Computer-construction tips please!

[Xander]

J3,

Depending upon what kind of CPU cooler you buy they come with fans. The cooler itself is the heatsink. Some of them use fans as standard to cool your CPU others are designed as passive and have no fans of their own relying on the airflow through the case to cool them and then you have probably the best in the field which are passive but have room enough for one or more fans.

The 120s from Thermalright were the best in the field when I was looking.. however if you want some bling there's the V8 CPU cooler from coolermaster. Now that puppy is cool in a different way

Oh and check out Anandtech for comparisons of CPU coolers... though I personally think they're lying scoundrels when it comes to what temperatures they achieve as I don't think I got within 10 degrees celcius of their recorded temps. Hence why I'm watercooling... it's part frustration and part "oooo plumbing!!"

 

[JivinJeffJones]

I just made the mistake of doing a price-check on ebay.com (as opposed to the australian travesty that is ebay.com.au) and I am PISSED! I could order a custom-built, water-cooled, warranteed system better than the one I have planned for about $1000 less. If I lived in America. WTF???


Stuck in the fucking 90s over here.

 

[millerm277]

I just made the mistake of doing a price-check on ebay.com (as opposed to the australian travesty that is ebay.com.au) and I am PISSED! I could order a custom-built, water-cooled, warranteed system better than the one I have planned for about $1000 less. If I lived in America. WTF???

Australia sucks? You could try to find a seller willing to ship to australia, or someone willing to buy it for you and ship it to you. (Second option is risky, unless you've got friends in the USA). Shipping is definitely a lot less than $1k.

 

[JivinJeffJones]

Australia sucks? You could try to find a seller willing to ship to australia, or someone willing to buy it for you and ship it to you. (Second option is risky, unless you've got friends in the USA). Shipping is definitely a lot less than $1k.

Hmm, nice idea. I do indeed have trustworthy friends in the US. Something to consider.


Wondering about the PSU though. The outlets and voltage are different in this ludicrously overpriced continent.

 

[millerm277]

Wondering about the PSU though. The outlets and voltage are different in this ludicrously overpriced continent.

You'll need a power cable, for your outlet type, like this. If you already have/can find a computer around, the power cord it uses should be fine. Computer Power Cord Australia -- DataPro

Voltage is even easier. There is a 99% chance you need to do exactly nothing. Almost all modern power supplies will automatically adjust to the voltage they're given. In a rare few lower-end units (unlikely with the price of your machine), there may be a little red switch on the back of the PSU (right next to where you plug the power cable in) labeled 120/240, if it's there, move it into the 240V position. That's it. Here's an example of one. http://z.about.com/d/compreviews/1/5/G/2/DIY-PSU5.jpg

 

[Xander]

It is true that all the PSUs are the same. Some don't even have the switch..

Oh and as I've found out recently... you don't really need all that much power. With a quad core system with three hard drives, a DVD and a Radeon 3870x2 running in game my zalman monitor thingy says I use just a little over 300W! I'm wondering what people are running to use those monsterous 1200W PSUs...

 

[Dom]

It is true that all the PSUs are the same. Some don't even have the switch..

Oh and as I've found out recently... you don't really need all that much power. With a quad core system with three hard drives, a DVD and a Radeon 3870x2 running in game my zalman monitor thingy says I use just a little over 300W! I'm wondering what people are running to use those monsterous 1200W PSUs...

Yours is water cooled!!! and running at very low temps... Omic resistance increases with temp, and air cooled system with all that stuff would probably be using far more energy, plus, i'm not sure how the monitor measures it, it could be missing a rail from the psu... just guessing... i think some sort of measure out side thebox would be best, actually measuirng what the psu is drawing in..

 

[Dom]

I just made the mistake of doing a price-check on ebay.com (as opposed to the australian travesty that is ebay.com.au) and I am PISSED! I could order a custom-built, water-cooled, warranteed system better than the one I have planned for about $1000 less. If I lived in America. WTF???


