Hello SEN,

currently I'm looking into the prospect of selling my computer and getting a new one because certain games (e.g. CoD: Black Ops) are just unplayable with my old Athlon X2 4800.
So what matters to me is getting a good performance jump so I can play all games decently (>= 20 minimum frame rate on >= high settings @1920x1080) while keeping the cost as low as possible (~ $550). Also all chosen components should be built to last at least 5 years before failing.

When recommending a certain part it'd be nice if you add a short reason why this component and not another. And please keep in mind that I live in Germany so I won't have the deals you have (assume standard price).

What I need:
Case: good airflow, front USB w/o cover
MoBo: up to 16GB DDR3, (hopefully) supports processors that are coming out in ~ 2 years. If not possible just keep it cheap. eSATA and USB 3.0 is a bonus, not a necessity.
RAM: 4 (maybe 8) GB DDR3, should be upgradeable later to at least 12GB without replacing the old RAM
CPU: with a good air cooler, nr. of cores optimized for gaming + multitasking
PSU: High quality, ~ 150W more than you'd usually take because of possible upgrades in ~ 2 years
HDD: I have 1TB, so I'd love a 64GB SSD for Windows. Though I'll go for a regular drive too if price becomes an issue.
Optical: DVD burner. Don't bother, I'll find one. Do you think BluRay is worth it?

I got all peripherals. Anything I forgot?

So gogo, build me my dream machine.

I'd post something but Excalibur will rip it apart immediately after . I do know that $550 can definitely give you a rig which matches your gaming expectations, however.

Alright Nude, lets get cracking.
First let me say this: At 550$ and expecting high to ultra smooth frame 1080p performance you're stretching a little bit. Its do-able, but there may be corners that have to be cut which I usually don't like doing. That being said I'll do my best to make this work.

The first thing I need is links to German sites where you'd most likely be buying from, because I need to know what parts and brands you have access too. I'd love to assume you have all the parts and prices available at Newegg but I know you don't. I also know in other countries parts will cost more, and I need to compensate for that.

Edit: Did some research.
http://www.alternate.de/html/product/Samsung/HD103SJ_1_TB/136219/?
http://www.alternate.de/html/product/GIGABYTE/GA-P67A-D3-B3/856552/?
http://www.alternate.de/html/product/Intel%28R%29/Pentium%28R%29_Processor_G620/781724/?
http://www.alternate.de/html/product/Mushkin/DIMM_4_GB_DDR3-1333/791844/?
http://www.alternate.de/html/product/XFX/HD6870_Dual_Fan/888426/?
http://www.alternate.de/html/product/Antec/High_Current_Gamer_HCG-520/763734/?

No case or optical yet. Show me cases on that site ( Can't read German. ), or wherever you'd be buying one from. Optical is simple, CD/DVD combo drive, SATA, should be like 20$. Blu-ray isn't worth it.

CPU is good but can be upgraded later, GFX is good but can be upgraded later, HDD is the fastest mechanical HDD there is, mobo is solid, RAM is solid and can be doubled for 8GB, GPU is good and will handle 1080p just fine, but isn't so expensive so upgrading it stays an option.

Cart said € 442,53** € 70,66
Gesamtpreis inkl. 19% MWSt.
So I hope I'm still within budget.

Post has been edited 2 time(s), last time on Aug 27 2011, 5:19 pm by Excalibur.

Uhm wow, you even went a step further than I expected. I was making it easy for you by assuming I can get pretty much everything you US guys can get, but for a higher price. Experience has told me I have to pay about the same price in Euros you pay in Dollars. So go for €550 (the first number on Alternate).

Alternate is almost comparable to Newegg in terms of product range but they are often a little overpriced. Still feel free to choose the components from either sites.
There's the cases

About the components you already chose:
- I already have the exact same HDD, so if you can find a cheaper one or a SSD. I don't care about size.
- The PSU seems a little weak, probably one of the corner cuts?
- When you "cut a corner" please give the more expensive alternative you recommend. The $550 aren't set in stone.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Aug 27 2011, 11:21 pm by NudeRaider.

