GPU help (HD 6000 series problem)

Icyseanfitz

im taking out the 5870's as i figure a 5970 2 gig is overkill as it is and buying two more of those monitors

Monotype

The picture for the 5870 is wrong (or the description is). Are you getting the 5970 then?
Is there any reason why you've stepped down to the quad core? The hexacore is only €30 or so more. It won't help in games really, but it would be worth it for other uses.

Yes, that adapter looks ok.

Overheal

and theres every likelihood games will adapt to as many cores as you can throw at them in just a year or so. A few already do.

Icyseanfitz

i figure right now there isnt much difference in game performance between x4 and the x6 and if games do start taking advantage of them i can always upgrade as of right now im trying to keep it just around €2000, and yes im going to go with the hd 5970 as it is going to give me good performance and is a good €300 cheaper than two 5870's (btw those sapphire 5870 pictures where right its just that they give you a ton of adapters for all those mini displayports (not an active one though )

Monotype

That's okay then if you get 2 DVI adapters + you active one. That motherboard seems expensive although it might not be worth it just buying that from somewhere else by the time you add shipping. Shipping from pixmania is also quite dear. €35 is dearer than just about anywhere in Europe.

Having a quick look on ebuyer, you can get the motherboard, harddrive and the sapphire 5970 cheaper. IIRC, shipping was £10-15 from ebuyer, so saving €5 might be hardly worth the effort.

Actually, you can get the processor, memory, sapphire 5970, case, harddrive, screen, motherboard and PSU all cheaper (some considerably) from hardwareversand.de.

Icyseanfitz

im just wondering is it good to buy a good mother board over a cheaper one? i dont really want to skimp on components but if it makes no noticeable difference i dont mind (except for the gpu case and psu as i figure i can use the the case and psu again in an other build if there good enough)

Icyseanfitz

Monotype wrote: »

That's okay then if you get 2 DVI adapters + you active one. That motherboard seems expensive although it might not be worth it just buying that from somewhere else by the time you add shipping. Shipping from pixmania is also quite dear. €35 is dearer than just about anywhere in Europe.

Having a quick look on ebuyer, you can get the motherboard, harddrive and the sapphire 5970 cheaper. IIRC, shipping was £10-15 from ebuyer, so saving €5 might be hardly worth the effort.

Actually, you can get the processor, memory, sapphire 5970, case, harddrive, screen, motherboard and PSU all cheaper (some considerably) from hardwareversand.de.

Actually hardwareversand.de are giving me much better prices are they ok to buy from (keeping in mind this is my first build) will they ship to ireland and if anything goes wrong how are they to deal with also whats their postage like?, also they dont have my case in stock so if i bought that of pixmania would that be alright?

Icyseanfitz

this is the build
pc.png

Monotype

I suppose it depends on how much you want to save. The next one down from asus is the M4A89TD PRO/USB3. It's nearly the same except a PCI-E slot less and probably less extras. I don't think the saving here is really worth the money (~€20).

The next biggest step down is the 890GX. These are about €60 cheaper and include integrated graphics. The main downside is that one of the PCI-E slots has half the bandwidth which might set back crossfire by a little. I think the 890FXs also have better memory managment features for virtualisation. This might be worth it depending on your needs. I wouldn't really sacrifice any more unless you were going for a budget build.

I think the crossfire IV's a nice board and all those blues look very boring in comparison. As I mentioned earlier, if money is a concern, you can save €30 on the board alone if you go with hardwareversand. Pixmania are French, so a little extra distance from Germany isn't going to make the world of difference (no I don't work for them and have never dealt with them, but a lot of people on the forum have used them).

Monotype

Icyseanfitz wrote: »

Actually hardwareversand.de are giving me much better prices are they ok to buy from (keeping in mind this is my first build) will they ship to ireland and if anything goes wrong how are they to deal with also whats their postage like?, also they dont have my case in stock so if i bought that of pixmania would that be alright?

I think hardwareversand charge €30 for shipping. I remember reading on here that someone had a problem with some item they hwv got back to them fairly fast (and in English!). Just don't order keyboards from them as you could end up with the wrong layout.
I think the only downside to them is that you need to do a bank transfer with them as opposed to credit card. Maybe do a search or post another topic if you want people's opinions on them.

Also, the case - I'll have a look around to see if I spot it anywhere cheaper. It's not the most common case to find, but I'll see what I can find.

Overheal

The 890GX is a nice chip all on its own but yes if you're absolutely insane theres every reason to use the FX especially if Crossfire is your end goal. I got the GX as an experiment and yes the IGP supports plenty of games all by itself but as soon as you put a graphics card in there, it shuts down. Im not sure if the improvements over the M4A89TD PRO/USB3 vs the M4A89GTD PRO/USB3 are worth the 30% price bump but its something you have to decide.

