PC build thread

[flex wood]

What a pain in the ass on the Origin stuff. I'll check that program when the time comes for Steam, perhaps…

I guess the other question is how much does the SSD get me for loading times on games (given the other components above)? Would it be worth the hassle?

Since you used Bioshock infinite as an example of a game, you know the text on the loading screens? I was unable to read more than 2 words of it when I had the game on my solid state. I believe that it does differ from game to game though but it is still much faster when playing anything on a ssd. Honestly with steam mover it is super simple and fast. You just find the location of your steam install directory on both hard drives and it'll populate a list of all the games then you just hit a button to swap it and bam it's moved.

[dsheinem]

What a pain in the ass on the Origin stuff. I'll check that program when the time comes for Steam, perhaps…

I guess the other question is how much does the SSD get me for loading times on games (given the other components above)? Would it be worth the hassle?

Since you used Bioshock infinite as an example of a game, you know the text on the loading screens? I was unable to read more than 2 words of it when I had the game on my solid state. I believe that it does differ from game to game though but it is still much faster when playing anything on a ssd. Honestly with steam mover it is super simple and fast. You just find the location of your steam install directory on both hard drives and it'll populate a list of all the games then you just hit a button to swap it and bam it's moved.

cool, good to know

[noiseredux]

well, as a personal upgrade I *finally* got around to installing my SSD. Obviously would have been smart to do it before I amassed so many games. But there's something sort of zen-like about spending an afternoon migrating files haha.

[jay_red]

I recently gave my PC some love, as I felt my graphics card was starting to show its age (Radeon HD 6870). I did a ton of research and ended up with a Sapphire Tri-x R9 290 4gb. I had decided I wanted a 290, but was not gonna deal with a reference design card, and this one had a lot of good reviews, noting that the noise levels were very low. The card is huge, and I had to modify my case a little bit to fit the length, but its all working and I am loving it. I also finally got an SSD, and while there is a noticeable improvement in start up, overall it does not feel a ton faster than the raid I was running before (but the noise reduction is great).

I have basically cemented my position as being PC for this next gen (and Wii U). Unless some amazing exclusive comes out on ps4 I think I can hold off for a long time.

So my current set up is:
i7 990x
Corsair water cooler
Asus Sabertooth x58 mobo
24gb Kingstion hyper x ram
sapphire R9 290
128gb SSD
2tb HDD
Thermaltake Toughpower 750w

[Jmustang1968]

Well, not a PC part per-se, but I picked up a new mouse: Logitech G600

I previously had the original Razer Naga, but that one was starting to double click when I only meant to single click. Even besides that, I feel this mouse is an upgrade for me.

I like that it is bigger (wider), as the Naga always felt too small. I also prefer the way the side thumb buttons are on the G600. The curvature helps indicate where your thumb is so you press the intended button. Making and assigning macros is pretty easy, and there are 3 different settings you can swap on the fly if you felt the need.

While this is an 'MMO' mouse, I find myself using the side buttons in almost every other gaming application. You can assign hotbar keys, unit groups, and any other macros or hotkeys you need and they are all at the tip of your thumb.

[isiolia]

I guess the other question is how much does the SSD get me for loading times on games (given the other components above)? Would it be worth the hassle?

IMO, migrating stuff around isn't really worth it.

If you have things you play regularly that particularly benefit from it, however, then you may just want to install them on the SSD (or an additional SSD down the line) and keep them there.

Games that aren't necessarily linear would tend to get more out of it than those that are. MMOs, for instance, are often brought up as games that benefit a lot from being installed on one. Logically, because the game can't entirely predict what data it'll be needing next. Online FPS map rotations, sandbox games, and so on are in a similar boat.

Cutting down on initial load times is nice, but if the content is pretty set, the game is probably going to be streaming it to RAM in the background anyway.

[dsheinem]

has anyone tried RAM disk stuff?

[Stark]

I guess the other question is how much does the SSD get me for loading times on games (given the other components above)? Would it be worth the hassle?

IMO, migrating stuff around isn't really worth it.

If you have things you play regularly that particularly benefit from it, however, then you may just want to install them on the SSD (or an additional SSD down the line) and keep them there.

Games that aren't necessarily linear would tend to get more out of it than those that are. MMOs, for instance, are often brought up as games that benefit a lot from being installed on one. Logically, because the game can't entirely predict what data it'll be needing next. Online FPS map rotations, sandbox games, and so on are in a similar boat.

Cutting down on initial load times is nice, but if the content is pretty set, the game is probably going to be streaming it to RAM in the background anyway.

Not sure if you said what kinda mobo you might have/are getting, but mine does a caching thing where you can get a smaller (which is cheaper) SSD and set it up to cache often used data for your slower spindle drive, which improves read speed quite a bit.

[emwearz]

has anyone tried RAM disk stuff?

I have. I have a small (1GB) Ram Disk set up at the moment, I only use it for Firefox, makes it wicked snappy on loadup since I don't have a SSD. (My OS boots in no time as I use Win8.1)

You can check online for videos, some people do it for games, the load times in games like Skyrim are amazing, but you would really need to limit it to smaller games (as you wouldn't want ot throw away more than half your RAM to one and most games are bigger than 8gb now, or at least the ones that you would want faster loading from).

[Frag Mortuus]

Warning: Wall of Text


Well, I had grand plans to upgrade my PC to the Haswell-e 5930K in September when it releases and have been selling off things in an attempt to raise money for it. However, adulthood has reared it's ugly head and instead of putting $1000+ into upgrading my entire platform, I have to spend a decent amount on car repairs and school clothes for the my daughter.

Honestly, my PC has no speed issues really. I mean I can't run next gen games like Titan Fall and Watch Dogs maxed out with AA turned all the way up and still get 60FPS, but I can turn AA down and get 60FPS+. However, since I've been running this i7-920 for nearly 5 years now I just decided to upgrade.

So, today I remembered that the LGA-1366 socket type also supported the Xeon line of server CPU's. So doing some research I learned that my MoBo was one of the special ones that could accept both types (i7 and Xeon). Off I went to eBay to see what an upgrade would cost me. For $85 shipped, I saw tons of X5650 CPUs.

For comparison:

Current: i7-920, Quad Core, 2.66Ghz 8MB L3 Cache
Upgrade: X5650, 6 Core, 2.66Ghz, 12MB L3 Cache
What I was going to upgrade to: i7-5930, 3.3 Ghz, 6 Core, 15MB L3 Cache

I currently have my i7 OC'd to 3.2 Ghz and could technically go much higher if I wanted.

Also, I can get a hold of 24GB of ECC DDR3 1333Mhz RAM, For free, which will upgrade me from 12GB RAM. Lastly, with a TDP of 95W, I should be able to overclock higher than I can with my i7 which has a TDP of 130W.

What do you all think?