The power supply is fine. Lots of ignorant enthusiasts have just assumed that big wattage = better, when really most of the time it goes completely unused. In fact the way power supplies work, they only don't reach full efficiency until they are at high load. Eg, if you're running at 60-70% load they might only attain 75% efficiency, but if they're running at 80-100% they will obtain 82% efficiency. So in that scenario you're actually better off buying a PSU that has lower headroom. PSU companies haven't gone out of their way to correct this misinterpretation by consumers because they can charge extra $$$ for things that people buy. The more unscrupulous ones simply take a low-end part, say it's capable of high wattage and sell it for more, with the knowledge that 99% of people who buy it won't actually exceed it's capabilities.

Just to give you an idea, I got an Enermax Liberty 620W power supply. Here's what they've rated it for: dual quad core CPUs, 300w graphics card (or 2x150w) + 18 hard drives.

In the booklet, the lowest wattage one featured is 565W, and it's rated for: dual quad core CPUs, 300w graphics card (or 2x150w) + 13 hard drives.

Now how many CPUs are you going to run? How many hard drives? 520W will be fine for you.

Also if you're wanting this computer to last 5 years without upgrades, you should try and get a motherboard with SATA 600 on it, because there are SSDs out already that saturate that bandwidth and their price is only going to come down in the next 5 years.

The PSU could handle up to an HD 6970 in current gen terms. I think it should be fine for anything up to a quad core, 8GB and HD 7950 upgrade. It was hard to find PSUs on that site. If you can find the next model up of Antec's HCG line or any Corsair or SeaSonic listing of 600w+ should be fine.

If you can spring for it http://www.alternate.de/html/product/Fractal_Design/Define_R3_Titanium_Grey/771844/?event=search is one of my favorite cases and I'm surprised you can get it since it only became US available recently.

If not, CM 690 II is a behemoth and will cool you down nice. http://www.alternate.de/html/product/Cooler_Master/CM_690_II/153719/?

Also if you want to spend the money, a 650w/750w SeaSonic would be the last PSU you would ever need. And they almost never die. So essentially it'd be a PSU to use for 8+ years which in my book is fantastic. Not sure how much they cost by you.

Alright, thanks that's a place to start from. Time to do my own research...

One thing I wondered about is the sandy bridge CPU since I don't do video encoding which apparently is what sandy bridge shines at. It's only a dual core (I think tricore would be optimal for multitasking + gaming) with 100 MHz more than my current CPU. Even though it's a fair bit faster than CPUs with the same clock speed this just doesn't seem enough. I thought standard would now be around 3GHz for gaming rigs, or are there other factors that make it effectively faster? Are there faster, but more expensive alternatives?

I replaced the HDD with a 96GB Kingston SSD and the CPU with the G850, added the CM Case (Lite) (I don't like the design of the other) and this LiteOn DVD burner, so I totaled € 584,18 + 19,90 shipping = ~ 604€. A little high, but that's because of the expensive SSD. So I'll probably skip the HDD/SSD for now.
Still looking into the perfect PSU, but this one will do for now.
And one important thing is missing: A CPU cooler! Recommend one please. Google'd "boxed".

So far so good. Time to look for cheaper sellers. Ordering from 2 retailers I get to
€338,43 + €221,38 = € 559,81 (incl. shipping, saving almost 10%)
- €90 for the SSD = ~ €470 which sounds good.

Any comments?

Post has been edited 3 time(s), last time on Aug 29 2011, 2:37 pm by NudeRaider.

The CPU you've selected will come with a cooler. You only need a separate one if you're intending to do overclocking (and even then, probably not). IMO overclocking just isn't worth the hassle any more.

Here's some useful resources for you:

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/desktop-cpu-charts-q3-2008/benchmarks,31.html This is a CPU test chart which includes your current Athlon 4800. This CPU doesn't seem to be on the newer charts, so if you want to compare it to a newer CPU than is on that chart, compare your current CPU to the i7 940 and then compare that to the other CPU in the later chart. You'll probably find that despite the clockspeed being similar, that the new CPUs perform significantly better than your old one. Here're all the charts: http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/processors,6.html

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ssd-solid-state-nand-reliability,2998.html Best SSDs for the money.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gaming-cpu,2971.html Best gaming CPUs for the money.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-performance-radeon-geforce,2997.html Best graphics cards.

