Bottlenecking question - is it worth it? Other options?

[JERorly]

Hi all, firstly I'd like to apologise for my first post to this forum being a needy one! I'll do my best to make myself an active member of the community also.

Let me explain the situation to you...

My Dad has got a 'more power' attitude, and although he only uses his PC for playing Football Manager, he thinks it's needed to upgrade to the following:

Core i7 860 2.8ghz (8 Meg Cache)
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 768mb 192bit GDDR5 1800mhz
500GB HDD
4GB DDR3 1333MHZ RAM
Asrock H55M Intel H55 Motherboard
750W 24Pin PSU
All packaged nicely into a Galaxy3 ATX Case

Now, before you scream overkill for Football Manager, hear me out.

We managed to strike a deal, I would help him search for a new computer (I don't know much about what hardware is good and what isn't but I know the basics of speeds and I know my way around Nvidia cards.) and then he would give me his old PC (his current PC) and swap out the cards so I get the new GFX card in his old (current) PC.

His current setup is below:

Intel Core2 Quad Q6600 2.4 GHZ
NVIDIA GeFroce 9800 GT
700 GB HDD (Approximately, displays as 693 on Local Disk)
8GB DDR2 (Unsure of speed, I think it's 1333MHZ, can confirm if needed)
I have no idea about the motherboard, and I'm only guessing about the PSU but I think it's 750w. If it isn't, we have a spare 750w and for the life of me I don't know why it's not in his current machine.
Again wrapped up in a Galaxy3 ATX Case!

I can provide a link to the exact computer he is buying through PM I guess, I don't have the 5 post minimum yet!

There is absolutely no doubt that I'm getting an upgrade by taking his current PC, but here is my question now that I have everything else out the way:

How badly will his current PC bottleneck the GTX 460 from his new one? Is it really worth swapping the 9800 GT out for the GTX 460 or am I going to just see the same performance anyway because it would be bottlenecked so bad?

If you guys have any alternatives, it may also help knowing that he has a £600.00 budget to spend, but he did tell me that he would be willing to go over (within reason) if he could get one with a GTX 480.

While on the topic, I'm also concerned about the i7 processor that is in the computer he's buying new - is 860 a bad number for the i7 processors? It obviously isn't as powerful as the newer ones but I'm still pretty sure any i7 processor is a good one.

Thanks for all your help, I think I covered everything but if I did miss anything feel free to ask and I will give you as much information as possible! I will bold out the question for the TL;DR! Thanks again!

Jack

[PC4Free]

Personally i would opt for a 1336 i7 CPU rather than a 1156. FM is very CPU intensive (and also fantastic - 2007 is the best)

[nibbler]

Forget a gtx 480. No need to upgrade imo, certainly not the CPU, just OC it to 3 GHZ and it's fast enough for anything gaming wise. Get an SSD maybe for that cash and maybe upgrade GFX. Also, I hope that PSU is branded, 750W @ £25 is an explosion waiting to happen.

[JERorly]

Forget a gtx 480. No need to upgrade imo, certainly not the CPU, just OC it to 3 GHZ and it's fast enough for anything gaming wise. Get an SSD maybe for that cash and maybe upgrade GFX. Also, I hope that PSU is branded, 750W @ £25 is an explosion waiting to happen.

Hi, thanks for your helpful response. Is the Q6600 fairly susceptible to overclocking with no issues?

Sorry but, what is an SSD? Also, upgrade the GFX on which machine? Remember that the 9800 GT and the GTX 460 will be trading places, and my Dad isn't all that bothered about the graphics card in his machine.

And yes, that PSU is branded. I was going to mention that it says "Branded" but I thought it was the seller just trying to say it was a proper named one and not just a cheap knock off so I didn't bother!

Thanks again

Jack

[nibbler]

Hi, thanks for your helpful response. Is the Q6600 fairly susceptible to overclocking with no issues?

Sorry but, what is an SSD? Also, upgrade the GFX on which machine? Remember that the 9800 GT and the GTX 460 will be trading places, and my Dad isn't all that bothered about the graphics card in his machine.

And yes, that PSU is branded. I was going to mention that it says "Branded" but I thought it was the seller just trying to say it was a proper named one and not just a cheap knock off so I didn't bother!

Thanks again

Jack

Q6600s OC to 3Ghz pretty easily, if it's the G0 stepping.
An SSD is a solid state drive, no moving parts and way faster than an HD, boot up an OS in about 20 seconds. Likewise, much faster with games.

I see your problem with the upgrade: you are relying on getting his PC essentially. I just wouldn't bother upgrading anything really on that PC, except the graphics. If you must though, then the suggested upgrade is a pretty good one, although you may as well get an AMD 1055T in my opinion, it's only £150 but has 6 cores so for FM it should be pretty nippy.

[Cheapy]

Is the Q6600 fairly susceptible to overclocking with no issues?

As with any overclock it changes from chip to chip but in general the Q6600 is a very good overclocker. All you will need is a aftermarket heatsink and the know how to overclock safely.

