My System Build-Need suggestion

[mfenn]

Yesterday, with that ultra-cheap H61 bundle, it wouldn't have. But today the CPU has gone up in price, and that board is out of stock. Today it's hard not to blow the budget with a 2GB 🙄 7850. But it's possible to fit it all in $400, with USB 3.0 and SATA3 on the mobo...

CPU/mobo combo for $179:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboD...=Combo.1029301

VisionTek 7850 from Amazon for $220:
http://www.amazon.com/VisionTek-Radeon-Express-Graphics-900505/dp/B007KJ1URG/ref=sr_1_3

...if you ignore the $7 shipping for the mobo.

:thumbsup: A 7850 is the same speed as or faster than a 6950 and uses less power. Unlocking a 6950 to a 6970 would be higher performance, but wasn't risk-free even in the heyday of dual-BIOS reference cards. I wouldn't push my luck with a late model custom board.

 

[Artista]

Let's not go down that path please. 🙂

True that. If I cant afford $600 cash for the video card I shouldn't get it!

Maybe I can get a wealthy sponsor to donate to the needy!:sneaky:

The sapphire board has dual bios.

When you say "back in the hay day" it makes me laugh. It was earlier this year and last year not in the 1930's which "hay day" reminds me of. Time flys in computer hardware.

 

[mfenn]

When you say "back in the hay day" it makes me laugh. It was earlier this year and last year not in the 1930's which "hay day" reminds me of. Time flys in computer hardware.

So it does. 😎

Flashing is a lot more risky than overclocking though, and I read some reviews of the Sapphire card saying that they were not successful in unlocking the shaders. If you want to get more bang for your buck, I recommend getting the 7850 and overclocking it.

 

[Artista]

I am trying to pick out a MB that has headers for a front esata (not a deal breaker), header for front usb, and a header for the two (pink and green) audio ports. I have a logitech 5.1 surround sound that I use for sound. It would be nice if the MB has four slots for memory so I can expand later. I have two 4Gb sticks now and want to add two more for a total of 16Gb memory. Should be enough, right?

I see listed in many MB headers/ connector descriptions a "front panel connector" what is that?

 

[mfenn]

I am trying to pick out a MB that has headers for a front esata (not a deal breaker), header for front usb, and a header for the two (pink and green) audio ports. I have a logitech 5.1 surround sound that I use for sound. It would be nice if the MB has four slots for memory so I can expand later. I have two 4Gb sticks now and want to add two more for a total of 16Gb memory. Should be enough, right?

I see listed in many MB headers/ connector descriptions a "front panel connector" what is that?

A front panel header can technically refer to any pins that are used by a cable that runs to the front panel of the case, but typically refers to the power and reset buttons and the front LEDs.

As for your desired connections, the front USB and audio connections come one every motherboard out there and front panel eSATA is just a normal SATA connector internally. The combo that Ken g6 recommended includes a board that meets all of those requirements.

It only has two DIMMs slots though. I think that this is fine because you're unlikely to find a general use task that can be performed with the current generation of processors that won't fit into 8GB of RAM. By the time you're ready to upgrade, you'll want to do the CPU, mobo, and RAM again. That being said, if you feel that having 4 DIMM slots is still really important to you, the Biostar B75MU3+ will meet your needs. It's a more expensive board and you lose out on the combo deal, so your total cost will go up by $16.

 

[Artista]

mfen thank you for your assistance. Your probably right. I will go look. I was doing a power search on newegg and was having a heck of a time weeding through all those boards.

When it comes to esata I just figured I would get a external hard drive to back up the internal hard drive and ssd drive. Then do it every week or so automatically.