Thanks for the interesting links, Lanth. It seems the CPU is fast enough (probably even the 620 Ex recommended).

Anyways, I'd like Ex or Rockz take a look at the items I modified on the list. Do you guys approve? If yes I'm probably gonna buy it and frankly I'm excited already, so hurry up.

EDIT:
Oh and I just found the better Corsair CX 600 PSU for just €3,50 more (incl. shipping).

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Aug 29 2011, 2:32 pm by NudeRaider.

A note on the CPU:
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/405?vs=406

57,72 € - 2.6 GHz g620
65,42 € - 2.8 GHz g840
74,80 € - 2.9 GHz g850
93,98 € - 3.1 GHz i3 2100
It clearly does not pay to get the i3, since it's 20 € for 2 MHz and 256 kB L2 cache (this is actually really low. If you can afford it I would recommend the i3, it's $125 in US, whereas the g840 and g850 are 88 and 98). Likewise, it's 10 € for 100 MHz in the g850 vs g840. The only real decision is between paying 8 € for 200 MHz between the 620 and 840. I just wouldn't advise getting the 850, since it seems like a waste of money. Another good part about the CPU is that it is the most important part of the computer, period. If you can, get an i5 2500k. It is the pinnacle of awesome right now. Of course if you plan on upgrading to it later, get the g620 so you minimize your losses when you upgrade.

Cooler:
I haven't bothered to look for a CPU cooler, but the best price/performance here is the Hyper 212+ ($20) or the scythe mugen ($40). There's also boatloads of reviews here: http://www.frostytech.com/top5heatsinks.cfm but their ranking systems don't exactly make sense to me. Make sure if you get a CPU cooler, you don't get the "BOX" version of the CPU you want to save a few dollars. However, as you can't overclock these CPUs, there's not really a point to any of this.

Case:
I am a Lian Li fanboy, period. I believe that more holes and more fans does not necessarily mean better cooling. At this point you should just choose what you like best, but I will pay extra to take the rice out of my cases. Interestingly, the HAF 912 is usually $50-$60 in the US, but it's 80 € at hardwareversand, whereas the 692 is typically $80.

64,33 € - k58
65,52 € - CM692

RAM:
I firmly believe that RAM does not matter in the long run. When you overclock/get faster RAM your overall performance increases in the 1-2% increase. There are good reasons for high performance RAM, but never on a budget. Though it is good to buy within your budget. Prices for RAM right now in the US range from $30-$40 for 4 GB of low quality, higher quality in same price ratio for 8 GB. You do not need 8 GB. Nobody needs more than 4 right now. Dual Channel is not necessary, but it does offer a minor performance boost. I couldn't find anything special to get. Newegg typically has email specials with promo codes and such for $10 off, so that's where I usually get ram.

HDD:
The spinpoint f3 is a beast and will remain the best value hard drive for a very long time. The seagate 7200.12 gives it a run for its money, though.

SSD:
I am not experienced with these. The technology is too new to me. I would be wary of kingston, however.

PSU:
First off: some Q&A on power supplies.
- Why do I need a good power supply?
To give power to your computer in a way that decreases the likelihood that you will damage the components
- What is the significance of having a "600W" vs "500W" power supply?
This is the theoretical maximum power that the manufacturer has labeled. If you have a good power supply, it is likely that the real maximum power is much greater, they just call it a lower maximum in order to keep it at an 80+ rating.
- Shouldn't a 600W PSU be better than a 500W PSU?
No. PSUs are most efficient at 50% capacity. Your computer will be idling most of the time. Power requirements are usually greatly over exaggerated. You could run 2 GTX 470s on a 400W PSU if you underclocked them a little and really pushed the PSU. The only reason to get a PSU above 500-550 W is for dual graphics. Power requirements are not going to increase that much in future generations due to PCI-e power limits, and manufacturers realize that efficiency is a good thing.

