Buying new machine looking for feedback

jimmydatwin

Putting it together myself.  Was looking for Bang for the buck.  Can get all the parts and OS for about $725 CAD including 5%tax and shipping.  If anyone is tech savy or running a similar setup would love to know how they feel this will run most MMO's on the market currently and coming out in the next year or so.   I am hoping to be able to run most  MMO's on almost maxed settings. 

Currently playing Darkfall and Vanguard, but would love to know how it will run any high graphics MMO's coming out soon too.

Chip - AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition Quad Core

Processor 3.2GHZ AM3 8MB Cache 125W Retail Box

Board - ASUS M4A77T/USB3 ATX AM3 DDR3 AMD770 SB710

PCI-E16 2PCI-E1 3PCI 6SATA USB3.0 Sound GBLAN

Motherboard



Ram - G.SKILL F3-10666CL9D-8GBRL Ripjaws 8GB 2X4GB

DDR3-1333 CL9-9-9-24 240PIN DIMM Memory



Video Card - XFX Radeon HD 6850 775MHZ 1GB 4.0GHZ GDDR5

2XDVI Display Port HDMI PCI-E Video Card



Box & PSU - Logisys CS308RD RED/BLACK ATX Tower Case 4X5.25

5X3.5IN 480W 80MM Blue LED Fan Front USB Audio



Hard Drive - Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA2 3.5IN 8.5MS

7200RPM 16MB Hard Drive



O/S - Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium Edition 64BIT

DVD OEM

Thanks in advance for any replies,

 

jpnole

I have a similar build - see my sig. Almost same chip, the same ram, same video card (well a gigabyte - but same thing) and OS. Probably a cheap psu with that case. I'd spend a bit more on a proven case with good airflow and go with a good brand name PSU. You don't want to hamstring yourself with a weak component. Stock CPU coolers suck @ss. Blow another $40 on a good aftermarket cooler.  Instead of shooting for $725 CAN don't be afraid to go $800 CAN and do it right. Don't forget to throw in a cheap $20 optical drive (burner) and you're good to go. Oh and you will be able to max EVERY mmo (and every PC game) with that build as I've already done it with similar components. Just built my first a month ago!

jdnewell

What PSU?

Other than that good to go I think. Like he said throw in a 20 buck DvD-R/ CD-R  drive and if your PSU is up to snuff then looks OK to me.

jimmydatwin

Yeah got a cheap burner for $15 with it didn't include it in the post cause I figured it wasn't that important.  PS is 480 watt and maxed out everything should run at a bout 420 watt so should be good.  I know I may need to spend a little more on a better PSU later, but if it works now I'll be happy cause the case and PSU was on sale for like $50 and did get great reviews.  I ended up going with the 955 processor instead of the 965 because I don't think I will need to Overclock (965 can OC much better I read) it to play MMO's in the next few years and it uses less power and runs cooler so I am hoping will work better with the cheap case and PSU.   Worst case scenario in a few months I fork out $150-200 and get a better case and PSU, but I think the one I'm getting should work if I keep the area around my box ventilated.

Thanks for the replies guys.

Quizzical

My dad recently got a Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition processor, and I was impressed with the stock cooler.  Sure, it wasn't great as compared to an aftermarket cooler, but it was a lot better than I expected the stock cooler to be.  It had four heatpipes (two on each side, so perhaps comparable to two heatpipes that each go up both sides) and a decent sized aluminum heatsink.  The fan blew down at the CPU chip, which isn't the greatest approach for general case airflow, but it should be just fine in a decent case.  It was vastly better than the stock heatsink that Intel ships with their Lynnfield processors.  There's no sense in buying an aftermarket cooler for that processor unless you're going to give it a heavy overclock.

You really, really, really need a better power supply.  This isn't something you can maybe worry about months down the road.  You'll be looking at dead hardware in short order if you try to run that hardware off of that power supply.  If you're lucky, the power supply will be the only thing dead.  Actually, if you're lucky, the power supply will be DOA and won't get a chance to blow up anything else.

