1329 replies to this topic

[Achaian]

thanks for the info guys.
i currently run on my core 2 quad 2.4 a 3870 sapphire.so you probably understand that i Definitely need a new card. i was considering the 6670,6870 types in order not to spend a lot of euros, but maybe the leap to the 7870 is worth it. i doubt though that with my asus p5e m/b i will get the most out of this gpu.

[Vulpesveritas]

Achaian, on 01 December 2012 - 03:25 AM, said:

thanks for the info guys.
i currently run on my core 2 quad 2.4 a 3870 sapphire.so you probably understand that i Definitely need a new card. i was considering the 6670,6870 types in order not to spend a lot of euros, but maybe the leap to the 7870 is worth it. i doubt though that with my asus p5e m/b i will get the most out of this gpu.

You shouldn't have to worry so long as you're running it in a full x16 lane.

[DisasterTheory]

Vulpesveritas, on 26 June 2012 - 07:11 AM, said:

This is by value of what you get for the boards. AsRock boards tend to come with more features at a price point versus other companies, hence why they are picked so often in this. The Biostar board was picked for the chipset at that price point. Asus boards for the most part at the lower end lack any defining characteristics, and don't really have anything extra feature wise, save digi VRM which AsRock also implements. Gigabyte does have at least some things behind their Ultra Durable 3/4 with additional VRM and board design features. EVGA also tends to lack price/performance advantages here either.

If I'm wrong, let me know, and if you want to perhaps you could find what is in your opinion the best deal is for an LGA 1155 motherboard for $75-100 without sales then?

Gigabyte, ASUS and MSI are the only board brands I trust and they all have various platforms at all pricepoints offering top quality. You can get a 970 board from them all for around 100 bucks which is the baseline motherboard for the AM3+ if you want the most out of the CPU's memory controller. (1866Mhz)

ASUS is obviously the top of the 3 but MSI and Gigabyte also have highend models.

[Vulpesveritas]

BLOODREDSINGLE, on 01 December 2012 - 09:47 AM, said:

Gigabyte, ASUS and MSI are the only board brands I trust and they all have various platforms at all pricepoints offering top quality. You can get a 970 board from them all for around 100 bucks which is the baseline motherboard for the AM3+ if you want the most out of the CPU's memory controller. (1866Mhz)

ASUS is obviously the top of the 3 but MSI and Gigabyte also have highend models.

In number of motherboards shipped, Asus > Gigabyte > AsRock > MSI.
In fewest number of failures per shipped motherboard 2011, Gigabyte > Asus > AsRock > MSI.
AsRock has been doing very well in the past couple of years since they became their own company, and have been winning awards from review sites left and right. They do very well in terms of value / performance. For Highend models, AsRock is also hard to beat, ex. Their OC formula board; http://www.xbitlabs....oc-formula.html

Because of that, I tend to recommend them. But in truth, any of the four I will recommend if the price / performance value is there.

[TIEZINE]

Steven McWayne, on 22 June 2012 - 02:40 PM, said:

I'm a member of a IL-2 flight squadron for around 4 years now and own a Thrustmaster Warthog + Simpeds.
If you do fly in simulations and use these sticks then it's worth the money, if not take the cheaper sticks like X52.
I started with X52 "not pro" variant + Saitek rudders. Useful if you use it once a week but its not that hell accurate around the center, the potis on the sliders are medicore..china quality i would say. The Pedals are full plastic and swing out of their rails if you put to much pressure from above on them.
We got 2 Members with the Logitech G940 and they had to exchange them for the 4th time, just don't buy them.
One of them Exchanged the full Logitech electronics with a custom Bodnar electronics to get it stable working.
The other one just bought a Warthog this week .
The Saitek X65...yeah, the stick isn't movable, it works with force sensing sensors..i wouldn't like it if it doesn't move.
Pedals? I would call the CH pedals "nutcracker", the way from left to right pedal are really tight.
Better get a beginner "Saitek" pedal or more quality Simped, also the russians build a full metal pedal for ~200€+ i guess.

