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Please review

Post Date: 2008-01-16
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PoppaWedge View Drop Down
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Posts: 43 		  Quote PoppaWedge Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Topic: Please review
    Posted: 16 Jan 2008 at 9:19pm
Howdy,
I'm about a month away from being able to order. Still tweaking what I want, but would like advice on the configuration I have below.
 
My current computer is a 7-year old beige box. I want to replace it with a fast machine that has good bones for upgrading in the future, so I'd like some advice on my motherboard.
 
I mostly play RTS games on my current system, with the occasional FPS. I'm guessing that the SLI might be overkill for that, but I don't want to have to upgrade cards anytime in the near future, so I'd rather go a little overkill here. If someone has some suggestions on video cards, I'd love to hear them.
 
I need to upgrade my 15" flat panel, but will do that once my wallet recovers from purchasing the computer.
 
My current computer also sounds like a jet plane taking off when I load any games, so I'd like to get something that is much quieter. I know, noise-levels are subjective, but if there things I can tweak to get a quieter system, I'd like to hear it.
 
I'm planning on getting 2 HDs, and then use Acronis True image to image the second drive with the first for back up purposes.
 
The bill so far is $2,791 for the configuration below. Any hints on ways to bring that down would be appreciated.
 
Thanks!
-PoppaWedge
 
Case: Digital Storm Twister ULTRA (Silver Anodized Aluminum Finish)
Power Supply: 620W Corsair HX (Dual SLI Compatible) (Silent Edition)
Processor: Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.4GHz (1066MHz FSB) (8MB Cache)
Motherboard: nVidia 780i Core 2 Quad (nForce 780i SLI)
Memory: 4GB DDR2 Corsair at 800MHz XMS2 (Dual Channel) (Extreme-Performance)
Floppy / Card: - No Thanks
Hard Drive 1: 320GB Western Digital (16MB Cache) (7200 RPM) (SATA)
Hard Drive 2: 320GB Western Digital (16MB Cache) (7200 RPM) (SATA)
Raid Option: - No Thanks
Hard Drive 3: - No Thanks
Optical Drive 1: DVD-ROM/CD-ROM (DVD Reader 16x / CD Reader 40x)
Optical Drive 2: DVD±R/RW/CD-R/RW (DVD Writer 20x / CD-Writer 48x)
Network Card: High Speed Network Port (Supports High-Speed Cable / DSL / Network Connections)
Video Card: 2x SLI Dual (nVidia GeForce 8800GT 512MB (By: eVGA) (PCI-Express)
TV Tuner: - No Thanks
Sound Card: Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer (Up to 7.1 Channel) (Recommended)
Physics Card: - No Thanks
Cooling: Air Cooled Stage 2 (Silent Artic Cooling Heat-sink (Copper Heatpipes)
Case Lighting: - No Thanks
Round Cables: - No Thanks
Overclock Processor: Yes, Overclock the processor as much as possible with complete stability
Overclock Video Card: - No Thanks, Please do not overclock my video card(s)
Overclock Memory: - No Thanks, Please do not overclock my memory
Tweak Windows: - No Thanks, Please do not tweak the services on the operating system
Windows OS: Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium
Protection: - No Thanks
Office: - No Thanks
Benchmarking: - No Thanks
Pre-Install Game: - No Thanks
Surge Shield: - No Thanks
Speakers: - No Thanks
Keyboard: - No Thanks
Mouse: - No Thanks my keyboard comes with a mouse
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Solo View Drop Down
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Posts: 395 		  Quote Solo Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 16 Jan 2008 at 10:44pm
go down to 2gb of memory unless you're using a 64 bit OS.  Anyone correct me if im wrong, but I don't know of a single RTS game that would need more than 2gb of ram to run smoothly, same for FPS.
 
I heard many good things about that soundcard, i only have a SB Audigy myself, costs like 30 bucks.  I like the soundcard, its great for what I paid.
 
Personally, unless you are a musician you really don't need that sound card, unless you're an audio  freak of course.
 