Monotype

Icyseanfitz wrote: »

this is the build
pc.png

You've got 3 dvd drives in your basket!

Icyseanfitz

Monotype wrote: »

You've got 3 dvd drives in your basket!

thanks for that il have to find out about this bank transfer as ive never heard of using such

Monotype

Pixmania are about the cheapest place for the case alright, even with €20 postage for just shipping that. When comparing to hwv, I hadn't realised it wasn't the amd edition. If you're going for that much red, then you should definitely get the crosshair board.
Hardwareversand definitely has a better reputation than pixmania at least.

Some topics talking about the bank transfers.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055379928
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055620687
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055379374
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055437599

Icyseanfitz

thanks for that il be saving a good €200 if i go with these guys, anyway they cant be an incompetent bunch as their german id be more worried about BOI not putting the bank transfer thorough or fecking up somehow

Monotype

Are you only buying the one harddrive? Hitachis used to have a reputation for not being good, but their recent series have been good, especially given that that's a two platter drive. Still, no hard drive is guaranteed fault proof and you should have something on hand for backing up the essesntials (just looking where I'd probably concentrate more money at this stage). Or you could just use a couple of DVDs and USB sticks.

Also, some reviews say that that monitor doesn't come with any dvi cables.

Icyseanfitz

might have one or two dvi cables lying around i take it dvi to dvi cables arnt very expensive anyway? and as for 2 hdd's they kind of confuse me as to how they work do you just plug both into the power and the sata connector and they work straight away or do i have to set stuff up for them to work?

Monotype

Icyseanfitz wrote: »

might have one or two dvi cables lying around i take it dvi to dvi cables arnt very expensive anyway? and as for 2 hdd's they kind of confuse me as to how they work do you just plug both into the power and the sata connector and they work straight away or do i have to set stuff up for them to work?

They're not that expensive, though no doubt they'd be some rip-off like €40 in your local tesco or wherever. You'd be better off asking on adverts or any friends if you need them.

That's pretty much how harddrives work yeah. Except that you'd have to format them. Very straightforward in windows nowadays. Speaking of windows... I hope you've considered an OS.

Did you want to set up any RAID for your computer? I know you don't want to be adding more cost to your computer at this stage, but I don't know if you're aware of them.
RAID-0 => Reads/Writes 2+ harddrives at the same time. Theoretically doubles speeds. The drawback is that each hard drive only has half of the data, so backup on a third drive is a must (since if one drive fails, you lose everything).
RAID 1 => 2+ drives mirrored. I.e., same data on two drives. Saves you from doing a backup. The downside is that if you delete a file, it's gone, so backup is usually better.

There's other RAID configurations for more than that many drives. Most good boards nowadays will support 0, 1, 5, 10, 0+1. I think your board takes up to six drives.

http://www.acnc.com/04_01_00.html

Icyseanfitz

ya i have the os sorted thank god raid 0 and raid 1 (sorry im a noob when it comes to this stuff) but does it mean if i have 2 x 1 Tb harddrives that i will have access to the full 2 Tb and do i backup manually or does it do it automatically really have no idea when it comes to this stuff

PogMoThoin

2x 1TB hd's in raid 0 will give the full 2TB usable as its striped, it reads/writes alternatively to each drive giving slightly better speed.
Raid 1 will give 1TB as its mirrored. Raid 1 should read as striped giving You extra speed on the read with full backup on the other drive, but You loose half the space, it writes to both drives at the same time (therefore no extra speed).

Its called raid 0 because thats the amount of info You'll rescue if either drive fails

Icyseanfitz

this would be a grand dvi cable right? i only need two has i have one myself

Icyseanfitz

PogMoThoin wrote: »

With 2x 1TB hd's raid 0 will give 2TB usable as its striped, raid 1 will give 1TB as its mirrored, it reads/writes alternativly to each drive giving slightly better speed. Raid 1 should read as striped giving You extra speed on the read with full backup on the other drive, but You loose half the space, it copies to both drives at the same time.

Its called raid 0 because thats the amount of info You'll rescue if either drive fails

ive never had a hdd fail in any compuer/laptop ive used does it happen very often?

Monotype

Ideally for games, people would normally have a RAID-0.
They pick two smaller HDs - Say two 500GB ones or something. You set this up in the BIOS/RAID setup before you install windows. The computer then recognises this as 1TB disc.* Now when you write a 1GB file to this disc, it writes 500MB to each disc, taking only half the time to write it. The same for when you're reading it.
The main problem is if one of the drives breaks, the other drive drive has only half your files (as in literally half a file), so you should really back it up (e.g., with a third 1TB drive, or less depending on how much data is essential).



*It's also a good idea to partition the drive - the fastest areas of the drive are at the start. So you put your OS/games on the first 30-50% of the drive and maybe videos/music that don't need as great a speed on the second half/two thirds.

