Help with gaming build :)

Solitaire · 09-09-2010 3:19am

HD4850/4770/5750 are great for sub-1080p gaming; the former is quite power-hungry but the others only sip at power so are very apt for this build. The GTX260 and non-512MB versions of the HD4870/5770 are good for 1080p gaming but only the HD5770 is frugal enough to run alongside a 95W CPU on a sub-500W PSU. The GTX465/HD5830/4890/GTX460 are good for very intense 1080p gaming or light multi-monitor gaming but none are very frugal and all are out of your price range.

Sandvich · 10-09-2010 1:05am

How long will this take to be delivered? If it comes in under a week I may order it, otherwise I'll have to wait until the next time I'm back at my parents which could take a while.

Sandvich · 14-09-2010 1:28am

Unfortunately the particular graphics card you linked me too seems to be sold out and could take more than a week to come back in... is there an alternative?

Solitaire · 14-09-2010 1:40am

I wouldn't want you spending so much on a HD5770 1GB anyway if you're only gaming at 1440*900

As I said before look for HD5750s around €100 like this

Sandvich · 14-09-2010 2:28am

Would a 1GB card be a safer bet though? There's a bunch of different 5750s though!

Unregistered. · 14-09-2010 2:51am

Sandvich wrote: »

Would a 1GB card be a safer bet though? There's a bunch of different 5750s though!

Only if you can get one fairly cheap, say €5-10 MAX more than the 512, because at the above resolution 1GB does not normally have much of an impact

Sandvich · 14-09-2010 4:24pm

12 euros is a no go then?

http://www4.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=34493&agid=1004

I imagine when things get more and more detailed textures, it will come in handy. Though they'll probably have games on mostly blu-ray by then... have to get a blu-ray drive at some point. My laptop has one though. But given I can just hook that up to the tele I'm not that bothered about having one.

Sandvich · 14-09-2010 4:30pm

There's also other 5770s

http://www4.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=30808&agid=1004

They scored a bit over 100 points higher in the test, though that's like between 1,400 and 1,500 so maybe it's not worth the extra 20 quid or so. Plus I can replace it with another €100 graphics card a few years down the road that'll be similar fairly high end.

Sandvich · 15-09-2010 6:12pm

So which should I get

Just a little more help please and I can order it.

Solitaire · 15-09-2010 6:50pm

If you honestly think you'll be upgrading to a 1080p screen sometime soon and you have the extra ~€30 outside your budget then get the HD5770 1GB.

Sandvich · 15-09-2010 11:16pm

Is there really that much difference between 900p and 1080p?

I'll likely be getting a new monitor at some stage alright.

I'll have a think about it.

Which of the 5770s should I get though? There's a few different ones. There are 2 Club 3D ones that look identical but cost diffeerent

Solitaire · 15-09-2010 11:22pm

Not really. I'd almost recommend the former to give your GPU a break, but the higher resolution is much more established and has much wider compatibility with HDTV, BluRay, console ports etc.

Sandvich · 15-09-2010 11:29pm

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/2010-gaming-graphics-charts-high-quality/3DMark06-v1.1.0,2392.html

Looking at this it seems the HIS and Powercolor versions of cards rank much lower... I thought they'd be more or less the same. Or am I reading it wrong?

EDIT: Ah yeah I am. I'm gonna take a look at other cards that rank similarly. The 5750 I was looking at is out of stock(1 Gig version, was down to less than a tenner more) so I may have to go for a 5770... the performacne improvement is just under 10% though so not exactly epic. I wish there were benchmark scores for the 5750 512mb versus 1gig.

Keep in mind I do like to play with lots of anti-aliasing, especially for games like Team Fortress 2 that are meant to look "smooth". Doesn't that really eat ram?

Solitaire · 15-09-2010 11:42pm

I wouldn't trust 3DMark far less Toms :P

A 1GB HD5750 is of most use to someone who doesn't mind tweaking up its GPU and memory speeds up a bit to let it take more advantage of the doubled framebuffer, as its only 900p and higher that see any kind of advantage from it. 1080p can get a good few additonal FPS from a 1GB HD5750 compared to the regular version, so long as you OC it a bit

Sandvich · 16-09-2010 2:18am

What's the best benchmark then do you think?

Solitaire · 16-09-2010 2:35am

The games you want to play

Normally I'd give 3DMark a cautious thumbs-up as a rough guide but it tends to favour certain GPUs in a way you'd never see in real life; a 9800GTX isn't going to thrash a HD4850 and draw almost level with a HD5770 in real life. The superiority of the GTX260 over said is also exaggerated.

Sandvich · 16-09-2010 2:54am

Well, would the 5770 fit in the case I'm going with? I heard it might be a little too long for some.

As for games I'll be playing

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/charts/2010-gaming-graphics-charts-high-quality/Left4Dead-2,2380.html

An extra 10 fps could be significant. In a lot of the tests the split was more like 35 - 42 or so, which would actually be noticable.

The advantage to the 5750 is that it uses up slightly less power too. But for the price of a couple of beers, an exxtra 5-10fps on average might be nice.

Would this 5770 be fine?

http://www3.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=30225&agid=1004

It's a couple of euros cheaper than the HIS I was going with. Should be fine? How is Club 3D?

Solitaire · 16-09-2010 4:03am

The card is only 8.5" long - and that's the big, bulky reference version!

Bear in mind that a full mATX mobo is 9.6" long... and if that were not enough the Vulcan was designed for big cards, you could fit a HD5870 in there!

No big difference in model either. The Club3D is the sturdy, reliable one, using the reference cooler and PCB straight from AMD. I've never had grief from that brand either

Sandvich · 16-09-2010 11:48pm

I'll go with that then providing it doesn't also go out of stock. Thank you for all your help.

Sandvich · 17-09-2010 3:45am

Bizarrely, the HIS one came back in, and at a cheaper price.

Here's what I ordered.

4GB Corsair Valueselect DDR3-1333 CL9 x2

AMD Athlon II X3 440 "Boxed" 95W, Sockel AM3

Corsair CX400W 400 Watt

HIS HD 5770 FAN GDDR5 1024MB Native HDMI Display Port D-DVI

LG GH22NS40/NS30 bare schwarz SATA II

MSI 760GM-E51, Sockel AM3, mATX, PCIe

NZXT Vulcan Micro-ATX LAN Gaming Case - black

NSamsung SpinPoint F3 1000GB, SATA II (HD103SJ)

TP-Link TL-WN781N, 150Mbps, PCIe x1

Subtotal: 585,37 €
Shipping costs by DHL-Normalversand + 30,00 €

Total: 615,37 €

Sandvich · 01-10-2010 8:28pm

I got the parts today and I'm really disappointed with the size of the case. Since it said it was a "Micro" I took it on it's word it'd be smaller than my Dad's computer at least. It's the same size. I should have checked the measurements but I would never have expected anything micro to be this big. The one saving grace is that it has a handle, but I don't think I can physically fit this on my desk. I don't know what to do.

I'm considering finding a smaller case, the motherboard I got seems tiny for the case. But I'm not sure everything would fit then. Argh.

Help with gaming build :)

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