Many people today are satisfied with the onboard audio
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Mythius101 View Drop Down
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Posts: 134 		  Quote Mythius101 Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 17 Jan 2008 at 12:40am
I'm an audio engineer, and I can't hear a difference in onboard audio VS a high quality standalone card unless I'm listening on a $500+ speaker system.
Vista Home Premium 32
Core 2 Quad Q6600
nVidia 680iA1
2GB Corsair Dominator RAM
2x SLI Dual GeForce 8800GTS 512MB
Creative Labs X-Fi Fatal1ty XtremeGamer
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Tyler Lowe View Drop Down
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Posts: 0 		  Quote Tyler Lowe Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 17 Jan 2008 at 1:54am
Use a decent pair of analog headphones...
 
 
The thing is, it's not only about sound quality. If you plan on playing games that rely on audio queues like first person shooters, the X-Fi offers extended audio *content* which can give those making use of the X-Fi an edge over those playing with onboard sound. Soundcards also free up CPU cycles.
 
Younger ears will no doubt hear more benefit from the upgrade, and to truly hear all of the sound quality improvements you really do need some sort of decent speaker set (headphones being the cheapest route) but there are benefits aside from better signal to noise ratios or frequency response capabilities.
 
 


Edited by Tyler Lowe - 17 Jan 2008 at 2:06am
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!ender_ View Drop Down
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Posts: 4219 		  Quote !ender_ Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 17 Jan 2008 at 8:30am
http://www.digitalstormonline.com/comploadsaved.asp?id=113115
 
ok i know you said that you were looking for less than 2700 but i thought id see how much more power i could get you for close to the same cost, as far as saving money:
-drop to 2gb@800MHz XMS2
-use a small drive as a back up, and put only the most critical things on it
-a good money saver would be dropping the sound card, like tyler said its not about quality as much as it is about the APU freeing up your processor
-another big saver would be to go for a single stronger card instead of SLI, sli is a resolution pleaser, personally i think that more than 1280x1024 is silly, (19" acer) but thats JUST me. You could save a bundle by dropping to a single GTS512, not to mention save temperature and power
 
those are the main shortcuts i see without any significant power loss


Edited by !ender_ - 17 Jan 2008 at 8:36am
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PoppaWedge View Drop Down
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Posts: 43 		  Quote PoppaWedge Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 17 Jan 2008 at 10:53pm
Thanks all for your feedback.
 
Sound card -- My "current" 7-year old system can choke on games with music -- the sound starts chopping up to the point where it's unbearable. I probably won't be able to tell the difference in the sound -- my main concern is having a separate card to only handle the audio. I'm guessing that current cards can probably handle the sound in today's games, but you never know.
 
RAM -- I know... I'll never see the full 4 GB of in the 32-bit version of Vista, but I'm an old fart who remembers paying more money for 8 MB of RAM than I will pay for 4 GB of RAM in this system. I grew up with the saying "Not even God has enough RAM." Willing to pay extra for RAM.
 
Motherboard - Anyone have anything to say on the 780i vs 680i mobo? Just read an article from late November saying that there wasn't much difference between the 680i and the 780i other than the potential for 3 VGAs in SLI. Don't see myself going there, but I don't want to have to muck around inside my computer for some time, so I'd rather spend a little extra now for the PCIe 2.0 support. Any thoughts?
 
Thanks again to all!
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!ender_ View Drop Down
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Posts: 4219 		  Quote !ender_ Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 18 Jan 2008 at 12:03am

Id call the sound card on processor load, not quality.

I would guess (and this really is just a guess) that with RTS-genre games, overlapping sound and an excessive amout of different sounds would yield a significant difference if you used a sound card with an APU as compared to like a cheap fps where theres pretty much shooting and running with an occasional explosion which may not show as much of a change from onboard sound to sound card w/ APU
 
ram, its a chocie you seem to have already made, it wont hurt you so i dont see a problem with it
 
if you go with NO sli, id look into the ASUS board, but that leaves no room for sli later on
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Tyler Lowe View Drop Down
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Posts: 0 		  Quote Tyler Lowe Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 18 Jan 2008 at 12:15am
I remember saving my pennies for weeks to upgrade my PC from 256 Kb to 640 Kb. It may be that there's just no changing your mind on this, but I have to at least try and save you some $$$. !ender is right IMO,  the 4GB isn't worth it unless you're going to a 64 bit OS.
 
