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Tom's Hardware > Forum > Systems > New Build > [Solved] Ka ka Combo Breaker! (GTX460+AMD Budget PC)

[Solved] Ka ka Combo Breaker! (GTX460+AMD Budget PC)

Forum Systems : New Build [Solved] Ka ka Combo Breaker! (GTX460+AMD Budget PC)

Approximate Purchase Date: (1-2 weeks (spread over time))

Budget Range: (950-850)

System Usage from Most to Least Important: (Gaming, more Gaming, 3D digital rendering, Standard Def video editing, Cubase)

Preferred Website(s) for Parts: Any site that has reputable RMAing, and/or doesn't involve me driving 300 miles to Atlanta (grr, darn you Microcenter and your so distant yet so glorious CPU prices)

Country of Origin: (USA)

Overclocking: Maybe

SLI or Crossfire: No, but you can convince me otherwise perhaps.

Monitor Resolution: 1280x1024, 1680x1050 <-- soon to be primary

I'm building a new gaming PC for the first time. Price to performance ratio is important to me, I am not looking towards buying a component thats 25% more in price but only 5% more in performance (AMD Phenom II X4 965 black edition v.s. i5-750). anyways let me get to the jist of the question I have.

This Combo on Newegg of a 750w OCZ power supply and the MSI N460GTX CYCLONE 1GD5/OC GeForce GTX 460 (Fermi) Is an amazing deal in my opinion. Priced at $249.98 after rebates
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Comb [...] mbo.506120

Yet I want to use this with an AMD processor. I've heard thats plenty fine enough- you can pair Nvidia cards with AMD, alright, but the mobos that use the AMD are chock full of features that require an ATI card, and I am uncertain if the AMD processor can bring out the full potential of the Nvidia card (PhysX?)

I noticed there were quite a few combo deals for the AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition + a mobo, and was wondering if any of these would be a good idea:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] =25&Page=2

Motherboard wise, I really don't know what's a good deal. I want a board has a good Memory Standard for video editing. (1333 or more, 1333 is fine) And will eventually be getting 8 gigs of RAM, or immediately if the buy is good. Gotta pick a board first though before browsing the memory. I do want whatever pulls the most out of the AMD CPU, and something that would allow overclocking (which I plan to do only in the far future)

I know these choices seem to undershoot my budget but I'm also getting an Acer G215HAbd Black 21.5" 5ms Widescreen LCD Monitor (1920 x 1080 res) for $150
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6824009264

Any thoughts on where to go with this?

Reply to Firewasp

Best answer

^ You can use a Nvidia card with AMD CPU no issues, but in most of the AMD boards, you cannot go SLI, and the boards that support SLI are older and dont have the current features like USB3.0/ SATA 6GB/s,...but if those dont matter, then this board is fine...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Comb [...] mbo.509777
And get the 955 instead of 965, because of the unlokced multiplier, you can easily set it to run @ 965's speed...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Comb [...] mbo.509778

And if going with AMD, then take a look at the 6-Core 1055T, for rendering and stuff, the additional cores would help, but would need a slight overclock to bring out the full potential though, but in gaming performance, dont expect them to be better than the 955 or 965 though...

Reply to gkay09

Thanks. I checked the 1055T and while it is more effective at rendering, It's actually worse in performance in most game benchmarks (Most game programmers have yet to fully utilize 4 cpus let alone 6, ugh.)

I need a second opinion on the SLI though- I have a friend who (like what I wanted to do now) built a computer with SLI compatability and planned on upgrading his computer with the second card a year later. He did, and found it very disappointing, and incredibly difficult to use, and underutilized by game programmers. He mentioned you having to setup custom card settings for each and every game. hearing this, I just planned on getting the single GTX 460, overclocking it a safe amount, and replacing it with an ATI card year or two down the road. So I don't really care for the SLI ability at the moment unless somebody could explain that my friend is an idiot, which I can believe at times.

USB 3.0 isn't that appealing right now (famous last words, when it becomes the new standard...), But having a 6GB/s HDDs would be very nice.

Reply to Firewasp

^ SLI when done right will offer very good performance increase. When did your friend go SLI? I mean with which series ?
Most of the current games utilize multiple card configs well, also the drivers are matured now and offer very good performance increase...
This would give a good idea -
http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] ,2678.html
And check out the scaling of the GTX 460s
http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] ,2694.html

But even your idea of sticking to a single card and later on upgrading to a more powerful cards is very good, also for your current monitor, the GTX 460 would suffice...

Reply to gkay09

How about this build ?
955 + HD 5850
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Comb [...] mbo.494180

ASUs 870A + DVD
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Comb [...] mbo.496441

Samsung F3 1TB + OCZ 550W
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Comb [...] mbo.492760

NZXT M59 + Corsair 4GB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Comb [...] mbo.492964

SSD - OCZ 60GB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820227542

Total - ~$884 | ~$829 After rebates...