Question: On the board you suggested(or others suggested that have only three audio ports in the rear), since I have a 5.1 surround audio for the pc, can I configure the three audio ports on the board, specifically the pink (input) on the back of the board to provide the three outputs I need for 5.1 (I think you need three) THEN use the front audio header for the front panel audio and use that for voice input. (dragon, gaming, skype, etc)

In other words can you change the rear input (pink) to a output for 5.1 surround? (the devil is in the details lol) 🙂

 

[mfenn]

Some onboard audio codecs can do dynamic jack reassignment, but I don't know that the ALC662 in the Biostar B75MU3+ and ASRock H61M/U3S3 can. This combo with the i3 2120 and MSI H61MU-E35 will give you the full set of outputs, but it only has 2 DIMMs slots. That probably won't matter as I mentioned above, but if you want those extra DIMM slots, you will need to pony up for something like the ASRock B75 Pro3.

 

[Artista]

Some onboard audio codecs can do dynamic jack reassignment, but I don't know that the ALC662 in the Biostar B75MU3+ and ASRock H61M/U3S3 can. This combo with the i3 2120 and MSI H61MU-E35 will give you the full set of outputs, but it only has 2 DIMMs slots. That probably won't matter as I mentioned above, but if you want those extra DIMM slots, you will need to pony up for something like the ASRock B75 Pro3.

Thank you again. The more eyes to look at parts or people that have specific knowledge of a board the better. I will look at those and make a purchase probably this week. 🙂

I noted the I52500k is $200. That is $20 dollars off. If I knew someone that lived near a micro center I would ask then to pick one up for me, and get it shipped for the last seen price of $159!

I also saw this in the email from newegg this morning. ASRock P67 EXTREME4 GEN3 LGA 1155 Intel P67
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-13157265-L07C

 

[mfenn]

The P67 Extreme4 is a nice board to be sure. It's basically a 3 generation old chipset at this point, so that's why they're trying to unload a fairly high-end board for cheap. It's probably a better deal than the B75 boards, but honestly I would grab an H61 and be done with it.

 

[Artista]

I pulled the trigger on a factory over clocked Radeon 6950 2Gb for final price of $190 after $10 MIR.

Using the suggestions from the fine members here. Since I probably will not overclock, the CPU will be:

Intel Core i3-2120 Sandy Bridge 3.3GHz LGA 1155 65W Dual-Core Desktop Processor $124

On that, is a four core CPU or two core the lowest one should go now days?

I am thinking that getting a motherboard that will allow a LGA 1155 CPU upgrade in the future would be smart. I am though a little confused regarding the different chip sets. (Z67, Z68, Z75, p67, h77, etc) I read them on paper but in the real world why get one vs the other?

I assume that the Z75 is the latest chipset and would allow a longer life and upgrades?

A few choices are:

ASRock Z75 Pro3 LGA 1155 Intel Z75 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813157304

ASRock H77 Pro4/MVP LGA 1155 Intel H77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813157302

The search I used on newegg with the basic criteria I want is here:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...lue=757%3A7618

In a year or two I would probably upgrade my CPU to a Ivy Bridge or whatever the latest CPU that will work in the LGA 1155 Intel socket.

Also then perhaps I would upgrade my GPU. (maybe)

How does the board choice up top look? (ASROCK PRO3 $84)

Thank you

 

[lehtv]

On that, is a four core CPU or two core the lowest one should go now days?

It's not quite that simple.

In general, you should value performance per core over number of cores at any given price point. Performance per core is something that all applications can take advantage of, whereas applications need to be coded to take advantage of several CPU threads. At this time, the number of applications (including games) that can use more than four threads are in the minority, while many still use only one or two. The practical implication here is that for most people it's better to get Intel i3 over AMD FX-4000 or FX-6000 series and Intel i5 over AMD FX-8000 series. Beyond i5, the only way to increase performance is more threads (i7).

Whether you should get an i3 or an i5 - or a Pentium or an i7 - is a matter of budget. The i3 is actually hyperthreaded, so its two cores generate four threads which makes it around 75% as fast as a true quad core (i5) in applications that use at least four threads. At the moment, the lowest you can get an i5 for is $185: i5-3470 (after promo).