So i would say.
High quality, Thrustmaster Warthog/Cougar + Simpeds or Russian pedals
Med quality, X52pro/X65F + Saitek combat rudder pedals
Low quality, G940, pedals inkluded
Or just get a stick with thrustcontrol and a twist axis

Oh..i played MW2 to 4 all with mouse and keyboard

I had the original X-36 and throttle setup. Those were very well made in my opinion, sadly it looks like the Saitek quality is slipping. I'll definitely be buying the HOTAS Hog for my next FCS setup. Not to mention it'd look better in a cockpit build.

[Vulpesveritas]

Updated 12/2/2012

Aaaaaand we're 19 days away from the day everyone freaks out.

[Youngblood]

So while we're on the topic of quirky cases, has anyone tried the Silverstone Raven or Fortress series? I was really surprised at how it can apparently fit standard size mobos and wondered if it would fit in the same cubby hole I keep my Fractal Arc Mini in.

[Staplebeater]

Vulpesveritas, I see you tend to recommend AMD CPU builds and was wondering why. A lot of gamers have gone with 2500k and the newer 3570kchips with great success. i have a 2500k OCed and am loving it and think it has done well in my rig. Tomshardware tends to recommend intel CPUs except for the $120 price point. Just curious

[Vulpesveritas]

Staplebeater, on 02 December 2012 - 01:59 PM, said:

Vulpesveritas, I see you tend to recommend AMD CPU builds and was wondering why. A lot of gamers have gone with 2500k and the newer 3570kchips with great success. i have a 2500k OCed and am loving it and think it has done well in my rig. Tomshardware tends to recommend intel CPUs except for the $120 price point. Just curious

Most recommendations are made for gamers playing lightly threaded / older games. MWO has shown to scale all the way up to eight threads, and the first four threads have quite good gains. As such, AMD quad cores outperform Pentium and i3 Intel processors in this game. AMD Vishera 8 cores compete quite well in this game against i5s as well, and offer better future-proofing capability, as MWO is one example of the trend games are taking towards more and more multithreaded capability, and as such it is a better investment in my opinion to plan for future game engines than to get a few extra FPS in older titles where you are already hitting 100+fps. In addition to this, I also do not like recommending Intel due to their criminal record, and as long as AMD provides a performance advantage at the price point that someone is looking at, I will recommend AMD to them despite Intel offering better performance / watt. Also, given AMD's pricing, I have an extra $50 or so to put to the graphics card or an SSD depending on what price point we're looking at, allowing for a faster overall system while maintaining CPU performance.

Also, AMD is better for tweakers at lower price points given their support for overclocking on the majority of their CPU models, rather than just a few as is in Intel's case.

[Sir Roland MXIII]

Vulpesveritas, on 02 December 2012 - 08:57 AM, said:

Updated 12/2/2012

Aaaaaand we're 19 days away from the day everyone freaks out.

Not me. I'm 19 days away from the day when I start laughing my *** off at people who are too ignorant of the truth to realize they're idiots for freaking out. Seriously, the guy who started all this started it with a FICTIONAL NOVEL, which bears no real resemblance to reality. Mayan calendar exists, yes. And we transition from the 5th Mayan Era, to the 6th Mayan Era. They predicted 12 or so Eras. They change roughly every 500 to 1,000 years.

Isn't it AMAZING what not being an ignorant fool can be like? LMAO.

December 21st of this year is my day to pop some popcorn and LAUGH at the stupid members I regretfully share a species with. December 22nd is my day to bring up certain ancient South / Central American cultures and LAUGH when people blush and change the subject. I am NOT kidding. I've been PLANNING this for a while now.

/off topic...

Edited by Sir Roland MXIII, 02 December 2012 - 03:18 PM.

[Sen]

LOL, Staple, this is a major point of contention between Vulp and myself. He has some good reasons that I won't get into, but most of them have little in the way to do with performance.

Sure, the vizshera 8 cores compete directly in price and performance with the i5 series of processors. You'll get similar performance between the two, though the i5 is a lot more power efficient and really starts to distance itself from AMD when overclocking. Moving up to the 2600/2700k line, vizshera just falls behind, FORGET OVERCLOCKING. . but price begins to become a factor. Move into socket 2011 category, AMD doesn't even have a contender. . but the 3930k is 3x the price!

