Build for friend

[Mutant]

Originally Posted by Rbstr

The only real shake up might be the 660 in lower cost builds or a massive AMD price cut.
Even then I still like nVidia because they're at a significantly lower TDP (670 takes 60 fewer watts than the 7970). It's a bit odd because they're both on TSMC's 28nm.

I fear for AMD if the 660 puts up as much of a fight at it's price as the 670 does.

Maybe AMD catches up with their new CPUs? But they're a node behind and Intel's got a whole new chip next year.

The reason the 680 is smaller with a lower TDP than the 7970 is that the 680 loses by a large margin on GPU compute and it is total crap for DP GPU compute. Since gpu compute is insignificant for gaming at this point in time the GK104 is better for a user who only cares about gaming.

Peak Compute performance;
HD 7970: 3788 SP-GFLOPS, 947.2 DP-GFLOPS (1/4)
GTX 680: 3090 SP-GFLOPS, 129 DP-GFLOPS (1/24)


Nvidia did exactly this for fermi. GF100 was a beast for compute but was hot and massive and lost against AMD for gaming.
GF104 cut a lot of compute performance and went head to head vs AMD.

GK110 should bring back the compute crown for Nvidia (their Tesla business depends on it) but I suspect it will be at the cost of gaming performance.

[Ailos]

Originally Posted by CrimsonRisk

So just getting an SSD will cause a bigger increase in performance than an i7? I thought I'd that SSDs are fragile/susceptible to failing. Is this true? Something to worry about? Do i5 cores handle running several CPU intensive programs at once well?

To get a significant increase on performance above the i5 3570K (by more than 15%), you're going to have to step up to the LGA 2011 platform. These chips are basically the byproducts of the high-stakes, high-price server CPU production line, and the prices start at $300 just for the chip itself. It also requires a considerably more expensive motherboard.

And even here, the only time the $300 i7 I linked will be more beneficial with a pretty specific set of applications - your average IM clients like Skype don't actually stress your CPU much. In fact, very few things (except for games) an average consumer can own will stress it. And even there, your mileage can vary. What most definitely WILL help you handle more programs at once is more RAM, which (if you have a couple extra bucks) should be stuffed into your system to your heart's desire. That and the SSD.

At the end of the day, putting an extra $600+ into a different CPU/mobo set will make your Photoshop filters process 40% faster, and will have little effect beyond that.

I guess, my point is, if you've got an extra $200 to spend on the system, spend it to double your RAM (to 16GB) and an SSD. The performance increase from that will make your second-to-second experience so much smoother you'll want to dance like Rainbow dash. The only thing you'll gain from throwing an extra $500 onto your CPU will be a slightly faster compression time for files, probably.

[Goku]

Crimson the only part I would add to that system is a 256GB SSD. You really won't see a benefit from anything else IMO. You have a top notch CPU and GPU already. Anything else besides adding in a 3570K to overclock is wasteful.

[CrimsonRisk]

Gotcha, thanks guys! I appreciate the advice, and I learned something here. SSD it is.

[Goku]

I suggest looking into the Crucial M4, Samsung 830, Plextor M3, or Intel 520 in 256GB flavor. None seem to be on sale atm. They were going for as low as $180 recently. If you can't wait for a deal get this one off amazon.

[CrimsonRisk]

Sweet, thanks. If you have the time, are there any particular parts you would suggest I order for all of the other components? All of the deals you had originally found expired yesterday.

[Goku]

Let me see what I can find. Are you ordering in the next few days? Deals only go week to week is all.

[CrimsonRisk]

I'd like to. I'm so ready to get this thing put together. I was only putting it off until after my trip.

[CrimsonRisk]

ReEdit: Thanks again for all the advice, I've been looking at parts again and it's beginning to come back to me. I see the logic behind the picks you make. The only thing I am still wondering about is how you find deals so reliably? Just googling for them? At this point I'm tempted to just get all the stuff from newegg even if the parts are 10 bucks each more expensive than they would be from somewhere else, so I can have them all shipped at once.

[Bags]

I am subscribed to newegg's newsletter and microcent'ers news letters. Plus, newegg reliably advertises daily deals and shell shockers (sometimes up to like 40% off) on their homepage.

[CrimsonRisk]

I see, thanks Bags. I'm browsing the daily deals now.... turns out I have no idea what kind of motherboard I need. They vary a lot in price, too... how important is a good motherboard? Anything in particular I should be looking for there?

I was also thinking of throwing down the extra 30 bucks to get a .3 ghz faster processor: i5-3570k Ivy Bridge 3.4GHz. Would this be wasteful? I tend to be a sucker for the "throw in a little bit more for a slightly better one" sort of sales pitch. I want a top of the line machine and I want it to be one for as long as possible, I probably won't have a chance to throw money down on computer parts again for a long, long time. Also, I'm seeing 4GHz processors from other brand names that are cheaper, what's up with that?

I'm grabbing an SSD Crucial M4 256GB. I figure I can store images and videos and stuff on my 1tb external and just keep game install files and such on the SSD for fast performance, so 256GB should last me a long time.

I think I'm going to go for 16 GB of RAM. 2x of these, as suggested: G SKill Value Series 8GB (2x4GB)

Also, anyone know if I can sign up for this ShopRunner trial to get the free 2 day shipping, and then cancel before the trial ends and I get billed, for free and fast shipping? Seems like an awesome one time deal but I'm wary.

My cart is up to $1,371, with a $170 monitor in it, and I think it has everything except the motherboard and a mouse (which I don't really need, I can just use this cheap one I'm using right now).
My Cart at the moment

[Ailos]

Motherboard is one of the more important components. It needs to have reliable components since everything else in your system communicates through it.

The 3570k is not only slightly faster but has an unlocked multiplier, which means you can over clock it in the future if you want to. If you're looking for a place to put the extra $30, this isn't a bad place, IMO, since over locking is an easy way to make a system last longer.

With that, I recommend this combo: 3570k + ASRock mobo

[Goku]

Crimson what exactly is wrong with the build I came up with originally? I went through it already and there wasn't any deals associated with it. Everything there is all you need with the exception of the SSD according to what Bags told me.

[CrimsonRisk]

Nothing's wrong with it except that (I thought) the deals all expired. I'm using it now to put together my cart, and the prices actually look all the same. As is I'm just throwing a little extra money ($30) at the processor speed and amount of RAM ($40). Part of the reason the order is much larger than I said it would be is the monitor, keyboard, and SSD adding another $305. I have the order put together here on Newegg and I'm probably going to check out fairly soon. I'm using the recommended case, RAM (twice as much), monitor, DVD drive, video card, power supply, OS, and core, but it's a .3ghz faster version. It appears I need the more expensive motherboard to use 4 RAM sticks? 4 memory slots on that one as opposed to 2 on the other.

Sorry for asking so many dumb questions and stuff, this is a big investment for me and I'm all excited about it. Also, sorry about the confusion. I really shouldn't have bumped this thread in the first place.

[Goku]

What cpu?