1329 replies to this topic

[Stormyblade]

I find it hard to put a whole lot of faith and trust in someone that has pulled snippets of headlines against Intel and then calls them on their "bad" ethics without posting follow-ups to said claims. The case of New York vs Intel was initiated by a suggestion from AMD and was later dropped for lack of evidence. The case of AMD vs Intel was dropped after Intel paid AMD a huge sum of money because litigation was going to cost more than any damages, regardless of who won.

Drop the bias...if your profile is actually factual, you're far too young to have any semblance of what really happens in the business world.

[Arnkh]

So I've got MW4 working (kinda) and played for about 15 minutes (before it crashed). And I can say is this - my shooter skill is pretty useless, as is my mouse. Sure, I can bind something to the 2 programmable buttons, but that won't change the fact that my left hand needs to control the entire keyboard. I went looking for that Thrustmaster, and the one I've seen in the shop had the grey rubbery thingy on it coming off, which isn't a good sign. Also, the whole construction looked rather shoddy, but maybe it's just me. I'd like to know if anyone here actually used one for a long time and whether or not it fell apart or anything.

[Skyefox]

Can I just get a clone of the original Sidewinder force feedback pro?? My fave joystick of ALL time, it was with me from MW3 all the way to MW4: Merc. GIMME GIMME!

[Death Mallet]

This is definitely a contender for the most well researched and presented post about a topic I've ever seen. Hats off to you sir!

[Stray Ion]

I do not agree with the review of the Logitech Extreme 3D Pro. I may be one of the lucky few who has had one for years with out issues and don't recall paying $25 for it I think it was $40-$60. But prices change with time i guess.

It is a plastic stick, but as long as you treat it as such it should last years. If you are the foolish type who throws tools only to have to shamefully retrieve them after, avoid this stick.

I still have no button slop or any axiz problems. When I bought it I was aware of trim problems, but also knew that an easy fix was available from logitech themselves.

I have used this stick for X3 for months on end as well as Aces High II and MW4, it has had years of use with no issues, but like I said I may be lucky.

[Stray Ion]

Skyefox, on 01 July 2012 - 05:25 AM, said:

Can I just get a clone of the original Sidewinder force feedback pro?? My fave joystick of ALL time, it was with me from MW3 all the way to MW4: Merc. GIMME GIMME!

One has to love a Joystick heavy enough to kill a toddler if dropped on it. Mine still works, but it is not USB compatible and using an adapter the gyros will not spin and your left with a limp stick. I'm too lazy to install a PCI serial port and get it working.

[Vulpesveritas]

Stormyblade, on 01 July 2012 - 05:11 AM, said:

I find it hard to put a whole lot of faith and trust in someone that has pulled snippets of headlines against Intel and then calls them on their "bad" ethics without posting follow-ups to said claims. The case of New York vs Intel was initiated by a suggestion from AMD and was later dropped for lack of evidence. The case of AMD vs Intel was dropped after Intel paid AMD a huge sum of money because litigation was going to cost more than any damages, regardless of who won.

Drop the bias...if your profile is actually factual, you're far too young to have any semblance of what really happens in the business world.

If you want me to follow up on it I can, but I thnk you are wron on at least one other note, given that my father owned and ran his own business until recently. I grew up in a highly political family as well.
as far as the NYC vs Intel being dropped, what about the number of independent countries which found Intel guilty on their own? Or are you going to leave that and saying I'm pulling straws despite the large amount of information against Intel whis available out there.
Lastly, I did my best to leave the CPU selection unbiased. And I do understand the IPC differences, however when it comes to AMD products in general, I don't understand the hate that they get by Intel and Nvidia fanboys who jump in, flame about it, spew information and say "Intel/Nvidia are still better. Light threading is king/ drivers are awesome " etc etc and try to make out that AMD processors as being worse than they are. If you want to try to claim that in a well quad threaded game,that a dual core w/ HT and 25-30% higher IPC is going to be faster than a quad core clocked 30% higher, and is overclockable, I would be asking where your logic is.

[Kumakichi]

Thanks for the post. Its funny to see that over years they added more doodads but really stick flaws haven't changed a whole lot. Bad pots, sloppy centering, etc...



I'm hoping my Sidewinder Forcefeedback 2 still works. I never liked the forcefeedback feature but its centering was terrific. A twisty stick might seem odd or uncomfortable at first but once you get used to it you dont want to go back. And it was built really well. If not I was thinking maybe a Razor Naga and a Throttle combo. Wonder if this is possible.

Edited by Kumakichi, 01 July 2012 - 06:35 AM.

