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How can I improve my "Ultimate Gaming System"

M

Mackie2k

Senior member
Just finished up building my new system, I love it so far.....

Unforunately, the overclocking problems with the BIOS are still be addressed by Gigabyte, so I'll just have to put in some better components for now....

Here's what I got, what do you think I should do to make this system better? I was thinking RAID0 or RAID5...and maybe a Creative Audigy2 soundcard..

I've read alot of reviews on RAID0 and RAID5, but still don't know exactly which would be better...

Money is really an issue, this is my ultimate gaming machine......but I don't want to replace the proc with a Fx55 or anything, since AMD is released dual core procs later this year.

[*]Athlon64 3500+ Winchester
[*]1gig Ballistix Ram
[*]Gigabyte K8NXP SLI MB
[*]600W Ultra Power Supply
[*]Western Digital 200gig IDE 8meg Cache 7200 RPM
[*]Onboard Sound
[*]Dual 6800 GT PCIe from EVGA

Any thoughts?
 
Raid 0 is a joke and won't increase performance. Raid 1 at least will give you some redundancy, that might be a nice feature. Raid 5 is a little hardcore for a desktop PC, I doubt you'd get any satisfaction from this... if anything just headaches and alot of money spent on hard drives.

Maybe overclock the vid card to an ULTRA!!!

Might give you a decent increase in FPS during some CounterStrike Source 🙂

 
Originally posted by: Wicked2010
Raid 0 is a joke and won't increase performance. Raid 1 at least will give you some redundancy, that might be a nice feature. Raid 5 is a little hardcore for a desktop PC, I doubt you'd get any satisfaction from this... if anything just headaches and alot of money spent on hard drives.

Maybe overclock the vid card to an ULTRA!!!

Might give you a decent increase in FPS during some CounterStrike Source 🙂
Click to expand...

Well it depends on what you define as performance?

as far as disk performance goes its hardly a joke.

I can load, transfer faster than a non raid setup.

As far as gaming performance goes no I dont notice an FPS boost, I do load faster though


 
Definitely get off of onboard sound. That is really killing you.

Also that Ultra PSU is probably causing all kinds of problems that you aren't noticing on the inside. I would sell it and get a quality PSU.

RAID is not for the average consumer. You would still need one more HDD for RAID 1 and 1 more after that (3) for RAID 5. It isn't worth it. You will see virtually no difference, maybe a second or two loading but other than that nothing. If you really want performance improvement ditch all those HDD's and get SCSI. Also why would you use RAID 1 for a gaming system. All it does is (Mirror) copy everything you install on one drive to the other so if one drive fails the other is still alive. Not meant for the average consumer, once again.

I wouldn't go so far as to say RAID is a joke but definitely not worth it for the average consumer trying to get more speed.

-Kevin
 
I agree with Gamingphreek, get away from the onboard sound, pick up an Audigy 2 ZS, or if you have the bank, an Audigy 4. Also, with RAID, it will only help with stuff like level loads and such, nothing really "big".
 
Originally posted by: geforcetony
I agree with Gamingphreek, get away from the onboard sound, pick up an Audigy 2 ZS, or if you have the bank, an Audigy 4. Also, with RAID, it will only help with stuff like level loads and such, nothing really "big".
Click to expand...

Audigy 4 is not worth it. All it does is update the SnR (Signal To Noise Ratio), IIRC it gives slightly better DACs (Digital to Analog) converters, and has an updated version of the APU. Not worth the extra money.

Also RAID doesn't even really help on loading levels. MAYBE 1 or 2 secs but really the only time when RAID will really shine is when transferring HUGE files and what not.

See Anands review on RAID for more benches.

-Kevin
 
Spend at most 200 on sound card but ONLY if you already have good speakers, get a better psu, and if you really have cash to burn, scsi.
 
So far the Ultra Power Supply has been really great with the Gigabyte board.....

I haven't noticed any issues whatsoever with it.

I know some people have had issues with the ULTRA Power Supplies with the plug in cabling system.....

that's not what I have....

I have this:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications...tem-details.asp?EdpNo=30312&CatId=1483

What power supplies do you guys recommend??

I agree with the Sound Card, I plan on getting a Audigy 2 ZS, don't see the point of the Audigy 4........I doubt the PERF is any better....

As far as RAID goes, I see the value in RAID 0, with a couple nice drives........but RAID5 probably isn't worth it......

This is just a gaming machine, so redundancy isn't really that important.
 
