20 replies to this topic

[MrMastodonFarm]

I am thinking about putting together my own desktop PC. I was wondering if anyone had any resources that might be useful to learn specifics. Any information helps. I would prefereably like to run games at their highest setting (for the cheapest price of course ).

I was also wondering if for a nice gaming rig I should use water cooling. Any suggestions?

[Ezendor]

What is your budget and what are you keeping from your current PC?

Edited by Ezendor, 12 November 2012 - 04:00 AM.

[MrMastodonFarm]

Ezendor, on 12 November 2012 - 04:00 AM, said:

What is your budget and what are you keeping from your current PC?

My budget is looking to be anywhere around $2000.

More than anything else, I just would like to have a desktop for the ease of use and power.

My current PC is a semi-customized Asus u47vc. Here are some specs....

- Graphics Video Card: nVIDIA GT 620M 1024MB PCI-Express DDR3 DX11 with Optimus™ Technology
- Ram: 12GB DDR3 1600MHz [SKU-41814P] (Dual Channel Memory (1x4GB + 1x8GB SODIMMS))
- Primary Hard Drive: 750GB 5400RPM 8MB Cache Buffer (Serial-ATA II 3GB/s) - Default (SKU - X5R308)
- Optical Drive Bay: Caching SSD: 128GB OCZ Synapse Cache (Serial-ATA III) Solid-State Drive (ODD Bay)
- Display: 14.1" HD 16:9 "Matte Type" Super Clear Ultra Bright Matte LED Screen (1366x768)
- Processor: 3rd Generation Intel® Ivy Bridge Core™ i5-3210M (2.5GHz - 3.3GHz, 3MB Intel® L3 Cache)
- Wireless Network: Intel® Ultimate-N 6300 - 802.11A/B/G/N Wireless LAN Module (Includes 3rd Antenna) (Dual Band)
- Operating System: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-Bit Pre-Installed + Drivers & Utilities Disk

Edited by MrMastodonFarm, 12 November 2012 - 12:17 PM.

[Quaker]

MrMastodonFarm, on 12 November 2012 - 03:09 AM, said:

I am thinking about putting together my own desktop PC. I was wondering if anyone had any resources that might be useful to learn specifics. Any information helps. I would prefereably like to run games at their highest setting (for the cheapest price of course ).

You can get lots of info right here in the Buying & Building forum.
http://www.guildwars...uying-building/
Basically, you'll want an i5-3570K (or better) with an HD7870 or GTX-660, or better.

Quote

I was also wondering if for a nice gaming rig I should use water cooling. Any suggestions?

Water-cooling would only be desirable if you get into extreme overclocking. For no overclock, or even 'normal' overclocking, air cooling is just fine. If you plan to overclock, a CM Hyper 212 EVO is all you'd likely ever need.
Of course, some people do water cooling just for the 'techie' aspect, but it's generally not needed.

Edited by Quaker, 12 November 2012 - 03:33 PM.

[Vayra86]

With that budget, find the nearest most recent Best Buy Desktop guide for that budget and build that system. What are your other requirements? 2k is a lot of money for a gaming rig, you could easily get something high end and given the nature of your posts I doubt you would utilize all that power/money efficiently.

It really is not difficult to get your own components and stick em in a case, and saves you a good buck plus the ability to customize to your own needs.

Check out the threads already in this forum because this has been dealt with.

Note: coming from your current spec list, there really isn't much more you need to run GW2 other than a better GPU. This is currently your bottleneck.

Edited by Vayra86, 12 November 2012 - 03:36 PM.

[MrMastodonFarm]

Vayra86, on 12 November 2012 - 03:34 PM, said:

With that budget, find the nearest most recent Best Buy Desktop guide for that budget and build that system. What are your other requirements? 2k is a lot of money for a gaming rig, you could easily get something high end and given the nature of your posts I doubt you would utilize all that power/money efficiently.

I was really looking to go for nice componentry so I can use it in college, and so I won't have to spend more money on a new one anytime soon, just the random componentry update every now and then. I have the money now, so I am looking to get something good out of it.

Do you think it would be wise to get a middle of the line one now, and upgrade components as the need arises?

Quaker, on 12 November 2012 - 03:32 PM, said:

Basically, you'll want an i5-3570K (or better) with an HD7870 or GTX-660, or better.

What is the big difference between getting an i5 and an i7. They seem so similar when compared online. Will it change gameplay or anything useful that much?

