[Domino]

I might be able to get a budget gaming rig finally. FINALLY. xD I'm going to be gaming at 1024x768, high settings, 4x af no aa. How do you think 9600GTs would par with that?

What I'm thinking of getting (also for birthday present):

Quote:

From Direct Canada: Coolermaster RR-920-N520-GP Hyper N520 Copper 5-HEATPIPE CPU Heatsink W/ Fan LGA1156 1366 775 AM3 $33.35 NZXT Gamma ATX Mid Tower Case Black 4X5.25 7X3.5 Front USB Audio eSATA with 120MM Rear Fan No PSU $42.12 Lg GH22NS50 Black 22X Sata Dvd Writer Oem $28.08 OCZ ModXStream Pro 700W ATX 20/24PIN SLI Ready Modular Cables 135mm Fan 80PLUS Power Supply * $25.00 CAD Mail in Rebate for this item $81.80 G.SKILL F3-12800CL8D-4GBTD Trident PC3-12800 4GB 2X2GB DDR3-1600 CL8-8-8-24 Dual Channel Memory Kit $116.40 MSI NF750-G55 ATX AM3 750A SLI DDR3 2PCI-E16 2PCI-E1 1PCI HDMI Sound SATA GBLAN Motherboard $104.18 nGear ATX12V 4 Pin P4 CPU Power Extension Cable 8 Inch $2.18 Western Digital Caviar Black 500GB 7200RPM 32MB Dual Proc SATA 3.5IN Hard Drive OEM 5YR MFR Warranty $66.63 Western Digital Caviar Black 500GB 7200RPM 32MB Dual Proc SATA 3.5IN Hard Drive OEM 5YR MFR Warranty $66.63 Total with taxes and shipping: Total $576.96 - 25 CAD bucks. From Newegg.ca: AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition Heka 2.8GHz Socket AM3 95W Triple-Core Processor Model HDZ720WFK3DGI - OEM $107.99 COWON S9 3.3" 8GB MP3 / MP4 Player $199.99 Total with taxes and shipping: $333.80 Parts I already have: BFG GeForce 9600GT OC 675MHZ 512MB 1.8GHZ DDR3 PCI-E Dual DVI-I HDTV Out Video Card BFG GeForce 9600GT OC 675MHZ 512MB 1.8GHZ DDR3 PCI-E Dual DVI-I HDTV Out Video Card Auzen Tech X-Plosion 7.1 Sound Card

TOTAL PRICE: $885.76

(Not going to be gaming on dx10 hardware, and if so, would it still do fine on 1024x768?)

 

[goobergump]

Your 9600 gt will be fine at that res. I use my 9600 gso (g92 512mb 96sp) on 1440 and I can run most things medium high/high with 0 aa.

Also, I'd recommend the Phenom II Heka tri core instead of the Propus for gaming which has 6mb of l3 cache split 3 ways, and is also stock at 2.8ghz but includes an unlocked multi.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-652-_-Product

edit: Nice case.

And what I mean by nice, is you'll be making love to that thing 3 days a week.

 

[Rewindlabs]

You would be much better off with a single card if you ask me

Whats your GPU budget?

 

[Domino]

Quote:

Originally Posted by goobergump Your 9600 gt will be fine at that res. I use my 9600 gso (g92 512mb 96sp) on 1440 and I can run most things medium high/high with 0 aa. Also, I'd recommend the Phenom II Heka tri core instead of the Propus for gaming which has 6mb of l3 cache split 3 ways, and is also stock at 2.8ghz but includes an unlocked multi. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-652-_-Product edit: Nice case. And what I mean by nice, is you'll be making love to that thing 3 days a week.

lol hehe. Well, the tri-core might be out of my budget. Plus it is going to be a gaming rig. The prices are in CAD and the tricore is 130 here. The dual core BE tho (3.1ghz) is 97 bucks. Should I switch that out?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rewindlabs You would be much better off with a single card if you ask me Whats your GPU budget?

Well, I honestly don't know. Trying to keep the system as cheap as possible. I won't be paying for this (or maybe) so the budget is probably around what it is already right there.

If my parents see that i'm going to be reusing parts and keeping it basically under 600 bucks, they might be lenient and get me it.

I don't think I can sell off the 9600GTs and get a single card that out performs it eh?

EDIT: In the future tho, maybe next year, i want to still have this system. might pick up a single card then, and maybe a bulldozer when it comes out

 

[goobergump]

Aww man, do they have an oem version you can buy? Although I love my 550 BE, and the 555 BE even better, I think a quad would do you nicely. I've seen those propuses hit 3.8ghz.

 

[NameUnknown]

I would just keep the SLI 9600GTs. But if you switch to the Tri Core (which I support doing as well) you will need a CPU cooler. The one he linked is an OEM chip, so it comes as a chip and a chip only. The last thing you want is to have a machine and no CPU cooling. You could also get some OCZ RAM instead of Tridents, save another $10. You may not get the OCing headroom, but on a budget, it may help get you a better cooler for that OEM chip.

 

[Domino]

Quote:

Originally Posted by goobergump Aww man, do they have an oem version you can buy? Although I love my 550 BE, and the 555 BE even better, I think a quad would do you nicely. I've seen those propuses hit 3.8ghz.

Man, see, that is something that would do me good for awhile too. Have you tried overclocking yours yet?

