Need some suggestions on building a new computer

[Xiong Chiamiov]

I'm kinda skeptical about putting the PSU on bottom, but I guess it'll work...

Just make sure that the PSU has long enough cables to stretch to things in the top of the case.  My mobo's power barely fit in my Antec P180.

[xShadow]

I forgot to update this, but I've actually got the thing up and running now (posting from it, actually). I'm surprised at how smoothly everything went. The only really bad thing that happened is my XP bluescreened trying to start up because I switched out the motherboard. So, I just acquired Windows 7 (64-bit) and then shoved it on here via flash drive.

I'm also surprised at how well stuff runs on 64 bit W7. I thought I'd have way more trouble than this with applications, but quite frankly it's been a breeze. I haven't had trouble starting up anything, and most of the stuff I have now runs just fine.

The only thing I'm a little worried about is how hot the thing runs. When the room is cold, it idles at 27-30 C, and goes to 58 C under full load. When the room is warm, it's up to about 60-something ish under load (depends on how warm my room is).

To me, this seems to be a little too hot for an i5, but I'm not sure...

That aside, I'm going to probably start looking at graphics cards in a few weeks. Gonna get one by the end of this month. My 7800GT is actually in surprisingly decent shape. With my new processor, I could play The Last Remnant quite decently.

</report>

[nstgc]

It idles at 58? Damn!

I don't know about Intel CPUs, but run some bench marks and keep on eye on the temperature. If it goes over 65, I'd worry.

If it were me, I'd over clock it by about 10 percent while making sure the voltage is fixed. Then run 3DMark several times, run Prime95 for at least one day (ensuring all cores are at their max), and running several passes with MemTest. Even if the temperature is elevated, if it can run overclocked through all that, then it can run at stock speeds.

[kureshii]

The only thing I'm a little worried about is how hot the thing runs. When the room is cold, it idles at 27-30 C, and goes to 58 C under full load. When the room is warm, it's up to about 60-something ish under load (depends on how warm my room is).

If you're on the stock cooler, those temperatures don't look surprising. Intel's coolers for their high-end processors are always inadequate for benchmarking and anything else really taxing. Suggest you invest in a good aftermarket cooler instead (though that would mean more $$$, but you should be able to find something affordable.)

[xShadow]

It idles at 58? Damn!

I don't know about Intel CPUs, but run some bench marks and keep on eye on the temperature. If it goes over 65, I'd worry.

If it were me, I'd over clock it by about 10 percent while making sure the voltage is fixed. Then run 3DMark several times, run Prime95 for at least one day (ensuring all cores are at their max), and running several passes with MemTest. Even if the temperature is elevated, if it can run overclocked through all that, then it can run at stock speeds.

Umm...

When the room is cold, it idles at 27-30 C, and goes to 58 C under full load. When the room is warm, it's up to about 60-something ish under load (depends on how warm my room is).

I forgot to mention, but at warmer temps the idle is about 32C-35C. Somewheres around that.

Suggest you invest in a good aftermarket cooler instead (though that would mean more $$$, but you should be able to find something affordable.)

This is about the only thing I could find.  If you think there's a better choice among these, let me know.

To be honest, I think the temperatures are all right... I just don't want to have to keep my room freezing cold whenever I want to use my computer... >_>

Welp, looks like I'll have to hold off on that sound card (at least...).

[nstgc]

What do you mean by "umm"? Its a good way to ensure stability.

Anyway, I recently purchased this for a Phenom II and it works great. Easy to install, cool, and quite. It doesn't explicitly list the i5 in the compatibility list, but it does list the i7 and several other Intel processors.

[edit] Oh, opps, I see. Yeah, 60ish under full load. Still, it never hurts to be sure.

[xShadow]

Alright, I think I've saved up enough to seriously finish off this computer.

What do you mean by "umm"? Its a good way to ensure stability.

Anyway, I recently purchased this for a Phenom II and it works great. Easy to install, cool, and quite. It doesn't explicitly list the i5 in the compatibility list, but it does list the i7 and several other Intel processors.

[edit] Oh, opps, I see. Yeah, 60ish under full load. Still, it never hurts to be sure.

That's a good looking CPU fan. According to their site, it does indeed support LGA1156 boards. I will probably be buying it. I hope Newegg's stock of them isn't out of date or something (that is, I hope they simply forgot to update their info page). I'll maybe try to email or get in contact with them about it.

