Old system specs: Win XP w/ SP3 Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 1.8ghz(OC'd to 3ghz stable) 4 gigs of Gskill DDR2-1066 ram Asus P5K-Pro Motherboard XFX GeForce 8800GT XXX Edition 2x 320gb Seagate Barracudas Antec NeoPower 550w PSU Antec Nine Hundred ATX case
Now don't get me wrong, that PC was no slouch and served me well for yeaaarrssss(much longer than I've let any other PC stay in one piece for!). But the difference in power in this rebuild is amazing. It's really hard to describe.. It just.. Kicks ass!
New specs:
Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit AMD Phenom II x2 555 Black Edition (3.2ghz stock, 2 cores. Was able to unlock to a quad core.) 8gig Gskill Ripjaw DDR3-12800(Can you tell I like Gskill?) Gigabyte 870A-UD3 AM3 MB Asus GeForce GTX 460 OC'd Edition 3x 320gb Seagate Barracudas Corsair 750w PSU Same Antec Case
My old PC did well with graphic intensive games like GTA4, Crysis, Bad Company 2, etc, but this computer obliterates them even at 1980 x 1024 resolution. Old PC averaged about 30fps on those games with the same resolution and lower gfx settings. This one everything gets maxed out with 80+ fps all over the place. I am very very happy. My gf has been dealing with me nerding out all night.
Anyone else update an aging rig lately?
[This message has been edited by N3M3S1S (edited 02-17-2011).]
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01:27 AM
PFF
System Bot
faaaaq Member
Posts: 3856 From: Madison WI, USA Registered: Sep 2009
...bought a new case...? lol. need more ram tho. only running 3 gigs. thinking about getting 6gigs from newegg for $50 but i need a car first. need a new mobo to overclock my q6600. i hear i can hit at least 3ghz with the stock fan. wishing i could get an Origin PC with either the 4.6ghz SIX core or the 5+ghz quad core
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06:53 AM
Xerces_Blackthorne Member
Posts: 6163 From: Mertztown PA Registered: Mar 2008
Psshhh, don't ya know Scott? Its not the specs of the PC that matter, its how ya use it I thought you had first hand experience on that matter with BoH
On topic though: I'm due for a new system. Unfortunately I've come to like laptops better than desktops these days, and since no one makes a desktop replacement laptop that is fully (I.E., completely) customizable, I'm stuck with a new desktop build. And if I do that, I'm doing it properly (going big server tower anyone?) Plans are to run the fastest available 6 core Phenom proc on an Asus board, 16 gb OCZ platinum DDR3 ram, dual GForce cards in SLI setup (shooting for 1gb each cards), 4x 1.5tb sata drives in raid array, all stuffed inside my old K7N8X Athlon 3000XP tower (after I gut the hell outta it of course) with blu ray combo drive. All powered by a 1000w PSU. Liquid cooling, etc. All the bells and whistles. Looking to build something that will last me the next 10 years at least. I figure with specs like this, 10 years down the line it'll be in line with the current widely available desktops (mass market crap). But for the next 3-4 years it would make one helluva server
Ironic though that while you guys are running stuff with all this hardware, my 7 year old HP laptop is still more than enough to handle most of the stuff you guys are running And its only a 1.7 ghz Athlon Turion with 2 gb ram and crap onboard ATI video (dedicated 16mb, can share out another 128mb). I threw WoW at it and it played great...need to upgrade the hdd's though. 160gb between 2 drives isn't quite cutting it. Need a couple 320's (on the list, couple weeks yet). Unfortunately once that is done the laptop is maxed. Looking at a new Turion II based (desktop replacement) laptop from Sony, and an HP business class I7 core desktop replacement laptop.
[This message has been edited by Xerces_Blackthorne (edited 02-17-2011).]