In a year or two I would probably upgrade my CPU to a Ivy Bridge or whatever the latest CPU that will work in the LGA 1155 Intel socket.

Not a bad idea. You can probably find plenty of used i5 Ivy Bridge CPUs for sale in two years when Intel releases Broadwell, the die shrink of the upcoming Haswell architecture. I'd say most hardcore users tend to upgrade every other generation.

How does the board choice up top look? (ASROCK PRO3 $84)

If you buy an i3, get the Z75 Pro3 since it supports overclocking - that way you can get full advantage from a used i5-3570K by coupling that upgrade with an aftermarket heatsink. If you get an i5-3470, I'd recommend Asrock H77M for $70. I would go with i5 and H77 myself... In two years, I would want to upgrade to a Broadwell i5.

 

[mfenn]

If you buy an i3, get the Z75 Pro3 since it supports overclocking - that way you can get full advantage from a used i5-3570K by coupling that upgrade with an aftermarket heatsink. If you get an i5-3470, I'd recommend Asrock H77M for $70. I would go with i5 and H77 myself... In two years, I would want to upgrade to a Broadwell i5.

Agree. I don't expect the relative prices of CPUs to increase much in the next few years, so you're better off getting the latest and greatest from Intel at that time. The used CPU market is sometimes dodgey because (a) you don't know if it's been pushed to the limit and (b) people seem to think that they're worth 80% of their original retail price.

 

[Artista]

Agree. I don't expect the relative prices of CPUs to increase much in the next few years, so you're better off getting the latest and greatest from Intel at that time. The used CPU market is sometimes dodgey because (a) you don't know if it's been pushed to the limit and (b) people seem to think that they're worth 80% of their original retail price.

So you think I should get a i5 for a extra $95 (instead of i3) now to future proof?

If so which i5? (Sandy Bridge, Ivy Bridge, etc?)

 

[mfenn]

Has your budget increased by $95? If so, then yes, I'd say to grab the quad now. An i5 3570K would be my preference.

 

[Artista]

Has your budget increased by $95? If so, then yes, I'd say to grab the quad now. An i5 3570K would be my preference.

I guess I am making it increase as I do not want to upgrade for a good while. If it takes a extra $95 bucks for a cpu to make that happen then I am willing to pop for it. I was leaning towards a Sandy Bridge 2500k but I will look at that CPU you recommend.😀

 

[krnmastersgt]

The 3570K is more like an updated version of the 2500K, it's more power efficient and performs slightly better at the same clock speeds. Unfortunately due to a (in retrospect extremely stupid) decision made by Intel the 3570K doesn't do so well with raised voltages, at stock speeds the temperature isn't much of an issue but with raised voltages the temperature rises dramatically.

Either the 2500K or the 3570K is fine, I'd say the 2500K if you like to tinker and fine tune a system and the 3570K if you just want to find a decent stable overclock and then just leave it alone.

 

[lehtv]

Remember that if you want to overclock, you will need a Z75 or Z77 board, and conversely if you don't care about overclocking, you don't need an unlocked (K) CPU.

 

[mfenn]

Remember that if you want to overclock, you will need a Z75 or Z77 board, and conversely if you don't care about overclocking, you don't need an unlocked (K) CPU.

:thumbsup:

 

[Artista]

:thumbsup:

Well the i5 3570k just went on sale at newegg so I popped for that along with a good cpu cooler, some arctic silver, 8 more gb of ram (total 16Gb) and the mb I refer to. (ASRock Z75 Pro3 LGA 1155 Intel Z75 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard )

Spent more money than I originally planned but got every single piece on sale, plus $20 off because I opened a new egg preferred account.

Going to take pictures of everything, plus keep receipt and get a new surge suppressor. That way if anything happens insurance can cover me for the loss.

