Phenom NVIDIA build for your viewing pleasure!

[customisbetter]

I got a job as a PC Tech at the university and i have a stable income so now its time to spend it!

All items below are from the 'Egg.

Phenom 9600 BE - $150

ASUS M3A78-CM - $80

4x2GB 1066 from G.Skill - $210

And the last thing to be purchased as i know the price will drop,

9800 GTX+ - $200
----------------------------------------
Total $650~

Any objections and/or suggestions are appreciated and will be considered if accompanied by solid reasoning/ experience.
Thanks dudes!

 

[sanjiwatsuki]

Drop to 4GB of good DDR2-800, unless you need the 8GB. Good DDR2-800 should overclock to DDR2-1066 anyway, but the overall difference in speed is minor.

Consider the GTX260? It's only $55 more, before MIR. It should give a decent gaming boost.

 

[customisbetter]

im switching to vista x64 when im finished with this build and i will start audio work along with Autocad stuff so i figure "what the heck"!

About the video card. $250 is a bunch of money and i don't know if the price will drop anymore. If its closer to $200 by the time i buy the graphics card, i definitely pick that up.

 

[4745454b]

Get an xx50 Phenom, or even better, a C2D based CPU.

Drop to 4GBs of DDR2-800MHz

Get the 4850 for $170. 9800GTX/GTX+/GTX260 aren't worth it.

 

[customisbetter]

^Reasoning or experience?
Here is a reason against the 4850, slower (not by much) than 9800 in Crysis and the cooler is junk.

Also, the e-Penis 3dmark scores have a slight effect on my decisions. No idea why but keep that in mind.

 

[skywalker9952]

The phenom 9600 seems to be at an untouchable price point so I wouldn't downgrade to an equally priced XX50 Phenom. The 9850 is something to think about at ~$195 but seems out of your price target. The 4850 and 4870 are king of their price points, but sales and special deals can give Nvidia products an edge in price to performance, but keep in mind it goes the other way as well. Newegg has a 4870 for $235 after rebate (of $20) and coupon code, just something to think about.

 

[customisbetter]

my checks at the end of the week are a little over $200 so i would like to keep each part in that range. im going to research the 4870 a little more and update.

 

[sanjiwatsuki]

Oh, I was under the assumption you were dead-set on keeping NVIDIA as your video card. Please do research on the HD4870, it's a very good video card. Crysis is just one game that tends to favor NVIDIA.

 

[customisbetter]

i looked and i think the 260 is a better deal. yes the 4870 wins by a few frames, but both max out all the games that are tested, minus crysis. I looked at the specs of both cards and i think the 260 has much more potential and longetivity. the green corner has 112 GB/s of bandwidth while the red dude has 68.8 and thats overclocked. green almost doubles the reds texture fillrate and has a 5 Gpixel lead. i know that memory bandwidth isn't the bottleneck now, but someday it might be, and the 260 will start to show an advantage. not to mention the amount of memory is insane.

that is what i consider reasoning.

Citations
260-- http://www.fudzilla.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=8518&Itemid=40

4870 -- http://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/powercolor_hd4870/images/4870_oc.htm

 

[Pazuzoo]

Except that the 4870 is running gddr5 memory instead of 3, and the 4870 has a bandwidth of 115.2 GB/s which edges out the 260.

The number you used (68) is for the 4850.

 

[customisbetter]

OHHH! my bad. See, thats why i use citations.
this one is "more correct".
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341

Does any body have stats on either card when overclocked?

 

[Pazuzoo]

I don't have anything solid, but I think even with overclocking the two cards stay pretty much even.

The 260 will probably overclock higher, but the 4870 doesn't have to clock as high since the gddr5 memory can benefit from smaller clock increases. Bumping the memory clock up 100 to 1k would actually yield in a 400mhz data rate increase for example (and I've seen some people with good cards get up to 1250).

The moral of the story though is - both cards are good, and are pretty much equal in most cases, so just get whichever you can get the best deal on.

 

[customisbetter]

^ok.
and this is a quote that i was looking for in regards to 'experience'.
from [H]

"I had hd 4870, I tried overclocking with amd gpu tool and I was able to get 850, but after that the nightmare started happening, the card worked fine for 2 days at 850 and than I would get stuck pixels even in 2d, and artifacts in 3d, and than tried downclocking to 840/830/820 and no go, it actually used to pass atitool at 830 with 35% fan speed, it was not even stable in games at 810, and it would be stable at 790 though and anything higher I just could not get.

the sad part is while it was stable at 790 but it still gave me artifacts in atitool after a few mins, so I really dont recommend overclocking hd 4870 past 790-800

and no it does not fly by the gtx 280 at 790(total bull), only time it matches up is when you turn on 8xAA and in few games it is faster period.

my card only got slightly faster with 790 core clock and I would gain about 3fps on average in games.

the reason is simple, Nvidia cards benefit more from overclock than ati cards do, why? because you are raising the shader clock 2+mhz for each mhz on the core clock and that is why if you want to overclock nvidia card is the best way to go, because those shaders scream in games.

