Looking to buy a new PC. Is this configuration any good?

[Arr0nax]

5 years ago i built this rig... dual core amd 4800 with 4 gig ram and xp64 and nvidia 8800

it cost me a shitload back then. and nowadays that is a "standard" computer setup.

i have been building my computers always keeping in mind that it needs to be good in 5 years.

what i am saying means that in 5 years you will have a "standard" setup.

So what you're saying is you're throwing five times the reasonable price out the window just so you have a useless piece of hardware that will be useful 5 years after, but will cost a shitload less...
Great.

In 4-5 years, we may very well be using new standards types of RAM, or it could very well be cheaper.

 

[Xellos]

Samsung F4 series released lately is great, 2*320 in RAID and you are set.

 

[iii]

Before one spends money on 12gb RAM, dual CPU/GPUs one should by an SSD.

 

[TheWesDude]

1)

i havent heard that they have solved the SSD's lifetime issue

2)

seagate has the highest MTBF in the industry, and the longest warranty's

3)

sea, if a single instance of a problem is the worst you can say about a HDD manufacturer that has been in business for over 20 years.... i would say thats something

4)

if you insist on going an IDE flavor for your HDs like SATA then make sure to get 10k rpm drives.

 

[iii]

1)

i havent heard that they have solved the SSD's lifetime issue

So?

 

[Inferos]

Back on topic, I just got my new computer today. Thrilling experience.

Instead of changing the configuration radically, in most cases I improved the components I initially chose, by going for their best models (for example, ordering a 965 Phenom instead of 955, Caviar Black HDD instead of Green, or HyperX RAM instead of plain, and so on). This added on my bill quite a few bucks, but I believe it's well worth it.

So here it is:


Case: Spire BlackFin V

CPU: Phenom II X4 965 Quad Core, Black Edition
Motherboard: Gigabyte 890XA-UD3
HDD: Western Digital 1Tb Caviar Black (64Mb sATA2)
RAM: Kingston 4Gb DDR3 (kit 2x2Gb, Bus1333) HyperX
Video: GT220 1Gb PCX, PhysX
+ Microsoft mouse, Microsoft keyboard, Sony DVD-RW, all three as black as the devil painteth.

Total spent for the above: 700 EUR.


I should be fine for the next couple of years, hopefully.

I'm coming from a AMD Athlon XP Barton 3000+ with an average motherboard and a 512 Mb Video card (can't remember what model it was), just 1 Gb RAM and a 320 Gb Maxtor HDD - so the jump is as dramatic as changing into a whole new species.

Thanks a lot to everyone who posted here, I really appreciate your input on this, I've given a lot of thought to everything I've been recommended and chose wisely based on that.

Now all that remains is getting accustomed with Win7.

 

[TheWesDude]

since you went with AMD did you splurge and get the 512 L2 cache?

intel only does 256 but if you go AMD you want the 512 L2 cache on the cpu

 

[jamotide]

Before one spends money on 12gb RAM, dual CPU/GPUs one should by an SSD.

Yeah! I have 2gb of 5 year old RAM in my PC, same age cpu and gpu, but recently bought a intel ssd and installed windows 7 on it (total expense 220 euros), and it is the opposite of a hog (a cheetah?).

I have not noticed any ram issues so far and the whole system starts up in 25 seconds from pushing the on button to being able to do everything.

Right now I see no reason to buy anything else, sure I can't run the newest 3d crapout 3, but why would I want to, every old game ran on w7 or dosbox so far, even from the old hd, not even needed to reinstall stuff!

Also RAM costs twice as much as last year, so how is it very cheap right now?

 

[Inferos]

since you went with AMD did you splurge and get the 512 L2 cache?

intel only does 256 but if you go AMD you want the 512 L2 cache on the cpu

Yup.

http://products.amd.com/en-na/DesktopCPUDetail.aspx?id=617

L1 Cache Size (KB) 128
L1 Cache Count 4
L2 Cache Size (KB) 512
L2 Cache Count 4
L3 Cache Size (KB) 6144

 

[Aphyosis]

with a 12 gb ram or more you could always setup a virtual drive in ram and install/copy your games there

Paying extra for a feature most people would never use is wise spending >.>

Why would you even want to do that anyway?

from everything i have seen running the dual GPUs only raises FPS by like 25-30%

That sounds about right. Let me tell you how much of a performance increase you'll get from running 12 gig of RAM and 2 Quad cores in a standard household/gaming application.

0%

Which is more likely to increase longevity?

i have been building my computers always keeping in mind that it needs to be good in 5 years.

I build to the philosophy that i want it to last as long as possible.

Building for five years into the future when a system released 6 months from now will do twice as much for half the price is silly. The parts simply evolve to quickly.

In 5 years time anything built now will be outdated.

buy it now, and in a few years what i am suggesting is going to be a standard setup in 5 years...

Games using 12 gig of RAM and utilizing 8 Cores will not happen in 5 years, for several reasons.

A) Games need to run on consoles. The PC parts coming out now are significantly more powerful than what games require and the reality is developers will code for that. There is a few exceptions, but these are rare.

B) Duel core's came out years ago and there is STILL game engines in use that only execute on one core. We're onto quads and Hexi cores now. What motivation is there for this surge in growth?

C) For a standard user the progression is going to be more cores and more power on one CPU. It's not going to be Multiple CPU's. Your "Current Setup" rig is going to running two outdated processors.

do you have to? hell no

but what im suggesting will be a standard setup in 4-5 years

The practical uses of that sort of rig are right now and will be for the next 5 years very, very small. What perplexes me is you recommend excessive spending on parts with very little real value but then turn around and say Multi GPU setups are a waste when in reality they're the most likely to increase system longevity if that's what your building for.

i havent heard that they have solved the SSD's lifetime issue

That was Generation one. Gen 2 made significant strides in that direction. They're getting to the stage cells can withstand enormous rewrites.

CPU: Phenom II X4 965 Quad Core, Black Edition

Would have been better going a 955 and overclocking it. They're the same core so can generally reach comparable speeds. Could have saved a few bucks

Anyway, Enjoy the new box!