The Power Supply Archive lists a whole bunch of trusted reviews for a whole bunch of power supplies. Generally Corsair is excellent, but this happens to be their cheapo line. The CX v2 is actually very good. The V1 wasn't spectacular.
However when you compare it to the high current gamer that ex posted there are very few reasons to get the corsair. The Antec is made by Seasonic (arguably one of the three best PSU manufacturers). It's also 80+ bronze. Cheaper in the short AND long run. The one thing that possibly worries me is the 85C capacitor, but I don't know what the corsair uses, and the Antec is just awesome.

Motherboard:
Much like RAM, I don't see the benefit of a high quality motherboard. However, there shouldn't be a problem with Ex's choice. He doesn't like MSI because of past experiences, so the next best thing is Asus. I also recall reading something about the z68 chipset being what the p67 should have been. Who knows (I don't see much of a benefit from motherboard chipset apart from pci-e lanes and peripheral support).

106.07 € - ASUS P8Z68-V LX - Here's a decent Asus. Note that as long as you have graphics on your CPU, you should go ahead and have the ability to use them. The p67 does not have this option, and instead wastes the space on parallel and serial ports.
92,81 € - ASRock Z68 Pro3 (B3) - Asrock is Asus' bargain brand. They are virtually identical, but the Asrock is 13 € less. You might also find a z68 somewhere else from another brand.

Graphics:
I don't think the brand of graphics matters very much, or the factory overclock. What is important is the cooler and the price. A bigger cooler will let you overclock more, and obviously being cheap is a good thing. IMO there aren't many good buys right now. The 560 Ti is about the most I could recommend anyone, and the 6870 is just slightly behind it. The reason that nothing is a good buy is that everything is just about equal right now: Price/Performance is all about the same. Finally you really do get what you pay for in graphics.

Optical:
generally this is something you can reuse forever. If you have an old one, great, but it's probably not sata.

I remember reading an article about where to spend your money recently, and they recommended not to bother with 'fast' RAM (in terms of timings) because you really just don't see it in actual applications or gaming, it only shows up in benchmarks. They recommended just putting that $ towards the CPU or graphics card.

For motherboard, generally more $$ = more features, but I suspect motherboards are probably at the point now where the mainstream boards will generally offer all the features you want. Last time I built a computer in 2008 I had to go slightly higher than mainstream to get what I wanted, but I don't think that's the case now.

SATA 600 is desirable, especially if you're getting a SSD. But SATA 600 can be added later as a PCIe card, as can USB3, so I don't think these are deal breakers if the motherboard you pick doesn't have them.

Good analysis. I'll go for the G840. Reason is that I simply want the best bang for the buck. Not the best bang, and neither the best buck. The system should last a few years without upgrading, but when the need arises (and it always will eventually) I want to be able to extend the rig's lifetime for as long as possible. Today's pinnacle will be cheap by then, so why buy it now?

I'm not planning to overclock so the boxed cooler is fine, right? (From what I read you can overclock sandy bridge, it's just much more limited and complex)

Right, then I'll go for the looks I like best and that's the CM.


Yeah, I'd liked to have dual channel but didn't make it a priority. And at that price it's just a no-brainer.

Luckily I already have the F3. So I don't *need* another hard disk. Also if I ever get a 2nd it'll be a SSD since space isn't an issue at 1TB. But for now I've decided it's not worth it even though I've found a pretty good deal. Why don't you trust Kingston?

Yeah this is pretty much what I still know from when you guys last got me up to speed on that topic when I was thinking about getting a new PSU. Btw. I replaced the fan instead because I got one for free. But I'm still glad for the knowledge I gained.

This is what convinced me. I know that max power says virtually nothing about a PSU, but I assumed power requirements would be going up over time. But now that you mention it I realize they haven't gone up for a while.

Aight, Ex's Antec it is.


k.

I agree. If you have internal GFX you should be able to use them. But I'm not so sure I'm willing to pay 10-20 € for that... So I guess Ex's recommendation it is. (once again)

Exactly my opinion as well. I was looking for a cheaper alternative with 2 coolers and I just couldn't find one.

