The RPGamer Computer Rebuild/Building Help thread. ^^

HyphyKezzy · August 2013

It kinda depends on your mobo but overclocking can be really easy now. With mine it was just a couple menu clicks culminating in a choice between a mild or more extreme overclock. It played around with it's own settings a few times cycling on and off and then settled into something it liked and was done. No fiddling with voltages or stuff from me necessary and it's been perfectly stable with no temp issues for over a year now. As far as cooling, I'm on air and it's been fine but I think if you really wanted to play with water they sell block setups that look pretty easy to install. My 14 year old cousin keeps trying to throw one in various builds he's coming up with even though I keep telling him to save the money there and skip the sound card he's also stubborn about and get an ssd instead.

Speaking of which, it's looking like I'm going to be building one with my cousin sometime in the next few months here. He threw a parts list at me when he first brought it up with an AMD cpu in it which made me finally stop being lazy and read the articles Flamethrower's been posting. I think we're going to stick with that since he's not really interested in games like Civ 5, which seems to be the big weak spot, and it does seem to be friendlier on the budget. I still need to dig around on the couple of different mobos he's proposed and figure out how to get him off the water nonsense since we aren't gonna overclock him but the plan is starting to come together.

maryadavies · August 2013

I can tell you right now Hyphy from what I've read; Watercooling from what I've seen is for really high performance machines or overclockers, and done wrong can ruin your system. (Leaks, etc.). It IS quieter I know, but for most people unless they're really anal, a watercooling kit is a un-necessary expense. Not to mention most fans are a lot quieter than they used to be; my new system runs really cool with 3 big fans, and is fairly quiet compared to my old system ^^ (You can hear the fans, but unless it is just starting up, it's quiet as a mouse.)

I hope you can talk him out of watercooling, and not just because he don't need it. I mean, far as I can tell, it's for really high end machines and for serious overclockers (since you can get more cooling with that for a ton less noise). Just make sure you research and have some good arguments ready against it; If your cousin is anything like 'Cat, it may take a few carrots and a lot of arguing to get him to see he don't need it. ^^ (stubborn is as stubborn does!)

Besides, I don't b/c I don't go that high end/don't overclock plus I know 'Cat isn't familiar with it, which would make it trickier to put together. He's already grumpy after work, why add to it?

smacd · August 2013

deleted.

smacd · October 2013

deleted.

flamethrower · January 2014

Finally got around to putting my component list together:
I want a mATX PC. I have an ATX PC now and don't use all the space it offers (or even close).
Will be buying these soon.

Case: Temjin TJ08-E $100
PSU: Rosewill Capstone-550 $75
Board: ASRock Z87M Pro4 $105
CPU: Intel i5-4570 $200
CPU Fan: Stock $0
RAM: 2x8GB 1600MHz CL9 - $130
GPU: Asus R9280X-DC2T-3GD5 $360
Sound: Onboard $0
SSD: Samsung 840 EVO 500GB $325
Storage1: 3TB HDD (already have)
Storage2: 1TB HDD (from old PC)
Optical: ASUS BW-12B1ST/BLK/G/AS (Blu-ray writer) $47 AC AR
OS: Windows 8.1 64-bit $100

Total $1477

I modeled it on this AnandTech guide.

Bad idea to skimp on the CPU cooler?

Went with the Asus GPU because it has a better cooler than cheaper cards (less noise). This would be the most expensive computer part I've ever bought.

maryadavies · January 2014

With the CPU cooler, bad idea to go with anything less than what is in the box (that the cpu comes with). Higher/overclock fan is fine though if you are really scared of overheats.

flamethrower · January 2014

I'm more concerned with noise than anything else.
I'm not overclocking - my build has the non-K 4570.
http://pcpartpicker.com/p/2ypPU

maryadavies · January 2014

Yeah so check the noise, they usually say how loud it'll be. FYI, my opinion is it's okay to go with a overclocker's fan if you hate overheating (and are chicken about overheating) even if you don't overclock. I did that with my old pc but by the time I repped that fan..It was hard to find fans for that processor so I went with teh biggest, nastiest CPU fan I could find.

I'll call 'Cat and tell him to tell you more if you want since he's the real tech in the house; I'm just the apprentice so I can learn how to fix my own machine.

HyphyKezzy · January 2014

Dayum! You gonna have all the storage.

I'm thinking a stock fan is a good choice for you. No overclocking anyways and the aftermarket coolers are quite a bit larger, you're probably better off just saving the space in a small form case.

I'm still keeping up on stuff but not as obsessively as when I was getting ready to build. I guess things shook out cool with those R9's? If I'm remembering right those are the ones where the cards sent to the press to test were outperforming the stuff in stores. I assume sites have gotten a hold of them through other channels now and they're looking acceptable regardless?

Other than that, which probably isn't an issue, it all looks good to me.

Shadowcat · January 2014

the stock fan is good on most machines and most of the high-end ones like water cooling, etc. are aimed at overclockers. Unless you want to do that what's in the box with the CPU will serve you just fine.

flamethrower · January 2014

HyphyKezzy wrote: »

If I'm remembering right those are the ones where the cards sent to the press to test were outperforming the stuff in stores. I assume sites have gotten a hold of them through other channels now and they're looking acceptable regardless?

I'd like you to link me to other reading on this. I think it's more like:
1) AMD's design was horrible (bad cooler design; bad cooling algorithm)
2) AMD partner designs were better (and cost more, and perform better)
The Asus R9280X-DC2T-3GD5 is a modification of the AMD 280X board. It's overclocked, has a different cooler, and a different algorithm for how hard the fans should work to cool the card under high load. As a result, it's $50 more than AMD's board, draws more power, and has much lower noise.

