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Time for a new build

W

WPN1969

n00b
Joined
Aug 11, 2008
Messages
41
Hi, like title says is now the time to upgrade from our old 775 system? My son has been complaining about the games he plays the pc freezes on him and the only way to restart pc is to hold down pwr button. He says it happens on homefront and Crysis2. I haven't experienced any issues, but I only play COD MW2 and black ops. Have all the issues with sandy Bridge motherboadrs been resolved or would it be safer with a AMD build? Here is what we have currently
CPU Q9400 2.66
MB Asus P5NE-sli
MEM OZC 4Gig DDR2
VC XFX 5770 1GB 128 bit
HD WD 250GB
Win vista
PSU OZC 750

1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc
Mainly gaming Homefront Crysis2 FREA3, and FB3

2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
850.00 including tax and shipping
3) Where do you live?
San Antonio, TX
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 AMD Phenom X6 ,or intel i5 2500K
MB AMD gigabyte Ga-870A-UD3 or Intel MSI p67a-g45
DDR3 4gb 1333
HD 500
VC GTX 560
5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
Coolermaster HAF case PSU OZC 700W and sony DVD drive.
6) Will you be overclocking?
no
7) What size monitor do you have and/or plan to have?
Asus 23"
8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
ASAP
9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? etc.
No crossfire or sli just basic mb with usb 3.0
10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If so, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?
Win7 32 home edition CD
 
The current SB motherboards are still a tad finicky but stable enough that we've been recommending them for the past few months. I would not go for an AMD setup due to your budget and the parts you're coming from. However I do recommend replacing your PSU if it's not one of OCZ's Z-Series PSUs since a vast majority of OCZ PSUs are crap. So which OCZ PSU do you have?

Here's what I recommend now:
$325 - Intel Core i5-2500K CPU + MSI P67A-C43 Intel P67 ATX Motherboard
$41 - G.Skill Ripjaw Series F3-10666CL9S-4GBRL 4GB DDR3 1333 RAM
$283 - XFX HD-695X-CNFC Radeon HD 6950 2GB PCI-E Video Card
$65 - Samsung Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
$84 - Antec Truepower New TP-650 650W PSU
---
Total: $798 plus tax and shipping

Some notes:
- That Samsung F3 1TB is pretty much faster than most 500GB drives. So went with that from a price to performance aspect
- The HD 6950 2GB outperforms the GTX 560 Ti.
- Went with a new PSU just in case you have a crap OCZ PSU
 
Your answer to sticky question #10 is vague to me: Do you already have the 32-bit copy of Windows 7? If so, which version?
 
This problem sounds fixable to me. Possibly a memory error, more likely some corrupt software.

I like Danny's build except I would go for a straight 2500 instead of the 2500k since you aren't planning on overclocking. You could also use an H67 board to save a bit more cash without sacrificing any performance.
 
Do you have an OEM or Retail disc? Can you (legally) obtain a 64-bit copy of Windows 7 Home Premium? (If so, you can use your 32-bit license key on the 64-bit version.)

While the ModXStream Pro is one of the better OCZ models, Danny Bui suggested a better quality PSU. In this case, you should listen to Danny.
 
I wouldn't say that. CPU intensive games will run better on it especially since it OCs very very high.
 
luluthemonk said:
Going to go with Danny here and say the Samsung F3 is the better option.
Click to expand...

I second (third?) this.

Falcon_CMH said:
I wouldn't say that. CPU intensive games will run better on it especially since it OCs very very high.
Click to expand...

Find me a benchmark where the 2600k is well above the 2500k when clocked equally. In a few instances I've seen the opposite. HT doesn't help games.

That is a good price for a 2600k though.
 
2500K doesn't clock equally it starts at a lower clock therrfore you are at the luck of a draw to what your chip will clock. And HT does help some games and benchmarks that are CPU intensive. Crysis 2 would come to mind. And Heaven 2/3D Mark 11. This is just my personal opinion no reviwes or charts to back it up sorry.
 
Falcon_CMH said:
2500K doesn't clock equally it starts at a lower clock therrfore you are at the luck of a draw to what your chip will clock. And HT does help some games and benchmarks that are CPU intensive. Crysis 2 would come to mind. And Heaven 2/3D Mark 11. This is just my personal opinion no reviwes or charts to back it up sorry.
Click to expand...

Then your opinion is useless. The only key difference between the i5-2500K and i7-2600K is the i7's Hyper Threading support; the i7-2600K is only 100MHz faster than the i5-2500K. Various reviews and benchmarks have confirmed the above fact.

The majority of games out now aren't really multi-threaded to the point that Hyper Threading would provide a greater benefit than a good video card.
 
Umm comparing hyper threading to a video card is useless. And it is a fact CPU intensive games can and will benefit from hyperthreading. I assume the PC will be used more than the next month. New games and more threading is on the horizon. But if you want to call my opinion useless and discard it thats your choice. Well disagreeing with my opinion w/o calling it useless since it is my opinion and I am entitled to it would have been more correct and less rude. The difference in cost is minimal getting the barely used one too seems a waste to not get it.
 
My problem with your opinion is that you said that you had no reviews or benchmarks to back it up. Had you said, for instance, that your opinion was based on the reviews and benchmarks that you looked at beforehand, I wouldn't have any issues with it.

That said, recalling the reviews and benchmarks that I've seen on the i5-2500K and i7-2600K, it is my opinion that the i7-2600K's Hyper Threading doesn't make enough of an impact with the majority of the games available today for me to recommend it over the i5-2500K. You are correct in stating that comparing Hyper Threading performance to the performance of a discrete GPU is similar to apples and oranges; however, I would counter that the majority of games out now are still largely GPU-dependent. But we're going around in circles at this point -- OK, I am -- so let's stop there.

Given that the OP has an $850 budget, and that the i7-2600K normally carries around a $100 premium over the i5-2500K, I don't believe that in this particular case that the OP should look at the used i7-2600K. While the price of the i7-2600K is great, especially for a recently released processor, Danny Bui recommended a $325 combo deal consisting of the i5-2500K and a good P67 motherboard. I personally believe that the combo deal makes the i5-2500K a better deal than the i7-2600K.

Then again, that's just my opinion. :p
 
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