Stuck in the fucking 90s over here.

LOL... it's the same in the UK, if you can buy in america it's about half the price to the uk... (completed systems that is I haven't played with components much while here)

 

[Xander]

Yours is water cooled!!! and running at very low temps... Omic resistance increases with temp, and air cooled system with all that stuff would probably be using far more energy, plus, i'm not sure how the monitor measures it, it could be missing a rail from the psu... just guessing... i think some sort of measure out side thebox would be best, actually measuirng what the psu is drawing in..

Dom, it's measuring it by intercepting the power cable before it's even connected to the PSU. It's inbetween the PSU and the plug on the wall.

You know it's quite a well known fact that most people buy a larger psu than they need but why not? Why stress the component which makes everything else run? All I'm advocating is not going too far in that quest. If you're at maximum load and not even scraping 50% of the max load of the PSU then it's probably not the most efficient use of your money (look who's talking eh ).

 

[Dom]

It's inbetween the PSU and the plug on the wall.

That's where it should be, and it would still draw less as it's water cooled

I think it's the quality more than the wattage with regards to psus anyway, a cheap one simply does a cheap job...

 

[JivinJeffJones]

It is true that all the PSUs are the same. Some don't even have the switch..

Oh and as I've found out recently... you don't really need all that much power. With a quad core system with three hard drives, a DVD and a Radeon 3870x2 running in game my zalman monitor thingy says I use just a little over 300W! I'm wondering what people are running to use those monsterous 1200W PSUs...

I think 3x GTX 280 (SLI) is what 1200W PSUs are for. Dunno if 1000W is quite enough, from what I've read.

 

[Ghost of the dead horse]

I'm 5 boxing WoW atm.

It means I have 5 bought accounts of World of Warcraft, each of which allows a one concurrent character per copy of the game. There is software which allows to manage multiple characters at once, but I've hit some performance issues.

I've got athlon 2.2ghz with radeon 9800 atm, and it can smoothly run 2 instances of the game at nice settings, but at 3 instances, not all of them run smooth.

Another machine is a lowly 1.7ghz running at 1.1ghz (only lvl it's stable), and it can only handle 1 game instance smoothly, and 2 when forced - but at bad response speed.

So I need a cheap machine capable of running 3 game instances smoothly, and the cheapest one I've found (new) is about 470e. Vista with 2core processor and 2g ram, some video card I don't remember.

Another chance is to buy a used 2.7ghz machine with 120e and run 2 game instances with it, 1 with 1.1g and 2 with my 2.2. Oh the power consumption

My main unknow issue is how to handle multi-graphics processes. I know all about CPU multitasking. But 3 graphics-intensive processes take on GPU resources as well, and GPU's aren't designed to be part of a multitasking system.

 

[Xander]

I think 3x GTX 280 (SLI) is what 1200W PSUs are for. Dunno if 1000W is quite enough, from what I've read.

I'd have thought that such is reason enough to avoid such a build. Think of the heat generated!!! Forget that without watercooling!!! You'd be building the world's most expensive space heater!!!


Santtu,
I've no idea quite what you're on about... You're running 3 games silmultaneously??? I'd have thought that the one being displayed would use the graphics and the others would just use the cpu. Aside from that... no idea. Wouldn't it be cheaper to build a dual graphics card system with two monitors and just get a laptop for the third?

Personally I'm an FPS man so playing more than one game at a time is a foreign concept to me.

 

[JivinJeffJones]

Personally I'm an FPS man so playing more than one game at a time is a foreign concept to me.

He's talking WoW. I haven't played it, but I've played text-based MUDs where having your own instant-party (eg fighter, cleric, mage) would be a good thing. You don't have to co-ordinate with other players, or surrender loot to anyone else. You can do far harder zones than you could solo. I'm guessing he would have three games of WoW running with from the CPU each character up on a different screen. Or 5. Whatever.

I know some new graphics cards have problems when you're running more than one monitor, but I can't remember which.