Reply to gkay09

Reply to mosox

First off, I really appreciate the help gkay09.

I don't really want to use that build though, theres a few problems with that I think- It has a 6GB/s mobo but no drive using it. Solid states are very nice from what I've read, although I don't know the difference in performance it gives is worth it. The biggest reluctance I'd have towards SSDs is trying to manage the small size of them since most temp files, game saves, and other things get put onto the primary C: Drive without much of any notice.

The HD 5850, would be abit of an improvement, but like you said, with my monitor it'd be overkill at the moment. The power supply is abit low to consider doing a future Crossfire with the motherboard I think.

Thanks for those links to the information on the SLI of the GTX460, That did remove some doubts about the SLI improvement, but I think I'll still stick to the original plan of upgrading to an ATI card later.

That Motherboard you linked- ASUS M4A87TD EVO AM3 AMD 870 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX AMD Motherboard http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813131647

Is very nice, and has a good price. It's definitely a future-proof board from the looks. I'm going to see about building around that while still using the Geforce 460GTX + OCZ 750w PSU $250 combo.

Will I need a non-stock cooler for the CPU to overclock the 955 to the 965 clockspeed? or 10% (er some conservative amount) higher than the 965?

Message edited by Firewasp on 09-22-2010 at 10:55:13 AM

Reply to Firewasp

^ Yeah I understand your concerns about the SSD, but as for SATA 6GB/s, it comes onboard with the current-gen AMD chipsets...So if you go with the 8xx chipsets, all have them...
As for the PSU, true that it would be a bit low if you want to go Crossfire, but instead when that card becomes slow, there would be even more powerful cards that you could upgrade to instead of going Crossfire with a older card, but its your call though...

As for the mobo, its good for a single card setup, but not for Crossfire as the PCIe 2nd slot runs @x4, which would cripple the performance of the 2nd card in Crossfire...
The board that mosox linked is good if you want Crossfire...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Comb [...] mbo.493086

And the stock cooler for both 955 and 965 is same so it would handle that speeds, but higher, then an aftermarket cooler would be good...

Reply to gkay09

Odd, the second motherboard you linked (GIGABYTE GA-890XA-UD3) doesn't list itself as compatible with 1600 RAM, or would it have to be over-clocked up to it?

Thanks for the heads up on the monitors.

Reply to Firewasp

^ Anything above 1333MHz would have to be set in the BIOS manually. But if you leave it default, then any RAM above 1333MHz would run @1333MHz...

Reply to gkay09

Thanks a lot for the heads up, I just ordered this off of Newegg. No brainer, despite the unnessecary $20+ of the 65 over the 55. With the money I saved from that, I'm going to see if I could fit that Radeon 5850 into my budget now ... And dang I hate my states' sales taxes.

Reply to Firewasp

^ Oh yeah that is a solid deal...

Reply to gkay09

Alright, so I've bought
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813130275
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819103727
which was $240.33, darn sales tax. But amazing deal

So with the Motherboard and processor out of the way, This is what I had planned:

Memory + Case Combo
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Comb [...] mbo.492939
the memory is a slower latency time than the Ripjaws Mosox linked thats $5 more, but this combo means getting a very quality case for a good price. Not going this combo would end up costing me at least $30-40 more, which is not worth the upgrade.

Power supply + Video Card Combo (combocombocombocombo[echoes and fades])
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Comb [...] mbo.506120
I have decided I am not going for Crossfire in the future, but having a high power ceiling means a lot of room for upgrades, external devices. Even if I don't get the rebates back (I'm not sure to expect any of them) It will still be a good deal.

The total cost of these two, after tax and shipping will be $480.46, so plus what I already got the total is $720.79.

Last two things I'm looking into is a HDD+Media hub combo, and a DVD drive.

<edited question here out> found the answer to if the mobo came with the 6gbs cord, it does . It was in microscopic text at the bottom of a page on the manufacturer website.
Will I need thermal paste? Or does the default cooler for this chip come with it pre-applied?

Message edited by Firewasp on 09-24-2010 at 03:27:24 AM

Reply to Firewasp

All components bought.
I got the generic $18 DVD drive and the case and memory I picked out was:
G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) -and- LIAN LI Lancool Black , Plastic + Mesh ATX Mid Tower
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Comb [...] mbo.492939

Grand total is $820.75 Which for most people would have been about $70 less without my states sales tax. Now to cross my fingers that every component works, and I can work through the initial "how do I turn this thing on?" experience. Now to read guides, get stuff ready... yeap. exciting stuff.

Over $85.00 saved through use of combos! I'm confident that I maximized bang for buck in this build. Thanks for the help everybody. I'll spare you from resurrecting this thread a week later to tell you guys how it goes.

Message edited by Firewasp on 09-24-2010 at 06:02:13 AM

Reply to Firewasp

Best answer selected by Firewasp.

Reply to Firewasp

Reply to gkay09

^^ Dint refresh...

Reply to gkay09

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