• You are currently viewing our forum as a guest, which gives you limited access to view most discussions and access our other features. By joining our free community, you will have access to additional post topics, communicate privately with other members (PM), view blogs, respond to polls, upload content, and access many other special features. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free, so please join our community today! Just click here to register. You should turn your Ad Blocker off for this site or certain features may not work properly. If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us by clicking here.

Computer-construction tips please!

Xander

Lex Parsimoniae
Joined
Apr 24, 2007
Messages
4,463
MBTI Type
INTP
Enneagram
9w8
Places where you lost me:

*reaches for the whiskey+coke*
Right... the hard drives....

Two velociraptors in a striped array would give you the ultimate speed for small file access and should speed up windows a little. Of course if you kept them seperate and installed your games on the second drive then that would reduce the load times in games dramatically (the first part of a drive is the fastest).

Striped arrays are nice and quick because they bifocate the information and store each half on alternate drives (based on a 2 drive array). This means basically you have two cables to use for your drive access and so theoretically twice the capacity of through put... however as you well know double the technical speed and you rarely get more than a 10 or 20 percent improvement in actual speed... except with graphics cards.

Cooling wise you should stick to air cooling (the standard) unless you either want to overclock or you're feeling adventurous. Water cooling would require buying new cooling blocks for your CPU and graphics card (you need water blocks to allow the coolant to travel to where the heat is) plus piping, a pump, a reservoir and a radiator... along with even more fans.

As for a fan controller... if you bought an Antec 1200 then you've got a potential 9 120mm fans and a 200mm... leave them at max and you'll be sucked into your computer and spat out.. along with everything in the room, plus it'll sound like a hovercraft. Get a fan controller and you can calm the storm without impacting on your cooling that much. It makes for much more relaxed computing and also makes you more popular with people who aren't using your computer or deaf ;)

Non legacy means you avoid anything which runs on analogue like old hard drives and old optical drives. The newer SATA connections are much faster (potentially) and have like 1.25cm cables as opposed to the older cables which were about 5cm wide and a swine to keep out of the way of the air flow (restrict the air flow and you can blow all you like... it won't do a thing other than sound noisey!!). Also it relates to things like USB keyboards and mice. Legacy is old tech.. not adaptable but reliable. New tech is where the speed is if a little more touchy.

The arctic silver AS5 is a good thermal grease which is the stuff you put in between the CPU and the CPU cooler. It's much better at heat transfer than the stock bit of gunk they stick on coolers. It can reduce your CPU temperature by a few more degrees (any shift toward cold is good). As for ceramique, a little tip I picked up (this applies doubly if you are thinking of overclocking or running hot) is to unmount all the cooling from the motherboard and graphics card (if you're air cooling because other wise you're already replacing the graphics cards cooler) and then clean off all the stock cooling gunk and replace it with ceramique... then reassemble the whole thing. That will protect your motherboard and should keep the temperatures down there too.

See I went mad on cooling after finding that many of the problems I had with my computer were cooling related. I have mine watercooled now so the temps rarely go above like 40 degrees celcius... including the graphics card which, with stock cooling, will hit 90 degrees!!!!

But anyhow, like I said.. start with the motherboard, then the graphics card and build from there. Those two components will define how much you've got to spend and what you should get. See even between memory and motherboards there are combinations that work well and other's that don't work so well. Oh and one thing I found was that it wasn't so much the speed of my memory but more the amount of it that mattered.

Just don't exceed like 4Gb unless you're buying 64bit Windows (XP or Vista). Anything more and it can't use it. 64bit however can use up to about 128Gb of memory though when I was running 8Gb it never went above 6Gb in use and that was on a benchmark!
 

Xander

Lex Parsimoniae
Joined
Apr 24, 2007
Messages
4,463
MBTI Type
INTP
Enneagram
9w8
I've decided to justify a lengthier spell of procrastination by waiting to see what the Radeon HD 4870 X2 can do. I'll call it "prudence". Just a couple more weeks at most, I think.
As an owner of a 3870X2 I shall just say :nice:


(Oh and that if you get one, I hate you :steam: )
 

JivinJeffJones

New member
Joined
Apr 25, 2007
Messages
3,702
MBTI Type
INFP
Oh wow, check it out: System Builder Marathon: Sub-$4000 PC : Setting the High Mark? - Tom's Hardware

How cool is that? I'm getting really excited. Looks like they agree with some of your choices too, Athenian.

And the 4870s are out (on show).

