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One Must Fall: Battlegrounds
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killer_roach
Joined: 18 Jan 2001
Posts: 8048
Location: Lexington, Kentucky
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 Posted: Thu Aug 28, 2008 10:23 am Post subject: New system |
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After having some issues with a troublesome motherboard, I decided it was time to upgrade again. This turned out to be almost a wholesale upgrade, but still... here's what I got.
Thermaltake Armor+MX case
Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550
Biostar Tpower I45 motherboard (Intel P45-based)
4GB Mushkin DDR2-1066 (2x2GB)
MSI Radeon HD 4850 w/ quad copper heatpipe
Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit
Still reserving the right to Crossfire the 4850 later on... we shall see.
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Malfrex
Ancient One
Joined: 27 Jul 2000
Posts: 2112
Location: Vancouver, BC/Canada
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| Posted: Thu Aug 28, 2008 1:58 pm Post subject: |
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My 2 cents:
Case - nice choice. I'm partial to my Silverstone but the CW-03 just cost too much so it's on the "to do" list.
CPU - Was going to say the Q9550 wasn't worth the speed jump, but then I noticed it dropped in price since I got my Q9450. Was over a $100 price difference for ~200Mhz increase, which I didn't think was worth it.
Mobo - Biostar is not a preferred company in my book, but the P45 chipset is solid. I splurged on the X48 chipset, although having dual PCI-E x16 doesn't really make real-world difference for Crossfire (although the extra SATA ports does for me...).
RAM - Timings? Not that it matters too much, but curiosity settles in.
Video - good price/performance ratio. I figured the extra $100 for the 4870 was worth it :p
OS - Ultimate is NOT worth the price IMHO unless you are configuring your own private network. Home Premium covers all the bases without costing a crazy amount.
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I'm not crazy, I'm sanity-challenged.
ASUS P8Z77-V PRO
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ouch
Joined: 04 Jan 2004
Posts: 501
Location: In a Mantis :)
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| Posted: Sun Aug 31, 2008 2:52 am Post subject: |
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the thing with biostar is that they are not particularly fast, but they are built like a tank and will last forever even if they are abused.
I run an office with 6 computers, 2 of them have biostar boards. I also have an old 333mhz biostar board that still runs today. (it's almost 10 years old now!)
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scientifically engineered to hate StarForce
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killer_roach
Joined: 18 Jan 2001
Posts: 8048
Location: Lexington, Kentucky
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| Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 4:48 am Post subject: |
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| Slasher wrote: | My 2 cents:
Case - nice choice. I'm partial to my Silverstone but the CW-03 just cost too much so it's on the "to do" list. |
Main reason for me was just because it was cheap enough for my purposes, and it looked cool. When it's to finally replace a nearly decade-old Enlight case that is corroded and warped... yeah.
| Quote: | | CPU - Was going to say the Q9550 wasn't worth the speed jump, but then I noticed it dropped in price since I got my Q9450. Was over a $100 price difference for ~200Mhz increase, which I didn't think was worth it. |
Definitely considered the Q9450, but with the price drop, it made my choice a lot easier.
| Quote: | | Mobo - Biostar is not a preferred company in my book, but the P45 chipset is solid. I splurged on the X48 chipset, although having dual PCI-E x16 doesn't really make real-world difference for Crossfire (although the extra SATA ports does for me...). |
Was reading some reviews on the Biostar, and it seems to be a beast of a board at a rather good price. I'm interested in putting this thing through its paces. Main concern was getting a P45 or X48 board, though (as, feature-rich as they are, a 780i can't do Crossfire). Needless to say, though, the X48 boards, while drool-worthy, weren't worth it. No way am I paying as much for a motherboard as I am for a mid-high-end CPU.
| Quote: | | RAM - Timings? Not that it matters too much, but curiosity settles in. |
Timings are 5-5-5-15 at 1.9V. For DDR2-1066, was more of a concern of looking for lower voltages to give me headroom, as almost everything at that binning is either 5-5-5-15 or 5-5-5-18.
| Quote: | | Video - good price/performance ratio. I figured the extra $100 for the 4870 was worth it :p |
And I thought the aftermarket cooling solution on mine was worth it. Seriously, it's quieter than my power supply. Worst-case scenario, I Crossfire it if I need more power.
| Quote: | | OS - Ultimate is NOT worth the price IMHO unless you are configuring your own private network. Home Premium covers all the bases without costing a crazy amount. |
Student discount - paid less for it than I would have getting Home Premium from Newegg.  Even still, an OEM copy from Newegg is less than what XP Pro was selling for just a couple years ago...
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Official forum economist. Explodes when thrown.
Desktop:
Core i7-2600K @ 4.5 GHz
16GB DDR3-1600
eVGA GeForce 970 FTW
Windows 10 Preview
Laptop:
Core 2 Duo 2.8 GHz
4GB DDR3-800
Radeon 4570 1GB
Windows 7 Home Premium x64 |
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killer_roach
Joined: 18 Jan 2001
Posts: 8048
Location: Lexington, Kentucky
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| Posted: Thu Sep 04, 2008 5:00 am Post subject: |
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Update: I got all my hardware in, assembled, although I sent it in to a shop because I was having problems getting the heatsink to mount properly. Oy. That's fixed, I'm now out $20, and I'd have it to test later today were it not for the pesky detail of my being in work or class until 8 today, so I'll have to wait until after I get out of work tomorrow to get everything set up.
Update 2: Ran 3DMark Vantage on it, scored P6868... any good?
Update 3: Crossfired my 4850. Vantage score now is P11820.
_________________
Official forum economist. Explodes when thrown.
Desktop:
Core i7-2600K @ 4.5 GHz
16GB DDR3-1600
eVGA GeForce 970 FTW
Windows 10 Preview
Laptop:
Core 2 Duo 2.8 GHz
4GB DDR3-800
Radeon 4570 1GB
Windows 7 Home Premium x64 |
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