763 replies to this topic

[Gorth]

My computer eventually ended up being "complete"

Antec Performance One P182
Antec TruePower Quatro 1000 PSU
Asus P5E3 Premium WIFI - X48 chipset
2 * Corsair (2x2GB) PC-10600 (1333MHz) XMP DDR3 (8GB total)
Intel QX9650 CORE 2 Extreme Quad Core (water cooled)
Zalman Reserator 2 Fanless Water Cooling System
Creative PCI EXPRESS X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Champion Series
1 * Samsung Spinpoint F1 1 TB
2 * Samsung 500GB 'HD502IJ'
2 * Seagate 640GB 'ST3400320AS'
Sapphire ATI Radeon 4870X2 w. 2 Gb DDR5 ram (tore off the stock fan (and the warranty) and equipped it with a cooling block from EK Water Blocks, Slovenia)
Samsung 30" SyncMaster 305T+

Running Vista Ultimate 64bit

Various peripherals: Wacom tablet, Microsoft LiveCam, Microsoft Multimedia Keyboard, Microsoft 5 button mouse (very old), Saitek X52 Pro flight stick, various external HDD and USB sticks, old 5.1 Speaker/Amplifier set from Creative. The latter is probably the only part I intend to replace in the near future with some nice 7.1 surround set.

[Rosbjerg]

After some upgrades this is my new rig.

Asus P5Q Pro Motherboard (onboard Realtek HD audio)
Intel Core2Duo 8400 3.0 Ghz
2 GB Corsair DDR3 RAM
ATI 4870 1GB DDR5
250 GB Maxtor HDD (will be upgraded to a 1TB SATA in january)
19" ACER 1951 LCD (max resolution is 1280*1024 but I actually like that)
Logitech MX 700 Mouse and wireless keyboard.
Altec Lansing 2.1 speaker system (somewhat old, but a really realiable setup with great sound)
XP Pro 32bit

[Theseus]

Ros, didnt you mention you wanted to play GTA IV? Because your Dual core isnt going to hold a candle against a quad core unfortinately with the poor programming R* did.

[Rosbjerg]

Actually I have GTA IV and I'm running it quite decently.. I play the game at 1280x1024 with settings on high and I only experience minor lag when there's explosions, shootings and about a dusin police officers after me (at the same time mind you)..

The biggest problem is bugs however - I had one that caused the game to go double speed (still not lagging) and then the patch came and fixed that, only to introduce a new bug - no sounds.. so I still can't play any missions, but I can run around and cause havoc.

[taks]

<snip general specs in the interest of space>

holy shemoligans. nice rig. what's up with the ATI gfx card, however?

Samsung 30" SyncMaster 305T+

so what do you think of this monitor? i have a syncmaster 21T at home (i think that's what it is) that i really like. for $1000 at newegg i hope it's worth it. of course, 72 out of 89 reviews give it a 5 out of 5.

i recently switched my office one to a 24" dell widescreen POS. i can't get the colors right. grrr. i'm tempted to switch back to my original 4by3 monitor.

taks

[Gorth]

<snip general specs in the interest of space>

holy shemoligans. nice rig. what's up with the ATI gfx card, however?

Uhh. whats up?

My only problem with the card was that it sounded like 737 taking off when I put a bit of stress on it. In the current setup, I can't hear it at all. It *does* generate a lot of heat though. When I put my cpu under full load (all 4 cores), I can't feel much of a difference on the radiator. If I try to run The Witcher (giving the gfx card something to do), I can keep a cup of coffee warm on top of the radiator

It does perform very nicely though and surprisingly few compatibility issues. The few things I've had with older games could be either that or Vista.

Samsung 30" SyncMaster 305T+

so what do you think of this monitor? i have a syncmaster 21T at home (i think that's what it is) that i really like. for $1000 at newegg i hope it's worth it. of course, 72 out of 89 reviews give it a 5 out of 5.

So far, it has been a good value for money thing. I have an aversion against widescreen for computer monitors, but there was just no getting a 4x3 in this size range

Just like the gfx card, it does generate quite a lot of heat, but I get colour ranges that I didn't get on my 19" samsung. Particularly noticeable on a couple of websites that use pale/pastel like colours, where you can suddenly spot the texture and subtle gradients

[taks]

sorry, taks<-nvidia fan.

hmmm. i'm going to upgrade my home monitor soon though i'm waiting for prices to come down before doing it. since 4x3 is my preferred aspect (for a computer) as well, i need something big to get the same feel in a 16x10 (or 16x9). as you note, 4x3 in anything even remotely close just don't exist. i'm guessing 4x3 is a goner in general within a couple years. sigh.

i have a buddy that did a 35" 4x3 CRT monitor back before monitors that large were affordable, like in 1996. he dropped a bundle on it, but it looked good (the only furniture in his living room, actually).

taks

[Gorth]

i have a buddy that did a 35" 4x3 CRT monitor back before monitors that large were affordable, like in 1996. he dropped a bundle on it, but it looked good (the only furniture in his living room, actually).