Originally posted by: Dewey
Originally posted by: Gamingphreek
Definitely get off of onboard sound. That is really killing you.
Click to expand...

Why is onboard sound "killing him"?
Click to expand...

Because it has VERY VERY high CPU utilization. Poor quality. Look at Anands latest M/B review with the Audio tests. Granted Intels HD audio is supposed to be decent, and VIA's Envy is supposed to be good the only one that really caught on was soundstorm. Other than that onboards is horrible.

-Kevin
 
Originally posted by: Dewey
Originally posted by: Gamingphreek
Definitely get off of onboard sound. That is really killing you.
Click to expand...

Why is onboard sound "killing him"?
Click to expand...

cuz if you have slightly good ears, you can tell that the onboard sound is really crappy. also, onboard audio takes up cpu bandwidth, so ya, get a sound card.
 
Originally posted by: Mackie2k
So far the Ultra Power Supply has been really great with the Gigabyte board.....

I haven't noticed any issues whatsoever with it.

I know some people have had issues with the ULTRA Power Supplies with the plug in cabling system.....

that's not what I have....

I have this:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications...tem-details.asp?EdpNo=30312&CatId=1483

What power supplies do you guys recommend??

I agree with the Sound Card, I plan on getting a Audigy 2 ZS, don't see the point of the Audigy 4........I doubt the PERF is any better....

As far as RAID goes, I see the value in RAID 0, with a couple nice drives........but RAID5 probably isn't worth it......

This is just a gaming machine, so redundancy isn't really that important.
Click to expand...

RAID 0 isn't worth it at all either. If you want a really fast coputer or simply a faster storage interface than ditch ATA altogether and get SCSI.

As for the PSU, you are not noticing it but im sure your components are. Voltage spikes etc.. I would sell that for ~60, pitch in another $50 and get an OCZ Powerstream. Or if you want even more power and a little better quality go for the high end PCP&C.

-Kevin
 
If you are loving it Why do you want it better? You can hardly make it significantly better. Maybe OC your GT to Ultra. And get rid of the onboard sound. You can get an audigy 2 ZS for $60 or $70.
 
Onboard sound may be of lesser quality, but I don't think it kills performance. Seriously, will anybody notice 1-3% difference? Quality though is another issue. Some setups can have audible crackling or buzzing sounds (especially during HDD access and mouse movements). If the OP can hear these artifacts, then get a PCI sound card. Which to get... depends. C'mon guys, there are companies besides Creative Labs that make decent sound cards. Heck, I'd imagine that all the CRAP that the Creative Labs drivers install would offset any lower CPU usage. I've been happy with my various Envy24T chipset sound cards and my Turtle Beach Santa Cruz.

As for the system, get a 74GB Raptor for the boot/applications drive and use the 200GB for data. That should boost performance a bit, along with overclocking video and CPU.
 
A Raptor will do virtually nothing. Look at the benchmarks that Anand did. The Seagate Barracuda's are much cheaper, have a larger storage capacity, and with NCQ and a lot of other times are just as fast as a raptor. Once again the only time the Raptors "superiority" will be shown is when transferring enormous files, other than that virtually no difference.

Also onboard sound does kill performance. You could see a 15fps increase by just going to sound that has an APU. With onboard sound the CPU does all the processing, with a 3rd party sound card (Creative) or with something such as Soundstorm, they have an APU (Audio Processing Unit). Instead of the CPU doing the work all the load gets offloaded to the APU. Ill garauntee you there is a large performance increase.

-Kevin
 
Originally posted by: Gamingphreek
other times are just as fast as a raptor.

Also onboard sound does kill performance. You could see a 15fps increase by just going to sound that has an APU. Ill garauntee you there is a large performance increase.
Click to expand...

I do agree with you on the Raptors to an extent. Besides sustained DTR there will also be an improvement with seek times.

With sound, I'd like to see some comparisons with benchmarks. I recall reading that sound takes a few CPU %. If that 15FPS is the difference between 15 and 30, then it's huge. If it is the difference between 300 and 315, then I'm not gonna sweat it. Links anyone? I'd like to know because if it indeed is such a huge difference, then I would feel bad saying it is okay to use onboard sound for such a high-end system.
 
Link

This should tell you all you need to do. If your CPU is devoting 30% of its time just for audio you are going to suffer a huge framerate drop. Ill post some more but im going to be up until 1am doing AP Homework so it might not happen until tomorrow.