 

[Xander]

He's talking WoW. I haven't played it, but I've played text-based MUDs where having your own instant-party (eg fighter, cleric, mage) would be a good thing. You don't have to co-ordinate with other players, or surrender loot to anyone else. You can do far harder zones than you could solo. I'm guessing he would have three games of WoW running with from the CPU each character up on a different screen. Or 5. Whatever.

I know some new graphics cards have problems when you're running more than one monitor, but I can't remember which.

Oh a multi monitor setup is easy... Any of the cards which use two DVI outputs should do you but I'd reckon the easiest solution is a couple of ATIs in crossfire and ultramon. That way you should be able to connect a different monitor to each output and then use ultramon to assign each output to a different screen.

I'd have thought you'd want a whole lot more than 2gb though with Vista. I found that if you get Vista 64 then getting 8Gb of memory is not difficult to achieve, though the FSB speeds aren't that good really.

 

[JivinJeffJones]

Oh and speaking of ATIs, I've heard that quad-crossfire with 4870X2 doesn't work very well. So basically it's a single-card solution. I dunno if that's true, so might have to wait until the retail release with "finished" drivers and the reviews go up.


TOO MUCH WAITING

 

[Sling]

When you build your next computer, use this case. Or something cooler. Either is good by me.

 

[Xander]

Oh and speaking of ATIs, I've heard that quad-crossfire with 4870X2 doesn't work very well. So basically it's a single-card solution. I dunno if that's true, so might have to wait until the retail release with "finished" drivers and the reviews go up.

TOO MUCH WAITING

Jeez you're a nervous type of person aren't you. Just go get one and add another if the first proves insufficient. One of those should run Fallout3. Hell it'd run Crysis and that's a hard game to run!

When you build your next computer, use this case. Or something cooler. Either is good by me.

That'd be a swine to upgrade

Personally I'm happy with my Cosmos S. I only had to make one small incision to fit a second radiator internally.

 

[Jack Flak]

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?

Did you buy anything yet? I'll sort you out.

Get all your parts from Newegg. These days, you can't find stuff noticeably cheaper.

Build it yourself. It's easier than you think unless you have parkinson's and jam a screwdriver through the motherboard. The forums at AnandTech: your source for hardware analysis and news ...everythingyou'll need for knowing.

Get Windows XP or Linux. Everyone knows Vista=Mac=Teh Suck

At Newegg you should be able to tell what comes with what and what doesn't. Like heatsinks. Make sure everything you buy is for everything else. i.e. "Socket XXX" cpu and motherboard and heatsink, all matching. Installing heatsinks is pretty easy, just drop a bead of Ceramique (arctic silver brand thermal paste, non-conductive) on the processor's heat spreader and clamp the sink on. done.

NVidia video cards. For Fallout3, I'd get the one that costs $200-$300 when the game comes out.

These days for CPU, Intel dual core (I still have AMD single overclocked). Get a motherboard suggestion from Anandtech (depends if you're overclocking, probably you aren't).

Get a case you like (Find out if it has space for video card you want), fans to match the holes, and a Seasonic 500+watt PSU.

DVD R/W, IDE Master, Cable Select jumper (use the cable came with mobo)

Hard disk, SATA's good, 500Gb good. Seagate good.

 

[Dom]

My main unknow issue is how to handle multi-graphics processes. I know all about CPU multitasking. But 3 graphics-intensive processes take on GPU resources as well, and GPU's aren't designed to be part of a multitasking system.

You really need a multi core GPU system... but looking at the processors you are considering, you probably don't have the resources for a decent pci express x16 option... which is a shame as (xander will correct if i'm wrong) if you got 2 cards that had 2 gpu's on them, (like mine, it is one card that is actually two put together to work as one) if you got two of them and put them in a system with two pci x16 slots and didn't SLI them, you could run four monitors in dedicated mode (1 gpu each) and each gpu should knock your old radeon 9800 into a dustbin...