Falcon? Maingear? What's a good prebuilt + stupid questions

[Wolfpup]

I've had notebooks for 5 years now but am thinking of going back to desktops, and no, I don't want to build one even though I used to.

I'm familiar if not blown away by Falcon Northwest, not so familiar with the other brands like Maingear, Origin, CyberpowerPC (which vs the others is more of just a parts assembler), etc.

I want air cooled, not liquid, and a lot of these only list liquid cooling now, but both Falcon and Origin have said they'll build me a system with air cooling. Maingear has a few that seem to be able to be configured with air cooling.

Maingear has this 'vybe' system for fairly cheap, for some reason Intel is only liquid cooling, but on the 4GHz or below AMD version it lists air cooling. I know the Bulldozer derivatives aren't as good but I'm sure it would still be fine, and I wouldn't mind supporting AMD. If I got that Vybe I'd be getting AMD's 4GHz 8-core, and either 1 or 2 R9 280x's. Not sure how AMD's driver situation is right now, nor whether crossfire actually works with no stuttering, but it's cheap... Would do the 280x over the 290 as the 290 is apparently LOUUUUD, and I'd prefer any system I get to not be too crazy.

If I got an F131 or Falcon's Talon special done with air cooling I'd get a single Geforce GTX 780 probably. (F131 seems like swapping hard drives would be tricky...guess they're on the opposite side of the case from the video cards?, and the Vybe seems to only take a single drive...)

Also wondering how big of a power supply do you need for say a dual Titan system? I'm probably not ever going to do anything that crazy, but I'd hypothetically like to be able to upgrade to any 2 video cards I wanted to in the future. Falcon uses Silverstone I think, and I was thinking I'd go for a 1000 watt supply from them (I figure it's not that expensive anyway, and easier than swapping it out later, even though I'd probably be getting a single 780 from them). (my understanding is it shouldn't be wasteful from a power standpoint to oversize the PSU...maybe at worst it would be a little less efficient at the actual level of power my system is drawing, but otherwise it just wouldn't be drawing extra power).

Maingear's Vybe and F131 both seem to max out at an 860 corsair PSU, so that's what I'd get. I'd assume an 860 watt PSU will work for a single Titain, but not sure about dual cards.

Anyway...just wondered what you guys thought!

Oh, and any thoughts on a monitor? I'm thinking one of Dell's 24" Ultrasharp monitors with a soundbar. Looks like dell currently sells at least 2 different Ultrasharp 1080p monitors, so I guess I'd get the more expensive one lol. (I've been very happy with years of Dell monitors so far, so figure that saves me some research time.)

 

[Wolfpup]

I should ask too if there's any weirdness with AMD CPU based systems today? My last experience was an Athlon 64 system I built which was DOA, and before that an original Athlon system from Falcon, which was NEVER stable even after a year of constant BIOS updates from Asus...I eventually tossed the board and CPU and bought a Pentium 3 equivalent which ran fine, but after those experiences I'm not blown away by AMD nor by Falcon NW, as frankly they should have done something about that situation. That was all like 10 years ago though...

Ditto question about AMD's GPUs, if I went that Vybe route. I've sworn by Nvidia's drivers since 1 month after the TNT 1's launch (had issues the first 3 weeks, but they got them nailed down after that, and have had basically zero issues with Nvidia in the 15 years since then). AMD...I know has microstutter, worse drivers, on the notebook side is an absolute non-starter as just getting drivers that work on a given CPU/GPU combo is a disaster (why Alienware wisely IMO ditched AMD options from their new notebooks). Soooo buying that Vybe may not be too bright, but it's cheap, wouldn't mind supporting AMD, and I'd think 1 or 2 280x cards in THEORY would run games well...

 

[DaveSimmons]

For gaming you want an Intel CPU.

If you're reading hype about AMD "Mantle" that only applies to graphics cards. If you're reading hype about the consoles using AMD, they are using slow 1.6 GHz cores that are slower clock-for-clock -- so they are less than half the speed of the cores in an intel chip.

Intel makes the best CPUs for gaming. My A64 X2 was great back in the day, but that was last decade.

Assembly really is pretty simple if you get a full-size case, but if you insist on paying for assembly then CyberPower has a good mix of standard parts. Get a name-brand PSU like a Seasonic.