-Kevin
 
Originally posted by: PhoenixOrion
A nice widescreen lcd to showcase what a 3500/6800gt sli can do.
Click to expand...

LOL.....

Here's some pictures of my SYSTEM and my LCD's

I already do.....Dual 2005FPW's.......but the 2nd one has become fairly worthless with SLI....

The Dell Rep at my work is going to upgrade one of them to the 2405 most likely.....
 
Originally posted by: Gamingphreek
Link

This should tell you all you need to do. If your CPU is devoting 30% of its time just for audio you are going to suffer a huge framerate drop.
Click to expand...

Point well taken. Some thoughts...

- I now wonder how well my generic VIA Envy24T card and my Santa Cruz do...

- I see that implementation can have a huge effect on CPU utilization, not just the fact that it is "onboard" or uses "cheap ALC chipset."

- The huge jump in CPU utilization comes with using 3D audio. Though there is a difference in 2D audio, not as drastic.

My new recommendations are:

If you are flat broke and cannot afford an add-in soundcard, no shame in using onboard..

If you absolutely want the best performance, use PCI add-in soundcard.

If you want to use 3D sound (does that mean EAX, 5.1/7.1, etc.?) use PCI add-in soundcard.

If you do not use 3D sound... tossup.

I guess it all comes down to budget and usage (well, and whether your particular onboard sound crackles).

I guess I haven't noticed much because I don't use 3D sound/EAX. Thanks for the link, Gamingphreek.
 
Money isn't the issue......

Probably going to get the Audigy 2 Platinum, because it has the BLACK Drive Bay Controller......and it's $80 cheaper than the Audigy 4....
 
Originally posted by: Gamingphreek
A Raptor will do virtually nothing. Look at the benchmarks that Anand did. The Seagate Barracuda's are much cheaper, have a larger storage capacity, and with NCQ and a lot of other times are just as fast as a raptor. Once again the only time the Raptors "superiority" will be shown is when transferring enormous files, other than that virtually no difference.

Also onboard sound does kill performance. You could see a 15fps increase by just going to sound that has an APU. With onboard sound the CPU does all the processing, with a 3rd party sound card (Creative) or with something such as Soundstorm, they have an APU (Audio Processing Unit). Instead of the CPU doing the work all the load gets offloaded to the APU. Ill garauntee you there is a large performance increase.

-Kevin
Click to expand...

GamingPhreek - i am sorry but i do not agree with you! if you check quite a few reviews you will find that the raptor drive is up there with the SCSI 10k HDD's (sorry for no linky) you are right in saying that you do not gain much from raid 0 so i would not recommend that, but the performance of the reptor is exceptional against most 7.2k rpm HDD's, and you will find the raptor is priced at a third of the price compared to equvilent scsi drives (shame about the poor size of the HDD tho)

Also correct me if i am wrong but i do beleive to run a SCSI drive you wil need a PCI adaptor card to run scsi drives. Now if you look at servers that have dedicated 64 bit PCI-X slots that connect staright to the southbridge and do offer the full bandwidth, current consumer mobos for what this user is using does not support that, also i think you will find that of course you can fit a PCI SCSI controller card to his mobe and other normal PCI slot mobos, but you will find that the pci slot works at 33Mhz and has a 100Mbs transfer rate as apposed to 66Mhz on PCI-x which will be able to exceed 200Mbs (which again you will only find on server mobo's). This inturn is slower then SATA 150 (150Mbs) i know that current SATA drives are not hitting there full potential yet but still you will have a higher transfer rate then scsi on normal PCI 33 Mhz ..... Therfore SCSI HDD's are pointless for these mobos without dedicated 64bit PCI-X slots, and not to mention the price and noise (15k ones) 😉 !!!!

Another thing is with the NCQ on the seagate 16Mb drives, the NCQ is not operational on any motherboard yet as this is not yet supported, and this feature is very dependant on what you intend to do on you rig... I think with the way it works which i cant quite remeber it wont benfit you in games etc ... its more inclined for multi tasking i.e. constantly accessing data from the hard drive like using Excel etc...

Feel free to flame its just MHO 😉
 
sorry posted twice 😕

Aso with the above post ^^^^^^ if anything is incorrect then please correct me if i am wrong 😉
 
I agree with above posts.
Get the Audigy2 ZS, it does make a differance.

What are your frame rates in CS:S? You should be getting 100.

I'm also stuck with my OC at 230mz, so I know it's frustrating to hit a roadblock.

I plan on upgrading my CPU after the FX57 comes out later this year.
 
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