreement, I've done my job. If you still choose to OC and use a 3rd party cooler, then as I also said before, but was apparently ignored by others, "...have fun and go for it! It can be a good learning experience."
Words cannot express how much I lol'ed I am very sorry, but you come to an enthusiast forum and start raving on about "expert heat management"? That is hardly a cause for concern with todays chips. Yes, 5 years ago it was another matter entirely, but I clocked my friends 2600k at 4.2 ghz on the stock cooler, and it is rock solid. He has a normal case with no extraordinary airflow. To claim that the OP would not receive advice regarding safe overclocking and heat management is absurd. If you look through the countless of build advice threads on this forum you will see that most if not all custom builds include a fairly hefty cooler which guarantees quite low and stable temps even with a powerful chip and an overclock that kicks butt. We also often have overclocking threads and people are advised accordingly to the fact that this is an enthusiast forum. Noone in the right mind would come to this place, ask for help with overclocking without having examined the risks involved. Especially not if they have splashed 100's of £ on a new system. You seem like a nice guy - but with the wrong audience. You posts are better suited for Yahoo Answers where every redneck and chav asks "how do i build zhe most 1337 peecee?!?!?!". We as a community would be glad to have you, but I think you would need to tone down your "DOING ANYTHING NOT SANCTIONED BY INTEL/AMD WILL GET YOU KILLED" attitude, since most of the people here goes "Warranty .. What is that?". Oh, and people who brag with who they are in real life tends to get ignored. I don't care if you are Chuck Norris or the Queen of England. On the internet, everyone's equal, unless you seem smart. Then people listen to you.
Thanks for the warm welcome! "c." is short for circa in Latin, which means around. I was being lazy and didn't want to write more on this interminable iPhone keyboard. Hospital? In answering that question I'll be covering how the build has changed from 'gaming powerhouse' to something more modest. I have crohns disease and just had a really serious attack that I'm lucky to be alive from. The upshot is that I'll need to have major surgery in the UK at some point in the next 3-5 years. I'm obviously a bit stunned by this and it has altered the build somewhat. So, because I'll now have to ship the computer back to the UK (the surgery will take 1 year to recover from, so storage in Japan is impractical) it now has to be smaller and leaner. My big question is whether it's possible to get a micro-ATX MoBo that supports crossfire and can house two double slot GPUs? I'll probably only want one GPU to start with, but would like an upgrade path for the future. Is such a thing available, or might I have to wait for the x67 mobos to launch? I plan to cram this into a Silberstone Fortress FT03, which looks fabulous. I appreciate the discussion about overclocking, especially for someone who has been out of the game for as long as me. I'm aware of the dangers and would always seek out pro level advice where I'm unsure. Thanks for looking out for me! It's these kind of discussions that makes Bit-Tech a great place to be after only a few posts. Obviously, that means that the MoBo needs to be a good overclocker. In trimming down the build I've settled for the core i5 and 8GB. An SSD is a must I think from everything I've read. I'm still undecided on the GPU. What are the long term advantages of the 69x0 2GB compared to the 5870? Will the performance be worthwhile on a 1080P HDTV? Can i drive the TV at a higher resolution? There's not much difference in performance and a lot in price. Finally, since I'll be looking to crossfire in the future (or reuse in a later high end build) would a 1000w modular PSU be worth the money? Thanks so much for people taking an interest im this thread. I really appreciate your help with this, discovering bit-tech has been great to take my mind off things (some of the project logs are jaw dropping) and I can't wait to get out of hospital and on my life and, most importantly, PC building.
Let me answer a couple of your questions, and come with my own suggestions. I would still go for a full ATX motherboard, but in a Lian Li A05B (look it up, you will see that it is QUITE small). The 6970 is the direct descendant of the 5870 - it's simply a bit newer and a bit faster. If you plan to crossfire two 5870 or two 6970's and overclock your CPU I would aim for one of the modular 7-800 watt PSU on the market today. Corsair and Seasonic are prime PSU makers. On a fullHD tv at 1920x1080 a single 5870 should suffice unless you want to play Metro 2033 at max settings, but more FPS = more fun, right? You cannot force resolution settings any higher than the maximum resolution of your monitor - this is a simple hardware maximum. If your TV has 1920x1080 points to display, it cannot simply "get" more points The socket is called Z68, and it should be released in the comming months. It is possible to crossfire on existing P67 boards, and though I cannot remember any on top of my head, you should be able to find them quite easily.
Bragging? Not hardly. It was merely a response to more personal attacks like this, Again, in each case, I simply made a small comment pointing out the facts. In each case, it could have stopped there with the OP informed. But NO! You guys attack! And not the facts, but the messenger. Yeah. Because I said that, right? And I blew it out of proportion? I'm done here. Good day.
