New PC Guidance

[KCR]

Ok, as nvidia and intel are releasing new stuff soon(ish) i am upgrading my rig. Im going to buy most of the components now and leave the mobo, GPU and CPU for when they get released. This is what i have now:

Corsair DOMINATOR AIRFLOW Fan
Logitech G19 Gaming Keyboard
NZXT Sentry 2 Fan Controller - 5 Fan Control, LCD Touchscreen
Asus Xonar D2X PCI-E soundcard, 7.1 Channel, SPDIF I/O
CoolerMaster RC-942-KKN1 HAF X 942 Black No PSU
Logitech G9X Laser Gaming Mouse USB
Hitachi 2TB SATA 7200RPM 64M
Scythe SlipStream 120mm 1900rpm Fan
NZXT 3 Pin Fan Extention Cable
Corsair HX-1050 1050W ATX Modular Power Supply
Corsair Cooling Hydro Series H100 High-performance CPU Cooler
LGE BH12LS38 Black BlueRay SATA LightScribe Writer Retail
LG E2750V-PN 27" LED 5ms DVI-D D-Sub HDMI TILT
Corsair 60GB Force Series3 SATA 6Gb/s. R/W: 555/495 MB/s
Kingston 16GB(4X4G) KIT HyperX 2133MHz DDR3 XMP ​

This is my second build but unfortunately i need to get all new components due to floods in my area taking out all electrics in our house. Just wanted a couple more eyes on this to make sure everything checks out. So Whatcha think? Also am i right in guessing that the optional 200mm fan will be taken up with the H100's radiator? meaning that all fan slots are in use?

 

[Zap]

I'm guessing you'll be overclocking and gaming? What's your budget?

Ok, as nvidia and intel are releasing new stuff soon(ish) i am upgrading my rig. Im going to buy most of the components now and leave the mobo, GPU and CPU for when they get released.

Bad idea. We know when Intel's stuff will be released, but when will Nvidia's stuff be released? What will happen is that the parts you buy now will sit around depreciating, plus warranty and return periods will be ticking. You will lose at least 2 months of your warranty just waiting for the CPU.

Unless if you find a hot deal (cheaper than normal price) on anything, don't bother buying until you can get ALL of your parts.

Corsair DOMINATOR AIRFLOW Fan
Logitech G19 Gaming Keyboard
NZXT Sentry 2 Fan Controller - 5 Fan Control, LCD Touchscreen
Asus Xonar D2X PCI-E soundcard, 7.1 Channel, SPDIF I/O
CoolerMaster RC-942-KKN1 HAF X 942 Black No PSU
Logitech G9X Laser Gaming Mouse USB
Hitachi 2TB SATA 7200RPM 64M
Scythe SlipStream 120mm 1900rpm Fan
NZXT 3 Pin Fan Extention Cable
Corsair HX-1050 1050W ATX Modular Power Supply
Corsair Cooling Hydro Series H100 High-performance CPU Cooler
LGE BH12LS38 Black BlueRay SATA LightScribe Writer Retail
LG E2750V-PN 27" LED 5ms DVI-D D-Sub HDMI TILT
Corsair 60GB Force Series3 SATA 6Gb/s. R/W: 555/495 MB/s
Kingston 16GB(4X4G) KIT HyperX 2133MHz DDR3 XMP ​

RAM cooler is not needed.

Fan controller is way overkill, but I guess if you like bling.

Sound card is okay if you really need a discrete card instead of onboard.

For PSU, if you are going to do SLI you only need around 750-850W. If only one card, 500-600W. 1050W is overkill either way.

Why aftermarket fans right off the bat? The case should come with reasonable fans.

The CPU cooler is overkill. Ivy Bridge (upcoming Intel CPU) will supposedly run even cooler than Sandy Bridge, and most overclockers have been running cheap $20-30 coolers on those already.

RAM is WAY overkill. If doing Ivy Bridge, go with 2x4GB=16GB of DDR3-1600 1.5v. If doing Ivy Bridge E, then go with a 4x4GB DDR3-1333 or DDR3-1600 1.5v kit. Actually, I don't even know when Ivy Bridge E will be out. You might be waiting for a while.

 

[KCR]

I read somewhere that kepler was coming in april with the ivy bridges? perhaps just a flicker of hope in my eye

I found a deal with the PSU so its the same price as a 850W so i figured why not. The ram was because I do a fair bit of video work and 3D rendering and modelling. You bet ya i'll be overclocking everything. The extra fan was because of the optional VGA slot in the case, im not replacing any of the stocks. The H100 and the ram cooler are also a deal so come with the fan controller. The fan controller is...well....yea..bling

Would any of the rig be outdated before the arrival of kepler/IB?

Budget is ATM flexible and i would like the option to do SLI in the future

I would be getting the IB equivalent of the 2500K which was what i had until the floods cause it could OC to all hell and the others offered no improvement to what i was doing.

