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Skylit Wrote:Agreed. On board Realtek HD ALC 889 is pretty good, although an add on sound card would sound way less muffled with good monitors. If you plan on running cheap $10-20 USD 3w speakers then it simply isn't worth the extra cost because it's going sound like crap anyway.
I am not sure what kinda sound work you're doing, but on my home computer, I had no problem using the onboard sound card with a set of 10 years old speakers, the Creative cambride soundwork 4 points surround (WHICH I JUST BROKE THE CIRCUITRY BOARD AFTER MESSING AROUND - FML) for anything including gaming, watching movies, musics etc and I had no problem with any sorts of distortions or muffles.
Sometimes, I even hook my behringer mixer to try out some mixing etc on the onboard sound card, and still doing pretty well at getting clean sounds. As someone who spend quite a bit of free time on sound works, I still find that having an extra sound card (which I have 2, one my old computer, another in a box) is just for my luxury. The money you spent on the sound card could be used for a good set of headphone for gaming purposes and so that the neighbour dont try to snipe you at 3 am.
PS: I have been using Sennheiser headphones and they're somewhat above average for the prices. Still a proud owner of 2 pairs of HD202 which is quite awesome for gaming IMO.
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GummyBear Wrote:I am not sure what kinda sound work you're doing, but on my home computer, I had no problem using the onboard sound card with a set of 10 years old speakers, the Creative cambride soundwork 4 points surround (WHICH I JUST BROKE THE CIRCUITRY BOARD AFTER MESSING AROUND - FML) for anything including gaming, watching movies, musics etc and I had no problem with any sorts of distortions or muffles.
Sometimes, I even hook my behringer mixer to try out some mixing etc on the onboard sound card, and still doing pretty well at getting clean sounds. As someone who spend quite a bit of free time on sound works, I still find that having an extra sound card (which I have 2, one my old computer, another in a box) is just for my luxury. The money you spent on the sound card could be used for a good set of headphone for gaming purposes and so that the neighbour dont try to snipe you at 3 am.
PS: I have been using Sennheiser headphones and they're somewhat above average for the prices. Still a proud owner of 2 pairs of HD202 which is quite awesome for gaming IMO.
I was agreeing with you ;o. The realtek HD 889 sounds good for onboard, but it simply can't compare to creative's outdated xfi or cmedia's audio chipsets when it comes to clarity. I mean hell, M-audio makes professional sound cards that make the cards listed above sound like trash lol
I meant to say that a sound card isn't worth it unless you have a pair of decent monitors to drive them.
As for the Senn HD202's, they're great for the price, but if you're looking for a pair of amazing gaming headphones or want to try something else, look into the JVC HA-RX700. They have a huge sound stage, but will require some burn in time to reach full potential.
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23.6" is a bit big for a display. I'd rather say a 19" 1440x900 screen would be more economical. Good monitor but a bit costly.
Did they have anything in the GTS series for the GeForce 4xx series that was 1GB but comparable? Good find on the warranty though.
You could sacrifice on those two and save the CPU and motherboard. Warranty might be less on the video card, but it would be less costly and leave some room to work with price-wise..
Also, you forgot the case, and the case fans.
Edit:
C-Media isn't that bad... they're better than Creative by a long shot... actually I take that back... ANYTHING is better than Creative. PERIOD! M-Audio is too overpriced.
ASUS makes some high end C-Media Oxygen HD powered cards under their Xonar label. Good cards BTW. Only thing I don't like about RealTek is they aren't capable of hardware acceleration and don't support Vista and 7's DirectSound GX extensions or OpenAL.
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Jamie_Kurosawa Wrote:23.6" is a bit big for a display. I'd rather say a 19" 1440x900 screen would be more economical. Good monitor but a bit costly.
o_O 1080p is industry standard nowadays. ;o I honestly don't know anyone who uses a 1440x900 montior anymore.. besides, the GTX460 would be considered overkill on anything lower than 1650x1080 lol
Did they have anything in the GTS series for the GeForce 4xx series that was 1GB but comparable? Good find on the warranty though. This card is $140, the performance from a GTX460>4
The GTS450 is considerably weaker and It isn't worth saving $10 over lol
You could sacrifice on those two and save the CPU and motherboard. Warranty might be less on the video card, but it would be less costly.