Now I need to figure out the best way to update the bios/firmware on the video card, the mother board and if possible the harddrive and SSD drive. (Then will load windows, update the os, and load any drivers that isn't loaded with Windows 7, etc.)

Is it possible to update the bios/firmware on the SSD (OCZ)?

If so should I do it using my current computer so the ssd isn't my main drive as it will be in the new build?

 

[mfenn]

I wouldn't tough the VGA BIOS unless you experience a specific issue. It's far too easy to brick your card. Same goes for the HDD. The mobo BIOS you can update easily from within the BIOS itself.

As for the SSD, you've bought a Vertex 2 pretty late in the game, so I wouldn't be surprised if what is on the drive is actually the latest. Regardless, unless you have a really old firmware on your drive, you can non-destructively update the firmware using OCZ's SSD toolbox from within Windows (system drive or not).

 

[Artista]

I wouldn't tough the VGA BIOS unless you experience a specific issue. It's far too easy to brick your card. Same goes for the HDD. The mobo BIOS you can update easily from within the BIOS itself.

As for the SSD, you've bought a Vertex 2 pretty late in the game, so I wouldn't be surprised if what is on the drive is actually the latest. Regardless, unless you have a really old firmware on your drive, you can non-destructively update the firmware using OCZ's SSD toolbox from within Windows (system drive or not).

I will try the tool. I have had some of these parts sitting around for at least a year. lol That includes the OCZ. When I bought the first 8 Gb of Ram it was just released for the Sandy Bridge chipset. The OCZ was the fresh and hot when I bought it. lol I got stuck half way through the build.

When everything arrives I will put together over the weekend and let you know how it is. 😀

 

[Artista]

Well I have the parts and am now going to put it together. Any tips? The assembly order is in question. My case is a Roswell Challenger, which has the power supply location on the bottom.

Motherboard first, then power supply, etc?

How much Arctic silver to I apply to cpu/cpu cooler surface?

I probably can figure it out. lol Never hurts to ask someone who has done it before though! That can save a lot of time and heart ache.

 

[mfenn]

My general order is:

- Attach CPU, RAM, HSF to mobo with the mobo outside of the case.
- Mount mobo in case.
- Connect front panel headers.
- Mount PSU in case, route power cables.
- Mount drives in case, connect power.
- Connect SATA cables.
- Install expansion cards in case.
- Connect ATX and PCIe power.

As for thermal paste, use very little, the size of a grain of rice is more than enough. Over-application of thermal paste is far more common than under-application.

 

[Artista]

Well I got it all together last night. Good news it runs well as far as I can tell.

Bad news: When I loaded Windows 7 it stopped at the point where it asked me which disk to load to. It said my disk were dynamic disks and could not load as well as I could not delete the partition and reformat to the ssd or the 1Tb harddisk. (I had installed them in my old system to test them prior to using them in new system.)

The only thing I can think of is to uninstall them, install them or at least connect them to my old system, and delete the partition. (Since they wont be boot or main drives.) Then reinstall and load Windows 7.

Every hear of this happening? (crazy that windows could not delete the partition during the install!)

Solution?

Interesting side note: in boot up it showed (In bios) my sony dvd drive as two drives. One a AHCI dvd drive and the other a Unified Extensible Firmware Interface sony dvd. I had to choose which one to be my boot drive. I chose AHCI and it worked, when I chose UEFI sony dvd drive it shut off.

 

[mfenn]

Yeah, the Windows installer won't touch dynamic disks. Generally people only go through the extra steps to change disks from Basic to Dynamic if they have a very good reason for doing so (usually software RAID), and the installer doesn't want to touch that. You don't need to pull the disks out of the drive, just boot up a gparted LiveCD and blow away all the partitions.

That does remind me of something though. It is a good idea to only have the SSD plugged in during the initial Windows install so that you ensure that the bootloader (different from the main OS install point) doesn't get accidentally placed on the HDD.

As for the DVD drive, yeah that is pretty weird, haven't seen that one before.