Edited by MrMastodonFarm, 12 November 2012 - 10:51 PM.

[sqwertty278448]

With "around $2000" is a TON of money.

This is a gaming rig that will definitely play every single game in existence on any monitor on the absolute highest graphics setting, while having 20 other applications/games open, and still average 80+ fps.

http://www.cyberpowe...om/saved/1EL7KT

Intel Core i7-3770k
32gb RAM
TWO AMD Radeon 7970 3gb running in CrossfireX/SLI
1000 Watt power supply
1TB SATA-III 6.0Gb/s 32Mb Cache 7200RPM HDD

Thats if you dont mind spending $2200+ on a overkill gaming PC...

Edited by sqwertty278448, 13 November 2012 - 08:20 PM.

[Zerk2012]

sqwertty278448, on 13 November 2012 - 12:04 AM, said:

With "around $2000" is a TON of money.

This is a gaming rig that will definitely play every single game in existence on any monitor on the absolute highest graphics setting, while having 20 other applications/games open, and still average 80+ fps. Money back if i am false.

This PC is the definition of OverKill.....

http://www.cyberpowe...om/saved/1EL7KT

Intel Core i7-3770k
32gb RAM
TWO AMD Radeon 7970 3gb running in CrossfireX/SLI
1000 Watt power supply
1TB SATA-III 6.0Gb/s 32Mb Cache 7200RPM HDD

Thats if you dont mind spending $2200+ on a overkill gaming PC...

I think I just peeeeeddd myself some THIS GAME IS ABOUT CPU SPEED NOTHING ELSE WITH A DECENT CARD.
You will not get 80+ in WVW geez.PS does that mean you owe me 2K?

[sqwertty278448]

Zerk2012, on 13 November 2012 - 01:36 AM, said:

I think I just peeeeeddd myself some THIS GAME IS ABOUT CPU SPEED NOTHING ELSE WITH A DECENT CARD.
You will not get 80+ in WVW geez.PS does that mean you owe me 2K?

First of all, i wasnt taking about WvW. i was talking about PvE and PvP and stuff

Second, if you did overclock Intel core i7-3770k, you have 32gb ram, and you have two 7970's, yes, yes you will average very very high in WvW. If not 80+, at least 70

[sqwertty278448]

And if you dont have a budget, which is nobody probably, unless you are the son of a millionare or something, this is probably the best PC you can get(extreme overkill):

http://www.cyberpowe...om/saved/1EL80U

Intel Core i7-3970X Extreme Edition Six-Core 3.50 GHz 15MB Intel Smart Cache LGA2011 (All Venom OC Certified)
2TB (2TBx1) SATA-III 6.0Gb/s 64MB Cache 7200RPM HDD (2TB x 2 (2TB Capacity) Raid 1 High Performance with Data Security
32GB (4GBx8) DDR3/1866MHz Quad Channel Memory
THREE AMD Radeon HD 7970 3GB 16X PCIe 3.0 Video Card HIS IceQ Edition running in CrossfireX/SLI
1300 Watt power supply
Liquid cooling

If this PC cant run it, no PC can. And if you overclock it, well, all i can say is, there is no task that this PC will struggle with.
This PC will DEFINETLY run every single game on the highest graphics settings including Guild Wars 2's WvW, on ANY monitor resolution, and will definetly average over 100 fps. Pure overkill. Now obviously i doubt anybody can afford, or would justify spending that much on a PC, but we can always dream.

Edited by sqwertty278448, 13 November 2012 - 08:20 PM.

[SuperNova]

That wouldn't run GW2 on over 100 fps because no PC can due to the game being cpu bound - no amount of extra graphics power helps.  Be careful what you guarantee.

[Quaker]

MrMastodonFarm, on 12 November 2012 - 10:50 PM, said:

What is the big difference between getting an i5 and an i7. Will it change gameplay or anything useful that much?

The main difference between an i5 and an i7 is the HyperThreading. HT is only useful for apps that can make use of the extra threads, such as some video editing apps, etc. Games don`t generally benefit from HT, but I`m not sure if HT may help GW2. You could plan on building with an i5-3570K and if the end result leaves room in the budget, simply change up to an i7-3770K (the rest of the system would stay the same).

Edited by Quaker, 13 November 2012 - 04:18 PM.

