Hi guys I am an average uninformed user, with a flexible budget, planing on buying a new gaming rig, some things to consider first: -It's a gaming rig. -Will be working on a dusty and tropical country, temperatures are an issue. -Money is not a problem, but I'm looking into smart buying, no madness, around a 1500 euro budget (flexible) - Please let me know your opinions on the doubts bellow: Current choice: i7 920 D0 - Should I run a i5 setup Instead? is it faster\worth the cash saving? Current choice: Mobo Gigabite GA-EX58-UD3R or any ASUS P6T (I'm clueless on mobos, these 2 are the only ones available here for this cpu) Current choice: Memory: Thinking on 6 to 12Gb of ram, thinking 1600Mhz -is 1600Mhz decent? - Read that 12Gb of memory might be overkill and get me performance issues... -should I push for more Mhz if I can? - Also clueless on memory timmings, any specific set of numbers I should look for? - A lot of brands and prices differ a lot for stuff with the same specs on this one, can I just go for the cheapest or should I be concerned with brand? Current choice: Tower\Box - ? Also clueless here, have access to most known brands here, I get lost with so many choices, would go for something well ventilated and with cooling features by itself, any advice? Dont suggest the ones made of gold please, lol. Would also like to avoid useless neon fancy stuff on them too. Current choice: Storage - WD Black Edition (the fast one...) - An option is a Samsung F3 - Another option is squeezing in a SSD, heard it has a limited lifetime... - Still another option that I kinda fancy would be a Raid setup, is it reliable? Faster than single drive but slower than a SSD setup I guess, but similar costs to a single drive I believe... Current choice: GPU - single 5870. - Is brand important? Some price variations, was looking into buying the cheapest 5870 available (in here the Saphire), but might be doing a mistake. - Been holding myself from losing my head and going for a dual downgraded GPU setup in crossfire, something that brings more questions by itselff such as, needing a mobo with dual e16x, which gpu to use? dual 5850? dual 57xx series? dual 5870 as pretty as it looks would be considered a bit expensive for my standarts, so I wont follow that one. A friend of mine sugested getting the mobo for dual GPU and just buy one 5870 looking into adding a second latter when prices drop. Current choice: PSU - I am aiming at at least 800W power for this system, might increase it if I lose my head and do a last minute shift to crossfire. Also, wth is "modular" power and should I chose it? Current choice: Extra cooling - I feel that I should be buying some extra air cooling, due to the tropical environment, any cheap\efficient suggestions? Sorry for crunching all my doubts in this kinda long post, just fire away your wisdom... Thanks
if you are even thinking about an i5 then go for it - i have said before that the only 2 decent options in the intel lineup are the i5 and i7 920 (in terms of price/performance). if you choose the i5 get 4gb RAM, for the i7 use 6gb. get 1600Mhz if you can as it gives overhead if you do decide to overclock. I have an Asus P6T, its a quality part, wont give any trouble. Get a tower, but find one with very good airflow and dust filters - HAF 922 or Antec 902 spring to mind. Samsung F3s are the current kings of HDs. Get a single gfx card, HD5870 is very good if you can find one. As temps are an issue for you dont go for a dual card setup as heat becomes an issue then. 650-700W will do you fine, as long as its a decent make. go modular if you can as it makes cabling so much easier. with a high airflow case that should take care of your cooling needs, although get a decent CPU cooler (titan fenrir, TRUE or megahalems).
you can still get a good gaming rig out of a 775 socket set up as long as you use good GPU's and 64bit o/s In the environment you will be using the set up, you wont be as annoyed to have to replace a cheaper mobo thats toasted or DDR2 / 3 Ram that gets fried. Maybe even a AMD set up might also be a better option for you considering where you have said you will be playing on it. A Solid Coolermaster case or similar will provide ample airflow with dust filters Just a thought.
barndoor101 Thanks for the input, specially the Case advice, have both those models available. You seem undecided on the i5 and i7 920, although I see you own a 920 yourself. mrb_n01 I understand your comment, I did read the article, and the other 2 previous months as well, actually part of my choices are based on what I read around on the web. However since I am not a modder or a specialist in these things I do have some questions regarding the setup and the environment in which is going to run. Some questions might be more silly than others, but I guess all of you guys started of asking them to someone else, so I apreciatte if you could see some of my concerns and doubts and give me some peace of mind before I toast 1500 euros on my playing mate for the next couple of years. Blarte that is very good advice, indeed where I'm going the hardware available is outdated and replacement parts very hard to find. That's why I have to be conservative on the cooling and on the way I push the system. Last rig I had was inactive for 2 months until I managed to bring a new PSU from europe, freaking power cuts and low quality power grid burned the old one to death (got a decent ups now to protect the machine a bit better now...) I travel to europe often, so I'll stick with the new technology and risk stuffing it in the airplane cargo bay with a lot of foam and a bit of faith too... heheh Funny fact - I will be using the machine in southeast asia, home of most hardware factories, but weird thing is I have the hardest of times to access good top of the line parts in some of those countries, I end up buing everything in Europe and bringing it back... hehehe
ah i didnt realise you had so much to spend - go for the 920 as the i5 is an extremely good budget part but isnt as good as the 920 (obviously). do you intend to overclock? and also is noise a concern?
No Problems, I dont have to travel out of my pc room to "stuff" up my hardware haha .. I do it by mending it when its not exactly broken ....Sigh*
I intend to overclock in a very conservative manner, its a tropical country and things heat up considerably. Might run it at stock speeds if it copes well with the games at hand. The big test will be running ARMA II at high detail settings. Noise isn't a concern.
in that case use this as a guide: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/buyers-guide/2009/11/10/what-hardware-should-i-buy-november-2009/3 but i prefer the Asus P6T Deluxe over the gigabyte (i find the BIOS easier to use), get the HD5870 of course, get whatever 1600mhz RAM you can find, and the rest is gravy.
I both agree and disagree, in terms of price the i5 works out better yes but in terms of performance well you can get much better performance from an Intel Core i7 860 which easily thrashes an i5 setup (and I know this as i've used both chips) not to mention the fact the i7 860 is also clocked faster than both the i5 750 and the Intel Core i7 920 2.66ghz (750/920) compared to 2.80ghz (860) but it's debatable which is actually better the i7 860 or the i7 920 (as mentioned several times in other threads) but let's not get back into that debate again
