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HP Blackbird upgrade help

R

rinaldo00

2[H]4U
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Joined
Mar 9, 2005
Messages
2,909
1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc
HARD CORE GAMING
2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
$2000 UPDATE $3000 before tax and shipping
3) Where do you live?
Chicago
4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. The word "Everything" is not a valid answer. Please list out all the parts you'll need.
CPU, RAM, Motherboard, GPU(s) SLI, sound card (possibly)
5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
Hard Drives
1x160GB Raptor 16MB 10000 RPM SATA 1.5Gb/s (WD1600ADFS)
1x750GB Seagate 16MB 7200RPM SATA 3Gb/s (ST3750640AS)
1 TB Western Digital

Optical Drives 2 X Slot-Load DVDR with LightScribe (TS-T632L)

Audio Analog Devices AD1988B (on board)

Power Supply 1.1 kW Modular Cable Design

Case

Heatsink/Cooling (if needed )
Asetek LLC Liquid Cooling for CPU/GPUs - Factory Sealed
1 x 120mm front case fan
2 x 120mm top case fans (for radiator)
6) Will you be overclocking?
No
7) What size monitor do you have and/or plan to have?
24", planning on buying 30" after build, considering multi monitors
8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
NOW
9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? etc.
SLI, Firewire
10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If so, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?
Windows Vista Ultimate 32-bit


I bought one of the first HP Blackbird 002 Dedication editions and now after almost 4 years of constant, hard use, something died. When I first power up I hear a long, loud, beep. RAM tested fine, tried pulling both GPU cards and installing them one at a time
in each slot but get the same sound. Called HP tech support and they think it is the MOBO. HP will fix it by replacing the MOBO, NO UPGRADE, for $300, plus labor. I decided to go ahead and upgrade it myself, my first ever build.

I plan on reusing everything except CPU, RAM, Motherboard, GPU(s) SLI, sound card (possibly). I used to read every review on here and knew exactly what I wanted, but I stopped keeping up so now I need advice on how to MAX OUT this rig for another
few years.

Thanks!
 
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$365 - Intel Core i5 2500K CPU + MSI P67A-GD65 Intel P67 ATX Motherboard Combo
$100 - 2 x G.Skill Ripjaws F3-10666CL9D-8GBRL 2 x 4GB DDR3 1333 RAM
$656 - 2 x EVGA 012-P3-1571-AR GeForce GTX 570 1280MB
$406 - Crucial M4 CT256M4SSD2 2.5" 256GB SSD
$100 - Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64bit OEM
----
Total: $1627 plus tax and shipping

That SSD will be the biggest upgrade to the PC yet. It's far far faster than ANY Raptor or Velociraptor drive in existence. I added a copy of Windows 7 because, well, Windows 7 rocks. That and technically your Vista OS key isn't valid anymore.

Also, if you're planning multiple monitors or a 30", you might be better off with the following due to the increased VRAM:
$540 - 2 x XFX HD-695X-CNDC Radeon HD 6950 2GB PCI-E Video Card
 
Thanks for the quick reply!

Will the SSD make that much of a difference? Wouldn't I be better off with 2 GTX 580s instead?
 
rinaldo00 said:
Thanks for the quick reply!

Will the SSD make that much of a difference? Wouldn't I be better off with 2 GTX 580s instead?
Click to expand...

You'd be better off, but not enough to justify the price.
However, for bragging rights...;)
 
rinaldo00 said:
Will the SSD make that much of a difference?
Click to expand...
Big time.
rinaldo00 said:
Wouldn't I be better off with 2 GTX 580s instead?
Click to expand...

IMO, GTX 580 cards aren't worth the money. With that said, if you don't care at all about best bang for the buck value and want every ounce of performance possible at all costs, then go for GTX 580 SLI. However again, do note that the due to the limited VRAM on those GTX 580 cards, they may end up having performance issue. However the 3GB GTX 580 version might work out as well.
 
Thanks for all the advice!

Just to make sure my motivation is clear let me state that I am not looking for "best bang for the buck" but for an absolutely killer system. If I increase the budget to $3000 would you make any changes?

Thanks again!
 
Wow, lets see. Dedication Editions came from the factory with an overclocked CPU that was water cooled, as well as water cooled graphics cards. Is that something you want to try and keep? You'll probably have to replace certain parts (if not all) of the water cooling system. But it should (hopefully) be possible to replicate it.

$357 - Core i5-2500k and MSI P67A-GD65 (from Microcenter)
$40 (use promo code EMCKBJB24) - G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333
$392 - Crucial M4 256GB SSD
$100 - Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
$1200 ($600 x 2) - MSI N580GTX Lightning Xtreme Edition GeForce GTX 580 (Fermi) 3072MB x 2

Total: About $2100.

