User Tag List

Page 1 of 4 123 ... LastLast
Results 1 to 10 of 32
  1. #1
    Moderator TimTim's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2013
    Posts
    1,804
    Country:

    Thinking of upgrading motherboard/CPU/RAM

    I already have a GTX 970 and a good PSU but my current motherboard, CPU, and RAM is garbage. Good enough to run UT99 at 200+ fps but not good enough to keep UT4 at a stable 144 fps.

    This is what I'm thinking of getting: https://pcpartpicker.com/user/timbur/saved/MWrZxr

    And this is what I'll basically have afterwards (so you can see what I already have): https://pcpartpicker.com/user/timbur/saved/vM3rxr

    Any objections/suggestions? Include reasoning/comparison if so, pretty please.

  2. #2
    Whicked Sick Chamberly's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2012
    Location
    Vandora Temple
    Posts
    5,488
    Country:
    On both of those links, the motherboard, cpu, and ram is the same... ;( so how can I compare?


    http://irc.lc/globalgamers/uscript for uscript discussion.

  3. #3
    Moderator TimTim's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2013
    Posts
    1,804
    Country:
    Quote Originally Posted by Chamberly View Post
    On both of those links, the motherboard, cpu, and ram is the same... ;( so how can I compare?
    Short list are the upgrades. Long list includes the upgrades on top of my current setup. My old setup is irrelevant.

  4. #4
    Administrator SAM's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2011
    Posts
    8,296
    Country:
    Right.....I'm pretty dead at the moment. I've been running a lot this week and I have ran 9 miles each day since Monday in under an hour....and then training on top of that. I will do my best.

    CPU:
    i5 6600K is a solid choice. I see you have watercooling option. Is there a specific reason you are choosing the H105 though? You could achieve clocks of 4.5 GHZ on the H60, save a few dollars there?

    Mobo:
    I personally would have went for the Asus Z170-E. Nothing to back up why, I'm just an Asus guy?

    SSD:
    I personally would go with Sansa or Samsung. I have no experience with PNY. Samsung have a good reputation too.
    Samsung's warranty is pretty good. The Samsung EVO comes with 5 years or 75 TBW. For their PRO range, 5 years (73 TBW for enterprise applications).
    More info here: http://www.samsung.com/global/busine.../warranty.html

    Graphics: nVidia's Pascal generation of GPUs are pretty close to release. They are dubbed to be 10x faster than Maxwell. If you can wait, then wait....I personally would wait. I've been following the leaked release announcement since 2015. No idea yet when, but definitely ear marked for this year.

    PSU: Small saving to be had here...I'd suggest the CS650M. It's more cost efficient. You're not using an SLI config. And in the long term, you would save money in terms of Electric bill. It's good for the environment too, to use less power, where possible.

    In terms of mouse, I'd definitely suggest the Razer Mamba though. Other than that overall a solid build.

  5. #5
    Moderator TimTim's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2013
    Posts
    1,804
    Country:
    @SAM thanks. I already have the SSD, GPU, PSU, and mouse. I'll only be buying the things in the smaller (first) list. Everything else I already have. I will probably get another SSD though. The PNY works well enough but I'm running out of room on it and you're right about other brands being better. I'll probably go with a Samsung SSD next. I got the PNY on a quick trip to my local Best Buy a while back since I wanted an SSD immediately lol.

    As for the liquid cooling, I would like to overclock the 6600k to maybe 4.9 GHz, at least, though I know it can do 4.6 GHz easy with standard cooling. I don't really expect to upgrade again for at least another few years so I figure I might as well get some solid cooling and squeeze as much out of it as I can and maybe it'll be able to keep up with everything for at least 3-5 years. The liquid cooling just to get an extra 300-400 MHz might be unnecessary though lol. IDK what do you folks think? Should I save a few bucks and go with standard air cooling?

    As for the motherboard, my decision there was based on 1) the number of ratings/reviews 2) average rating 3) price range and 4) SLI capabilities. I can't seem to find many reviews on the Asus Z170-E but I may not be looking in the right places. I'll look further tomorrow. I also need to look further into the Gigabyte Z170XP's overclocking abilities, but from the few things I've seen it looks good in that area.

    I definitely want to go with a motherboard with SLI capabilities though, because DX12 is SUPPOSEDLY going to result in massive improvements to parallel processing and actually utilize all of the hardware available such that, say for instance, two 970's would in fact perform almost twice as good as one 970 (hopefully I'm right about that lol). You can even mix and match nVidia and AMD with DX12! So in the future, 2 or 3 years from now when DX12 is hopefully standard in most games, I want to be able to just pop in another GPU and see some really solid performance gains.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by TimTim View Post
    As for the liquid cooling, I would like to overclock the 6600k to maybe 4.9 GHz, at least, though I know it can do 4.6 GHz easy with standard cooling. I don't really expect to upgrade again for at least another few years so I figure I might as well get some solid cooling and squeeze as much out of it as I can and maybe it'll be able to keep up with everything for at least 3-5 years. The liquid cooling just to get an extra 300-400 MHz might be unnecessary though lol. IDK what do you folks think? Should I save a few bucks and go with standard air cooling?
    Decided against the liquid cooling. Gonna save $70 and go with the Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO instead.

