New self build - Ideas please

[ik9000]

oh really? yet another "internet connection required to play the game"? Don't goods sold need to be fit for purpose? How can the manufacturer claim that the single player game requiring permanent internet access is fit for purpose when significant numbers of the population do not have access to stable broadband internet connections? Also is it really the manufacturer's business to know how long you've played their game for, or when, or how much progress you've made - does it measure such things?

I remember buying Far Cry and playing the thing on my laptop over my Christmas holidays when I was away from home a few years ago - with no net connection. Before that were Half Life and Quake 3 - endless hours on the single player getting used to giving myself RSI trying to learn how to jump rocket shells... call it gaming boot-camp if you will.

These were the things that got me into gaming in the first place. If I'd needed a continuous internet connection just to play the single player version I simply wouldn't have been able to play them. People still suffer from dodgy wi-fi, and poor net connections - won't it effectively means the game for them will be unplayable?

I still keep a copy of Far Cry and Quake 3 on my laptop for those long train/plane journeys when internet just isn't an option. It looks like I won't have to bother upgrading my laptop now -since none of the new games will be playable when I'm on the road...

[brduk]

Need five posts to include a link...

[brduk]

Thanks for all the feedback guys, appreciated.

So, do we reckon that getting the 3.2GHZ Phenom II X4 955BE would be a good choice?

What about the motherboard? Should I be looking to O/C the CPU or run it at stock? Any suggestions?

As for RAM, I found Kingston 2GB sticks on play.com for £15 each - http://www.play.com/PC/PCs/-/3319/25...archtype=genre - Would this be okay, or should I be looking elsewhere?

[ik9000]

As for RAM, I found Kingston 2GB sticks on play.com for £15 each - http://www.play.com/PC/PCs/-/3319/25...archtype=genre - Would this be okay, or should I be looking elsewhere?

It's value RAM with no heat spreader - I wouldn't.

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/4gb-(...s-9-9-9-24-15v is only slightly more (sub £40) for 2x2Gb of paired RAM with heat-spreader and a much better bet.
It will come up in Scan Today Only offers at least once a week for cheaper than this - got mine that way for £33. Scan also often do it in bundles with CPUs and motherboards which can be worth looking out for.

Cos the modules are paired i think it means you should get better dual channel performance. It's also 1600MHz rather than 1333MHz.

[brduk]

Here's another example of my ignorance, what would I be looking to use a SSD for? the O/S? or gaming data?

[ik9000]

Here's another example of my ignorance, what would I be looking to use a SSD for? the O/S? or gaming data?

Use an SSD for the OS - quicker boot times, quicker program access.

since they cost a lot per GB it might be worth getting a moderately sized one and then getting a large storage drive for file storage. I did this and it runs fine. I also moved the user files onto a partition on the storage drive to prevent the SSD getting cluttered with temp files + user data.

good instructions for this are here:

http://www.maximumpc.com/article/how...ia_storage_ssd

[Ultima2876]

If you're gonna buy an SSD, use it for the OS. The only difference in games will be maybe a couple of seconds reduction in load times, which won't be that long anyway. To be honest though, SSDs are overrated in my opinion

The Phenom II 955 BE is a great processor. If you're wanting to overclock it, you'll want to bear that in mind and get a good quality ATX motherboard and an aftermarket cooler. The Coolermaster Hyper 212 Plus is a great cooler that'll do the job very nicely and wion't break the bank. I've got a pretty mediocre cooler and I've got my 955BE to 3.6ghz - I'm a total overclocking newb so I haven't bothered with any advanced tweaking, I literally just knocked the multiplier up a bit and ran some stability tests.

If you go for the Phenom II 955BE, I'd recommend these motherboards:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/gigab...-sata-raid-atx - The one I have. Great mobo for the money - packed full of features, built like a tank and highly recommended, especially if you plan to overclock at all. Also, if you're planning to get an SSD make sure to get a SATA 6 one with a motherboard that supports SATA 6 like this one

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/asus-...board-graphics - If you're not overclocking something like this would be adequate. The main difference is the power design; for overclocking you want something with 8 mosfets; this one has 4.

Personally I think it'd be well worth spending the extra and getting the Gigabyte one. It's an awesome motherboard

Note on RAM: Definitely get Corsair or OCZ. Don't bother with anything else, you'll maybe save a few pounds for a massive headache. This kit: CMX4GX3M2A1600C8 - it's recommended by Corsair to get this one for AMD builds rather than the CMX4GX3M2B1600C9 kit (which is designed for Intel builds). They seem to put a big emphasis on getting the correct 'approved' kit for AMD systems; I'm personally using the "intel" CMX4GX3M2B1600C9 kit cause it saved some money and haven't had any problems but it's worth bearing in mind. Also, on some motherboards you may have to set the voltage correctly for your RAM kit or you won't get the full performance/stability out of it. If you get the "intel" CMX4GX3M2B1600C9 kit, bear in mind it's 1.65v even though it's sold as being 1.5v...