I dropped in a 1GB stick of 667 with my 2 GB of PC6400 just to see how much of that RAM my system could use, and the answer was .35 GB. I tested with the timings set to 667MHz 5-5-5-12 at both 2GB and 3GB and there was *zero* change in performance. If you're going 64-bit, or are even considering an upgrade to it at a later time, this could justify the additional expense. Otherwise, it really is a waste.
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PoppaWedge View Drop Down
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Posts: 43 		  Quote PoppaWedge Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 18 Jan 2008 at 7:09am

Thanks for the feedback. I think I may drop the extra 2 GB of RAM for now and just add it later if I decide to upgrade.

Tyler, I thought in newer systems you are supposed to put RAM in in pairs to see any real benefit. Would that be why you were seeing no change in performance? Not trying to challenge you on this, just trying to clear up my understanding of RAM.
 
One more question: If I'm dropping from 4 to 2 GB of RAM, should I change the type of RAM? I currently have 4GB DDR2 Corsair at 800MHz XMS2 listed in the config above. Should I change the speed/type?
 
Thanks!
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Tyler Lowe View Drop Down
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Posts: 0 		  Quote Tyler Lowe Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 18 Jan 2008 at 10:59am
That would be to run the ram in dual channel, but the performance gains from this are also small. I had a link to an extensive benchmark of dual channel vs the same pair of RAM run in single channel (I have no idea which of the dozens of sites this was posted on at this point) and the result was a shockingly small difference, to the point of negligible.
 
In terms of RAM speed, moving up to 1066 RAM won't grab you any big performance gains because of the increased bandwidth, but it does make things easier when trying to overclock. You can also run higher grade RAM at a lower than rated speed and then set the timings more aggressively. This will reduce latency, which *will* get you more performance.
 
edit: BTW, challenge away Big%20smile. I'm not by any means a be all end all, just another joe that reads entirely too much and enjoys tweaking and benchmarking. I've been wrong before, it'll happen again.
 
I went back and did another set of benchmarks, and I will say the extra 1GB does matter if you're going to do heavy rendering. In my PCMark tests, the two configurations were within 300 points of each other, ~9600 and ~9300 respectively. This is pretty tight. SiSandra Processor Arithmetic showed a substantial gain of about 2,000 points, but again, FPS rates in games seemed largely unaffected.
 
So I guess I will qualify the statement about adding a 3rd GB of RAM. For *gaming* it doesn't matter. Wink


Edited by Tyler Lowe - 18 Jan 2008 at 12:17pm
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Posts: 128 		  Quote Getout Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 18 Jan 2008 at 4:32pm

Great Job Tyler!!!
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PoppaWedge View Drop Down
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Posts: 43 		  Quote PoppaWedge Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 19 Jan 2008 at 7:06am
Tyler,
Thanks for the explanation - I appreciate it!
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  Quote PoppaWedge Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 25 Jan 2008 at 1:14pm
Tyler,
I thought you had me straightened out on RAM requirements, but then I see something like the reported system specs for Assassin's Creed:
    “In order to play this game properly, your PC MUST meet or exceed these minimum requirements:
    Supported OS: Windows XP / Vista (only)
    Processor: Dual core processor 2.6 GHz Intel Pentium D or AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ (Intel Core 2 Duo 2.2 GHz or AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+ or better recommended)
    RAM: 2 GB (3 GB recommended)
    Video Card: 256 MB DirectX 10.0–compliant video card or DirectX 9.0–compliant card with Shader Model 3.0 or higher (512 MB video card recommended) (see supported list)*
    Sound Card: DirectX 9.0 or 10.0 compliant sound card (5.1 sound card recommended)
    DirectX Version: DirectX 10.0 libraries (included on disc)
    DVD-ROM: DVD-ROM dual-layer drive
    Hard Drive Space: 12 GB
    Peripherals Supported: Keyboard, mouse, optional controller (Xbox 360 Controller for Windows recommended)

    *Supported Video Cards at Time of Release:
    ATI RADEON X1300-1950 / HD 2000 / 3000 series
    NVIDIA GeForce 6600-6800 / 7 / 8 / 9 series.”
 