Also, you forgot the case, and the case fans.
I already stated that I'm not picking out a case in my last post, it's something the buyer should pick out anyway.
lol
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Jamie_Kurosawa Wrote:ASUS makes some high end C-Media Oxygen HD powered cards under their Xonar label. Good cards BTW. Only thing I don't like about RealTek is they aren't capable of hardware acceleration and don't support Vista and 7's DirectSound GX extensions or OpenAL.
A majority if not all of Asus' cards feature the CMI8788 Audio chipset. They're launching the Xonar DG with a headphone amp and a CMI8768 relativity soon.
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They only have the Xonar DG in PCI? The Xonar DX supports DTS and 3D audio for Headphones. I'd rather have a PCIe audio card for one reason... PCI sound cards have some very strange problems due to the PCI bus being shared with other PCI slots in many designs. Most had a seperate shared PCI slot for this which also ran the audio codec modem and the onboard audio as well, but not all of them. Good thing about PCIe is everything has it's own dedicated data bus with the chipset and nothing is shared around. The DG seems like a lower end audio card as well.
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Jamie_Kurosawa Wrote:They only have the Xonar DG in PCI? The Xonar DX supports DTS and 3D audio for Headphones. I'd rather have a PCIe audio card for one reason... PCI sound cards have some very strange problems due to the PCI bus being shared with other PCI slots in many designs. Most had a seperate shared PCI slot for this which also ran the audio codec modem and the onboard audio as well, but not all of them. Good thing about PCIe is everything has it's own dedicated data bus with the chipset and nothing is shared around. The DG seems like a lower end audio card as well.
The DG is launching at >$40-45 Its targeted towards gamers and or audiophiles that have >300 ohm headphones. If you've noticed, there aren't any cards that feature headphones amps sub $200
Most decent/expensive pairs of headphones need to be powered/driven. If we were to run a pair of 250 ohm Beyerdynamic DT 770's though a standard DX/D1, it would honestly sound worse than if it was driven through the Xonar DG. If you had a separate external headphone amp then of course the DX/D1 would be superior.
The only problem with the DX is that the PCI-E x1 bus cannot power the card alone. It requires you to plug it in to the power supply while the standard D1 PCI version receives power though the motherboard.
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I find that gaming speakers tend to have a boost on the lower frequency, which is somewhat a pain when I use it as room control on the mixer, which the Senn HD202 is also criminal of. Also, having a mixer in my room allows me to do much more than a gaming headset can. I guess I have been spoilt by the audio hardware that I stopped caring about audio coming from a computer.
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2010-09-17, 01:30 PM
(This post was last modified: 2010-09-17, 01:56 PM by KajitiSouls.)
Time to play catchup during the weekends =O But in the meantime while I'm combatting college and work, I have more questions to bounce around...
E-mail Wrote:Last time I spec'ed out a computer, it was for ******. I pretty much based most of the things on the ArsTechnica Budget Box guide. They haven't released their guide for this year yet, but it's probably coming up next month. Here's the 2009 version: http://arstechnica.com/hardware/guides/2...dition.ars.
Usually new architectures are more expensive. Did they mean a new socket architecture that's not compatible with the existing one? On the other hand, the longer you wait, generally the better things get for the same price, so I tend to like waiting as long as possible until things feel right.
From what I hear, Newegg is better than tigerdirect.
I think going beyond 5 years is maybe unrealistic as parts start to fail. Recently, new games haven't been as demanding on having up to date graphics cards lately (probably because of consoles taking up a lot of gaming dollars), but I'd expect you might need a card update in 5 years as well.
1.) I haven't used my next level of google-fu, but what exactly is so exciting about the new architecture from Intel and AMD?
2.) Last statement in the email about updating GPU, true or false?
3.) Something I've noticed from both NewEgg and TigerDirect is the option to protect your stuff with warranties. For TigerDirect, can you simply not select a warranty by leaving the drop-down menu on the first item? ("Choose From Extended Service Plans as Low as $xx.xx") Silly question, but I'd rather have word-of-mouth insurance than trying things blindly.