    If I ever want that extra ~400 MHz (or more?) in 2-3 years I'll try liquid cooling. At least by then I'll have gotten plenty of use out of the CPU in case anything goes wrong. Thanks @SAM and @seabass.

    I was going place the order this morning but the case jumped up from $70 to $100 overnight. Pretty annoying lol. I'll contact Newegg and maybe they can drop that back down to $70 for me if I tell them I'll order right away. If not, I'll probably just wait until price(s) drop again.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Placed the order. Newegg wouldn't give me the original price but they did give me a $20 gift card to make up for it. Not quite the $30 difference but meh, whatever.

    Looking forward to having a powerful PC again. My current setup has handled things pretty well but it's clearly lagging behind any games made within the past few years. It'll be nice to play games other than UT99 on max settings now lol.
    Last edited by TimTim; 03-10-2016 at 05:55 AM.

  6. #6
    Administrator SAM's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2011
    Posts
    8,296
    Country:
    I still don't think sli or xfire technology has reached the stage where it will be the same as having a single, similarly powerful GPU? In all benches I've seen, the single equivalent GPU is faster and more stable? Until I see the figures though, I don't see a solid case on investing in sli/xfire ready setups.

    If the airflow in your case is good enough you could quite easily over clock to 4.6+ on air. How have you setup fans. How many intakes how many out and how are you dissipating heat/airflow exhaust?

    I know myself and after build, I would want that measly 400mhz. It would have made all the difference to me, even though in real terms probably would not be noticeable. I personally would have went for the H60 though. The possibility to achieve higher clocks would have been there and also it's quiet (due to single fan as opposed to dual fans on the H105). Dare I say will probably clock like for like too. I say all this but you Americans mostly live with AC. So having water cooling is negligent really. It's the European peasants who don't have AC that really need the water cooling.

    But again it is still a solid build. You will have a good time piecing it all together. It's my favourite part

    I am sometimes absolutely blown away by my laptop's performance. Like...how could they build all that into something so small! I'm really looking forward to hearing the frames you get in newer games.
    Last edited by SAM; 03-11-2016 at 06:58 PM.

  7. #7
    Moderator TimTim's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2013
    Posts
    1,804
    Country:
    Quote Originally Posted by SAM View Post
    I still don't think sli or xfire technology has reached the stage where it will be the same as having a single, similarly powerful GPU? In all benches I've seen, the single equivalent GPU is faster and more stable? Until I see the figures though, I don't see a solid case on investing in sli/xfire ready setups.
    Yeah right now dual GPUs are pretty pointless. But DX12 is supposed to change all that to allow each GPU (and all CPU cores) to be used to their full potential, in parallel, regardless of configuration or compatibility. We probably won't see games using DX12 in this way for at least another few years though. The GTX 970 (which I already have) combined with the new motherboad/CPU/RAM should be more than sufficient until then. Plus! When DX12 becomes standard we'll see tons of gains without SLI anyway! Check out this article. The performance boost is unlikely to be 1000% as shown in the article, but even if it's only a 100% boost or even just 50%, that's still crazy significant.





    Last edited by TimTim; 03-11-2016 at 08:32 PM.

  8. #8
    Moderator TimTim's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2013
    Posts
    1,804
    Country:
    AWW YISSSS





    - - - Updated - - -

    I could definitely get more MHz out of the CPU right now (I'm betting at least 4.8 GHz) but there isn't really any point lol. Right now CPU is at 4.4 GHz from 3.5 GHz and GPU is at around 1.45 GHz from 1.1 GHz (something like that). Damn this case is quiet as shit too. I can't hear a thing. It's been so long since I've had an above average PC. Haven't had any need for it... until now.

    Feelsgoodman.

    Last edited by TimTim; 03-12-2016 at 09:32 PM.

  9. #9
    Dominating uranus's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2011
    Posts
    646
    Country:
    DAT GIF DOE!

  10. #10
    Killing Spree Sheepy's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2011
    Posts
    139
    Country:
    Pretty much got the same setup as you @TimTim - happy with it apart from the graphics cars.. not really sattisfied with the 970.
    Are you still thinking bout getting a 2nd one and running them in SLI?
    Heard SLI might be really cool with VR stuff, so thats a plus!
    If you do, lemme know the results - im thinking of either getting a 2nd 970 or buy a pascal titan when they get released and throw my current one in the bin
    Last edited by Sheepy; 03-19-2016 at 10:05 AM.

Thread Information

Users Browsing this Thread

There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)

Tags for this Thread

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •