Time to start putting a new comp together...

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » February 19, 2008, 1:59 pm

Okay, I have been doing some looking around, and I have a few questions about the "evolution" that I seem to have missed in the system-building world. First note in this *I am not looking to overclock anything*

My first question would be, would a PCIe card work in the PCIe 2.0 slots? I have been looking at options to go with a quad-core CPU, and I was thinking about going the Phenom route since I have a deal that I can take advantage of to get one soon. Most, if not all, of the motherboards that support the AM2+ slot seem to have only PCIe 2.0.

Second, I remember a lot of talk about the Seagate 7200.10 drives, and I have tried to figure out how to recognize if it was this version or not in stores. I can find them just fine on a site like Newegg, but is there anything on the actual packaging that would indicate this? Would 7200.11 not be the same, or a newer/better version of what was already out?

noel · Post by **noel** » February 19, 2008, 2:17 pm

PCIE 2 is backward compatible.

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » February 19, 2008, 2:29 pm

noel wrote:PCIE 2 is backward compatible.

Thanks for clearing that up for me. I kind of expected it to be, but I did read one user's comment on a board that his card wasn't being recognized. I was worried that it was due to 2.0 vs 1.0.

valryte · Post by **valryte** » February 20, 2008, 5:01 am

If you're looking for speed, take a look at the WD Raptors. I have 2 of them and they are extremely fast. They don't go past 150 gigs, but they aren't really meant for storage. I use them for my OS.

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » February 20, 2008, 9:44 am

I looked into them, and I don't think I will be going that route. I don't see that I really need the speed enough to justify having a separate smaller OS drive that cost more than a storage drive. The 7200.10 drives I have seen seem to be priced about the same as any other drive of a similar size.

I am considering:

Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 ST3500320AS 500GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM.

If anyone has any feedback on good motherboards if I go with the Intel vs AMD processors, I would appreciate it. I am still torn on whether I want to grab dual or quad core, so any ideas for both would be helpful.

Kluden · Post by **Kluden** » February 20, 2008, 1:15 pm

If you plan to go AMD, ie. Phenom, then you are going to want to wait a few weeks until the "real" AMD790 motherboards come out.

Right now, all the AMD790 Northbridge motherboards I've seen have the ancient AMD600SB Southbridge. The new AMD700SB southbridge will be out very shortly. You are going to want to wait for that so the board is truly more future proof. The AMD 700 series mobos are the only ones I would buy to put with a phenom processor.

As for the Intel side, just stick with the intel chipsets. They are very stable (and very OC'able even though you aren't going to do that), and the price is not bad on them. The P35 seems to be a very good balance of price v. performance.

With those two chipsets mentioned above, you would also get to stick with DDR2 memory, which is so dog cheap it makes no sense to go DDR3 yet.

All the above also assumes you are either sticking with only one video card, or if you want multiple GPU, you are doing ATI. If you are hell bent on doing SLI, then your only choice is the nvidia chipsets. If that's the case, you will be spending a large sum of money for the new 790i chipset nvidia has coming out. Don't confuse it with the 780i which has been getting fairly bad reviews.

Winnow · Post by **Winnow** » February 20, 2008, 1:31 pm

Boogahz wrote:I looked into them, and I don't think I will be going that route. I don't see that I really need the speed enough to justify having a separate smaller OS drive that cost more than a storage drive. The 7200.10 drives I have seen seem to be priced about the same as any other drive of a similar size.

I am considering:

Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 ST3500320AS 500GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM.

If anyone has any feedback on good motherboards if I go with the Intel vs AMD processors, I would appreciate it. I am still torn on whether I want to grab dual or quad core, so any ideas for both would be helpful.

I had the original 36gb Raptor a long time ago. They are fast but mine was loud. Since then, the 7200rpm drives have cut the speed difference quite a bit. The Raptors have also gotten a little quieter. The new WD drives are a little better than the seagate 7200.10's IMO. The 750 WD's I bought f0r 209.00 each can be had for 154.00 these days @ Newegg. If you're happy with 7200.10's (I have a 340GB version as well) stick with that. Seagate may be more reliable than this generation of WD's.

It doesn't matter if you use a large drive for your OS as long as you make the OS partition reasonably small (like 50GB) which makes backing it up a breeze for easy recovery.

The 340GB 7200.10 is my OS drive atm. I can't believe it's still working with all the shit I put it through. I guess that's a vote of confidence fro Seagate 7200.10's.

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » February 20, 2008, 1:39 pm

I plan on sticking with only one video card. I went the SLI route on my last mobo, and I never really felt the need to fill the extra slot.

That is another area I have not watched recently. I used to have horrible luck with ATI cards, and I have no idea which current ATI cards would basically compare with the 8600 on up from nvidia. I noticed that Frys had a list that kind of showed where the cards ranked for performance, but holy hell that table was hard to read! I have considered sticking my current card in the new box at the start until sorting out the ATI vs nvidia questions, so it is not as essential for me to get right away. I think the only "real" requirement I have for a card would be that it is directx 10 compat.

This thread really may be kind of jumbled, as I am trying to work out what I actually want to do one or two pieces at a time. The information about the AMD motherboards is pretty much what I am looking for. I would not have thought to watch for the 700 series to come out before grabbing one, and I literally know nothing about the Intel boards.

Reading Winnow's post, I might actually just go with the 7200.10 with the 16MB Cache over the 7200.11 with 32MB Cache. Maybe letting the "kinks" get worked out on the new ones would help me avoid potential headaches I was reading about in some of the comments online. That is what I was originally thinking about going with anyhow.

Kluden · Post by **Kluden** » February 21, 2008, 10:04 am

Well, Intel chipsets just seem to change a lot more frequently due to the memory standard transition the industry is in right now. They released the X38 northbridge Top of the Line about 2 months ago, and already it is updated with the X48. The P35 would be the intel northbridge that suits you best, but it is also about to be updated by the P45 in March, I think.

You would need the P35 or better to support their new 45nm CPU's. There will be motherboards with the P45 in it that support either DDR2 or DDR3, so that helps too on the price end. I personallly don't think DDR3 will ever take off, because the improvement over DDR2 just isn't enough to affect software enough, in my opinion. That's just my opinion though, and thought that skipping to DDR4 would have been the better route...but I digress.

Wikipedia has all the info you could want on the AMD northbridges and southbridges HERE.

Let us know which way you go, I always love hearing peoples' build stories with different hardware.

Forthe · Post by **Forthe** » February 21, 2008, 9:03 pm

I have 3 7200.10's (2x320, 1x750) and they are very loud if thats a consideration.

I plan on picking up some Samsung F1's, at 334GB per platter performance is crazy. They are very quiet and run cool as well. I have some concerns about error rate at the moment which is holding me back, not sure if its manufacturing issues or firmware\compatabilty issues.

My second choice would be the 7200.11's, at 250GB per platter they are #2 performance wise now.

The raptors still rule access time, and IO operations as a result, but are blown away in transfer rate by current drives.

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » February 21, 2008, 9:06 pm

The unreliable batches of 7200.10's around the time they came out are the only reason I have not to go with the 7200.11.

valryte · Post by **valryte** » February 21, 2008, 10:25 pm

I don't see that I really need the speed enough to justify having a separate smaller OS drive that cost more than a storage drive.

That's the thing, if you are going to use them as OS drives, there shouldn't be any issues with the size. You don't want a 500 gig OS partition anyways, that's a nightmare to back up. My OS partition is currently about 75 gigs and it's great. I'm able to do backups of the entire OS partition on a regular basis (yeah my drives are mirrored, I don't believe in having too many backups hehe).

As for recommendations, I'd go with an Intel Quad Q6600, they are running at 250.00 atm. As for motherboard, I currently have with a Gigabyte P35-DS4 and it's been running nice. They have other variations so take a look at them, but like others have said, definately go with a P35 based board and stay away from DDR3.

miir · Post by **miir** » February 22, 2008, 9:48 am

The Radeon 3870 is comparable to Nvidia's 8800.
I have a 3870 and absolutely love it.

Kluden · Post by **Kluden** » February 22, 2008, 10:39 am

True that Miir, and the 3870 just dropped MSRP to $189...which is a steal for performance.

I run a 7200.10 and mine is silent...so not sure about the others saying they have loud ones. It sits in my case with my media storage drive, an old Maxtor diamonmax, and that is audible when it is being accessed.

If you live near a Microcenter, they have the Q6600 for 199.99 in store only right now. But I think quad cores are highly overated unless you have programs that are designed to use every core available...there are only handful of games that do that. I think the newer 45nm dual cores from Intel would be better for you especially since you are not overclocking, and the new chips are faster clocked from the factory.

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » February 22, 2008, 11:43 am

miir wrote:The Radeon 3870 is comparable to Nvidia's 8800.
I have a 3870 and absolutely love it.

What would be the step below that card? That is where I have been confused as the numbering system, or maybe just the release order of cards, has not seemed to follow the same type of path as the Nvidia cards.

miir · Post by **miir** » February 22, 2008, 12:23 pm

The latest generation of ATI cards are the Radeon HD 3XXX.
They have various flavours from the bargain basement 3450 to the gaming oriented 3870.

The previous generation was the Radeon HD 2XXX.
This was their first DX10 card and it wasn't a very good card, price/performance wise.
The top line 2900XT was the only one that beat the performace of the X1950XT (which is a fantastic DX9 card) but it was stupidly expensive. The cheapest I ever saw one was $400+. The 2600XT is a chronic underperformer and the 2400 is not a gaming card.

Here's a basic run-down of ATI naming convention over the last few years.

9550
X1050
X1300
X1550
X1600/1650
X1800
X1900/1950
HD2400/2600/2900
HD3400/3600/3800

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » February 22, 2008, 12:25 pm

thanks, it sounds like skipping the 2xxx series would not be a bad idea as I look around

miir · Post by **miir** » February 22, 2008, 12:37 pm

Boogahz wrote:thanks, it sounds like skipping the 2xxx series would not be a bad idea as I look around

Getting a 2xxx would be pretty silly considering the ridiculous price of the 3870.
I'll probably be picking up a second in the next month or two.
2 X 3870 will dominate a single 8800GTX and it will run you $100 less.

Winnow · Post by **Winnow** » February 22, 2008, 12:59 pm

8800GT is currently the sweet spot for price performance. (nVidia)

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » March 7, 2008, 11:39 am

Okay, I did end up going with the AMD Phenom 9500 Agena 2.2GHz 4 x 512KB L2 Cache 2MB L3 Cache Socket AM2+ 95W Quad-Core Processor - Retail

I was able to grab one for $140 at the CompUSA near me when they did the final price cut just over a week ago. I will probably be checking a couple local places tonight and/or tomorrow to price some of the other pieces. I would go with NewEgg for everything, but I have had such nightmares getting deliveries that I don't want to even think about being almost done just to have one piece disappear.

I think I am most torn over whether to go with ATI or NVidia for the video card. I have had issues with drivers on ATI cards in the past, and my NVidia cards have had no issues that I can remember. I know that this hasn't been the case with everyone though.

Winnow · Post by **Winnow** » March 7, 2008, 12:38 pm

Boogahz wrote: I think I am most torn over whether to go with ATI or NVidia for the video card. I have had issues with drivers on ATI cards in the past, and my NVidia cards have had no issues that I can remember. I know that this hasn't been the case with everyone though.

nVidia > ATi

Miir is the only one that's confused over that.

ATi hasn't been relevant since the 9700 Pro which was awesome.

YOu can find the 8800GT for $209.00 now if you look and it's the best price/performance deal out there. If not that, pay a little more for the new (512mb, not the old GTS cards which can be confusing) 8800GTS cards that have the new gpu chips. Or pay even more for a GTX although that's going to cost you. The GTS takes two slots but runs cool and quiet. So does the 8800GT if you get the MSI version that has a Zalman fan stock without it costing more than other 8800GTs.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... i%2b8800gt

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » March 7, 2008, 12:46 pm

by taking up two slots, I am assuming you mean it is a "fat" (not phat) card, but it only uses one actual slot...correct?

miir · Post by **miir** » March 7, 2008, 12:48 pm

If you're going with a Phenom CPU, it's a no brainer to go the 790FX chipset for your motherboard.
That chipset comes with Crossfire support so the logical choice would be ATI.
The 3870 is such a great card and the price really can't be beat... and Crossfire is such a hassle-free multi-gpu solution. If you find the performace of a single 3870 isn't adequate, you can add one (or two or three) more 3870s (or even a 3850)... doesn't matter the manufacturer or configuration. It's nowhere near as fudgy as SLI (eventhough SLI is now a lot less picky about using cards from different manufacturers).

Games need to specifically support SLI. that's not the case with Crossfire.
As an example, you'll see no performance improvement in EQ2 with a SLI setup unless you download a profiler that will force the game to use both GPUs. Even with that, your performance gain will be marginal.
Crossfire doesn't require specific application support... it just works.

As for driver issues with ATI... you might be concerned about that if it were 2002/2003.

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » March 7, 2008, 12:55 pm

Ah, so Crossfire isn't as restrictive as SLI? I did not realize that you did not have to have two cards that matched exactly. I will keep that in mind while I shop. I don't see myself picking up two cards right now, but it would be nice to know that I could add something else later if needed without being restricted to the exact same card I buy first. I honestly haven't heard much at all about ATI cards recently, and yes, my issues with them go back to 2003ish and before.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 7, 2008, 1:08 pm

Winnow wrote:nVidia > ATi

That was the absolutely the case with ATI's first gen DX10 cards. The 2900xt was very disappointing.
The 3870 compares very favorably to the 8800GT and costs $30-40 less.
Unlike winnow, I've used both current gen cards from Nvidia and ATI and when comparing image quality, video playback and 3d performance I think the ATI is far superior overall.

That's not to say that nvidia doesn't make great products. I loved my 6600, 6800 and 7950.
I had driver issues (specifically with EQ2) with my 8800 which resulted in some games freezing and hitching and becoming basically unplayable. Even after replacing the card.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 7, 2008, 1:10 pm

Boogahz wrote:Ah, so Crossfire isn't as restrictive as SLI? I did not realize that you did not have to have two cards that matched exactly. I will keep that in mind while I shop. I don't see myself picking up two cards right now, but it would be nice to know that I could add something else later if needed without being restricted to the exact same card I buy first. I honestly haven't heard much at all about ATI cards recently, and yes, my issues with them go back to 2003ish and before.

It might be a moot point as I'm not even sure if there's a chipset available for the Phenom that offers SLI support...

AMD = ATI so Crossfire support is there.

Winnow · Post by **Winnow** » March 7, 2008, 1:13 pm

Boogahz wrote:by taking up two slots, I am assuming you mean it is a "fat" (not phat) card, but it only uses one actual slot...correct?

Correct, and I wouldn't go for either Crossfire or SLi. One card is fine as long as you don't buy one on the cheap end.

The driver issues for the original 8800 series have been fixed. One reason I hadn't upgraded my 7800GT is that lame OSX 10.5 didn't support 8800's without a lot of work. I'm pretty sure that's been corrected with 10.5.2. Sometimes it doesn't pay to be the first on the block. That's usually the case with video cards as the drivers (and support for the card) take awhile to sort themselves out.

Fash · Post by **Fash** » March 7, 2008, 1:20 pm

With the AMD motherboard, I'd also recommend ATI... and not to go SLI, just get one good card.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 7, 2008, 1:25 pm

Winnow wrote:Correct, and I wouldn't go for either Crossfire or SLi. One card is fine as long as you don't buy one on the cheap end.

MY driver issues with the original 8800 series have been fixed.

I would also recommend going with a single GPU to start... and if you REALLYREALLY need more performance just add another card whenever you want.

I fixed your second comment.

Winnow · Post by **Winnow** » March 7, 2008, 1:25 pm

eBay the AMD board. Go Intel!

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » March 7, 2008, 1:27 pm

miir wrote:If you're going with a Phenom CPU, it's a no brainer to go the 790FX chipset for your motherboard.
That chipset comes with Crossfire support so the logical choice would be ATI.

So, on that note, I am looking at something like this:

MSI K9A2 Platinum AM2+/AM2 AMD 790FX ATX AMD Motherboard

I have no experience with MSI boards. I believe I have mainly used ASUS and ABit boards with no real issues in the past (except for my strange issue on the last build where the DVD burner was making the board think I had RAID set up when I didn't).

Winnow · Post by **Winnow** » March 7, 2008, 1:34 pm

Ignore crossfire and sli in your decision. That's a waste and the least of your concerns when building a system from the ground up.

Performance of the CPU, memory compatibility with the MB, onboard gigabit network make/model/compatibility, etc etc should be what you're looking at.

Most important is the stability of the MB. Head over to the Hard[OC] forums and do some reading.

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » March 7, 2008, 1:41 pm

The mobo example came from:

Socket AM2+ (necessary)
AMD 790FX Northbridge (recommended a couple times)
DDR2 1066 Memory standard (not necessary, but figured it would buy me more time before upgrading just for better speed)

That was it. The Crossfire support "came with" the boards in my search, and the MSI board was just the first one on the list. There were also Gigabyte and ASUS boards, but reading feedback about boards catching on fire made me quickly exclude Gigabyte!

I currently have an SLI board in my "main" comp. I never really wanted to get a second card, so I just have one card now. So, IF I choose to go with more than one card in the future, I would like to have it fit my needs.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 7, 2008, 2:00 pm

Winnow wrote:Ignore crossfire and sli in your decision. That's a waste and the least of your concerns when building a system from the ground up.

Do you even read what you post sometimes?

Fash · Post by **Fash** » March 7, 2008, 2:01 pm

Hehe... is it opposite day?

Winnow · Post by **Winnow** » March 7, 2008, 2:03 pm

Sounds good. Try to find some memory that peeps have had success with on the MB you buy and rock on!

Kluden · Post by **Kluden** » March 7, 2008, 2:43 pm

HERE you go for a review on that MSI board.

Like I told you way up above though, the current amd 790 boards use the old southbridge (SB600). The new southbridges SB700's, are being shown this week at CEBIT, so they will be coming to market soon. In other words, if you are ready to build, don't worry about the southbridge. It MOST LIKELY won't make a difference anyways. The Northbridge is really the one to look for in a motherboard.

Nvidia's 780a (the "a" is for AMD, while an "i" would be for intel) series chipset mobos were shown this week at CEBIT too, but I believe the nvidia 780 northbridge has been nothing short of a disaster on the intel side. I'm not sure how it could possibly be anything other than a disaster on the AMD side.

As for video cards, get whichever you can afford. They are all good right now. I have a ati 2900pro with a mod'd bios to make it an XT, and its plenty fast enough for the games out there, not including Crysis. The 3870 is a very good card for the price right now, as are the two new G92 based 8800's after rebates.

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » March 7, 2008, 3:56 pm

yeah, I had been watching for the series of southbridge that you were talking about early in the thread, but I really can't wait for those to be available. Thanks for the link for that board.

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » March 8, 2008, 3:25 am

I ended up with:

AMD Phenom 9500 Agena 2.2GHz 4 x 512KB L2 Cache 2MB L3 Cache Socket AM2+ 95W Quad-Core Processor
MSI K9A2 Platinum AM2+/AM2 AMD 790FX ATX AMD Motherboard
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 (Perpendicular Recording) ST3500630AS 500GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
Crucial 4GB(2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit
DIAMOND Viper 3870PE4512SB Radeon HD 3870 512MB 256-bit GDDR4 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card
RAIDMAX SMILODON ATX-612WB Black SECC STEEL ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
Vista Home Premium...didn't feel the need for Ultimate like I have on the other comp

Moved a couple other things from an older comp

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » March 10, 2008, 12:02 pm

side-notes: I was blind the first 20 times I looked for a power slot on the 3870. It wasn't until I took it back to Fry's, and the guy took it out of the box that I saw it. The fan will turn on without connecting the 6pin cable from the power supply, but nothing else on the card works (no signal). This had led me to think the card was faulty...but it was just my vision.

I had a little trouble getting Call of Duty 4 to work at first, but after installing the actual Realtek drivers, instead of the defaults installed by Windows, it worked great...as in, it looks effin' awesome. I can also see the sky in EQ2! I did not realize how much I was missing before when I would use lower settings due to the processor limitation I had.

The fresh install of Vista was actually done and patched faster than installing/patching EQ2! No problems on the build at all (once I realized my error with the video card), and now I just get to finally replace the power supply on the comp this one replaced.

Thanks for the input all!

miir · Post by **miir** » March 10, 2008, 1:15 pm

LOL dork!

I figured you'd got the new computer up and running because you were zoning lightning fast yesterday.

Boogahz · Post by **Boogahz** » March 10, 2008, 1:16 pm

miir wrote:LOL dork!

I figured you'd got the new computer up and running because you were zoning lightning fast yesterday.

yeah, it was nice not getting left behind...except for when distracted by shinies I could see from a mile away instead of not seeing them until I got within 5 feet!