Advice on upgrade to current desktop - Calgarypuck Forums - The Unofficial Calgary Flames Fan Community

Thor · 03-23-2013, 03:06 PM

Currently have the i5 2500 3.3Ghz, with 8 gig RAM 1600, GTX 480.

My sister is in Canada for a few weeks so figured I'll get her to pick me up a new video card at least, maybe with that a new Mobo and for sure a SSD 120 gig maybe 240, corsair probably or OCZ still not fully decided.

Anyhow jumping into the upgrade for the video card, I'm leaning towards the Asus GeForce GTX660, maybe the 680 but wow its pricey right now..

Any thoughts on that, there is a fair bit of options for both the 660 and 680, terms of my current system I'm looking at a solid upgrade but looking at about 1 more year with my current setup before I go upgrade it fully (cpu, mobo, ram).

Any advice appreciated

Handsome B. Wonderful · 03-23-2013, 09:42 PM

Alright, I'll bite.

Upgrading to a SSD is highly recommended. Don't go with a OCZ, when I was doing my research no one had anything good to say about them.

As to the video card, why bother? I'm running with a GTX 470 myself and there's nothing it can't handle.

To Be Quite Honest · 03-24-2013, 12:09 AM

I love my Geforce GTX 660 Ti but I use it mainly for the cuda cores. It's freaking fantastic working with adobe's editing suite. I went from 1 hour and 45 mins rendering a 2 hour production for a client to 60 mins.

Thor · 03-24-2013, 02:25 AM

Well the reason I want to make use of my sister's trip to Canada is I would save about 40% off the 660 if I buy it in Canada, because stuff is expensive here in Iceland

Plus I went from a 1920 to 2560 display resolution, now the fan is going nuts when I play anno 2070, gonna take the whole system a part and make sure there is no lingering dust but having way too much noise and the GPU running over 90c for anno 2070.

Thor · 03-24-2013, 05:55 AM

Maybe its best to wait for later this year to buy the 680's, and stick to maybe just getting my SSD and an external HD instead.

Just spent an hour totally cleaning the inside of the desktop, including inside the GTX480 and there was a lot of dust that was clogging it up, probably going to see a big difference after that mess I just cleaned up!

To Be Quite Honest · 03-24-2013, 06:46 PM

Wow, I'd be very concerned at running my PC at those temperatures. Hopefully cleaning it will make a big difference!

PsYcNeT · 03-25-2013, 08:11 AM

Crucial M4 128GB

ASUS 660Ti DirectCUII OC - $280 after rebate

or

ASUS 670 DirectCUII - $360 after rebate

The 670 in particular is more or less $80 off right now, and the DirectCUII coolers have the best cooling to noise ratio beyond h60 mods.

Quote:

Originally Posted by To Be Quite Honest

Wow, I'd be very concerned at running my PC at those temperatures. Hopefully cleaning it will make a big difference!

Modern GPUs have a TJMax ~105c, so running them at 90c isn't a *huge* deal, but it's certainly preferable to run them 70c-80c under load.

Thor · 03-26-2013, 03:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by To Be Quite Honest

Wow, I'd be very concerned at running my PC at those temperatures. Hopefully cleaning it will make a big difference!

HUGE difference, man was there a lot of dust inside that video card!

Raekwon · 03-26-2013, 08:30 AM

Yeah people need to clean out their PC's more frequent, I did an install for a buddy this weekend and his whole PC was a dust/hair machine. After doing comparisons on Toms Hardware we decided on.

Gigabyte GeForce GTX 660 TI OC 2GB PCI-E w/ Dual DVI, HDMI, DisplayPort http://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX40951

He had a driver crash the next day and only one but after that I did some research and found a lot of people with similar issues. These issues all seemed to happen on old drivers from last year but we are keepig an eye on this.

Besides the one crash this card was speedy, of course to him it seemed like a miracle upgrade as he was running a 285gtx prior.

sa226 · 03-26-2013, 12:08 PM

Not to hijack the thread, but I have a similar question that is along the same lines.

Basically I have a pretty decent set up......5 years ago.

I have a P5Q-E mobo with an Q6600 Oced to 3.3ghz with 4gigs of DDR2800 RAM

I have no intention whatsoever of upgrading to the latest and greatest because I have no need to, and I keep needlessly pouring money into my HTPC.

But I would like to have the option of taking advantage of some of the Steam sales and playing a few PC games. What would be the best Video Card to at least give me the opportunity?

Obviously I don't want to break the bank, but there has to be some decent powered video cards in the 125-175 price range. GT 650? ATI7750? etc etc...

PsYcNeT · 03-26-2013, 12:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sa226

Obviously I don't want to break the bank, but there has to be some decent powered video cards in the 125-175 price range. GT 650? ATI7750? etc etc...

7850 @ $170/175 is your best bang for yer buck, as it performs about the same as a 660 (~$200-210) for less money, and is far better than a 650 Ti/7770.

Though MemEx has a 660 on for 175 right now, and it does outperform a 7850 in most games:

http://www.memoryexpress.com/Products/MX41569

Lithium · 03-26-2013, 12:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Handsome B. Wonderful

Alright, I'll bite.

Upgrading to a SSD is highly recommended. Don't go with a OCZ, when I was doing my research no one had anything good to say about them.

As to the video card, why bother? I'm running with a GTX 470 myself and there's nothing it can't handle.

Where did you read the OCZ stuff? The OCZ vertex were/are near top of the line when I custom built my PC in 2010.

Edit:http://www.techradar.com/news/comput...articleContent

PsYcNeT · 03-26-2013, 12:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lithium

Where did you read the OCZ stuff? The OCZ vertex were/are near top of the line when I custom built my PC in 2010. I am pretty sure the corsair neutrons are rated the best at the moment.

OCZ Sandforce SSDs are the most unreliable on the market, which is a shame because they are among the fastest.

Vulcan · 03-26-2013, 02:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PsYcNeT

OCZ Sandforce SSDs are the most unreliable on the market, which is a shame because they are among the fastest.

I have one and it's had no problems. I thought once they had their
firmware updated they've been okay?

MickMcGeough · 03-26-2013, 02:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PsYcNeT

OCZ Sandforce SSDs are the most unreliable on the market, which is a shame because they are among the fastest.

Is it different NAND chips in OCZ drives, or something? Why is OCZ singled out here?

I've had 3 SandForce drives and never had a problem.

But yeah - I can't imagine why anyone would go with a non-SSD system right now...

PsYcNeT · 03-26-2013, 03:09 PM

Appears my bias is a bit outdated, as the Vertex 4s are considered fine. It was the drivers in the Agility 2/3s and Vertex 2s that were failing right and left, and OCZs refusal to give refunds for some bricked drives soured the community.

SSD reliability seems to go up every year.

NuclearPizzaMan · 03-26-2013, 03:15 PM

SSDs are Intel, Samsung, Crucial or bust.

Burninator · 03-26-2013, 03:21 PM

My Vertex 2 bricked. MB couldn't even tell that something was plugged in. But OCZ did replace it and now it stores my steam games.

PsYcNeT · 03-26-2013, 03:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by NuclearPizzaMan

SSDs are Intel, Samsung, Crucial or bust.

This is typically my approach, but I've heard some good things about certain Mushkin drives.

I've also been reading about bricked Samsung 840 drives, and that it's typically better to try an find an 830 drive if you can.

TSXCman · 03-26-2013, 04:42 PM

I've got a Crucial M4, paid the premium for reliability vs the slightly lower speeds. Unfortunately it crashed within a couple of months use, upon a reboot it had automatically formatted itself fresh. Very odd and destructive action.