I should have clarified that i can scab an older CPU, MOBO and GPU from my grandfathers comp while i wait for the IB and nvidia. Though i understand what you are saying about warranty and returns. I may wait until IB chips are released. My other option would be to get another 2500K if that would still be able to handle all i needed and the IB does not show to greater performace increase (since this is a "tick") correct me if i am wrong. In which case i would be looking at the ATI 7970 although the 40%(?) increase the GTX 6 series seems to show over the 7970 is a major temptation.

I guess what i am asking now is if it would be worth the wait to get an IB and a GTX 6 series or i should just get a 2500k and a 7970. Thoughts?

 

[mfenn]

I guess what i am asking now is if it would be worth the wait to get an IB and a GTX 6 series or i should just get a 2500k and a 7970. Thoughts?

If you need a new computer now then buy it now. It's not like new stuff will be released next week or anything. If you want to wait, then wait.

By the way, I agree 100% with Zap's critique of your parts choices. By my rough math, you are spending $600 on useless parts and upgrades. Make more sensible choices there (I will do a full build once you answer the above) and you can easily get CFX right off the bad within the same budget envelope.

 

[Zap]

Do you need a computer now or in a few months?

The RAM is still overkill. Even if you feel you need the amount of RAM, get some cheaper stuff. There is very little real world performance difference between 1600 and 2133 for socket 1155.

If you have the budget and you really, REALLY want more memory bandwidth, then instead of socket 1155 you need to be looking at socket 2011 for quad channel RAM. Some motherboards also have 8x RAM slots too, if you really want to load up. Speaking of loading up, if you relaly feel you need high amounts of RAM, you should start with 8GB per stick instead of 4GB per stick, especially on socket 1155 where you only have 4 RAM slots.

Ivy Bridge is like a tick+. The integrated graphics performance goes up. Other than that, yes it is a die shrink so we theoretically get lower power draw and temperatures at the same MHz, or potentially can overclock a bit better. Right now nobody knows. Intel may even (very unlikely) botch it like they did with Prescott and release a chip that leaks like crazy, runs super hot and didn't overclock much higher (initially).

 

[KCR]

might scale down the ram a bit, looking at vengeance 2x4, easy to upgrade to more later. i think I'm going to wait for the 7990 and IF nvidia have made a release i'll decide, else i'll go with the 7990. The 7990 is out in march i believe.

I would like to be able to run crossfire 7990s at a later date if they are required (I'm going to build up to get a 3 monitor eyefinity ) What speed CPU would i need to run crossfire 7990s?

 

[KCR]

So if i had crossfire 7990s in mind what do you think i would be looking at in terms of actual build?

Obviously i would be looking at a mono with 2 16x PCI-E slots (most probably pci-e 2 cause 3 doesn't seem to hold any advantage).

8gb 1600mhz ram - probably corsair vengeance

GPU - 1x 7990 at first might upgrade later when i need to

CPU - i was thinking 2500k or equivalent in ivy bridge

Case - HAF X

Sound Card - XONAR 7.1

PSU - i got the HX1050 on sale but how much power would i actually need for the build?



HDD, SSD, Disk drive, peripherals etc are all pretty much done.

 

[Zap]

Obviously i would be looking at a mono with 2 16x PCI-E slots (most probably pci-e 2 cause 3 doesn't seem to hold any advantage).

Why do you say that? Each generation of PCI Express roughly doubles the throughput of the previous generation, so PCIe 2.0 x8 will perform around the same as PCIe 1.1 x16, and PCIe 3.0 x8 will perform around the same as PCIe 2.0 x16. Thus, socket 1155 with PCIe 3.0 (if new "Gen 3" boards support it, otherwise Z77 chipset) would be perfect with a pair of x8 slots.

PSU - i got the HX1050 on sale but how much power would i actually need for the build?

Just use what you already got.

 

[KCR]

http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/foru...s/49646-amd-radeon-hd-7970-3gb-review-21.html

PCI-E 3 might be faster but apparently the 7970 does not utilise it.

 

[KCR]

Though now thinking about it i would think the increased bandwidth would do the 7990 (since its a dual GPU card) good.

 

[mfenn]

might scale down the ram a bit, looking at vengeance 2x4, easy to upgrade to more later. i think I'm going to wait for the 7990 and IF nvidia have made a release i'll decide, else i'll go with the 7990. The 7990 is out in march i believe.

I would like to be able to run crossfire 7990s at a later date if they are required (I'm going to build up to get a 3 monitor eyefinity ) What speed CPU would i need to run crossfire 7990s?

A 7990 is almost certainly going to be a colossal waste of money just like the 6990 and 5970. It's marketed towards people who must have the "fastest" whether or not it makes any sense whatsoever. 7950 Crossfire is easily within your budget and will drive Eyefinity better than a TDP-limited dual-GPU card will.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: the monitor cost for a worthwhile Eyefinity setup far outweighs the GPU cost. Get your display situation sorted out first so that you know how much power you need.