However, I'm kinda 0.o'ing at the shape of it. I mean, I've had one kind of like that before (this, specifically; it worked wonderfully.), but the whole thing kind of seems a little awkward. I'm considering orienting it as facing upwards (if I can), because my case has a huge fan on top, so pairing them up might not be such a bad idea.... not that there is much point unless I actually decide to overclock it... which there isn't much point in doing because the thing is already a pretty beastly processor (no seriously it's a beast...).


Well, CPU cooler aside, I'm actually thinking of rescaling my graphics card money limit. Specifically, I'm aiming at one of these.

The 5850 line just seems to be really good right now. It's not quite CUTTING EDGE, but it looks good... and it supports DX11.

The next closest competitor is the 4890. I'm not looking at any Nvidia products at the moment.

I think the 5850 will complement this budget gaming computer pretty nicely. It should last a good while (at least I hope).

As usual some comments would be great. >_>

[xShadow]

Okay, I don't mean to double post, but I really need some input here; I've been kind of split between the 5870 and 5850 line from Radeon for a bit now. I just can't decide which one is seriously the best for me. Has anyone had direct experience with either line, or have some input to offer here? I can afford either one, but I'm wondering just how worth it the 100$ extra for the 5870 is.

I don't think Nvidia really has anything comparable to offer, so I'm effectively ruling them out.

[sdedalus83]

Okay, I don't mean to double post, but I really need some input here; I've been kind of split between the 5870 and 5850 line from Radeon for a bit now. I just can't decide which one is seriously the best for me. Has anyone had direct experience with either line, or have some input to offer here? I can afford either one, but I'm wondering just how worth it the 100$ extra for the 5870 is.

I don't think Nvidia really has anything comparable to offer, so I'm effectively ruling them out.

1 - There's a good chance your case will be too small to realistically house a 5870.

2 - The performance difference is about 13%.  The price difference is 33%.  Is 4xAA rather than 2xAA worth a 33% increase in price?

3 - You can get a 1.5 TB hard drive for that $100 difference in price.

Conclusion - There's no point in spending the extra money for the 5870, and by going with the 5850, you can use the money saved to buy something really useful.  When looking at newer games, there's a much, much bigger jump from the HD4890/GTX285 to the HD5850 than there is to the HD5870.  That difference will only become more pronounced as time moves on and new games come out, while the difference between the 5850 and 5870 will always be about 10 - 15%.  Since you're already considering spending $400 on the 5870, I wouldn't even think about the older cards.  Just get the 5850 and splurge a bit to get one of those 2TB Hitachi drives Frys is selling for $140.

[xShadow]

Okay, I don't mean to double post, but I really need some input here; I've been kind of split between the 5870 and 5850 line from Radeon for a bit now. I just can't decide which one is seriously the best for me. Has anyone had direct experience with either line, or have some input to offer here? I can afford either one, but I'm wondering just how worth it the 100$ extra for the 5870 is.

I don't think Nvidia really has anything comparable to offer, so I'm effectively ruling them out.

1 - There's a good chance your case will be too small to realistically house a 5870.

2 - The performance difference is about 13%.  The price difference is 33%.  Is 4xAA rather than 2xAA worth a 33% increase in price?

3 - You can get a 1.5 TB hard drive for that $100 difference in price.

Conclusion - There's no point in spending the extra money for the 5870, and by going with the 5850, you can use the money saved to buy something really useful.  When looking at newer games, there's a much, much bigger jump from the HD4890/GTX285 to the HD5850 than there is to the HD5870.  That difference will only become more pronounced as time moves on and new games come out, while the difference between the 5850 and 5870 will always be about 10 - 15%.  Since you're already considering spending $400 on the 5870, I wouldn't even think about the older cards.  Just get the 5850 and splurge a bit to get one of those 2TB Hitachi drives Frys is selling for $140.

That's a very good evaluation of the situation.

Well, I could probably make it fit in the case (it's not THAT small), but that's a fair point.

I didn't think the difference between the 5850 and 5870 was that small, though. I had actually been leaning towards the 5850 for a bit now, but I just wanted to make sure it was seriously worth it to cut off that much price for that much performance.

I'll probably be going with the 5850 now for sure, though.