[ik9000]

Note on RAM: Definitely get Corsair or OCZ. Don't bother with anything else, you'll maybe save a few pounds for a massive headache. This kit: CMX4GX3M2A1600C8 - it's recommended by Corsair to get this one for AMD builds rather than the CMX4GX3M2B1600C9 kit (which is designed for Intel builds). They seem to put a big emphasis on getting the correct 'approved' kit for AMD systems; I'm personally using the "intel" CMX4GX3M2B1600C9 kit cause it saved some money and haven't had any problems but it's worth bearing in mind. Also, on some motherboards you may have to set the voltage correctly for your RAM kit or you won't get the full performance/stability out of it. If you get the "intel" CMX4GX3M2B1600C9 kit, bear in mind it's 1.65v even though it's sold as being 1.5v...

Thanks for clarifying the approved RAM vs AMD/Intel - didn't realise it mattered! I'd always thought decent DDR3 is decent DDR3 and would work fine provided you got the speed + voltages right.

Btw, OCZ have stopped doing RAM to concentrate on SSD etc. There might still be some available, but once it's gone it's gone. http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=28422

[ik9000]

If you get the "intel" CMX4GX3M2B1600C9 kit, bear in mind it's 1.65v even though it's sold as being 1.5v...

Can you clarify this?

I have both the CMX4GX3M2A1600C9 which defaults to 1.65V and CMX4GX3M2B1600C9 which defaults to 1.5V. If the CMX4GX3M2B1600C9 runs 1600 at 1.5V this is a good thing right, cos it means you can crank the voltage and drive it harder without going over 1.65V. Or is that too naive a view? I've not tried dropping the CMX4GX3M2A1600C9 to 1.5V to see if it still runs 1600. Will do eventually but until my exams are done I've promised myself I won't start changing any settings, or game. If I do I know that all my revision time will just evaporate before my eyes.

[Ultima2876]

If it's rated at 1.65v then running it at 1.5v is a fairly considerable undervolt - if you've tested it and it's stable then go with it you're not going to do any harm by running below the rated voltage; the only possible problem would be stability as it'd have been tested to run at the rated voltage... I noticed with my sticks I couldn't get 1333mhz stable until I upped the voltage to 1.64v, but I'm running 4 sticks which is going to require more.

My advice is that if it's stable at 1600mhz, stick with it.

[billythewiz]

what would I be looking to use a SSD for? the O/S? or gaming data?

If your main goal is bang for your buck, I'd not consider SSDs. They are the fastest hard disks you can get and if you want the fastest system you can possibly get then they're great, but they are not the best value for money.

These days you can get some pretty nifty HDDs (~ 1TB) for ~£40. Double that will get you an SDD of ~ 1/20th the size ..... but faster.

WRT to Linux, as has been said, don't bother unless you like solving Linux problems. One thing you could do (to see if the Linux route would be any good for you) would be to try it on your existing P4 system (to run . Assuming you have the spare disk space, install Ubuntu (use the Wubi installer and it will go on as a Windows app). If you want to do some research before you start search for cedega on the ubuntuforums. Faced with all that fuss I recently got a retail version of win7 from amazon.

I agree with the comments on ram too. Don't waste money on the expensive stuff but also don't waste it on the cheapest

BTW, how much are you planning to spend ?

[Ultima2876]

I agree with billythewiz about SSDs - not worth the extra cash tbh, unless you literally want a bleeding edge PC (in which case you'd be better spending your moeny on an i7 sandybridge, a £150 mobo and some insanely good cooling/case, plus a few graphics cards )

[Pob255]

Ok a bit late but I'd like to say on the ram that at 1.5v ddr3 shouldn't need heat spreaders, that was one of the original selling points of ddr3 it runs far cooler than ddr2 did where you could be pushing 2.3volts through ddr2.

I've never had any major issues with branded value ram (non-branded ram is different) as long as you're not overclocking it that is, it's overclocking the ram where value ram often falls short.

[Ultima2876]

Better to be safe than sorry though, with something like RAM. I've had so many corrupt "value" sticks in the past (even if it's just 1 or 2 bad blocks it will cause you UNIMAGINABLE problems), I've personally decided that it's just worth putting out the extra £6 or whatever to avoid a massive RMA/problem solving process...

Muhskin is also a brand of memory I've heard good things about, but to be honest there's nothing wrong with going with good ol' Corsair

[george1979]

+1 to the comments re not needing 2 graphics cards. One GTX460 is handling 1920x1080 admirably, so can't imagine you'll have any problems for 1650x1050

Yeah I'd agree with this. I just built my 1st gaming rig about 6 months ago and bought an SLI capable board for the upgrade potential. In all honestly the gtx460 has handled anything I have, including Crysis without issue. By the time I want to consider SLI there will probably be newer options available and my current card will be more difficult to get hold of so don't let things like SLI influence your decision too much.
Its nice to have the option to SLI but If I could have a 'do over' I probably would have went for a mobo with USB3 instead.

Also the current generation of cards all seem to OC pretty well so you have options to get more horsepower if needed.

Good Luck

[oolon]

I have not heard to much talk about Os, unless you are a linux expert using that for gaming will hurt. If you want to save money get windows 7 home and use opensource programs like openoffice (officelibre) to reduce you costs if you want more features, web servers, database etc use linux and dual boot, if you have little unix experence a linux distro is not going to make for an easy gaming experience. Linux 3d is based arround opengl rather than directx this can result in poor performance in games, yes its a software issue but do you have the knowledge to bridge the gap or infact care? Get a cheap windows if you want to game.