Psshhh, don't ya know Scott? Its not the specs of the PC that matter, its how ya use it I thought you had first hand experience on that matter with BoH
On topic though: I'm due for a new system. Unfortunately I've come to like laptops better than desktops these days, and since no one makes a desktop replacement laptop that is fully (I.E., completely) customizable, I'm stuck with a new desktop build. And if I do that, I'm doing it properly (going big server tower anyone?) Plans are to run the fastest available 6 core Phenom proc on an Asus board, 16 gb OCZ platinum DDR3 ram, dual GForce cards in SLI setup (shooting for 1gb each cards), 4x 1.5tb sata drives in raid array, all stuffed inside my old K7N8X Athlon 3000XP tower (after I gut the hell outta it of course) with blu ray combo drive. All powered by a 1000w PSU. Liquid cooling, etc. All the bells and whistles. Looking to build something that will last me the next 10 years at least. I figure with specs like this, 10 years down the line it'll be in line with the current widely available desktops (mass market crap). But for the next 3-4 years it would make one helluva server
Ironic though that while you guys are running stuff with all this hardware, my 7 year old HP laptop is still more than enough to handle most of the stuff you guys are running And its only a 1.7 ghz Athlon Turion with 2 gb ram and crap onboard ATI video (dedicated 16mb, can share out another 128mb). I threw WoW at it and it played great...need to upgrade the hdd's though. 160gb between 2 drives isn't quite cutting it. Need a couple 320's (on the list, couple weeks yet). Unfortunately once that is done the laptop is maxed. Looking at a new Turion II based (desktop replacement) laptop from Sony, and an HP business class I7 core desktop replacement laptop.
Go big or stay home. (No, I don't actually have this system, as the price tag is somewhere in the realm of HOLY HELL WHAT ARE YOU THINKING.[$7,500])
*Yes, I know it's only a quad core, but AFAIK, there's nothing software wise that's designed to properly utilize 6 cores. When that happens, I'll upgrade to a 6 core, but until then, I'm gonna run a quad.
On topic though: That's a nice upgrade N3M3S1S, I'm going to be doing something similar to my dads computer here in the next month or so. His is going to be a quasi budget build. Except he's only getting 2 HD's, and upping it to 16GB memory and a Phenom II x4 970 BE.
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09:22 AM
Pyrthian Member
Posts: 29569 From: Detroit, MI Registered: Jul 2002
something I am meaning to do my main home PC isnt even a dual core....its just a P4 w/hyperthreading....YAY and FX6200 (AGP) graphics WOW
but - its does what it needs to do: stream Hulu & Netflix, which it does just barely ANY little item running in the background will make Hulu (flash video) jumpy (1300x768 display) also - dual display - the 2nd is a FX5200 (PCI) running at 1024x768, which is so I can keep a browser open on the side while watching TV
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09:53 AM
Blacktree Member
Posts: 20770 From: Central Florida Registered: Dec 2001
I just recently made some upgrades to my desktop system... nothing really drastic, but the computer does seem to run games and apps better. Here's what I started with:
OS: Windows XP Pro x64 Motherboard: Asus M2N-E CPU: AMD Athlon x2 5400+ RAM: 4GB PC2-6400 Video: Geforce 9600GT Hard Drive: WD 160GB SATA Optical Drive: Samsung IDE DVD-RW Monitor: Generic 19" LCD PSU: Coolmax 500W Case: Lian Li PC-A16B
I upgraded the following components:
OS: Windows 7 Ultimate x64 Video: Geforce GTS250 Hard Drive: WD 750GB SATA Optical Drive: Asus SATA DVD-RW Monitors: Acer 23" LCD plus Dell 17" LCD
After replacing the DVD-RW drive, my computer no longer has any ribbon cables in it. I haven't had a floppy drive in years. And the existing drives use SATA cables.
According to the Windows Experience Index, my weakest component is currently the hard drive. I'm thinking of getting a SSD to use as the boot drive, while keeping the 750GB drive for data storage. The next weakest component is the CPU. I'll probably replace that with a quad-core chip.