Unfortunately, I also want to overclock it (not right away; I just want the option to be there when I need it), and I heard the only ones that had an unlocked BIOS were ASUS, Gigabyte, and msi. The one I'm looking at right now is out of stock. I do hope a miracle happens and the price just spontaneously decides to go down while they're restocking. Of course, I heard that you can do a BIOS flash on whichever one you get, to change it into ASUS or whatever you want, but I quite frankly don't wanna mess with something that has even a small chance to brick the card.

[sdedalus83]

Well, I could probably make it fit in the case (it's not THAT small), but that's a fair point.

I have an Antec 900 and an HD4850 is almost long enough to render the top 3.5" drive cage unusable.  The cage itself would have to be removed to fit a 5870.

Unfortunately, I also want to overclock it (not right away; I just want the option to be there when I need it), and I heard the only ones that had an unlocked BIOS were ASUS, Gigabyte, and msi. The one I'm looking at right now is out of stock. I do hope a miracle happens and the price just spontaneously decides to go down while they're restocking. Of course, I heard that you can do a BIOS flash on whichever one you get, to change it into ASUS or whatever you want, but I quite frankly don't wanna mess with something that has even a small chance to brick the card.

You're thinking about unlocking the disabled stream processors, not overclocking.  Overclocking is pretty easy, and you might be able to come close to HD5870 levels.  Unlocking requires a BIOS flash, an act which might brick your card, and even if it does succeed, you might find that the disabled components were faulty.  There's also the issue with the smaller cooler on the HD5850 - you might actually have to drop the clock speeds to get it to run stably if you manage to unlock the stream processors.  This isn't like some of the older video cards, where an unlock could carry a huge performance boost.

[xShadow]

Well, I could probably make it fit in the case (it's not THAT small), but that's a fair point.

I have an Antec 900 and an HD4850 is almost long enough to render the top 3.5" drive cage unusable.  The cage itself would have to be removed to fit a 5870.

I'll take your word for it.  >_>

Unfortunately, I also want to overclock it (not right away; I just want the option to be there when I need it), and I heard the only ones that had an unlocked BIOS were ASUS, Gigabyte, and msi. The one I'm looking at right now is out of stock. I do hope a miracle happens and the price just spontaneously decides to go down while they're restocking. Of course, I heard that you can do a BIOS flash on whichever one you get, to change it into ASUS or whatever you want, but I quite frankly don't wanna mess with something that has even a small chance to brick the card.

You're thinking about unlocking the disabled stream processors, not overclocking.  Overclocking is pretty easy, and you might be able to come close to HD5870 levels.  Unlocking requires a BIOS flash, an act which might brick your card, and even if it does succeed, you might find that the disabled components were faulty.  There's also the issue with the smaller cooler on the HD5850 - you might actually have to drop the clock speeds to get it to run stably if you manage to unlock the stream processors.  This isn't like some of the older video cards, where an unlock could carry a huge performance boost.

Actually, what I'm talking about is this. Apparently, the Sapphire version of the card can't be "overvolted". Now, the thing is, I know that using more voltage on a product probably makes it run hotter, too. I just wonder if I won't be able to reach a decent overclock without "overvolting". I'm personally not too keen on the concept anyway.

I have done some research on this, though. Also, apparently, shoving a 5870 BIOS on a 5850 doesn't really "unlock" that much. It just allows higher stock clock speeds and... something else, I forgot. Doesn't matter to me anyway.

Otherwise, if I can reach decent speeds without this "overvolting" thing, I'm not gonna be bothered too much with just taking a Sapphire rather than an ASUS. I also know that the default ASUS overclocking utility does not allow you to go very high at all.

[sdedalus83]

Otherwise, if I can reach decent speeds without this "overvolting" thing, I'm not gonna be bothered too much with just taking a Sapphire rather than an ASUS. I also know that the default ASUS overclocking utility does not allow you to go very high at all.

You can adjust the voltage on a reference HD4850 with MSI Afterburner and adjust the clock speed with AMD GPU Clock Tool.  There's no need for a bios flash.

[xShadow]

Oh, after reading up on those same forums, it appears you're right. Looks like I won't have to wait for that ASUS card to get back in stock.

Thanks for your input on the graphics card.

Well, it looks like I'll be going Sapphire, then.