Icyseanfitz wrote: »

this would be a grand dvi cable right? i only need two has i have one myself

Yes.

Icyseanfitz wrote: »

ive never had a hdd fail in any compuer/laptop ive used does it happen very often?

They're better than they used to be. To me, if a graphics card died on me, I'd be upset. But I'd be more upset if I lost all my data. It's not hugely likely to happen, but even a small external drive just to get the essentials now and again is advisable.

Nice pic PogMoThoin! :cool:

PogMoThoin

Icyseanfitz wrote: »

ive never had a hdd fail in any compuer/laptop ive used does it happen very often?

I've had 2 of mine fail in 4 years. I replaced one in my Mams pc less than a yr old. They can and do just die without warning.

Icyseanfitz

ive never started a computer from start all the computers ive used previously have been preloaded with an os etc. what is the procedure when first booting a computer? do i sort all this hdd stuff out in the bios and then boot my os from the dvd drive through the bios as well, and then when im in the os (windows 7 64 bit) will the default drivers for my devices automatically load up or will i have to go to the websites in order to get them? by the way thanks for all the help guys ive learnt so much in the last couple of weeks

Icyseanfitz

Monotype wrote: »

Ideally for games, people would normally have a RAID-0.
They pick two smaller HDs - Say two 500GB ones or something. You set this up in the BIOS/RAID setup before you install windows. The computer then recognises this as 1TB disc.* Now when you write a 1GB file to this disc, it writes 500MB to each disc, taking only half the time to write it. The same for when you're reading it.
The main problem is if one of the drives breaks, the other drive drive has only half your files (as in literally half a file), so you should really back it up (e.g., with a third 1TB drive, or less depending on how much data is essential).



*It's also a good idea to partition the drive - the fastest areas of the drive are at the start. So you put your OS/games on the first 30-50% of the drive and maybe videos/music that don't need as great a speed on the second half/two thirds.



Yes.



They're better than they used to be. To me, if a graphics card died on me, I'd be upset. But I'd be more upset if I lost all my data. It's not hugely likely to happen, but even a small external drive just to get the essentials now and again is advisable.

Nice pic PogMoThoin! :cool:

i actually have a 1 Tb external drive so if there is anything that is really important i will put it on that also il second that that pic is great at displaying what ye are saying

Monotype

Icyseanfitz wrote: »

ive never started a computer from start all the computers ive used previously have been preloaded with an os etc. what is the procedure when first booting a computer? do i sort all this hdd stuff out in the bios and then boot my os from the dvd drive through the bios as well, and then when im in the os (windows 7 64 bit) will the default drivers for my devices automatically load up or will i have to go to the websites in order to get them? by the way thanks for all the help guys ive learnt so much in the last couple of weeks

Sort out your bios first. Clock and things like that.
Set your hard drives to RAID mode if you want them as such.
Then go into the RAID setup and add whatever drives you want to the array.
Windows 7 is good for drivers and recognises most of your stuff, it didn't recognise an ethernet last time for me (or was that vista?), but you should probably install a few drivers like chipset and the essentials (and of course drivers for you graphics card).

Icyseanfitz

Monotype wrote: »

Sort out your bios first. Clock and things like that.
Set your hard drives to RAID mode if you want them as such.
Then go into the RAID setup and add whatever drives you want to the array.
Windows 7 is good for drivers and recognises most of your stuff, it didn't recognise an ethernet last time for me (or was that vista?), but you should probably install a few drivers like chipset and the essentials (and of course drivers for you graphics card).

what do you mean clock? as in processor speed RAM timings do i set the hdd's to raid mode through the bios? and is raid setup in the os or the bios? sorry for the thousand questions but i want to get this right the first time so im not on here having a heart attack when the thing wont work

Monotype

Icyseanfitz wrote: »

what do you mean clock? as in processor speed RAM timings do i set the hdd's to raid mode through the bios? and is raid setup in the os or the bios? sorry for the thousand questions but i want to get this right the first time so im not on here having a heart attack when the thing wont work

No, I mean the actual clock. Like time. I remember I didn't do this one time, I installed windows then went back to fix the clock, booted up only to find that my trial period for windows had expired and I had to activate immediately. Only problem was that the internet wasn't working as I hadn't installed the drivers.

In the bios, for each hard drive, IIRC, you get options like AHCI, IDE and RAID. Default is usually IDE. For stand alone hard drives you should select AHCI and RAID for HDs you want in a RAID array.
You then reboot and it will say --press <<something>> key to enter raid setup-- which you press. It gives you a list of the hard drives you selected raid for. You select that you want a new array. It tells you that you'll lose all your data or something. You say OK and move them over the ones you want. You then select RAID type (e.g., RAID 0) and sector size and you're done.

You then install windows.

Icyseanfitz

actually seems pretty straight forward do i have to set RAM timings etc. before i install the os?