I returned my hd 4870 and got the gtx 280 now and it is really a great card, I got mine running at 692/1400/1250, my card is not the best overclocker but it is pretty damn fast, the shaders wont go any higher and I have to set the fan speed higher than auto in games, and I turn it down after I start gaming."

-HKD

 

[customisbetter]

i just found another crysis bench that i like. it shows FPS in different parts of the game.
not english though.
http://www.egielda.com.pl/?str=art&id=4400-20

and anything on that motherboard/cpu? i want to try for 3Ghz but i know that probably won't happen. 2.7 is good.

 

[customisbetter]

Seriously, no one has anything to say about the motherboard or CPU?

and BUMP.

 

[4745454b]

No offense, I have things to say, but you seem to be a bit closed minded. The 9600BE might be at a good price, but don't forget the cooler that you'll need to get with it. You are now looking at spending the same amount for the Q6600, which is faster. There is a reason why when people go quad, they tend to get the 6600. I've already said this, you said no.

Same with your choice of video cards. Nearly every review I've seen shows the 4850 and the 9800GTX to be equals. The 4850 is considered better due to handling AA/AF better, and its cheaper. If you are looking at the GTX260, you should be getting the 4870 instead. It's faster, and usually not much more. If however you want to look at a few reviews that fit your beliefs, then enjoy your build.

 

[customisbetter]

Yeah, i know the q6600 is a bit faster, but i would like to keep the same motherboard for a few years. Nehelem is a comin' and if i don't really want to have to get a new motherboard the next time i upgrade.
which leads me to the question; is this motherboard good?

i will overclock the gpu. so comparing stock setting in those reviews doesn't mean much to me. here
http://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/evga_gtx260/6.htm
the 260 overclocked always wins, but i have yet to read a 4870 overclock benchmark. if you can direct me to some, please do. i am going to continue my search.
EDIT
i found this...
http://en.hardspell.com/doc/showcont.asp?news_id=3703&pageid=3076
not a very good review though, but it shows the performance with the cpu i am hoping to use. Although not at the resolution, 1280 x 1024.
I will just get whatever is cheapest when i buy it.

 

[joelg88]

Forget AMD go with Intel. Better Performance.

CPU:

Q6600 A Q6600 is a good overclocker if you get a Good $40-$50 dollar Cooler for it. You'll be able to get it over 3ghz no problem. $190

E8400 If you don't need the power of 4 cores the E8400 is a great CPU. It even Beats the Q6600 in many things and costs less. It also overclocks very well. $170

Mobo: Asus P5Q Deluxe $200

RAM: A good set 4GB PC2-6400 Ram from a good Brand like Corsair, Crucial, G.Skill, Mushkin etc. $60-$90

GPU: Radeon 4850 $160 after rebates.


The specs i mentioned above will give better performance than the AMD system you mentioned and will cost less than $650. it will be like $620 after rebates. maybe even more less. The Q6600 or the E8400 will be much faster than the Phenom. The 4850 kills a 9800GTX.

 

[customisbetter]

Sorry man, but $200 for a motherboard is a little steep. Especially when the socket is heading towards the end of its life. Is there a good 775 motherboard (preferably mATX) that is a bit cheaper?
And i think i am going for the 4870/260 for the GPU.
EDIT----------
im dumb, and don't need 8 gig of ram. thats -$100 right there.

anybody dislike this board?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813138105

 

[Blaze051806]

Hi there. i JUST built myself a new rig 3 days ago. im using the AMD 9850 BE running at 2.5GHz. a EVGA GTX 260. and 8GBs of DDR2 800MHz. as for your CPU-MOBO here is the Mobo i bought.

BIOSTAR Tseries. TA790GX A2+

it supports 140Watt Amd CPUs ( 9950 ) and i had no trouble with this Mobo at all put my 9850 and it booted right up and i installed vista 64bit not 1 problem. also as for CPU performance i would have to Recommend the AMD 9850. With a the stock cooler im idle at 40c and load at 52c. with my Zalman 9500a im idle 30c and load 41c . this is a very fast cpu and i cant seem to slow this thing down. yes i would totally agree with intel fan boys the Q6600 is faster. but not by a long shot does it own the 9850. and with this GPU im running crysis at 1200p Av-24-Max30 FPS and AC at Av-35Max-40 which is playable at the least take in mind thats with max settings. i normally play at a lil lower Res and my FPS shoots up.

as for pricing

AMD 9850 - $190
GTX 260 - $280
Mobo - 99$

all from Newegg.com

my friend has a HD 4870 and i would agree thats a damn fast card, but with the GTX 260 you get more memory which means higher FPS with larger displays by Inch. here is a link to my Mobo hope this helped abit.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813138128

 

[customisbetter]

THANKS!!!^