... On a side note, why did you suggest I get a hard drive earlier? I never really mentioned the need for HD space. Even after backing up (read: moving) all my other drives to it, I still haven't filled up that 1.5TB external I got earlier. >_>;

Well, so far, all the stuff I'm buying this time around is:

• A new mouse (corded this time, I'm sick of wireless battery crap). I think I'm going with this one. It's really cheap, and it looks much better than this wireless mouse.
  
• Cpu cooler.
  
• Graphics card.
  

There's only ONE thing left:

I was thinking of buying a sound card, but I'm not willing to spend over 5x bucks on a sound card, and everything newegg has in the 4x-5x dollar range is absolute shit. From what I've read on the reviews, everyone that gets it just randomly starts hearing popping noises, with no exceptions. I might just stick with onboard sound. At least I know it won't give me popping noises. If anyone knows a "better-than-onboard-sound" cheap solution, please do tell.

[sdedalus83]

Sound card - ASUS Xonar DS 7.1 - $50.

Mouse - Logitech MX518 for $40 or G500 for $55 - Half the gamers here use a G5.  If you asked them what they'd get to replace it should something happen, they'd tell you one of those two since their beloved mouse has now been discontinued.  The wireless G7 is an exact replica of the G5 - unfortunately it's wireless.

[Typhoeus]

Well, I could probably make it fit in the case (it's not THAT small), but that's a fair point.

I have an Antec 900 and an HD4850 is almost long enough to render the top 3.5" drive cage unusable.  The cage itself would have to be removed to fit a 5870.

Unfortunately, I also want to overclock it (not right away; I just want the option to be there when I need it), and I heard the only ones that had an unlocked BIOS were ASUS, Gigabyte, and msi. The one I'm looking at right now is out of stock. I do hope a miracle happens and the price just spontaneously decides to go down while they're restocking. Of course, I heard that you can do a BIOS flash on whichever one you get, to change it into ASUS or whatever you want, but I quite frankly don't wanna mess with something that has even a small chance to brick the card.

You're thinking about unlocking the disabled stream processors, not overclocking.  Overclocking is pretty easy, and you might be able to come close to HD5870 levels.  Unlocking requires a BIOS flash, an act which might brick your card, and even if it does succeed, you might find that the disabled components were faulty.  There's also the issue with the smaller cooler on the HD5850 - you might actually have to drop the clock speeds to get it to run stably if you manage to unlock the stream processors.  This isn't like some of the older video cards, where an unlock could carry a huge performance boost.

he wouldn't need to remove the fan shroud to fit a 5870, I have a 5870 in my antec 900 and it fits like a glove. And also, for cooling solutions, the best temp drop per $ is found here: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103065&Tpk=Coolermaster%20212

I personally have the TX3, the cheaper version, but the 212 is worth the upgrade. Your specs are going to be really similar to mine (besides clockspeeds)

My two rigs:

Antec 900s
5870 in 1, 5850s in xfire in the other all 3 OC'd to 1000MHz core/1200MHz mem (1325mhz mem on the 5870)
Core i5 750s, one at 4GHz on air w/ the 5870, soon to be on a corsair H50: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835181010&Tpk=Corsair%20H50 and another i5 750 @ 4.62 GHz on a corsair H50 24/7.


The Coolermaster 212+ would allow you to overclock if you need to, and would keep your CPU within tolerance on a warm (100F+) summer day at stock, where the stock cooler fails. Also- when applying the paste to the coolermaster, be sure to spread a fair amount between the heatpipes (you'll see what I mean if you get it) and a small dot the size of a pea on the CPU itself, then attach it. This is what I've found is the best way to apply (my TX3, the smaller version with a smaller less powerful fan is keeping my CPU @ 60c at 4GHz)




And btw, the differences between a STOCK 5850 and a STOCK 5870 can be between 20-25%, the differences between an OC'd 5850 and a 5870, are roughly 3-5%. That said, the 5850 should be PLENTY for anyone but an enthusiast's needs. Neither of my XFX 5850s have had any cooling troubles. the only ones I know of that have trouble are some 5770s that have coolers that don't do anything for the VRMs. my 5850s @ 1000/1200 have never gone above 70c (Furmark at its most intense settings and 2560x1600) and doesn't go above 50c in 99% of games with a custom fan profile in MSI Afterburner (best OCing app to date, imo)

sorry for a bit of a lengthy post here, feel free to PM me if anything is unclear/off as its 1:30am for me right now and I just got done doing a lot of repetitive benching for a contest w/ some friends =P