What to look for in a GPU...

[Zak33]

I read that NVIDIA Kepler's are rumoured to be mid-2012. Any news on Radeon 7000s?

/harsh uncaring mode ON

You see, you've now moved into the future so far that I've lost interest

Buy a gaming rig for NOW..... and in mid 2012 you can worry about it.

PC hardware moves so fast .. you blink.. you miss it.

So... lets be short and to the point.. something I'm getting a reputation for.

How much you wanna spend NOW?

£150 of £200?

I'm gonna roll you back to something MORE important and I'm gonna guess you'll ignore half of it, but I shall say it anyway.

SPEND THE MOST MONEY ON THE PSU relative to it's competitors.

SPEND THE NEXT MOST ON THE CASE relative to it's competitors and make sure it'll fit all the kit.

RAM needs to be GOOD QUALITY but does NOT need to be uber speed. Corsair stuff is all good.

Motherboard needs to be good quality but you may change it in the next 2 years.
CPU same as above but more likely to be a new CPU in the motheboard than new board

and graphics last...... last.......

I PROMISE.. A GOOD PSU WILL OUTLAST EVERYTHING ELSE. Get the best, MODULAR one you can afford and in 5 years, with 4 upgrades.. you'll come back and thank me

the graphics card will be upgraded loads inbetween.

[kalniel]

^ all sound advice. Listen well.

[Zak33]

lol

Kal and I have started seeing eye to eye....

that means only one thing... well... two things.

one.. he's as old and crotchety as I am... (only kidding Kal)

and

two... he's as old and crotchety as I am... (only kidding Kal)

[EvanJackPenn]

I do have quite a Corsair affinity

I'm likely to get a Corsiar HX650, 600T White, and 8GB Vengeance memory. Do i have your approval?

I don't see myself upgrading any of these parts in the forseeable future, unless there is like a breakthrough in super-ultra RAM; which I doubt.

Many thanks, especially for the bluntness

[Zak33]

£135 on a case is .... pushing it a tad even for my love of cases.

£50 http://www.scan.co.uk/products/antec...g-case-w-o-psu

£60 http://www.scan.co.uk/products/silve...-panel-w-o-psu

both good, used both... both quite up to the job.

[Zak33]

PSU.. I drop you £5 and raise you to an Antec 750 Truepower

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/750w-...quiet-fan-atx-

a tool

[Zak33]

ram is fine... I have 16gb of Gskill Ripsaw and 16bg is totally useless. I've taken 8 gig out and have 8 gig in.. and it makes no difference at all.

So don't be tempted to up the amount unless you are MR VIDEO EDITER

[Zak33]

and while I'm preaching..

buy one of these.

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/icybo...d-black-colour



it goes in a CD drive bay. It needs a SATA power cable and a SATA data cable plugging into the back. Then you can slide a drive in, close the door which pushes the SATA drive back ito the connectors.. and it's in.

then.. when you need to put your mates SATA drive into your machine, or transfer data to your Dad's house.. etc.. whack a cheap SATA drive in it.. boot up... transfer data.. boot down.. take it out.

I use mine for back ups too. So good is it that my Dad and my mate SAOFG both have one so when I go to their house, I take a cheap 250 gig drive with me with everything I need on it incase of PC reapirs, or game requirements.

I also have an old drive with XP installed and if I need XP I whack it into this caddy, boot into bios and change boot order to that drive...

£15 of the best money ever spent.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

TBH,if you upgrade cases at the rate I do even £100 to £150 is not too much! I would rather get a £100 to £150 case every 5 to 6 years than get a £50 every two years TBH. Just get the one you really want otherwise you might end changing it too many times.

As Zak as mentioned getting a good PSU is a good investment in the long run. My HX520W was £60 to £70 in 2007 and it is still fine know.

For some weird reason the LED version of the PSU he suggested is £80 on Scan:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/750w-...ps-12v-quiet-f

However,beware of getting caught in the Corsair marketing as you should consider the OEM more than the actual re-badge!

[Zak33]

However,beware of getting caught in the Corsair marketing as you should consider the OEM more than the actual re-badge!

to explain this..

Corsair.. great people.. don't make PSU's

they buy someones elses...

Antec make their own.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I do have quite a Corsair affinity

I'm likely to get a Corsiar HX650, 600T White, and 8GB Vengeance memory. Do i have your approval?

I don't see myself upgrading any of these parts in the forseeable future, unless there is like a breakthrough in super-ultra RAM; which I doubt.

Many thanks, especially for the bluntness

One of my mates got a white 600T last week. I am a SFF PC person myself but it is one of the few ATX cases I would consider buying myself! It has a retro sci-fi vibe to it IMHO. The top fan is so powerful on full whack that you could probably play miniature air hockey on it!!

[scaryjim]

For once ( ) Zakky's talking nothing but sense. Antec make stonking PSUs - I'm currently running a 650W Truepower Trio which is humming away happily to itself after almost 4 years.

As to cases - I know a lot of people make a big song and dance about all the wonderful features on £100 cases, but consider this: how often will you take your computer out of your case and put it back in? For some people / inveterate fiddlers it's almost monthly, but for me it's "when something goes badly wrong" - so a lot of the cool features on high end chassis just aren't necessary. Case in point: I'm still rocking a budget ATX mid-tower that I acquired in January 2004.

I'm not saying that you should therefore rush out and buy a £16 beige box - more expensive chassis do have benefits - but I think we sometimes get carried away by the coolness factor without thinking pragmatically Ebuyer do a range of Casecom cases at around £25 that have a lot of the features of bigger name brands, and very decent build quality. They're not to everyone's taste, but take a look at them - I've built into them, as have a couple of other people on Hexus, and you get a lot of features and quality for your money...

[this_is_gav]

to explain this..

Corsair.. great people.. don't make PSU's

they buy someones elses...

Antec make their own.

You realise Seasonic make some Antec PSUs, I believe including the one you linked to earlier?

[scaryjim]

You realise Seasonic make some Antec PSUs, I believe including the one you linked to earlier?

I believe they're made to an Antec specific design though, rather than being an OEM unit with a new sticker slapped on it?

[simon66]

I've been doing some searching because i'm thinking of building and the closest i got to a card which suits me is the Sapphire Radeon 5770. I need one that can combines decent enough graphics and keep the power comsumption low so this one seems to fit the bill. Although i know little about these things this is what i gathered from reading forums like this one.

There are newer cards better in performance than this one i guess but when i look at their power usage on idle and full they seems high.

Cheapest i've seen the Sapphire Radeon 5770 is around £92.

[Lee H]

What I did when I looked at the cards was narrowed them down depending on the features I wanted from my new PC.

As I decided to take the plunge into 3D and got one of the acer 24" 3D monitors, I ended up getting the largely named MSI GTX 570 twin frozr III PE/OC card to give me 3D and also for physx.

I find that if you choose the card on what features you would use, and you cannot get it wrong