Recent content by JDrew

  1. J

    Trouble with more recent games

    It depends - I guess that's the million dollar question (er...well, $650ish question in this case:P). I looked at the prices of the 7970 from where I would buy (NCIX Canada) and the cheapest I saw was ~ $330CDN, which is a bit pricey and would use up a fair percentage of my budget. The 7950 is...
  2. J

    Trouble with more recent games

    The game itself was unplayable when I first tried it (I didn't run the benchmark until after the fact). When I first tried running the game, I configured the settings on the game launcher and even the main menu on first boot was a slide show (which I took as a bad sign:P) - I had to...
  3. J

    Trouble with more recent games

    That seemed to do it (I guess this is why we ask;)). I ran the in-game benchmark and so long as I set "tessellation", "post-processing", and "high precision" (whatever that is) to "OFF", I can pretty much crank up everything else at native resolution and things are good. I ran the in game...
  4. J

    Trouble with more recent games

    Hi everyone, I have been patchwork upgrading over the past year or so on an as-needed basis (forums have been helpful), but I think I am starting to run into issues with newer games brought in through the most recent Steam sale:P Brief specs: Q9550@3.4 4GB DDR2 PC-6400 EP45-UD3R (rev 1.1)...
  5. J

    Best SSD for a motherboard with no SATAIII support?

    Hi everyone, Quick question - a check of the SSD sticky and Google did not answer my question, so I thought I would run this by you... I currently have an Intel 320 Series 80GB SSD bought mid-2011 running via SATA II on a Gigabyte EP45-UD3R motherboard. While I know that I am capped as far...
  6. J

    Budget 27" monitor

    Hi everyone, I wanted to look a bit further into a question that I had that came out of an issue I had in the general hardware forum thread. I am looking at the various options to upgrade my current monitor - it is a 24" 1920x1200 Westinghouse L2410NM that I bought back in the summer of 2007...
  7. J

    Has my system hit the upgrade limit?

    OK - thanks for the feedback. Adding in an extra 4GB of RAM should be fairly straightforward. I wanted to follow up on the comment that peripherals might be a better investment for my setup. Given my setup, what would your opinions be as to swapping out my 24" Westinghouse (bought in summer...
  8. J

    Has my system hit the upgrade limit?

    Hi everyone, It's spring, which can only mean that it's time to address the upgrade itch again;) I have actually come to the conclusion that I do not wish to replace or do a massive update to my current system (specs below). Most games I have on the go or have played recently have run fairly...
  9. J

    Budget upgrade options?

    Thanks for the feedback. The system still seems to be holding out fine on a day-to-day basis, but since I have no point of comparison I am wondering if I am losing out on reasonable performance I could be getting (like when I first got my SSD I did not think that much about my startup/loading...
  10. J

    Budget upgrade options?

    Hi everyone, My current setup is about 3 years old (with some upgrades along the way) and I am looking to see if there is a good upgrade path for my purposes. I tend to do a major overhaul/new system every 3 or 4 years and upgrade at the mid-point (usually the video card). Anyhow, current...
  11. J

    Issue with new LCD used as a PC monitor

    OK, changing the mode seemed to do it (although I had to create a custom resolution as well) - the manual doesn't factor in PC monitor usage so their definition of 'standard mode' is different than mine:D Thanks.
  12. J

    Issue with new LCD used as a PC monitor

    Hi - thanks for the reply. I checked the back of the TV - the model number corresponds to the 1080p model according to their website (Seiki Digital). Hmmm...so unless its a mislabeled TV in the wrong box I must have the right TV - is there any other reason why it might not be extending beyond...
  13. J

    Issue with new LCD used as a PC monitor

    Hi everyone, Probably a straight-forward question but I wanted to have a second opinion before returning the TV. I bought a 32" 1080p LCD to use as a monitor for my PC. The particular TV I bought comes in two models - a 1366x768 version and a 1920x1080 version. I purchased the 1920x1080...
  14. J

    Windows 7 on primary SSD suddenly won't boot

    Hi everyone, Briefly, my specs: Q9550 @ 3.4 4GB (2X2) Corsair XMS3 GTX 570 Primary HD - 60gb OCZ Vertex 1 (Indilinx) - Windows 7 x64 SP1 install Secondary HD - 320GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 - Windows XP x32 SP3 install + storage for the Windows 7 install Problem: I primarily use Windows 7...
  15. J

    Upgrade old SSD/hard drive?

    Thanks for the replies. One other option - would buying a second Seagate Barracuda http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=38...acture=Seagate and setting up a RAID help me as far as load times go if I store my games there? I haven't set something like this up before, but I am sure I can learn...