I remember a recent cheating story for mobile processors. Manufacturers were configuring their phone GPUs (or GPU parts of the phone processors) to behave differently (different clock speed) in benchmark situations vs all other situations.

HyphyKezzy · January 2014

Looking for it and skimming this one are-retail-radeon-r9-290x-cards-slower-than-press-samples real quick makes me think you have it right. And it was the 290's there but yeah cooler design and something they tried to patch for with software. I just remembered reading something small about it before the holidays and figured I'd ask, I've been paying more attention to the Nvidia side with the G-Sync stuff.

goateguy · January 2014

When I was in college at 20 I was happy with the old XP based computer that I was given. I had all the time to look up and know what I wanted in a build, I just had no money to make it work. Now that I am 26 and out of college with no debt (with a wife that needs a computer for school) and a job, I have lost all that time and knowledge to build, something nice. If you all don't mind me asking. What is the best I can get for around 650-700 with monitor and os? I'm not looking for a gaming pc but something that will at least let me play a few games.

flamethrower · January 2014

Go here:
http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/11/ars-technica-system-guide-november-2013/

From that guide, I wouldn't get the mouse or keyboard (you probably already have those). Also from that guide, the suggested GPU is a little anemic. I'd splurge for an R9 270 (if you like AMD, $50 more) or a GTX 650 Ti Boost (if you like Nvidia, $40 more).

I would just delete the SSD from that part list (re-use the part from your current PC, if you have one) to make your budget. You can always add one later if you come into some money.

goateguy · January 2014

I wouldn't trust anything from the last pc I had....it has been gathering dust the last 3 years since I've been out if college. I have been using a laptop that could blow that desktop out of the water in the mean time. And it is because that one is getting old (4years at this point) my wife and I decided to go out and get a new one with the tax return we will get in April. So everything will be from scratch unfortunately....but I do appreciate the guide anyway. It will give me a base to choose from.

maryadavies · January 2014

Well, I think some know (Primarily Shadowcat, since he's heard me complain) that I've been having some problems. Turned out the "free" RAM I got with my new pc was not well rated and can cause crashes.

I've gotten some Corsair Vengeance RAM from Best Buy (I bought the offending ram chips + my mb instruction book to Best Buy with me) and hopefully that solved that, otherwise I'm staring down another reformat. (Have had to do that once which solved the crashes for a little while but not forever) ..But that happens. I hope the MB isn't bad or I'm going to be furious.

goateguy · February 2014

Because I am lazy, I was wondering if it would be cheaper to pay someone to get the parts for me and pay them a slight premium to assemble the parts and ship it to me? Or would that be too impractical to work really?

maryadavies · February 2014

It depends on if the person is local or not. Me, my brother lives right in the same house, so it's cheaper for me to get parts/operating system and bribe him with cookies/kisses/candy/pussycat eyes to get him to do it. (Tho I want to learn how to DIY it since I don't know if we'll be in the same house forever...) I know some local computer shops will do it and unlike 'Cat, you won't have to buy parts. So let your fingers do the walking..I actually did that with my first pc. I had a mom and pop computer shop in Atlanta build me a pc, complete with a Voodoo 3(that was a mistake in the end..) and Windows 98 SE (which was the best operating system at the time). Very practical if you don't have about 2 hours to DIY it, I think. ^^

Not local people, it might be cheaper to get the parts from Newegg and ship to them than you ship them (shipping costs more than you think...I should know since I've sold stuff on Etsy...I swear that the post office likes to charge a arm and a leg) and pay for labor/shipping back. But yeah, make sure you compare costs. It might be better to DIY the PC or just have ye old mom and pop computer repair shop do the work. ^^ I haven't investigated the possibility too heavily (tho I've been telling friends; if you need a pc built, contact 'Cat to see if he can and to negotiate labor costs, and have Newegg ship the parts to him b/c simply speaking, 'CAT NEEDS $$!) but it might be workable. Again, if it's not Shadowcat, make sure you compare prices pretty aggressively on any online service and make sure it isn't some fly by night that'll take your money and run. (I know 'Cat'd be honest but you never know..) I figure there's some online compy shops that'd do the same thing as the local ones but again, CHECK FOR FEEDBACK and costs. Remember shipping is pretty expensive.

Oh and a tip. Be very careful going for operating system. If you want Windows 7, I don't know if MS is actually selling that anymore. So you have to be careful of pirated versions. ^^

Oh and one more thing; if you wanna do the fixit shop route, DO NOT CHECK AT BEST BUY. They do not do this. Only places like Computer Renaissance and mom and pop computer shops will do this.

maryadavies · May 2017

Pardon the double post/bump, but PC update.

Finally decided that my old video card was too old, so I upgraded it. It's now a Geforce GTX 1060. Also I'm now running windows 10 (got it for free when MS was doing that.)

Will have to consider carefully about any future updates; I am thinking about going for the HDD next; maybe get a 2-4 tera as soon as I can find a good sale? Tho of course, upgrades after more important things.

TheAnimeMan · June 2017

Just make sure you have a power supply big enough to support all your stuff. There was a guy in my guild in WoW who had a much lower power supply then what his new graphics card needed and his comp kept shutting off

maryadavies · June 2017

I mean to. I actually ASKED both company and around to make sure my PSU could support that video card, and it can, np. I haven't had any mysterious shut-offs.

Luckily newer Nividia cards actually don't use much more powah than the older ones, so that helps. Now, once things get better I'll worry about my hdd.

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