4.) I was trying to look up the Radeon HD 4870 that Zelkova selected in post 3, and found these two cards that were more or less identical. However, one had a spec that said "Memory Bandwith: 161.0 GB/sec" while the other one simply didn't list it. What exactly is that, and what would be the assumption for graphics cards with unlisted values?
5.) Comparing graphics cards side-by-side, I saw the PNY GeForce GTX 460 and the Diamond Radeon HD 4870. Both are about the same price, but they obviously have different structure. Which one performs better? And what flaws do they potentially have?
| PNY GeForce GTX 460 | Diamond Radeon HD 4870 | | Core Clock (MHz) | 765 | 750 | | Shader Clock (MHz) | 1530 | Not Found | | Memory Clock (MHz) | 3700 (effective) | 900 | | Memory Size | 1 GB | 512 MB | | Stream Processors | 336 | 800 | | Max Resolution | 2560x1600 | 2560x1600 |
Initial (noobish) impressions: the Nvidia one has a stream processor bottleneck, possibly, while the Radeon seems to be much more balanced, but less memory.
6.) Not that I'm going to buy this, but I saw a Gulftown CPU for $900! Now why the heck is it so expensive? Is it because it's i7 with fancy QPI? What's the equivalent of QPI in the older CPUs anyways?
7.) In terms of buying parts, would it generally be better to try and match brands, or should they all generally work with each other, given that you match the slots, etc.?
I think that's all for now. Currently compiling a big list of things I'm looking for, translated into fancy pants technical vocabulary...
Oh yeah, a few other things, since many of you are eager to select the computer parts for me...
--I probably won't take advantage of the higher resolutions (my laptop does 1280xSomething) until much later. Don't bother looking at monitors.
--Ditto with sound card, if ever. Though I might get one in case the MOBO doesn't have an integrated card, or decides to be retarded or something.
--I don't really care about aesthetics that much. Just as long as the stuff isn't butt-ugly like that dragon in my siggy. Oh wait...
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It's Intel. That's why it's expensive. You're paying for a name and their commercials you see every night. Ever wordered why AMD is cheaper? They don't use useless advertising, they don't offer kickbacks to their dealers, and they're generally a longer lasting product which in turn, passes off the savings to you.
Yes AMD could sport a thousand dollar CPU but they only do that for their servers, not a home user level CPU that will be outdated in 6 months and half the price.
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LF> more answers to my questions here.
Anyways, an opportunity came up. Some of my family and relatives are going to the wedding of yet another relative this November for about a week trip or so. This guy owns his own computer company of sorts called Cyber Power, and he says he can get me parts as long as I provide a list and a budget. About the only obvious problem I see with it so far is that I have to shell out money earlier than I planned, and I'm not even guaranteed a stable income source yet.
FYI, the company website: http://www.cyberpowerpc.com/
Grabbing stuff through this guy should be cheaper. But I'm wondering, will the quality of the parts be good or not compared to other outlets? (He's given me the impression that the components will be assembled on the spot, and by that, I mean he's not just going to be buying a graphics card from somewhere; he's going to be buying the GPU, the sockets, the fan, etc. But I could be wrong =P)
Also, keep in mind I still intend for this to be a learning experience. I don't want to just ask him for a gaming PC and expect to have it all ready to go.
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KajitiSouls Wrote:Oh yeah, a few other things, since many of you are eager to select the computer parts for me...
--I probably won't take advantage of the higher resolutions (my laptop does 1280xSomething) until much later. Don't bother looking at monitors. Your laptop has a connector for video input (e.g., capture card, tv tuner)? Or you're going to take off your laptop's screen and rewire it? Or you're going to use VNC (e.g., TightVNC) or some other remote desktop software? (Note: VNC/RDP is too slow for gaming purposes.)
Otherwise, you cannot use your laptop's screen as a monitor for a new/other computer.
Regarding your questions:
1) The usual...: better performance at the same prices. (will probably be around 10-15% performance increase)
2) If you're planning to build a computer that will "last" for more than 5 years, I think you're doing it wrong. After 5+ years, it really should be reassigned to secondary computer status... Specifically, used for "old" games (no new games when the comp. is 5+ years old), web browsing, e-mail, etc. (It may be possible to extend usefulness with a video card upgrade, but then it would be better to save that money to use for a new computer.)