I attempted to solicit the advice of an IT acquaintance (who tells me he's in the WoW alpha testing team, whatever that means), and got a facefull of lecture about how stupid it is to spend thousands on a high-end gaming PC when the Xbox 360/PS3 do much the same thing and cost way way less. I've been thinking a lot about that (it shook me, I must admit) and concluded that the PC is still for me. To be honest, if the Xbox360/PS3 used mouse and keyboard then I would probably go for them. Maybe it's the fact that I'm pretty incompetent with the controllers, or maybe I just haven't played either console on a really good setup (screen- and sound-wise). But I've never found the fixed-console games to offer an immersive experience. I'm always too busy trying to remember which button does what, and trying to target quickly and accurately. By the time I've mastered those things with a game I'm already sick of the game. The mouse-and-keyboard method is so natural and easy that I can forget about interacting with them entirely and just lose myself in the game. There's such a world of difference between a merely fun gaming experience and an immersive gaming experience. One experience passes the time on a rainy Sunday afternoon. The other creates addicts. It's like the difference between getting raped in the dark by awesomeness or reading some cheap, semi-erotic literature starring Awesome Kincaid - the dangerous yet intriguing smuggler of highland rebel pirates.

Additionally, I love RTS games, and they really only work on PCs. It'd be a nightmare trying to play them on a fixed-console.[/justification]
 

vince

New member
Joined
Oct 8, 2007
Messages
320
MBTI Type
INFJ
Enneagram
6w
Additionally, I love RTS games, and they really only work on PCs. It'd be a nightmare trying to play them on a fixed-console.[/justification]

Yeah that's true. I love RTS too. Can't imagine it on a console. What games do you play ? I like LOTR BFME2 a lot.
 

Octarine

The Eighth Colour
Joined
Oct 14, 2007
Messages
1,351
MBTI Type
Aeon
Enneagram
10w
Instinctual Variant
so
Nearing the best (of current consumer PCs):

Intel Core 2 Extreme Quad QX9650
Gigabyte X48-DQ6 (or similar)
2x ATI 4870X2 (when they're availabe)
OCZ Reaper HPC 4GB DDR3 (or similar) It is rare to need more than 4GB.
Corsair HX1000W

2 Velociraptors in Raid, although 15krpm SAS drives have faster access times.

2 Samsung F1 750gb in RAID for storage (these are cheap, but you don't want too much storage, or you'll spend too much time downloading shit, rather than using your computer for its true purpose: benchmarking playing games.
Pioneer DVR-216 (coming out shortly)
Pioneer BDR-202

Case and cooling - I'm not sure yet, but it definitely involves modified phase change cooling (Modified to handle the huge heat load of a heavily overclocked quad core and four gpus)
 

Ghost of the dead horse

filling some space
Joined
Sep 7, 2007
Messages
3,553
MBTI Type
ENTJ
I used to think nothing of screens before the first GUIs on a computer, obsessing on processor speed, memory and such. More so than any of the other parts, a good monitor (or several) will increase human productivity, as opposed to that of the machine. Now which one of them is the bottleneck? Depends on the application.

I've outlined different high performance setups for different uses.

A year ago I was seeking to start programming on a particular task, solving one particular mathematical problem. My best algorithm used 8-16Gb of memory, depending on compression - so my high performance setup was going to have a server side motherboard with a lot of RAM space. I didn't have time for that hobby, so I tossed my plans aside.

Yes, that was with efficient use of memory, to the last bit.

I wanted to start playing Supreme commander, as I read the reviews and decided that's the game of the year for me. Sadly, I didn't have money at the time. That's a game that benefits greatly from dual monitor setup, and demands at least a dual core processor to run properly.

At a time my greatest dissatisfaction was with the program loading times. My high performance system would have been a one with solid state boot drive, speeding up the boot-up process tremendously. Perhaps it's 'cos I installed a lot of applications requiring reboots at the time. Now that I've installed most of the applications I'll need, the effect of reboot time has diminished.

Fast boot drive, spacious storage drive is one of the cheapest, yet effective standard tricks to improve overall system performance, good for most uses of a computer.

Oh, we were talking about some high end in here?

Haven't bothered to buy high-end stuff in a long time. What a money sink.
 

Ghost of the dead horse

filling some space
Joined
Sep 7, 2007
Messages
3,553
MBTI Type
ENTJ
Btw, my ISP is offering 100Mbps internet connection in autumn, for a yet undisclosed price. I signed myself up for the waiting list :D
 

JivinJeffJones

New member
Joined
Apr 25, 2007
Messages
3,702
MBTI Type
INFP
Yeah that's true. I love RTS too. Can't imagine it on a console. What games do you play ? I like LOTR BFME2 a lot.