Oddly enough, my old DDR2 RAM gets a high score in the Windows Experience Index (7.1), which is kinda funny since it's only running at 800MHz. It's also the highest scoring component in the computer. The video comes in at 6.9, with the CPU at 6.3 and the hard drive at 5.9.
I'm not home enough to update my old rig... I never get to use it.
Thinking about buying an Asus G73 laptop, though. Got to play with one and I really liked it.
I LOVE mine. I went with the version with the 460M. The ATI apparently had heating issues. I spent I think $1500 on it. I kind of wish I would have bought this instead though. $500 is a lot of clams.
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12:28 PM
Doug85GT Member
Posts: 9470 From: Sacramento CA USA Registered: May 2003
My 6 year old nForce 680i with Q6600 is still running strong. I have upgraded the OS hard drives and graphics cards but it is still the same MB, memory and CPU as I originally bought back then. It can still run the latest FPS at the highest settings. Most games are much more graphics intensive than processor intensive. As long as you have fast drives and graphics, then even and old Q6600 is more than enough power to run them.
I may be upgrading it soon. Intel finally came out with their next generation processor. I am still on the fence since it does not look like that much of a increase in power.
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01:44 PM
Synthesis Member
Posts: 12207 From: Jordan, MN Registered: Feb 2002
I have four systems at home, one of which is being decommissioned.
My primary system has:
AMD Phenom II X3 720 CPU with the fourth core unlocked. 8 Gigs of DDR3 64GB Sandforce based SSD boot/OS drive 1TB Western Digital Black Edition storage drive 320 GB WD Black Edition 7200 RPM 2.5" game drive nVidia GTS250 1GB graphics card 7900GT secondary graphics card for the third display 650 watt modular PSU Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit
More than ample for my uses.
My HTPC has: AMD Phenom II X2 555 with the two additional cores unlocked (Quad core) 6GB (2x1024 and 2x2048 sticks) DDR3 40 Gig Intel SSD boot/OS drive 500MB WD Black Edition storage/recording drive Hauppauge PVR150-MCE tuner card (not really used) ATi Radeon HD 5750 video card BluRay drive 650 watt PSU Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit The system bitstreams over a single HDMI cable to my home theater receiver... LOVE LOVE LOVE it...
My new file server, which just replaced the old on has: AMD Phenom II X2 560, with the two additional cores unlocked (Quad Core) 16GB DDR3 Storage currently consists of: 4x 1TB WD Blue hard drives 1x 2TB Seagate hard drive I have several other 1TB+ drives I will eventually connect to this system. The mainboard is a USB 3.0 board. 2 Intel GigE PCI NIC cards 1 HP dual Gig PCI-Express 4x NIC card 750 Watt modular PSU VMWare ESXi 4.1 Update 1 as the baremetal hypervisor.
File server OS is Windows Home Server with all updates and powerpacks with the vmxnet 3 network card (10GBps speeds)
My Linux Router also runs on this system as a Virtual Machine.
The file server that was replaced had 4TB of space, an AMD Athlon 64 4400+ X2, ad 4GB of RAM running ESXi.
Worked fine, just underrated for my needs.
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03:16 PM
Feb 28th, 2011
faaaaq Member
Posts: 3856 From: Madison WI, USA Registered: Sep 2009
Originally posted by Doug85GT: Most games are much more graphics intensive than processor intensive. As long as you have fast drives and graphics, then even and old Q6600 is more than enough power to run them.
ive got the q6600 as well. when i got it it was nearly top of the line aside from the Black edition processors. games run great. i think i have like 2gigs of memory just for graphics at all times so that helps too. anyone looking to do a cheap graphics upgrade, get a Sapphire Radeon HD4850 (or similar if price isnt too bad). very few games i cant max, and its great with AA (frame syncing, not so much, but its whatever). get the sapphire one because it keeps cooler than other brands, and the 4850s are known to run VERY hot
I thought you had first hand experience on that matter with BoH 
(No, I don't actually have this system, as the price tag is somewhere in the realm of HOLY HELL WHAT ARE YOU THINKING.[$7,500])