This is from direct Canada and they give you free ground shipping for anything about 200 bucks. plus, they are usually cheaper then most other Canadian suppliers. I'll take a look at ncix and newegg and see if i can get it cheaper there (with shipping).

Quote:

Originally Posted by NameUnknown I would just keep the SLI 9600GTs. But if you switch to the Tri Core (which I support doing as well) you will need a CPU cooler. The one he linked is an OEM chip, so it comes as a chip and a chip only. The last thing you want is to have a machine and no CPU cooling. You could also get some OCZ RAM instead of Tridents, save another $10. You may not get the OCing headroom, but on a budget, it may help get you a better cooler for that OEM chip.

hmmm. In the budget there is a Coolermaster RR-920-N520-GP Hyper N520. Also going to be parring that up with some old ocz freeze thermal paste.

 

[NameUnknown]

Quote:

Originally Posted by goobergump Aww man, do they have an oem version you can buy? Although I love my 550 BE, and the 555 BE even better, I think a quad would do you nicely. I've seen those propuses hit 3.8ghz.

Its not a matter of the speed of the chip in this case. Its the L3 Cache. The Phenoms and the Phenom IIs both have a much larger L3 Cache. Depending on the usage of the machine L3 is either irrelevant or of utmost importance. In high stress environments, such as video editing, transcoding, and gaming, the L3 is a great great thing to have. So even if you cant get your 550 over 3.8, you still may be able to perform better in real world applications depending on what you can get it to.

Ive heard good things about the N520, I dont think Ive ever seen an AMD based review of it though. I did see that it keeps a QX9770 at 3.6GHz at 58C. IMO if you hit that on an AMD chip, you would be at your OC limit, I keep my 955 under 50C as much as possible. Though if you use a tricore you can get some more OC out of it since there aren't as many heat producing cores.

 

[Domino]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NameUnknown Its not a matter of the speed of the chip in this case. Its the L3 Cache. The Phenoms and the Phenom IIs both have a much larger L3 Cache. Depending on the usage of the machine L3 is either irrelevant or of utmost importance. In high stress environments, such as video editing, transcoding, and gaming, the L3 is a great great thing to have. So even if you cant get your 550 over 3.8, you still may be able to perform better in real world applications depending on what you can get it to. Ive heard good things about the N520, I dont think Ive ever seen an AMD based review of it though. I did see that it keeps a QX9770 at 3.6GHz at 58C. IMO if you hit that on an AMD chip, you would be at your OC limit, I keep my 955 under 50C as much as possible. Though if you use a tricore you can get some more OC out of it since there aren't as many heat producing cores.

hmmm thats good to know.

Well newegg does have an OEM triple core BE Heka for 124 bucks with shipping and taxes. That does save 10 bucks off

Basically I come off with the same price as last time with better hardware. Wheee xD

 

[NameUnknown]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Domino hmmm thats good to know. Well newegg does have an OEM triple core BE Heka for 124 bucks with shipping and taxes. That does save 10 bucks off Basically I come off with the same price as last time with better hardware. Wheee xD

Thats whats great about OCN, they help out with everything. I ended up the same way when i went to build mine. OCN helped me tweak my build A LOT and if you look at that OP in the linked thread, then my sigrig, you can see it was tweaked more after that thread. but without OCN, I wouldn't have my beloved sigrig

 

[Hey Zeus]

SLI'd 9600GT's would be fine at a higher resolution as well. My clarkdale rig had two 9600GT's and it pulled 20K in 06. They're not slow

 

[Horsemama1956]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Domino hmmm thats good to know. Well newegg does have an OEM triple core BE Heka for 124 bucks with shipping and taxes. That does save 10 bucks off Basically I come off with the same price as last time with better hardware. Wheee xD

VERY few games care about l3 cache. I wouldn't worry about it.

 

[Domino]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NameUnknown Thats whats great about OCN, they help out with everything. I ended up the same way when i went to build mine. OCN helped me tweak my build A LOT and if you look at that OP in the linked thread, then my sigrig, you can see it was tweaked more after that thread. but without OCN, I wouldn't have my beloved sigrig

maaaaan i know eh!!!!! i've too learn ssoooo much from this site along. pretty much all my more advance computer knowledge came from the members on this site

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hey Zeus SLI'd 9600GT's would be fine at a higher resolution as well. My clarkdale rig had two 9600GT's and it pulled 20K in 06. They're not slow

really? man, i think my old amd 3800+x2 @ 2.4ghz, 1.5gb ddr1 ram, nf4 mobo with the sli (no sli bridge, for some reason wasn't working with it) was only pulling off like 7000-9000 on 06 (or 08, can't remember now, if it was 08, it would more then likely be something like 7111). I think that old gaming rig had such a bottleneck

Quote:

Originally Posted by Horsemama1956 VERY few games care about l3 cache. I wouldn't worry about it.

that is also good to know. but i'm guessing more and more games are going to be using it more often later on. let alone, the phenom II chips do outperform their athlon counter parts with similar clock speeds.

 

[Domino]

hmmm, might be getting it for my birthday around june 13th. The price should also jump up to about 1'000. But i'm wondering if I should keep it the same and maybe throw a few extra things in there: like games, a new mp3, a new phone (win7 mobile), and maybe a ssd?