 

[jaydee]

My understanding is CPU (mid to high end, either brand) is relatively unimportant if your only gaming with a single GPU.

 

[Essence_of_War]

My understanding is CPU (mid to high end, either brand) is relatively unimportant if your only gaming with a single GPU.

Depends on a lot of factors including the particular games being played, resolutions, etc.

Many games, such as Skyrim and SC2, only make use of one or two cores, and thus typically see better results from Intel's significantly better single-core performance

Some games, particularly newer ones like Crysis 3 scale very well with higher core/thread counts so CPUs from both Intel and AMD tend to perform similarly.

Depending on specifics of budget, and willingness to overclock, CPUs from from one manufacturer or the other might be a better fit.

Edit:

Oh, and any thoughts on a monitor? I'm thinking one of Dell's 24" Ultrasharp monitors with a soundbar. Looks like dell currently sells at least 2 different Ultrasharp 1080p monitors, so I guess I'd get the more expensive one lol. (I've been very happy with years of Dell monitors so far, so figure that saves me some research time.)

Do you want/need a new monitor? The 1920x1200 24'' ultrasharps are great monitors. Were you looking to add more?

 

[Wolfpup]

I've actually put all my monitors into other use now, so need a new one. Think I'm going with a 24" ultrasharp though not really sure what the difference is between the two models they seem to be selling now is.

No one has one of these botuique builders they like? Maingear's prices seem pretty good, but...no idea. I don't really want to use CyberpowerPC after reading a bunch of horror stories, and Maingear's about the same price depending on what you get anyway...looks like Falcon and Velocity are both at least a few hundred more though.

 

[Essence_of_War]

Currently, there are two 24'' ultrasharps, the u2412m, and the u2413 (update of the u2410). Both are 1920x1200 IPS panels.

The 2413 (and 2410) are pro-quality wide-gamut monitors.
The 2412m is a standard gamut monitor.
Unless you're doing photography or videography at a level where color correctness is essential, the 2412m is the better choice.

 

[jaydee]

Currently, there are two 24'' ultrasharps, the u2412m, and the u2413 (update of the u2410). Both are 1920x1200 IPS panels.

The 2413 (and 2410) are pro-quality wide-gamut monitors.
The 2412m is a standard gamut monitor.
Unless you're doing photography or videography at a level where color correctness is essential, the 2412m is the better choice.

There's a 3rd. U2414H, which is 1920x1080 and has a very thin bezel and some other neat, but seldom used features, like DP out (daisy-chain capable), HDMI-MHL port, etc.

http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=us&cs=04&l=en&sku=860-BBCG

 

[Essence_of_War]

Good catch, I didn't even know about that one!

 

[Wolfpup]

I'd not seen that either! Doesn't look bad! Thanks for that, and the explanation of the difference between those two other models. Essence, you did a better job explaining that than Dell does LOL

Now I just need to figure out what PC I'm buying lol

 

[Necrolezbeast]

I've no experience with their desktops, but I've been running a cyberpower pc laptop, the fangbook, for 8 months now and still love it.

I was scared with the horror stories and buying a completely new system they'd just started building,but it's been great. The only negative thing I could say is that I requested the RAM they installed to be placed in the two slots under the keyboard so I could use the quick access slot for the RAM I ordered and they said yes to the request, but still installed in the quick access panel... Added a few moments to setting it up and I really didn't want to have to tear it apart so much before use... Not much of a complaint though

I'd vote that the quality of components used is more important than the boutique putting it together.. so just make sure that things like the psu aren't skipped out on.

 

[SithSolo1]

Just throwing this out there but NCIX US will assemble and test a system with parts you buy from them. Its $50 and comes with a 1-year in house warranty plus they send you all the boxes for RMAs after that point. Might be a way to save a few bucks while getting the exact parts you want but haven't dug that deep into reviews so far.

 

[Bolas]

I like www.xoticpc.com and www.digitalstormonline.com

 

[piasabird]

I have purchased parts from this store a time or two but never a complete sysem. No flashy pictures or outragious claims. I dont think they do overclocking.

www.directron.com

One thing they dont sell is ASROCK Motherboards.