3) Make sure to select the option that doesn't charge you extra. And make sure that the total is correct when you checkout.
4) Doesn't really matter. However, for graphics cards of the exact same model number, GDDR5 > (G)DDR3 > DDR2 (old cards..). For example, the NVIDIA GT240 has a version with GDDR5 memory and another with DDR3.
5) You don't compare specs side-by-side to compare NVIDIA vs. ATI/AMD graphics cards. Consult some benchmarks. For example, you can use AnandTech's GPU Bench: http://www.anandtech.com/bench/GPU/88 (According to AnandTech's data, the GTX 460 (1 GB) stomps all over the 4870.)
6) I think this was answered in a previous post. Reiterating.. Intel currently has the performance crown. They can charge what they want for their top of the line stuff. I can recall AMD doing the same thing for top end stuff when their Athlon 64 trounced Intel's Netburst processors (Northwood / Prescott cores) in 2003-06.
7) Your CPU socket must be supported by the motherboard. Your RAM must be supported by the motherboard (this one is easy because DDR2/DDR3 are not compatible - the notch is in a different location). If you want SLI/Crossfire, that must be supported by the motherboard and then you need NVIDIA cards (SLI) or ATI/AMD cards (Crossfire).
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singularity Wrote:Your laptop has a connector for video input (e.g., capture card, tv tuner)? Or you're going to take off your laptop's screen and rewire it? Or you're going to use VNC (e.g., TightVNC) or some other remote desktop software? (Note: VNC/RDP is too slow for gaming purposes.)
Otherwise, you cannot use your laptop's screen as a monitor for a new/other computer.
I have monitors lying around the house.
singularity Wrote:Regarding your questions:
1) The usual...: better performance at the same prices. (will probably be around 10-15% performance increase)
Really? I was under the impression that since they'll be new, it'll be more expensive. Got any sources on this?
singularity Wrote:2) If you're planning to build a computer that will "last" for more than 5 years, I think you're doing it wrong. After 5+ years, it really should be reassigned to secondary computer status... Specifically, used for "old" games (no new games when the comp. is 5+ years old), web browsing, e-mail, etc. (It may be possible to extend usefulness with a video card upgrade, but then it would be better to save that money to use for a new computer.)
Overclocking would be part of the deal, but as far as I've seen in the gaming world, I've seen plenty of games that will most likely run fine with technology from the yesteryears. I hope there's nothing wrong with that. Unless the overclocking goes horribly wrong that is =P
singularity Wrote:4) Doesn't really matter. However, for graphics cards of the exact same model number, GDDR5 > (G)DDR3 > DDR2 (old cards..). For example, the NVIDIA GT240 has a version with GDDR5 memory and another with DDR3.
Great, stupid fake numbers that only "pad" market value. Guess I'll have to take your word for it, and the word of reviewers too.
singularity Wrote:5) You don't compare specs side-by-side to compare NVIDIA vs. ATI/AMD graphics cards. Consult some benchmarks. For example, you can use AnandTech's GPU Bench: http://www.anandtech.com/bench/GPU/88 (According to AnandTech's data, the GTX 460 (1 GB) stomps all over the 4870.)
I suppose Nvidia vs. ATI comparison is a fallacy, but if it's Nvidia vs. Nvidia with similar specs, would you do a side-by-side comparison then?
And the benchmark tests I've seen say that the GTX 460 steamrolls the ATI 4870. Being a detail-oriented person, I'm warry that said tests could be biased in one way or another (actually all of them are), but I guess there's nothing else to go by.
Other than connectors and monitor support, is there any reason to choose the ATI 4870 over the GTX 460?
singularity Wrote:6) I think this was answered in a previous post. Reiterating.. Intel currently has the performance crown. They can charge what they want for their top of the line stuff. I can recall AMD doing the same thing for top end stuff when their Athlon 64 trounced Intel's Netburst processors (Northwood / Prescott cores) in 2003-06.