That lucky bastard

I used to be a Matrox fan until they gave up competing with Nvidia and ATI on the 3D high performance market. Still the darn best image quality I've seen on a computer screen though. I've had two Matrox cards, one Nividia and now one ATI card. I've been happy with all of them so far.

[Deraldin]

I just ordered a new computer for my dad thanks to a couple boxing day deals.

Coolermaster Centurion 590
Seasonic M12 600W ($50 after rebate! $100 off regular)
Gigabyte EP43-DS3L
Intel Core 2 E8400
4GB (2x2) Mushkin PC-6400 DDR2 (CL5-4-4-12)
HIS Radeon HD 4870 ($220! $90 off regular)
Seagate 1.5TB HDD ($140! $70 off regular)

He actually ordered the 4870 for me. It's going to be swapped out with my 4850 which will go in his computer since he really doesn't need the extra power, but it was just too good of a deal to pass up. Ordered the PSU and HDD separately because they were limited stock items, then went searching for the rest with him. The Seasonic was a damn good deal. I was going to grab one myself, but they ran out of surprise special stock before I got my dad's second order (everything but the PSU and HDD) through.

[Bokishi]

Core 2 e8400 @ 3.8 GHz
EVGA nForce 680i
3x EVGA GTX 280 Triple-SLI
8GB OCZ nVidia SLI DDR2 800
Creative X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty
150GB RaptorX
2x 1TB Hitachi Deskstars
1.2kw SilverStone Decathlon
LG Blu-Ray Burner
CoolerMaster Stacker 830
30" Dell 3007WFP-HC
Windows Vista x64 SP1

[J.E. Sawyer]

New RIG (not that great)

Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3LR motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo E8600 CPU
4 gigs of Patriot Viper DDR2 RAM (one stick is probably bad because I keep getting BSoD IRQL crashes)
EVGA GeForce 8800GT
WD Velociraptor main drive
WD Raptor secondary drive
Dell 24" LCD monitors
Samsung Super Writemaster DVD burner
Antec TruePower 2.0 550w power supply
Windows XP SP3
onboard audio, LAN, etc.

[Pop]

How will that setup handle Alienz?

[Pidesco]

I'm guessing the 8800GT will struggle with Aliens on a 24" screen.

[Morgoth]

I hope Aliens does run fine with a 8800GT on a 22" screen. If the 360 can handle Aliens, a Core2Quad with 8800GT should handle it as well....hopefully.

Edited by Morgoth, 26 December 2008 - 05:18 AM.

[samm]

Intel Core 2 Duo E8600 CPU

Ooh, I smell wasted money (only half kidding, price/performance ratio on the fastet dual core isn't great at all, here that is, don't know about the US)

[Pidesco]

I hope Aliens does run fine with a 8800GT on a 22" screen. If the 360 can handle Aliens, a Core2Quad with 8800GT should handle it as well....hopefully.

Well, on the same detail level, hopefully it will. But I'm guessing(praying?), Aliens will look considerably snazzier maxed out on a PC than on a 360.

I have a 8800GT myself, but my screen is a 17" CRT so let's see if I can max it out completely.

[Bokishi]

Update

Core 2 e8400 @ 3.8 GHz
EVGA nForce 680i
3x EVGA GTX 280 Triple-SLI
8GB OCZ nVidia SLI DDR2 800
Creative X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty
150GB RaptorX
2x 1TB Hitachi Deskstars
1200w Thermaltake Toughpower (Tri-SLI 280 Certified)
LG Blu-Ray Burner
CoolerMaster Stacker 830
30" Dell 3007WFP-HC
Windows Vista x64 SP1


Some pics

[Theseus]

Wow bok, nice use of space. I cant believe your mobo had room for a audio card. If only you had a quadcore to help your framerate with GTA IV! Sharp machine. I might upgrade my CPU and Ram this summer with a Q9550 and 6 to 8 gigs of ram. Is it worth it if im running windows Vista 64?

[Pidesco]

Bok is clearly an evil man.

[Bokishi]

Wow bok, nice use of space. I cant believe your mobo had room for a audio card. If only you had a quadcore to help your framerate with GTA IV! Sharp machine. I might upgrade my CPU and Ram this summer with a Q9550 and 6 to 8 gigs of ram. Is it worth it if im running windows Vista 64?

Yeah, the only thing a quad will help me with is GTA 4. e8400 and the i7 are still pretty much equals in most game benchmarks, so I left it alone for now. And yeah gets lot's of DDR2 Ram it's cheap, you can probably get 8GB for under a hundred dollars these days. DDR2 performance compared to DDR3 in games is still only 2-3 fps, not worth the price premium for now