[sqwertty278448]

Well, according to toms hardware, http://www.tomshardw...ark,3268-7.html , intel core i7 gets about 5 more average fps and 2 more minimum fps than i5. Not a big difference, but i7 does have slightly better performance

[Essence Snow]

One would also be advised to note that once you start getting into 3-4way sli/crossfire lots of issues start creeping up that start to degrade any performance gained.....ie...creates more problems then it solves.

[MrMastodonFarm]

Quaker, on 13 November 2012 - 04:18 PM, said:

The main difference between an i5 and an i7 is the HyperThreading. HT is only useful for apps that can make use of the extra threads, such as some video editing apps, etc. Games don`t generally benefit from HT, but I`m not sure if HT may help GW2. You could plan on building with an i5-3570K and if the end result leaves room in the budget, simply change up to an i7-3770K (the rest of the system would stay the same).

Ah, I see. I read on here that GW2 can't utilize hyperthreading.

sqwertty278448, on 13 November 2012 - 08:22 PM, said:

Well, according to toms hardware, http://www.tomshardw...ark,3268-7.html , intel core i7 gets about 5 more average fps and 2 more minimum fps than i5. Not a big difference, but i7 does have slightly better performance

That doesn't seem like a huge difference. Worth the money?

[sqwertty278448]

Quote

That doesn't seem like a huge difference. Worth the money?

Well, if you dont mind spending a little extra for a little extra perfomance than go for it. If you really dont want to spend more or you are on a budget get an i5.

basically if you have some money left over after deciding all the other componenets, get the i7 but if you cant spend more get i5

[MrMastodonFarm]

sqwertty278448, on 14 November 2012 - 07:57 PM, said:

basically if you have some money left over after deciding all the other componenets, get the i7 but if you cant spend more get i5

More important than sinking that money into an upgraded graphics card?

[sqwertty278448]

MrMastodonFarm, on 14 November 2012 - 11:40 PM, said:

More important than sinking that money into an upgraded graphics card?

Depends what graphics card you are getting, and what you could get if you didnt buy i7. or if you can afford it get both

if your using 1366x768, then it should be pretty easy to get ultra on it with a graphics card. which gpu are you getting??

[MrMastodonFarm]

sqwertty278448, on 14 November 2012 - 11:46 PM, said:

if your using 1366x768, then it should be pretty easy to get ultra on it with a graphics card. which gpu are you getting??

I am thinking about getting one of the higher end nvidia GTX series. How do they compare to the Radeon ones? I have never played with a Radeon GPU. I feel pretty good about Nvidia's products.

[typographie]

MrMastodonFarm, on 14 November 2012 - 11:47 AM, said:

That doesn't seem like a huge difference. Worth the money?

The i7's of the same generation come stock at slightly higher clock speeds than their i5 counterparts, a difference that can be made up with a simple BIOS setting. Most benchmarks are run at stock speeds unless they specify otherwise. So no, that almost-illusory difference does not justify paying $100 more on its own.

Of course, $2000 is a very, very large budget. Its not hard to find situations where i7's really shine, they're just usually not games. It depends on what else, if anything, you want to do with this machine.

MrMastodonFarm, on 15 November 2012 - 12:23 PM, said:

I am thinking about getting one of the higher end nvidia GTX series. How do they compare to the Radeon ones? I have never played with a Radeon GPU. I feel pretty good about Nvidia's products.

Everyone probably has their own horror stories, but AMD products are as solid and reliable as Nvidia's. Due to recent driver improvements, AMD has a card on the market now that matches every Nvidia product, and often can be found for a bit cheaper. They also tend to have extremely wide memory bandwidth compared to their Nvidia counterparts, which can be helpful in some games/monitor setups.

I don't mean to dissuade you from Nvidia necessarily, but there's no practical reason not to consider both.

Edited by typographie, 15 November 2012 - 03:37 PM.

[Lord Sojar]

Essence Snow, on 13 November 2012 - 08:28 PM, said:

One would also be advised to note that once you start getting into 3-4way sli/crossfire lots of issues start creeping up that start to degrade any performance gained.....ie...creates more problems then it solves.

Interestingly enough, I've found that 3x GTX 580s in TriSLi gave me a phenomenal performance boost.... GW2 is odd.  

In fact, it gave me a higher percentage boost than just adding the 2nd 580.  The only trouble is, I had to rip my normal rig apart to make it happen, so I just run with 2 normally.  But.... GW2's engine is freakshow.   So, at least for Fermi based SLi, tripling up doesn't cause issues.

Granted though, that rig is running an i5-2500k OC @ 5GHz.