[Kumakichi]

You really like AsRock and I guess whats not to like. I'm running an AsRock z68 Extreme4(gen3). Its my first AsRock board and its really nice. CPU air cooling is at good place too from both a price and performance viewpoint. Only thing about the performance air coolers is they might not fit in your case such as mine. I have to run it with the door off.

Also watch out for sub $100 boards. Yes they are very cheap. But do your homework. Some of those cheap boards have many issues and take a lot of effort to get sorted. My board I simply put the components in and it fired right up. And I like to overclock and that is wonderfully simple with this board bios.

[Vulpesveritas]

Stormyblade, on 01 July 2012 - 04:54 AM, said:

@Vulpesveritas: While I feel your overall guide is good at getting people started, I think you really need to lay off the Intel hate and just present unbiased specs on your components.

I do my best to do so. As far as Intel hate... i understand outside of the guides and advice I give I go have quite a bit, but i don't see where it all is within the guides. unless you want to claim that an intel CPU is twice as fast clock-for-clock or more vs an AMD CPU, which simply is not true. Not to mention, once you get a quad core in your system, there is hardly any difference in performance. In the Techpowerup! comparison between a Nethalim i7, Sandy Bridge i5, and an Zambezi FX-8150, there was only a 3% difference overall in gaming between Zambezi and Sandy bridge. To me, that gives a price / performance advantage to AMD, especially when you take into consideration that your graphics card is going to create a vastly different level of gaming performance. I tend to recommend the FX-6200 to people on the simple basis that it is on par with SB i5s in multitasking while being only $160. Just because I understand multitasking is something people tend to do in the real world. If it weren't for that, I would be recommending Phenom II X4s across the board. And given that Techpowerup has a more in depth review process than most review sites, I do tend to trust them.

On another note, this thread was meant to be more of a "clearing up misconceptions" thread, and I will be creating a true guide to shopping for new computer hardware overall soon, once my writers block goes away.

[cipher]

Stormyblade, on 01 July 2012 - 04:54 AM, said:

@Vulpesveritas: While I feel your overall guide is good at getting people started, I think you really need to lay off the Intel hate and just present unbiased specs on your components.

He hates Intel for political reasons, so he's inherently biased. He tries his best not to be when doing recommendations, but it almost always shows through because of his personal bias.

[Catzklawz]

Cougar with Nxt pots is the way to go for me anyways. I been buzzing around with mine for awhile now and after throwing in the upgrades I am very happy with it and it will probably last for years. Add a set of propedals and bam dreams of building a mech cockpit start to look more reachable....

now they are turning up on "EBAY" occasionally.

[Game_Overture]

Does anyone know if the Logictech g940's pedals are loud when shifting forward and back? Loud enough to disturb someone under me?

[Owl]

+1. The Sidewinder Pro™ was a GREAT stick. Went through 3 of them on Starsiege™ and MW3. Got to the point it was a verb: "Well, looks like I Starsieged™ another stick..."

Skyefox, on 01 July 2012 - 05:25 AM, said:

Can I just get a clone of the original Sidewinder force feedback pro?? My fave joystick of ALL time, it was with me from MW3 all the way to MW4: Merc. GIMME GIMME!

[FrozenWaltDisney]

heres my setup... Running Dual ASUS DCUII 7970s in crossfire, and still can run 6 monitors

Please note: Running currently 5, and the alienware laptop is not connected to them (obviously)

Edited by FrozenWaltDisney, 02 July 2012 - 06:59 PM.

[Skadi]

Mod's y u pin this but no meme thread.

[DeclanH]

Arnkh, on 30 June 2012 - 09:46 PM, said:

Thank you for this roundup, it got me thinking.
-snip- So, while I would love to get Thrustmaster Hotas Warthog, I want to be damn sure it'll be worth the asking price, as in whether or not my gaming experience will be better than the setup I successfully used for playing every other game (mouse and keyboard, obviously)-snip-

My thoughts exactly, I REALLY want to buy the warthog and a set of saitek combat rudder pedals but I am unsure on dropping the ~$700 AUD on them. Suppose I will play the game with keyboard/mouse first and see how I go. I have played MW titles with a joystick and much preferred it, I don't know how this game will play and it is an awful lot of money to spend when I don't really play flight sims as well.

Edited by DeclanH, 03 July 2012 - 03:07 AM.

