A topic? From me?

[Krizonar]

First off, thanks to Katarina and her support, $100 of this computer is on her. I'll try to make it just as amazing as she is, too bad I'll fail.

Now then, let's move onto the topic purpose.


The purpose of this topic is because I'm going to be building a Computer this summer, one most people would call a PC. As I have little experience with these types of systems, I might require help from the gracious OSC members.
The current parts I have decided on are as follows:
-AMD Phenom II X6 2.8 Ghz /w 6 MB L3
-ASRock 870iCafe AMD SATA 6GB/s ATX "Mother"board.
-Team Elite 8GB DDR3 SDRAM 1333 Dual Channel Kit
-Seagate Barracuda 250 GB 7,200 RPM SATA 6GB/s HDD
-Radeon HD 5750 1GB DDR5 GFX Card
-DVD X8 RW Drive

Case and Power Supply have yet to be decided, but Katarina's gracious gift should pay for, or greatly help pay for, a very nice set.

Current price of parts is $543 with shipping included.

Well, savvy? Feel free to give any pointers or recommend parts.

[NejinOniwa]

>AMD
Wait for Bulldozer.

[Nichi]

With the graphics card, I'd suggest avoiding the Radeon HD 5000 series if you can; I've heard nothing but bad things about them. The 4000 series would be a cheaper alternative that's regarded as being more reliable; after all, 2k-tan the Desktop originally had a 4350 when I built her, which worked well for lighter gaming until I could afford the 6850 I wanted.

As for Nejin's suggestion to wait for AMD Bulldozer to be released, I haven't seen anything giving a solid date as to when they're supposed to be out, so I wouldn't worry about it too much unless you don't mind delaying the project.

[Alex_Reetz]

ssd are still new technology; just get a good hard drive.

(oh, you didnt mention one....NM)

[Krizonar]

>AMD
Wait for Bulldozer.

I'm kinda on the fence about it, this 6 core processor is extremely cheap at the moment probably BECAUSE of Bulldozer supposedly coming out soon and it's not like it's a weak processor.
Is Bulldozer really drastically superior?

@Alex; ...this doesn't have an SSD
@Pentium: could you give me a link to a good 4,000 series card? The 5,000 card I chose has good reviews and is similar (slighter lesser than) to the one used in the Mac Pro. Looking at the 4,000 cards, I don't really see anything that stands out performance wise. This one stands out review-wise, though
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161315

[Alex_Reetz]

go for a bigger hard drive, 2tb hard drives are pretty cheap now a days.

as for a videocard

visiontek 4850.

[Nichi]

I can't find the exact 4350 I used, so scrap that idea. Besides, maybe the issues with the 5000 series where just with the first batch, and the one you chose will be fine.

Now, if you're willing to pay more, this is what I'm using currently, and it's frigging awesome.

[Krizonar]

Newegg doesn't appear to have a 4850, I also saved money on the hardrive by buying a size I need. All my stuff, including my gigabytes upon gigabytes of garageband stuff, like 8 HD movies and tons of programs this rig won't have is on here and I'm using only 80 gigabyes. I shaved half the price off by purchasing a smaller HDD

also, as unfortunate as it is, the only 6,000 card that fits that motherboard is sold out.
@Pentium; unfortunately, that card doesn't match up with the PCI slot from what I can tell (2.1 instead of 2.0) if I am wrong though, I'd by happy to spend a bit more for that beast of a card.

[NejinOniwa]

Don't buy any of the 4000's. True, they're good, but noisy as FUCK.

Go 6000 instead.

And another reason to wait for Bulldozer, that you get PCI3.0 AND AM3+. No worries about upgrading for years to come.

[Nichi]

PCI Express is backward compatible; a card designed with a 2.1 slot will work fine on a 2.0 port, so you have nothing to lose

[Krizonar]

@Pentium, oh, that's good to know, will it take a major performance hit or anything, though?
@Aurora; lol, Katarina says she's going to stalk me because she wants to learn this stuff.
@Nej: a 6,000 is what I'd want, yes and now that I know they'll work, definitely getting one. I was practically only paying $40 out of pocket for this whole thing anyway, parents owe me money and I have un-cashed checks. I also kind've wanted to get the system built soon, plus, I doubt this system would ever reaaaaly be upgraded, so I'm still on the fence about a Bulldozer.

[Nichi]

I just did further checking, and discovered that the motherboard I used in 2k doesn't support 2.1, but the card works very well; so you don't have anything to lose

[Krizonar]

Well then, it's a serious consideration.

Any other quirks about this card?
Watt usage? (it is not listed)

and do those features mean anything... meaningful? I know sometimes they put junk there to make it look impressive.

[Alex_Reetz]

i would go for a 4850, they run hot, but it was made to do so.

it pays all new games on max, takes up one slot, and scores a 7.4 on the Windows ratting system.

their are 2 models, the ddr3 512mb, and the 1gb model.

for the 512mb mb model, it is about 50.00 on ebay, the 1gb is about 80.00 to 100.00

it does require a 500+ PSU and a 6 pin connecter, but you will not be disappointed with it.

here is a link: http://cgi.ebay.com/ATI-AMD-Radeon-4850-1GB-DDR3-PCIe-video-VGA-card-/320707849749?pt=PCC_Video_TV_Cards&hash=item4aabad6e15

[Nichi]

The features are stuff that's going to be fully implemented with 3.0, but it doesn't make much of a difference now.

Also, I'll have to dig out the box to figure out how big of a power supply it needs. According to a PSU calculator I used, under a unrealistic load that I'll likely never use (That graphics card and the Core i7 with 4 SIMMs of RAM, an internal HDD, an SSD, a BluRay drive, and all 14 USB ports being used to charge several MP3 players), it only needed a minimum of a 475W power supply.