Hell, you could go with 3-Way SLI if you swap out that motherboard and go with this combo instead:
$460 - Intel Core i5-2500K and ASUS P8P67 WS REVOLUTION

If you decide to water cool your system, these might be a good starting point:
$720 (each) - EVGA 03G-P3-1591-AR GeForce GTX 580 (Fermi) Hydro Copper 2 3072MB
 
CPU: Core i7 970 - $500 new from Ebay
Mobo: EVGA Classified 4-way SLI: $400 from Amazon
RAM: 24GB DDR3 1600 - Corsair Vengeance: $180 from Newegg http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...Order=BESTMATCH&Description=corsair+vengeance
2 EVGA GeForce GTX 590: $1500 from EVGA's site
SSD: IDK, ~$200...pick your favorite
$100: Win7
$100: Corsair H100

Total: $3K
The motherboard + CPU combo is waaaay overkill for anything, but an i7 970 hands-down beats a i7-2600K at threaded tasks, and for gaming, it doesn't really matter since most games aren't going to be CPU-bound. You did ask for the best, right? ;)

The most ridiculous build I can think of (within reason) looks like so:

$1120 2 Xeon E5645 Hex-core 2.4GHz
$580 EVGA Classified SR-2
$1440 2 EVGA GTX 590
$3606 Corsair Vengeance 2x4GB DDR3-1600 kits

But that runs $3500 for the core system alone. Add $500 for an OS, SSD, and water coolers, and suddenly you're 1K over-budget :(
Plus the entire system is extreme overkill; *nothing* needs a pair of Xeons.
It is beastly though; those Xeons will happily do 3.5 GHz, maybe 4.
 
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rinaldo00 said:
If I increase the budget to $3000 would you make any changes?
Click to expand...

Pretty much what tonytnnt did would be my changes. Maybe up the CPU to the 2600K if you just want to spend money for a .5% increase in gaming performance
 
AWESOME AWESOME suggestions, and in such AMAZING DETAIL !

Thanks everyone !

Before I make my final decision I have another question. Is now a good time to buy or is something new coming out so soon that I should wait a bit?

Thanks again!
 
Stupid budget. Don't even need half of that, as others have already explained. Go with Danny's initial suggestions. He's a god.
 
rinaldo00 said:
Before I make my final decision I have another question. Is now a good time to buy or is something new coming out so soon that I should wait a bit?
Click to expand...

Well, there's always something around the corner.

Right now, the elephant that was supposed to be in the room but hasn't shown up to the party yet is AMD's Bulldozer CPU architecture. It was supposed to be out this past summer. The latest I've heard is September/October, with the expectation that server chips will be out a few weeks ahead of consumer ones. I have not seen reliable performance testing of Bulldozer. It could be amazing, but it could also be a flop. Or it could be just okay. (AMD really needs it to be amazing.)

Intel will be releasing their Sandy Bridge - E chips in Q4 2011. The Core i5-2500k and 2600k are actually midrange parts. Intel hasn't released their "high-end" Sandy Bridge chips yet (i.e. the Sandy Bridge E chips.) The high end chips will support up to quad channel DDR3-1333 and some will be 6 core chips with HyperThreading. Note that Sandy Bridge E will use a different socket than current Sandy Bridge chips (LGA 2011 vs LGA 1155) and therefore it will require a new motherboard in order to use.

Intel is releasing Ivy Bridge in March-April of 2012. Ivy Bridge will feature chips that can (theoretically) be used in current LGA1155 motherboards with just a BIOS/EFI update. Ivy Bridge is just a die shrink of Sandy Bridge, but there should be some decent performance gains to be had.

AMD is also working on the Radeon HD 7000 series GPUs. Expected release is before end of 2011. GPU generations are not as revolutionary as they once were. Whereas before you'd have the next gen GPU be twice as fast as the previous one, things have slowed down quite a bit. For example, the Radeon 6870 is about as fast as the last gen 5850. The 6970 is only about 10%-15% faster than the previous generation (5870.)

nVidia's Kepler/GTX 600 series is not expected in 2011. Samples will float around late in the year, but it'll be next year (first half?) that they are sold in retail.

SSDs will continually improve. No sense in waiting on that though.

Overall, I think now is still a good time to buy unless you want to wait and see how Sandy Bridge E performs. The only downside is that you're looking at $300, $600, and $1000 chips, plus the X79 motherboards will more than likely be more expensive than current P67 and Z68 boards. So assuming your budget of $3000 is fixed, the advantage to waiting is you can get a more powerful CPU. But if you buy now, you'll end up with a system with faster GPUs, and you can always upgrade to Ivy Bridge later.
 
Again, thanks for the detailed reply.

Since it seems with the CPUs out now games are not CPU limited those upgrades can wait. As for GPUs, I would rather not wait several months for even a 25% increase. I want my computer back!
 
It really comes down to if you're going to go multimonitor or not. Because the build I posted above is overkill for a single screen. Well, the GPUs anyways.
 
If going multimonitor what is best?

$1200 ($600 x 2) - MSI N580GTX Lightning Xtreme Edition GeForce GTX 580 (Fermi) 3072MB x 2

$1440 2 EVGA GTX 590

or adding a third MSI N580GTX Lightning Xtreme Edition GeForce GTX 580 (Fermi) 3072MB ($1800)

What kind of setup will that run? I assume 3 x 30" is too much, but can it do 20" x 30" x 20"?
 
Read them both but I'm wondering how a tri-SLI with three 3 GB 580s will do (that review used 1.5 GB 580s) compared to two 590s in SLI. I have seen reviews of both setups, but never a head to head comparison.
 
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