Advice on a new rig

[SnakeCharmer]

Get a dog.

Problem solved.

[veredus]

What would you all recommend for CPU?

AMD Phenom 9950 Quad core http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103285

or the Intel Q8500 Core 2 Duo? Both of them fall within my limited budget but the 9950 is about $20 cheaper where I was looking at these both. This will be my gaming PC if that makes a difference.

[Trippy]

What would you all recommend for CPU?

AMD Phenom 9950 Quad core http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103285

or the Intel Q8500 Core 2 Duo? Both of them fall within my limited budget but the 9950 is about $20 cheaper where I was looking at these both. This will be my gaming PC if that makes a difference.

Only you know if you really need 2 extra cores on the quad. For pure gaming, at the moment, dual core with the faster clock speed is the way to go. Also if you are willing to spend the $20 extra dollars to go with Intel and you still think you might want a quad core CPU you should consider the Q6600. It's slightly faster than the Phenom even at the slightly slower clock speed and it's a much cooler running CPU.

[fuser]

What would you all recommend for CPU?

AMD Phenom 9950 Quad core http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103285

or the Intel Q8500 Core 2 Duo? Both of them fall within my limited budget but the 9950 is about $20 cheaper where I was looking at these both. This will be my gaming PC if that makes a difference.

If your on an AM2+ platform as your looking at the older phenom, AMD released the Phenom II X3 720 embargo yesterday. Check some reviews on it as its a really good bank/buck processor (long as you have the AM2+ to support it).

[veredus]

Building a new system so can go either way but on a pretty tight budget. Have about $450 to get the case/motherboard/cpu/psu. Stripping parts out of an older computer for everything else for now and will upgrade stuff later. Will probably just go with the Q8500 since this will be for gaming and have pretty much always used Intel so comfortable with it also.

[apocrypha]

Toying with the idea of building a new PC at the moment but it's a LONG time since I bought any PC hardware. I know very little about currently available hardware, anyone able to give me some pointers?

Rig will be primarily for gaming but also needs to be good for image processing (Photoshop and the like). Doesn't need to be a bleeding edge ninja machine, really want to keep the cost down, so I'm looking for price/performance sweet spots for processor & GPU really. I'm very ATI-averse due to a couple of exceedingly bad experiences with ATI graphics cards in the past.

I know that's vague, but I'd really appreciate any suggestions for current bang-for-buck winners.

[Trippy]

My usual first question cause everybody forgets to mention it: what's your budget?

[apocrypha]

Well I thought about that and it's actually big. I've got savings that are earning nearly zero interest at the moment, in a bank that's failing and likely to be part-nationalised at any moment. I have zero ZERO faith in the UK government's promise to protect all savings under £50,000 so I'm thinking I either spend this money now or I run the risk of losing it completely.

I'm more interested in what the best value is right now. If the price:performance sweet spot means a PC that costs me £1500 to build, well so be it. For sake of argument though let's say my budget was £1000 (about er $1500 at the moment I'm guessing) but I'd like to get it lower. No peripherals needed at all, just the case & components.

An hour or so of research this morning is giving me the impression that the Core 2 Quad Q9550 looks like a very good processor point for the money and that a GeForce 9800 GTX+ would be a good GPU starting point. That sound reasonable?

[Trippy]

Is a new monitor part of the budget?

[apocrypha]

Nope, I've got monitor already, and mouse/keyboard/speakers/etc. All I need is case, mobo, PSU, CPU, RAM, GPU, HDDs.

[Trippy]

If you are using Photoshop it's kind of a toss up between the i7 920 and the Q9650. The 920 has a slower clock speed but the more efficient multi-threading makes up for that compared to the older Core 2 architecture. For games the Q9650 would still be better.

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,2845,2333775,00.asp

For a video card the 9800 GTX+ is too low end for your budget, plus the new GTS 250 is a die-shrunk 9800 GTX+ so you might as well get that if you wanted to spend that amount on a video card. I'd recommend starting with the GTX 260 and going up from there if you can afford it.

[apocrypha]

Nice one thanks Trippy, gives me some starting points :)

So how's this look, comes to just about £1000 on the nose:

Code:

Intel Core i7 920 2.66Ghz                               229.99
Asus P6T Intel X58 (Socket 1366)                        209.29
EVGA GeForce GTX 260 896MB                              165.99
Coolermaster HAF 932 Case                               109.24
Corsair 6GB DDR3 XMS3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz               103.49
Coolermaster Silent Pro Modular 500W Power Supply        71.99
Western Digital Caviar Black 640GB x2                   126.48
Akasa AK-967 Nero Direct Contact Heatpipe CPU Cooler     31.04
Sony NEC Optiarc AD-7201S 20x DVD±RW                     21.84

Plus, Vista, wtf? Which one do I want? There's like 30 different flavours of Vista ffs!