I'll come up with a (hopefully) final buy list shortly...

hardwareversand: 3,99 € shipping
Case: 65,52 € CM 690
MoBo: 80,81 € Gigabyte PA67
CPU: 65,42 € Intel G840

Alternate: 6,95 € shipping
PSU: 57,90 € Antec HGC-520
GFX: 149,90 € XFX HD6870
RAM: 15,99 € Mushkin DDR3-1333
Optical: 17,79 € LiteOn iHAS122
HDD: ---
---------------------------------------------------
= 215,74 €
+ 248,53 €
========================================
= 464,27 €

I'll leave that up for 1 day for final considerations and then I'm going to buy if nothing significant turns up.

And btw. Ex if you wonder about all the back and forth just to be landing almost exactly where you started: I'm just the type of guy that has to understand and be convinced of why I should buy x and not y. In conversations I want to be able to name the reasons why I bought it and not just say: "I know a hardware guru and he told me to." It's my money so I need to actually stand behind the decisions. I hope you can understand that.

In any case, to anyone who helped: Thanks, greatly appreciated.

I'm going to have to make one more attempt to sway you away from the p67, or at least gigabyte. After a little research I was amazed that gigabyte started supporting UEFI, and presumed I could restore my faith in them. However upon closer inspection they're calling "hybrid EFI" or something like that. I don't know what it means, but it's not UEFI.

UEFI is essentially a BIOS replacement (let's face it BIOS is old). Certainly if you like to fiddle around with BIOS settings, it's good, but afaik, UEFI allows for faster boot, and a lot of really cool other things that you really just have to see to believe. Youtube it if you want.

it seems there is a bit of a bonus for keeping the old BIOS in the form of easier overclocking, but that's only because they didn't do it like intel wanted them to.

I'm not 100% on this either, but the z68 offers some key differences from the p67.
Z68 adds Virtu (which adds ~$20 to the price) and some other option for those who don't have an SSD
But not everyone thinks that virtu is a good thing
More on virtu

So there you have it. Sorry if I made the decision that much harder on you. Here's the thing: no matter what you get it will work, and work great. You can think of virtu as a gimmick, but I'd like to think of it as a really nice method to decrease power consumption. It also might be fun to play around with, or you might not enjoy fiddling with it to get it to work.

Also, it's sort of funny how I'm telling you to avoid gigabyte, then they go and get an award in the z68 review I linked you. Oh well. Just goes to show that everything is a good buy right now (which also means that nothing is a good buy unfortunately).

I just noticed something that could become a deal breaker: I need 2 PS/2 ports. Actually none of the mobos I checked has that. So what to do?
Wait... I know PS/2 keyboards are better because of more keys that can be pressed simultaneously. But what about mice? Do USB mice have drawbacks? If not I could get a USB mouse...

EDIT:
What about this one? http://www3.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?adp=0&aid=46920&agid=1601&apop=3 (I know it has no Virtu, which sounds quite awesome on paper, so I'll keep looking.)

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Aug 31 2011, 12:44 am by NudeRaider.

I would simply buy a new mouse. Unless you've got some fancy mouse that you don't want to replace. But most mice, especially fancy ones, have been USB for about the last 10 years, so I'm guessing you've just got a standard optical wheel mouse.

If you have nkro it's worthwhile for ps/2. Otherwise you probably can't press more than 4 or 5 at a time due to keyblocking.

Also why are you using a ps/2 mouse? USB has no drawbacks for mice, and for keyboards it's pretty small too (I can press a certain 10+ at the same time with my comfort curve 2000, and it's USB, since the firmware knows to delay the last 4 keys pressed until the next poll).

that one looks fine, but I would seriously get a better mouse, unless for some reason your ps/2 mouse is awesome. There are converters but I don't know how well they work.

The converters are generally USB -> PS2. I've never seen one that goes the other way.

Aight, just took me a bit to say goodbye to the 2-3 perfectly fine mice I have lying around, but I really like the Virtu concept, so it's probably worth it. I just hope it works at least half as fine as advertised.

Anyways, going for the ASRock Z68.

If you really want to use your old mice, you could probably get an adapter to use them. Most likely the adapter will be for both a keyboard and mouse, but you won't want to use it for your keyboard if it isn't necessary. Note that I have no experience with any of these adapters, however; since I've had USB mice for many years, even though I used my first ones in PS/2 ports; and most motherboards for computers you would build still have a single PS/2 port you can use for a keyboard.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Aug 31 2011, 3:46 am by ShadowFlare.