I found the Asus P8P67M-Pro which seems to be able to do everything I need. Crossfire, able to take a card the size of the 6950. Thanks for the hints about PSUs, I know nothing about this other than they're very important! What benefits will the z68 offer? Is it worth waiting on it? For the sake of space AND future transport I'm still erring towards the Silverstone and a mATX build. It'll be sat next to my TV for the next 3-5 years, so needs to look the part AND be cheap to ship 6,000 miles. Yes, I'm a tough customer! I'll give speccing the while thing out a whirl in a minute. Thanks for the advice!
well, if you stick around, you'll see i'm kind of a dick to everyone that posts info about topics they clearly aren't...knowledgeable on...which clearly you aren't. so don't take it personal...had the op asked about warranty violations in regards to oc'ing, your expertise would have been a great help. but it's pretty common knowledge to anyone who has built a pc what a warranty covers...but there are a few out there that dont i suppose. stick around...like someone said, while you may be better off giving advice on yahoo answers or ms mvp sites lolz...you can ask more technical questions here or read threads on the like and learn a few things...
Digerati, I genuinely appreciate the advice. I'd like everyone on this thread to be civil to each other. Whether you agree with him or not I'm certainly better informed about the legalities and consequences of bad overclocking. Rest assured, when I try it, I'll take every precaution. Right: here's the build, still open to tweaking and advice (everything from scan.co.uk unless otherwise noted). Case: Silverstone Fortress FT03S Silver, £131.33 PSU: Antec True Power New 750W Modular Power Supply, £86.78 MoBo: ASUS P8P67M-Pro, £112.40 CPU: i5 2500K, £160.98 Cooler: BeQuiet Dark Rock Pro CPU Cooler, £54.98 from overclockers.co.uk (will it fit the case?) RAM: Corsair Memory XMS3 8GB DDR3 1600 MHz CAS 9 Dual Channel, £70.94 (still need advice on this) GPU: Asus HD 6950 OC 2GB, £198.83 (is this a stock card? Can I combine this with any stock card in the future for crossfire?) HDD: Crucial 128GB RealSSD C300 SSD, £166.94 Optical: Samsung Slim DVD Writer, SN-S083, SATA, Black, OEM, £29.26 Software: Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit OEM, £72.08 TOTAL: £1,084.52. Thanks for all the help guys!
What is it that makes you so sure you will want Xfire in the future? Do you play (or plan to play) the games that have heavily optimised drivers? Check out the games you want to play now and see what other people are saying about the performance gains for Xfire. It might just not be worth it, ever..... and so pushing large PSU's in to the system well, I'm not sure that you'd even need that kind of juice for Xfire... check the following link to help with power calculations of various options: http://extreme.outervision.com/psucalculatorlite.jsp
Hi Kroy, thanks for the help! Crossfire is part of giving me an upgrade path. Right now, the games I want to play on a 1080P HDTV probably would not benefit (Civ5, Dawn of War II, Starcraft 2, The Sims, etc.). However, I'd like the option to give my rig a boost in a few years to keep it at the upper half of the performance table for newer games. I've read a lot about Crossfire and how well it scales, and occasionally I'll want to play a multi-platform title (like the new Deus Ex) on something more powerful than my 360. It's mostly about options right now. Since my prognosis I've changed the rig's plans somewhat. As an aside, I got served liver for breakfast today in hospital. Sometimes, words fail...
nice build, what do you need advice about the memory? Thats some good stuff at a reasonable price, WITHOUT ridicuously tall heatsinks for once *cough* corsair vengence *cough* and yes that is a stock card, bar the most stupid clock bump in history in my opinion, if you want to crossfire in future get another one of those and you'll be fine
I've been reading about memory and just don't understand timings and latencies and the effects they have on real world performance. The low profile heat spreaders are a winner though and at less than £10 per gig I thought they'd be okay. I'm open to suggestions though. The card I'll flash to a 6970 regardless, but do I need the exact same card (manufacturer, etc.) in the future for Crossfire? If it's just reference models that would make getting Crossfire up and running easier. Correct? Thanks for all your help. This is a friendly, informative forum. Cheers guys.
I thought I was on yahoo answers there.....sandybridge processors just require you to open the bios change the multiplier until your hitting 4GHz. I haven't heard any cases where the chip can't hit that on stock voltages with the stock cooler! If your confident in building your own PC and can't overclock sandybridge, its more than advice on a forum you need, its taken out the back with a double barrel shotgun. due to sandybridge having the clock on the processor rather than board means you can't really break the board either unless you start fluffing around with voltages which aren't needed to get a good OC on sandybridge. @OP crossfire is funny since you can mis-match cards from the same generation. You mentioned unlocking the card earlier but to do that you need the 2gb version rather than the 1gb. Unless you know you will crossfire I personally would go with the 1gb card. Tho you will pass the chance of unlocking. Just make sure there is enough spacing between the cards as heat can build up between them. While this wont make the explode or anything, the cards will throttle down and run slower so as to produce less heat. For extra reading check out tomshardware for their recent crossfire/sli tests. The looked at pci-e slots and the difference between x16/x16, x8/x8 and x16/x4 link Will that slim dvd writer fit in the case?