[Engels]

Well, with 6 gig of ram, you'd want to go 64 bit.

As far as vista varieties, here's the lowdown:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-vista/compare-editions/default.aspx

Not as helpful as we'd like, but it something. Bottom line is:

Home Basic doesn't have Aero, the slick gui that hogs memory

Windows Media Center only on Home Premium and Ultimate (the only reason I see for this is that it'll give you a DVD watching Codec, whereas you would otherwise have to buy PowerDVD, WinDVD or another 3rd party software to get the codec. I recommend doing this anyway, since I don't like the WMC interface, but that's relative)

Business and Ultimate allow you to connect remotely to your computer from another machine (allowing that you've figured out how to do port forwarding on your home DSL/Cable modem and are comfy with that)

Other than that, there are some features that generally don't matter too much. Windows BackUp, for example is not very reliable.

[apocrypha]

Hmmm ok, well I will never watch DVDs on the PC, I'll always either play them on the PS3 or (if they're not region 2) rip them and stream then via PS3MediaPlayer. I don't care about the Aero GUI one jot and I am now able to walk so I can physically get to all 5 computers in the house so I don't care about the remote connection.

Home basic 64 it is then, awesome thanks 

[schild]

The tiny bit of money it costs to get Home Premium over Home Basic is worth it. Or at least, aero is so much nicer on the eyes that I think - alone - it's worth the upgrade.

I have not noticed it being a memory hog at all on my machine.

Also, I remember something about home basic's networking being totally gimped in some important way, but I forget how. I just remember everyone giving pretty great reasons for getting Premium over Basic, but not moving further up than that.

[apocrypha]

Fair enough, I was considering that cos as you say, it's a tiny amount more.

[schild]

Especially if you can get it OEM. Of course, if you can't over there, anyone here can - no clue how bad the exchange rate is though.

[apocrypha]

£86.44

[Lantyssa]

The tiny bit of money it costs to get Home Premium over Home Basic is worth it. Or at least, aero is so much nicer on the eyes that I think - alone - it's worth the upgrade.

Never, ever, get a Home version of an MS operating system if you can help it.  They are always crippled in some fundamentally important way.

It's okay for your parents, if you don't have to provide their tech support, but anyone reading this board or building their own machine is well advised to stay away.

[Reg]

I've always had the home versions ever since Windows XP came out and never once missed any of the features that weren't available.

[apocrypha]

Well I've ordered Home Premium 64 anyway. When I was spending just north of £1k an extra £20 didn't seem that important 

[Rendakor]

IIRC XP Home was missing some basic networking functionality. It's been a while, but my friends and I had some difficulty LAN-ing games where I (having XP Pro) had to host since everyone else was running XP Home. They might've added this in a service pack (or we might have just been retarded), however.

[Numtini]

XP home and XP Pro just use different networking methods. They are compatible, it's just a PITA to reset everything on one or the other PC. I don't see how it would affect lan stuff though. An IP is an IP.

[Lantyssa]

It did, at least initially.  My attempts to get a Home and Pro machine talking to one another were nightmarish.  I do think there were some changes later, but I saw the same problems Rendakor had way, way back.

[Furiously]

QOS wasn't editable in XP home I believe.

[apocrypha]

Well everything just arrived. Heh. That HAF case is a fkin monster. Really. Wish me luck assembling it all

[Trippy]

Tech Report's CPU price/performance analysis:

http://techreport.com/articles.x/16570/1

[fuser]

XP home and XP Pro just use different networking methods. They are compatible, it's just a PITA to reset everything on one or the other PC. I don't see how it would affect lan stuff though. An IP is an IP.

Sorry to necro this post...

XP Home/Professional use the same network stack, they just "turn things off". A lot of LAN issues seems to be related to the way file security is held and user authentication on pro vs home. Home is simply dumbed down and allow guest browsing of shares etc where a professional would have to enable the guest account or give a username/password to all the clients.  Another issue is the limitation of the 4(I think) active share connections on home which can cause some issues say if everyone needs to grab files from a person who has the patches.

Besides that, there's no difference in the stack as most features of professional can be *cough* enabled on a home license (change a registry key, reboot, hit f8 and select start windows with last known good configuration). With that simple hack your limits on SMB connections, security tabs, and the ability to join an active directory domain re-appears. Note: I say most because some things are still missing software wise that professional has but can be patched in (like the ability to host RDP/terminal services), oh and one major thing it might fail a SP3 install.

[Strazos]

Here's a challenge for you system builders. I only need the box:

$600-$700

Go.


 

[Trippy]

Do you need everything inside the box (and the box itself) or are you going to reuse stuff?