[Stormyblade]

Vulpesveritas, on 01 July 2012 - 06:10 AM, said:

If you want me to follow up on it I can, but I thnk you are wron on at least one other note, given that my father owned and ran his own business until recently. I grew up in a highly political family as well.
as far as the NYC vs Intel being dropped, what about the number of independent countries which found Intel guilty on their own? Or are you going to leave that and saying I'm pulling straws despite the large amount of information against Intel whis available out there.
Lastly, I did my best to leave the CPU selection unbiased. And I do understand the IPC differences, however when it comes to AMD products in general, I don't understand the hate that they get by Intel and Nvidia fanboys who jump in, flame about it, spew information and say "Intel/Nvidia are still better. Light threading is king/ drivers are awesome " etc etc and try to make out that AMD processors as being worse than they are. If you want to try to claim that in a well quad threaded game,that a dual core w/ HT and 25-30% higher IPC is going to be faster than a quad core clocked 30% higher, and is overclockable, I would be asking where your logic is.

Look, I'm not going to be drawn into a war over who has sued who, or for what reason. Both AMD and Intel, as CPU manufacturers, have been sued for years by several different types claiming all sorts of things. There is no "winner" when it comes to lawsuits such as those that the companies have to go through because litigation only helps lawyers and not the companies. Both Intel and AMD have suffered through cases where patent infringement or unfair business practices has been implied - and, again, the only real winners are the lawyers.

You referred to the PassMark benchmark test where you said AMD beats out Intel...funny...Intel holds 18 of the top 20 slots in your preferred benchmark: http://www.cpubenchm...cked_cpus.html.

AMD just last year quit the BAPCo benchmark group, claiming that the tests weren't designed to correctly show off all the performance aspects of CPUs -- except that AMD had voted support in over 80% of those tests (http://news.cnet.com...ing-intel-bias/).

Also, even Tom's Hardware keeps giving Intel the "win" even in the budget rig ring: http://www.tomshardw...mark,3136.html. Just 6 months ago, Tom's Hardware also published this recommendation that basically says Intel beats out AMD at every price point, and even being able to tweak/overclock doesn't give AMD any definitive advantages: http://www.tomshardw...k,3120-10.html.

[Vulpesveritas]

Stormyblade, on 03 July 2012 - 03:17 AM, said:

Look, I'm not going to be drawn into a war over who has sued who, or for what reason. Both AMD and Intel, as CPU manufacturers, have been sued for years by several different types claiming all sorts of things. There is no "winner" when it comes to lawsuits such as those that the companies have to go through because litigation only helps lawyers and not the companies. Both Intel and AMD have suffered through cases where patent infringement or unfair business practices has been implied - and, again, the only real winners are the lawyers.

You referred to the PassMark benchmark test where you said AMD beats out Intel...funny...Intel holds 18 of the top 20 slots in your preferred benchmark: http://www.cpubenchm...cked_cpus.html.

AMD just last year quit the BAPCo benchmark group, claiming that the tests weren't designed to correctly show off all the performance aspects of CPUs -- except that AMD had voted support in over 80% of those tests (http://news.cnet.com...ing-intel-bias/).

Also, even Tom's Hardware keeps giving Intel the "win" even in the budget rig ring: http://www.tomshardw...mark,3136.html. Just 6 months ago, Tom's Hardware also published this recommendation that basically says Intel beats out AMD at every price point, and even being able to tweak/overclock doesn't give AMD any definitive advantages: http://www.tomshardw...k,3120-10.html.

I would have to disagree on this point. First of all on the passmark statement, I have never said that "AMD beats Intel at every price point." I have merely said that "AMD is competitive at the sub-$200 price point."
Not only are your Tom'shardware links dead

Spoiler

But, Tom's hardware has been known to be biased towards Intel in the past. Hence reducing some credibility to the claim.

Furthermore, most benchmarks only go so far, not taking into consideration multitasking in most cases, and hence will tend to reduce the advantage a higher core count processor will have.
In the end, we stand at two ends of the point, as on the performance side of things, until I see a benchmark from a credible source, which shows Intel having an advantage across the board in both light-and-multi thread environments, with a large sample size and variety of benchmarks, even against overclocked AMD chips in the sub-$200 price points, my recommendations will remain the same.
And until I see evidence that AMD is as guilty of as many crimes, and of the same scale as Intel, then I will continue to advocate the ethics side of the picture, given that some individuals do consider the ethics of their purchases to be important.

[Valhakar]

Crescent Fresh, on 01 July 2012 - 04:24 PM, said:

Does anyone know if the Logictech g940's pedals are loud when shifting forward and back? Loud enough to disturb someone under me?

....as in the floor under you? Shouldn't be a problem

Besides, I usually wind up placing my pedals for any rig on a memory foam pad to keep it from sliding. Zero noise when you do that.