Lulz economics
singularity Wrote:7) Your CPU socket must be supported by the motherboard. Your RAM must be supported by the motherboard (this one is easy because DDR2/DDR3 are not compatible - the notch is in a different location). If you want SLI/Crossfire, that must be supported by the motherboard and then you need NVIDIA cards (SLI) or ATI/AMD cards (Crossfire).
I'm going to assume you meant "the latter option"... =/
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KajitiSouls Wrote:Really? I was under the impression that since they'll be new, it'll be more expensive. Got any sources on this? New items replace old items in the product lineup. The old items get their price knocked down (usually) and get discontinued. For example, here is Intel's product roadmap: http://www.anandtech.com/show/3871/the-s...in-a-row/4 KajitiSouls Wrote:I suppose Nvidia vs. ATI comparison is a fallacy, but if it's Nvidia vs. Nvidia with similar specs, would you do a side-by-side comparison then? I wouldn't. Looking at a bunch of specs doesn't tell you anything at all about performance. At most, it could be used to compare cards of the same generation (i.e., you shouldn't compare specs of ATI's 4xxx and 5xxx series cards). KajitiSouls Wrote:Other than connectors and monitor support, is there any reason to choose the ATI 4870 over the GTX 460? The ATI 4xxx series doesn't have Eyefinity, so I don't know what connector/monitor advantage it could have over the GTX 460.
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I finally went through the entire thread and read every word. And dam do I look like a stupid idiot in some of my posts o.O Of course, no thanks to my college work load and other commitments >_>
I'll have a list of parts ready for comment and critique probably by late tonight or tomorrow. In the mean time, I have a few questions regarding RAM.
1.) According to some people, you should pay attention to whether the RAM is high density or low density, and avoid the former. Without actually buying the thing and trying it out, how can you tell which is which?
2.) How much does CAS latency affect memory speed? I found an apparently great deal on RAM, but its CAS latency is at the top end of the scale (9).
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1. I think that was true on far older models of RAM. That's not really an issue these days.
2. CAS latency has a negligible performance impact in real world applications. Your memory will have a lot of bandwidth regardless of which you pick and it's rare that you would max it out anyway. Just focus on getting the right type and speed. Don't worry about latencies.
The difference between CAS 9 and CAS 8 might be shaving off 0.2 nanoseconds from 2.0 nanoseconds. It's very doubtful anyone could perceive the difference. Just go with a reputable brand, the right type, and a good speed.
WINTEC is a pretty good brand. I've bought from them before. However, I've used GSKILL RAM for years and I'll continue to shill for them whenever I can. 
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Current list of selected parts:
Code: MOBO: 98.99 [url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131402&cm_re=ASUS_M4A79XTD_EVO_AM3_AMD_790X_ATX_AMD_Motherboard-_-13-131-402-_-Product]ASUS M4A79XTD EVO AM3 AMD 790X ATX AMD Motherboard[/url]
CPU: 69.99 [url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103699]AMD Phenom II X3 740 Black Edition Heka 3.0GHz 3 x 512KB L2 Cache 6MB L3 Cache Socket AM3 95W Triple-Core Desktop Processor HDZ740WFK3DGI - OEM[/url]
GPU: 99.99 [url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150436&Tpk=XFX%20HD-487A-ZWFC%20Radeon%20HD%204870%201GB%20256-bit%20GDDR5] XFX HD-487A-ZWFC Radeon HD 4870 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card[/url]
RAM: 67.99 [url=http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820161279&Tpk=WINTEC%20AMPX%204GB%20%282%20x%202GB%29%20240-Pin%20DDR3%20SDRAM%20DDR3]WINTEC AMPX 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model 3AXH1333C9WS4GK[/url]
For some reason the price on the CPU jumped up to $89.99 o.O; I have no idea what happened there... might have to find an alternative...
Today has been unexpectedly busy. I'm currently looking for a compatible PSU...
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How about if you go to tigerdirect and buy a barebones kit?
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Fiel Wrote:How about if you go to tigerdirect and buy a barebones kit?
Aside from the fact that it partially defeats the education purpose of this project... I should do this because it is cheaper?
(lab + lab + lab + midterm + homework + homework = unfun week)
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