[Strazos]

My system is 6+ years old...

So yes. 

I can only hope a new system could last anywhere near that long for what I would be trying to pay. My current rig was $1200 in 2002.

[Trippy]

Any preferences between AMD vs Intel (CPU) and AMD/ATI vs NVIDIA (GPU)?

[Strazos]

Best Bang for the money...but also reliability. I've heard AMD has pulled back to be pretty close to Intel, but wtf do I know. Not expecting to be close to bleeding edge

Also, I'd LIKE to stay with nVidia; I had 3 ATI cards all die from their fans crapping out in less than a year. BUT, if there is a good ATI card out there that seems reliable and is demonstrably better than a nVidia card at a similar price point (and if their drivers are usable  ), then sure.

Really, I'm just looking for a decent PC that is reliable, can ACTUALLY run the shit that's coming down the pipe now, and has the capacity to be upgraded in the next year or 3 to stay somewhat current.

The PC is pretty much just for gaming; I don't do video work or anything, though I do like HD video (my PC can be chugish at times, not sure if that's an issue with new PCs).

At best, I could migrate my DVD-RW drive over, but it's IDE (I think they're all SATA now).

[apocrypha]

Since I've got Tom's Hardware open already from the tech questions page, the $625 Gamin PC:

Code:

$625 Gaming PC System Components
Component	    Model	                      Price (USD)

CPU	            Intel Pentium E5200 2.5 GHz	                   $83
CPU Cooler	    Xigmatek HDT-S963	                           $25
Motherboard	    Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3L	                  $100
RAM	            G.Skill HK 4 GB DDR2-800 (PC2 6400)	           $45
Graphics	    Sapphire 100259L Radeon HD 4870 512 M         $200
Hard Drives	    Samsung SpinPoint T Series HD501LJ 500 GB      $55
Sound	            Integrated HD Audio	                             0
Network	            Integrated Gigabit Networking	             0
Case	            Rosewill R222-P-BK	                           $22
Power	            PC Power&Cooling Silencer PPCS500 500W	   $70
Optical	            LITE-ON 20X DVD±R SATA Model iHAS120-04	   $24

Total Price:                          	                          $624

[Trippy]

$99 Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium SP1 64-bit for System Builders - OEM
$119 Intel Core 2 Duo E7400 Wolfdale 2.8GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor Model BX80571E7400 - Retail
$87 ASUS P5QL PRO LGA 775 Intel P43 ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail
$51 CORSAIR XMS2 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model TWIN2X4096-8500C7 - Retail
$60 Western Digital Caviar GP WD5000AACS 500GB 5400 to 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM
$130 XFX PVT98GYDLU GeForce 9800 GT 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Retail
$26 LITE-ON 22X DVD Burner with LightScribe Black SATA Model iHAS222-06 - OEM
$67 SeaSonic SS-500ET 500W ATX12V V2.2 / EPS12V V2.91 SLI Ready CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS Certified Active PFC Power Supply - OEM

$639 TOTAL

That leaves $61 for a case and misc. items not including tax (if applicable) and shipping. Items and prices are from Newegg but I intentionally avoided rebate items since 1) I didn't know if you like to deal with rebates and 2) the expiration dates all vary so they are dependent on when you make the actual purchase. You can obviously save some extra money if you are willing to get items with rebates. I also went with the better brands. You can save more money and/or get higher spec stuff if you are willing to go with the lesser brands.

The P43 chipset is the same as the P45 minus Crossfire support. Since you expressed preference for NVIDIA going with the P45 gains you nothing since neither chipset supports SLI.

Since I've got Tom's Hardware open already from the tech questions page, the $625 Gamin PC:

Code:

$625 Gaming PC System Components
Component	    Model	                      Price (USD)

CPU	            Intel Pentium E5200 2.5 GHz	                   $83
CPU Cooler	    Xigmatek HDT-S963	                           $25
Motherboard	    Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3L	                  $100
RAM	            G.Skill HK 4 GB DDR2-800 (PC2 6400)	           $45
Graphics	    Sapphire 100259L Radeon HD 4870 512 M         $200
Hard Drives	    Samsung SpinPoint T Series HD501LJ 500 GB      $55
Sound	            Integrated HD Audio	                             0
Network	            Integrated Gigabit Networking	             0
Case	            Rosewill R222-P-BK	                           $22
Power	            PC Power&Cooling Silencer PPCS500 500W	   $70
Optical	            LITE-ON 20X DVD±R SATA Model iHAS120-04	   $24

Total Price:                          	                          $624

This list is missing an OS so that'll bump the price up at least $100. Also, they skimped on the CPU in preference for a more expensive GPU. Given how much more of a pain it is to replace a CPU compared to a video card my preference is to spend the extra money on the CPU.