The power supply is rated at 16 A on the +12 V rail, which comes to 192 W.  The processor and video card are rated at 251 W added together, and use almost solely the +12 V rail.  That's already running the power supply way out of spec, and that's before you try to power anything else in the machine.

And that's before you consider build quality.  New Egg sells the case+power supply you're looking at for $40.  It sells the power supply alone for $14 plus shipping.  You can't buy a power supply that would be safe to run a nettop on for $14.  Apart from very short term sales and big rebates, the cheapest you can get a decent enough quality power supply is about $40, and even that is often for power supplies with too low of wattages to run a computer like yours.

Try this power supply if you're not willing to mess with mail-in rebates:

http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151094

Or this one if you will do rebates and regard them as "free":

http://ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=36263&vpn=TP%2D650&manufacture=Antec

jimmydatwin

Final System:

CHIP - AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition

Quad Core Processor 3.2GHZ AM3 8MB

Cache 125W Retail Box



BOARD - ASUS M4A77T/USB3 ATX AM3 DDR3

AMD770 SB710 PCI-E16 2PCI-E1 3PCI

6SATA USB3.0 Sound GBLAN

Motherboard



MEMORY- G.SKILL F3-10666CL9D-8GBRL Ripjaws

8GB 2X4GB DDR3-1333 CL9-9-9-24

240PIN DIMM Memory



VIDEO CARD - Gigabyte Radeon HD 6850 775MHZ 1GB

4.0GHZ GDDR5 2XDVI Mini DisplayPort

HDMI PCI-E Video Card



CASE - Coolermaster Elite 370 Black Mid Tower

ATX Case 3X5.25 1X3.5 5X3.5INT No

PS



PSU - Antec Truepower New 650W Modular

Power Supply ATX12V V2.3 Active PFC

80 Plus SLI Ready 120MM PWM Fan



HARD DRIVE - Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB

SATA2 3.5IN 8.5MS 7200RPM 16MB

Hard Drive OEM



DVD DRIVE - LG GH22NS50 Black 22X SATA DVD

Writer OEM



OS - Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium

Edition 64BIT DVD OEM

 

I decided to go with the Gigabyte video card instead of the XFX to save $15 since I decided to buck up and get the better PSU.  All in costs about $800 Canadian and I can live with that.  Knowing that I won't be frying $700 worth of hardware to save $100. 

Thank you all, and if anyone has any comments on final system would love to hear it.

Quizzical

Some things that you might want to consider changing:

1)  Your motherboard is kind of dated.  It will work, but a more modern motherboard based on an AMD 870 chipset and an SB850 southbridge would offer more features.  If you're operating on a tight budget and a newer motherboard would be significantly more expensive, you can keep the old one and it will be fine.

2)  You don't actually need 8 GB of memory unless you have unusual needs.  4 GB is plenty for the foreseeable future.  If you do decide to get 4 GB, make sure that what you get is rated at 1.5 V or lower and 1333 MHz or higher.  You should run it at 1.5 V and 1333 MHz anyway.  Whatever capacity you get, make sure it's in a kit with two identical modules.

3)  The case only comes with one fan, and you should get more airflow for what hardware you have in there, especially since your video card is an internal exhaust model.  It has room for five more case fans, but only ships with one.  You could buy two more 120 mm case fans and stick them in the top and that should be plenty.  If you don't, then the interior of your case could get hotter than it ought to--and if the one fan dies, then you have no airflow and things could fry.

4)  A Western Digital Caviar Black hard drive would be significantly faster than a Seagate Barracuda 7200.12, and probably more reliable, too.  The Seagate hard drive will be decent enough, but I'd probably spend the extra $20 or so to get a WD Caviar Black.

5)  LG optical drives come with "bluebirds" ad-ware in their firmware that borders on malware.  Basically, it will display ads when you use the optical drive, and be annoying.  You can likely get a different brand for the same price, or only a dollar or two more.

-----

Of those, adding a couple more case fans is the only one that I'd consider important.  On the others, it's just some things to think about, and you might decide to keep the setup as it is.

TheLizardbones

If you get an HD 6950, you can use a bios tweak to get turn it into an HD 6970. There are articles on Slashdot and Engadget about it. It only saves you $30, but $30 is $30.