RE-buildingrig and stuck on what to do Im rebuilding my current rig on tuesday but im a little confused on what else to change. First off my rig is mainly used for gaming and watching films etc. Heres my current rig:- Q6600 ( running @ 3.32GHz ) 4GB DDR 2 800 Asus P5Q-E board BFG GTX 275 Grpahics X-Fi Gamer Sound 750W Jeantech PSU 22x SATA DVD- RW Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB drive So far I have ordered:- Asus P7P55D-E Board I5 760 CPU Corsair XMS3 1600 Ram I will also be getting a Pair of SSD drives to stick in RAID 0 For Win 7 and Arma 2 to run off plus a few other essential apps etcs. Im stuck on what card to go for though between the GTX 460 ( 1GB ) ATI 5770 If i waited a little while and somehow scrapped the cash together I could get the GTX 470 or maybe the ATI 5850. What would people go for out of the four as an upgrade.
Is the 275 really struggling in current crop of games? What res are you playing at? Maybe you should wait a bit for the 6xxx series and compare it to the nVidia alternative ?
at the moment im only pulling 15 - 25 fps in ArmA 2 : Operation Arrowhead ( i used to get a minimum of 45FPS ) and Ive been trying to play GR:AW 2 as well. Theres not so much of a problem in there as I get 60+FPS where as i used to get over 165FPS. I think a lot of the issues are board or ram related hence the upgrade...I couldnt afford to buy i7 and at the same time it was pointless buying a socket 775 board and possibly DDR 2 ram either so i decided to go fot the i5 set up. I usually play at 1920 x 1080 on a 23.5" screen
Why are you buying two SSDs to RAID!? Have you budgeted for a HighPoint 6Gb/s 'card too? The chipset SATA6 ports are basically not going to support full SATA6 speed. My advice is, buy ONE Crucial C300 128GB, a HighPoint card, and see where you are with i5 before upgrading your GTX275, as none of the 'cards you've specified will be that revolutionary compared to your existing GFX.
I could look at just one bigger capacity SSd rather than 2. Im just trying to get the best kit i can at the moment...this old board has had over 25 BSOD's in the last few weeks so i know its time to sell it before I have to scrap it.
Did you end up getting to the bottom of the BSOD's to determine that the board is actually the problem?
TBH no not really but i tried loads of things from underclocking switching, ram out, flashing the bios etc. Then the wife had a little win on the old bingo and offered to help me do the upgrade I had been considering for months anyway. So I was faced with a dilema....do I continue battling away trying to find the damn source of the problems or do I bite the bullet and start the upgrade path to a new pc....the decision took milli seconds...cos its shiny new stuff lol
Ahh, okay, faced with a "little win" I would probably do the same. GPU wise, it is a bit of a volatile market at the moment and the next gen of ATI cards will make it even more so. Arma II is a beast of a game with all the eye candy turned on so you really want the best GPU you can afford. The i5 760 should be fine as you can overclock it if and when required, it is the GPU that will limit you. Given that the 5850 is coming down in price, maybe consider one of those? They can be overclocked quite well to give a significant edge over a 460 but I am wondering (as we all are) what ATI are going to release. That said, if you are willing to go SLI then 2 x 460's are apparently fantastic, it is just that with 2 cards in SLI there is a harder upgrade path. To summarise, to drive Arma II at high FPS at your resolution you will need a good GPU (or 2), if you want to go dual cards then 2 x 460's is the way to go. If you want a single card then it is a tough call given that ATI are, in my opinion, going to throw a spanner in the works shortly. You could always get a single 460 now, see what ATI do and either sell the 460 if you want a new ATI card or, if they don't appeal, simply buy a second 460. Oh and one other thing. I would definately get a good quality PSU to replace your Jeantech no matter what you do.