Now, leaving aside whether you think the game is worth the expense of upgrading, my assumption is that if Vista alone recommends 2 GB of RAM, and a game is recommending 3 GB of RAM, then going for 4 GB of RAM couldn't hurt.
 
Signed,
--Confused... 
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Posts: 2220 		  Quote skyR Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 25 Jan 2008 at 2:31pm
vista recommends 1gb of ram.. not 2.
The only thing that keeps me wishing on a wishing star.
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PoppaWedge View Drop Down
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Posts: 43 		  Quote PoppaWedge Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 25 Jan 2008 at 4:44pm
Oops. My bad.
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Posts: 37 		  Quote Digitalkryme Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 25 Jan 2008 at 5:06pm

Hi, just going to throw in my two pence worth on the ram debate, i run 4gb OCZ DDR2 667 ram on my xp and see 3.25gb of it, but it is definatly faster than with 2gb or even 3gb for me anyway.

I was running 6gb when i ran Vista 64, but had compatibility issues with a fair bit of software and my USB tv tuner wouldn't work Cry

Im also of the same mindset that you can never have too much ram, although now im starting to think that about HDD space as well Confused
Before you mock someone, walk a mile in their shoes, then at least your a mile away and have their shoes as well :)
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Tyler Lowe View Drop Down
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Posts: 0 		  Quote Tyler Lowe Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 25 Jan 2008 at 11:14pm
Interesting.

I've seen suggested system specs before on yet to be released games promising improved performance with over 2GB of system RAM, or multiple cores, or 64 bit OS , that failed to deliver on any of those promises*cough* Crysis *cough*. I wouldn't necessarily bank on the need for 3GB to play Assassin's Creed.

However, if you'd rather insure against that potential I suppose it can't hurt anything Wink.

One thing I would definitely recommend is to make sure what you're getting is a 2 x 2GB kit, and not a 4 x 1GB kit. I would agree you can't have too much RAM.... unless the inclusion of more than 2GB is causing you to trim more important things from your budget.






Edited by Tyler Lowe - 25 Jan 2008 at 11:15pm
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PoppaWedge View Drop Down
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Posts: 43 		  Quote PoppaWedge Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 26 Jan 2008 at 9:21pm
Yeah, I'm well aware of the potential for over-promise-under-deliver.
 
Anyhoo... In looking at the RAM options here, all I'm seeing are size, speed and size. I'm not seeing anything regarding two 2 GB sticks vs four 1 GB sticks on the configurator. Anyone have any clue as to what the options are for RAM configurations?
 
Thanks as always!
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Tyler Lowe View Drop Down
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Posts: 0 		  Quote Tyler Lowe Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 27 Jan 2008 at 3:11am
When it comes to specifics like whether you're getting 2x2GB or 4x1GB you want to do that on the phone, and request it in writing under the notes section.
 
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Posts: 43 		  Quote PoppaWedge Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 28 Jan 2008 at 9:01am
Thanks again for all of the great information! Leaning towards 4 GB at this point. Will check with DSO about the 2x2 configuration.
 
On a side note, as I was thinking about this more over the weekend, I remembered convinvincing my parents to shell out $150 bucks to upgrade our Apple ][e from 64K to 128K so that the little word processing app that came with it would handle 80 columns of text characters as opposed to 80 columns of text characters. Course, that was 24 years ago when I was 11. So I don't even blink at shelling out ~$150 for 4GB of RAM these days. Unbelievable.
 
Thanks again!
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Posts: 162 		  Quote jimbo Quote  Post ReplyReply bullet Posted: 28 Jan 2008 at 9:44pm

The first System I built was an IMSAI 8080.  It cost $600 for 8KB.

Oh the good old days ( may they never come back again....Wink
Life's too short
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