Post your PC Builds! - Page 3 - Calgarypuck Forums - The Unofficial Calgary Flames Fan Community

Cliche · 02-27-2009, 11:01 AM

Athlon 64 4800+ X2
2x1 GB micron DDR
A8N-SLI Premium
SB Audigy 2
XFX 8800GT 512mb
(many HDD drives)
Antec case 430?(Based off of the sonata, but had the rougher exterior, was essentially the office version of the case)
OCZ Gamextreme 700W
Samsung 940T
Thermalright XP-90 w/Sunon 92mm

Suprisingly enough despite some chuggy sections in Crysis I was able to get through it ok. Bioshock looks pretty good, Supreme commander makes it cry after an hour of gameplay, and C&C had no problems. My comp competently does it job.

Also, any of the intel boards with the ICH7 don't natively have an IDE channel, which is why any of the newer intel boards have a 3rd party chip doing the ide work.

ATI/AMD and Nvidia still support IDE natively I think. I haven't really looked at their chipset roadmaps in over a year.

Esoteric · 02-27-2009, 11:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PsYcNeT

If you really want something special, get these:
http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applicatio...4&sku=T26-1090

They are wonderful for gaming, and they work on all 5.1 style outputs (Optical, Coax, and 3 plug analog).

Thanks, I'll look into those ones. Do you have a pair? If so, what are the positives and negatives?

PsYcNeT · 02-27-2009, 02:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Esoteric

Thanks, I'll look into those ones. Do you have a pair? If so, what are the positives and negatives?

I've heard about problems w/ the mic plug, so it's not really a tool-about pair (I have a Creative pair for my laptop bag), but they feel pretty solid on the whole. The splitterbox works fine, and the sound is fantastic. Left 4 Dead is mad intense in full 5.1. It processes stereo sound pretty well too (though not at the level of some stereo headsets), and feels natural for music. The 'subwoofer' has moderately good bass reflex and punctuates the general EQ adequately.

starseed · 03-02-2009, 05:08 AM

This will be my first time building a computer, this is my shopping list:

i7 920
Gigabyte - GA-EX58-UD5
Corsair 6GB 1333 DDR3
Western digital 500GB 7200rpm 32mb cache X2 in RAID 0
(was looking at the raptor, but every single person I talked to warned against it. Seagate is also apparently having drive failure issues with their new drives)
e-GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 SSC Edition
(If I went in on friday, could have got the 280 for a similar price

)
Corsair 750W PSU
BenQ - V2400W 24in Widescreen LCD w/ DVI, HDMI, 2ms, Black

I have not been able to sleep for days in anticipation of starting this build. Any recommendations?

Esoteric · 03-02-2009, 08:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by starseed

This will be my first time building a computer, this is my shopping list:

i7 920
Gigabyte - GA-EX58-UD5
Corsair 6GB 1333 DDR3
Western digital 500GB 7200rpm 32mb cache X2 in RAID 0
(was looking at the raptor, but every single person I talked to warned against it. Seagate is also apparently having drive failure issues with their new drives)
e-GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 SSC Edition
(If I went in on friday, could have got the 280 for a similar price

)
Corsair 750W PSU
BenQ - V2400W 24in Widescreen LCD w/ DVI, HDMI, 2ms, Black

I have not been able to sleep for days in anticipation of starting this build. Any recommendations?

You can still get a 280 for a similar price

http://www.memoryexpress.com/Product...21171(ME).aspx

Better be quick about it though!

starseed · 03-02-2009, 08:39 AM

Ya, I saw that, but it says that the $160 instant savings ended on February 28th.

I will be heading into memory express today to poke around... and maybe start buying components.

Esoteric · 03-02-2009, 08:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by starseed

Ya, I saw that, but it says that the $160 instant savings ended on February 28th.

I will be heading into memory express today to poke around... and maybe start buying components.

So it does, I missed that.

If you plan on doing a fair bit of gaming, why not shell out the extra $100 or so and get a BFG GTX 285? The gains are quite a bit more, and the cost really isn't too much higher. Memory express has it listed for $450 after a $25 mail in rebate.

bomber317 · 03-02-2009, 09:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by starseed

Western digital 500GB 7200rpm 32mb cache X2 in RAID 0
(was looking at the raptor, but every single person I talked to warned against it. Seagate is also apparently having drive failure issues with their new drives)

What were the warnings against the Raptor? I was just about to get one to replace some HDs in my current build.

starseed · 03-02-2009, 09:14 AM

I will check out the 285, I may do just that...

The problems I heard about the raptor were the noise level, and the greater risk of having the drive fail. A couple of people I talked to told me that the difference in speed is not that much. I am just going to play it safe and go with 7200rpm drives.

bomber317 · 03-02-2009, 09:23 AM

Noise levels was addressed earlier in the thread for the Raptor.

But yes, I'd have to agree with the possible higher fail rate. With it running at 10k RPM and higher heat levels. Will need to compensate with some cooling especially if you take it out of the casing for the noise issue.

Esoteric · 03-02-2009, 09:53 AM

The Western Digital Caviar Black drives perform almost as well as the Raptor drives. Having 32 MB of cache makes a huge difference.

PsYcNeT · 03-02-2009, 10:30 AM

If you're concerned about noise and drive failure but still want fast loads, just run 2 drives in raid 0. It's awesome.

photon · 03-02-2009, 12:30 PM

Just be aware that with raid 0 your chance of loosing everything doubles.

starseed · 03-02-2009, 12:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by photon

Just be aware that with raid 0 your chance of loosing everything doubles.

I put all essential data on my external drive, I always act as if I could lose drive tomorrow.

How much does this speed up? I hear different things about the effectiveness of setting up RAID 0.

Hack&Lube · 03-02-2009, 02:24 PM

It's a beast, absolutely destroys anything you throw at it

OBCT · 03-02-2009, 02:25 PM

This product has been mentioned before in other similar threads, but...

Drobo. Combining RAID 0 and data redundancy in plug-and-play simplicity.

PsYcNeT · 03-02-2009, 02:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by starseed

I put all essential data on my external drive, I always act as if I could lose drive tomorrow.

How much does this speed up? I hear different things about the effectiveness of setting up RAID 0.

Your write times are doubled, and your load times are halved.

That's the gist of raid 0

Esoteric · 03-02-2009, 03:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hack&Lube

It's a beast, absolutely destroys anything you throw at it

You talking about the computer, or the guy sitting in front of it?

photon · 03-02-2009, 03:24 PM

In practice it's not doubled though, in benchmarks it can come close, but in real world tests the impact is noticeable but not revolutionary.

PsYcNeT · 03-02-2009, 03:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by photon

In practice it's not doubled though, in benchmarks it can come close, but in real world tests the impact is noticeable but not revolutionary.

This is true, but it's nice for certain games (COUGH BATTLEFIELD COUGH) which before took up to 90 seconds to load a map, now it's always under a minute.