Nibbler gave good advice with the graphics being the only thing you may look at upgrading. What resolution is he playing at? As a GTX 460 could be overkill for what he needs.

EDIT: Nibbler got in first

[JERorly]

Thank you both for your responses, they have been quite helpful.

However I feel as if I have caused some confusion.

I am taking the computer that he has currently (the second set of specs in the OP) however the 9800GT mentioned there is being replaced with the GTX 460 from the first set of specs (therefore mine which will be used for much heavier duty gaming than his) which is why I was so concerned about bottlenecking on the GTX460.

As for overclocking the Q6600, is there no way I can overclock with some type of software to keep things on the safe side? Maybe not knock it up to 3.0GHz but definitely something more reasonable than 2.4, like around 2.8 perhaps?

Overclocking is a station I have never boarded!

[nibbler]

3 GHz is fairly conservative for a Q6600 I think - people crank them up to 3.6 regularly. With a little help from the forums, it should be a breeze.
So you will be getting the second set of specs with a GTX 460, right?
I knew that, I'm just saying your dad is wrong in thinking his rig needs updating

[JERorly]

3 GHz is fairly conservative for a Q6600 I think - people crank them up to 3.6 regularly. With a little help from the forums, it should be a breeze.
So you will be getting the second set of specs with a GTX 460, right?
I knew that, I'm just saying your dad is wrong in thinking his rig needs updating

Oh, now I understand what you were saying. Yeah, but I'm not going to argue because I get a much better PC out of all this.

When it comes down to it I'm sure I'll be rearing my curious head looking for help overclocking my Q6600 if I find my performance is bottlenecked by it.

[Domestic_Ginger]

I stopped playing FM as soon as I realised I could crank up a whole season in a little over two days and it meant I had no life away from it. IIRC it has multicore support and will love an SSD as mentioned earlier.

This branded business is fishy; when Nibbler says branded we all on here think of it in terms of brands we have heard of and have reliable reviews of a number of their products. For £600 it seems to good to be true!

[nibbler]

Oh, now I understand what you were saying. Yeah, but I'm not going to argue because I get a much better PC out of all this.

Thought that might be the case

In which case yeah, seems reasonable upgrade except save £50 on the CPU and get a 5850 or GTX 460 1gb instead.

[nibbler]

For clarity: branded = corsair, seasonic, Enermax, ocz, seasonic etc.

[scaryjim]

OK, can I just clarify: your dad's getting the top build for £600?

If so, it's being skimped on something, probably the PSU. 750W is huge overkill for that rig, and that probably means it's a cheap / dubious brand unit that could well go pop, taking the rest of the build with it! I get the components without case and PSU to ~ £550, and I wouldn't be happy putting a PSU costing much less than £50 in there, which means that he's essentially getting a case and (presumably) an optical drive for free. I'd definitely want to look at the exact specs of the rig he's buying. You'll hit 5 posts next post, so you should be able to provide us with a link that we can check out for you.

As others have said, don't worry about a Q6600 bottlenecking a GTX460. With decent resolution and image quality the GPU is going to be the primary bottleneck. I'd certainly have a swing at overclocking the Q6600 though: if you're unsure how to go about it try following Hexus's Core 2 overclocking guide (it says Core 2 Duo, but the principle is exactly the same for overclocking a Core 2 Quad), written by forum member Clunk.

[Pob255]

Well if I'm reading that right the case is also being scrimped on
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/p...h/GALAXY3.html
A fairly cheap, basic and not a great case.

The motherboard is also a low end one
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/190514...edium=products
although it could well be the LE version http://www.eclipsecomputers.com/prod...A-H55MLE&af=50

Although that in it self is not a major flaw as you dad doesn't sound like the sort of person who overclocks, adds additional cards or generally fiddels around inside his pc.
It'll still be good at it's stock settings.

£600 I'd guess a cheap and nasty PSU as well, which I'd not trust.
Although it could be a decent OEM unit, but again 750w for that spec? rather susspious sounding.

Oh and if they are advertising this "750w" psu as "a 24pin" psu as if it was a key feature, that would mean one of 3 things
1 - The seller has not got the first clue about psu's
2 - The seller is so used to dealing with people who know so little about computers that he treats all his customers like total idiots.
3 - The seller knows the PSU is rubbish and is just putting down keywords that make it sound good to people who don't know much about computers
Which fills me with less confidence.

The key for overclocking his old system would be finding out what the motherboard is (esp the chipset) what the memory is and the make&model of the current PSU and probably the spare too.

[scaryjim]

Well if I'm reading that right the case is also being scrimped on
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/p...h/GALAXY3.html

Based on that pricing the PSU's coming in at £17. Tell your dad to steer well clear of that - he'll be lucky if it provides a stable 350W, let alone 750....

[JERorly]

Thanks everybody for your responses, hopefully we'll get to a solution that is solid soon.

This is my exact 5th post so I'm not sure it's going to work, but I'll have to double post.