I still play Spellforce a lot, which didn't seem to make big waves at all in the English-speaking gaming community. I have no idea why. Maybe it got some bad reviews. Maybe because the voice-talent sucked. I dunno. But it's pretty close to the upper-limit of what my current geriatric pc can handle.

I've outlined different high performance setups for different uses.

Where?
 

JivinJeffJones

New member
Joined
Apr 25, 2007
Messages
3,702
MBTI Type
INFP

Yep. I've gotten over my initial outrage and come to the same conclusion thousands of other Aussie gamers have no-doubt arrived at: ebay. Fuck the censors.


In other computer-component news, I'd basically decided to suspend my sanity and go the route of 2 gtx280s in SLI, which seemed to make my choice of motherboards clear. Then I read this review of the 4870x2. On the one hand, I'm a bit wary since most of their excitement for the card seems to derive from it being a lot better than the gtx280 in just one game (Age of Conan). Plus, it isn't even out yet. On the other hand, those are impressive results.
 

Xander

Lex Parsimoniae
Joined
Apr 24, 2007
Messages
4,463
MBTI Type
INTP
Enneagram
9w8
There's a price war out there on graphics cards. Choose your timing wisely Monkey or you'll regret reaching for your wallet at speed.
 

JivinJeffJones

New member
Joined
Apr 25, 2007
Messages
3,702
MBTI Type
INFP
There's a price war out there on graphics cards. Choose your timing wisely Monkey or you'll regret reaching for your wallet at speed.

I'm seeing it. Gtx 280s have dropped $150 in about 2 weeks. It's a thing of beauty. Balanced against that price-war though is the fact that the Aussie dollar is actually pretty strong atm - approximately equivalent to the US dollar for the first time I can ever remember. Which is bad for an export-based economy like Australia's. So the government and those in charge will doubtless take it upon themselves to devalue it as soon as they can. I think it's pretty much peaked. Which means my dollar will soon buy less. I guess I'll buy all the other components and hold off on the vid card. Oh and btw, which motherboard would you recommend for ATI? I seem to recall you recommended one somewhere, but I can't find the bastard.
 

Xander

Lex Parsimoniae
Joined
Apr 24, 2007
Messages
4,463
MBTI Type
INTP
Enneagram
9w8
I did point towards the Gigabyte X38-DQ6 but that's DDR2. If you wanted DDR3 then either the X38T-DQ6 or even better the X48-DQ6. I reckon they're about the most reliable board I've had so far... and I'm quite..err... "testing" on motherboards :D

(I think I've broken one from each manufacturer so far aside from Abit... never had an Abit.)
 

JivinJeffJones

New member
Joined
Apr 25, 2007
Messages
3,702
MBTI Type
INFP
So I'm looking at buying an OEM CPU since I can get them for roughly $300 cheaper than retail versions. Is this sheer lunacy? Does anyone have any thoughts on this? I understand that the main difference (price aside) is that it doesn't arrive with the stock cooler or the manufacturer's warranty. The stock cooler I would replace anyway. I dunno how important the warranty is though. From what I hear, CPUs don't fail that often.

Oh, and it wouldn't come with the heatsink. Are they necessary? I can't seem to locate them in my fav. online computer stores.
 

runvardh

にゃん
Joined
Jun 23, 2007
Messages
8,541
MBTI Type
INFP
Enneagram
6w7
Instinctual Variant
sx/so
So I'm looking at buying an OEM CPU since I can get them for roughly $300 cheaper than retail versions. Is this sheer lunacy? Does anyone have any thoughts on this? I understand that the main difference (price aside) is that it doesn't arrive with the stock cooler or the manufacturer's warranty. The stock cooler I would replace anyway. I dunno how important the warranty is though. From what I hear, CPUs don't fail that often.

Oh, and it wouldn't come with the heatsink. Are they necessary? I can't seem to locate them in my fav. online computer stores.

Most heatsinks come with fans attached these days, and that set up has actually gone from nice to have to with out it you get to watch your CPU melt. That is unless you have access to large quantities of liquid nitrogen you can poor on the CPU all the time, ^_^.
 

JivinJeffJones

New member
Joined
Apr 25, 2007
Messages
3,702
MBTI Type
INFP
Most heatsinks come with fans attached these days

You'll have to bear with my newbness here. Does that mean all cpu coolers (aftermarket) come with cpu heatsinks attached? Or do you have to have a heatsink already in place to attach your cooler to?

In other words, if I choose to buy an OEM CPU with no heat-sink or stock cooler, will any cooler I buy for it come with the necessary heat-sink attached? Would that be all I'd need to replicate a retail CPU?
 
Top