That doesn't mean that AMDs latest offerings are inherently worthless however. When you start to factor in the rest of the components for a build, and AMD build can be be fairly inexpensive. $200 on sale is a fairly sweet opener for a pseudo hyperthreaded quad core, you're talking about $300 for a 2600/2700k, and if you're on a budget they can still make very competitive builds. *I* would argue that the value goes out the window when your paying an extra $20 or w/e a month in electricity. . but who really thinks of things like that? Certainly not John Q 16 Year old living in his parents basement.

Ultimately, however, the biggest reason to support AMD is the same reason people support REAL independent film and music. . to give the world an alternative. If intel were the only game in town, it would be bad for everyone. . bad for innovation, bad for pricing. . competition is NECESSARY.

At least for now. . we'll see what happens with Broadwell


And for the record our calendar is off. Dec 21st 2012 has actually been and gone. Interestingly enough, apparently that date was COINCIDENTALLY the Mayan new year. The planets will all be in a specific alignment, that was the end of one year and the beginning of the next. . can we say "well, we had to stop the calendar SOMEWHERE"?

Edited by Sen, 02 December 2012 - 03:27 PM.

[Vulpesveritas]

Sir Roland MXIII, on 02 December 2012 - 03:17 PM, said:

Not me. I'm 19 days away from the day when I start laughing my *** off at people who are too ignorant of the truth to realize they're idiots for freaking out. Seriously, the guy who started all this started it with a FICTIONAL NOVEL, which bears no real resemblance to reality. Mayan calendar exists, yes. And we transition from the 5th Mayan Era, to the 6th Mayan Era. They predicted 12 or so Eras. They change roughly every 500 to 1,000 years.

Isn't it AMAZING what not being an ignorant fool can be like? LMAO.

December 21st of this year is my day to pop some popcorn and LAUGH at the stupid members I regretfully share a species with. December 22nd is my day to bring up certain ancient South / Central American cultures and LAUGH when people blush and change the subject. I am NOT kidding. I've been PLANNING this for a while now.

/off topic...

Sen, on 02 December 2012 - 03:25 PM, said:

LOL, Staple, this is a major point of contention between Vulp and myself. He has some good reasons that I won't get into, but most of them have little in the way to do with performance.

Sure, the vizshera 8 cores compete directly in price and performance with the i5 series of processors. You'll get similar performance between the two, though the i5 is a lot more power efficient and really starts to distance itself from AMD when overclocking. Moving up to the 2600/2700k line, vizshera just falls behind, FORGET OVERCLOCKING. . but price begins to become a factor. Move into socket 2011 category, AMD doesn't even have a contender. . but the 3930k is 3x the price!

That doesn't mean that AMDs latest offerings are inherently worthless however. When you start to factor in the rest of the components for a build, and AMD build can be be fairly inexpensive. $200 on sale is a fairly sweet opener for a pseudo hyperthreaded quad core, you're talking about $300 for a 2600/2700k, and if you're on a budget they can still make very competitive builds. *I* would argue that the value goes out the window when your paying an extra $20 or w/e a month in electricity. . but who really thinks of things like that? Certainly not John Q 16 Year old living in his parents basement.

Ultimately, however, the biggest reason to support AMD is the same reason people support REAL independent film and music. . to give the world an alternative. If intel were the only game in town, it would be bad for everyone. . bad for innovation, bad for pricing. . competition is NECESSARY.

At least for now. . we'll see what happens with Broadwell


And for the record our calendar is off. Dec 21st 2012 has actually been and gone. Interestingly enough, apparently that date was COINCIDENTALLY the Mayan new year. The planets will all be in a specific alignment, that was the end of one year and the beginning of the next. . can we say "well, we had to stop the calendar SOMEWHERE"?

Point 1: In terms of energy bills without overclocking if you are in the USA, you will see at most a $5 increase in energy cost between a vishera core and an Ivy bridge core in a YEAR. $30/year difference at most (max load, average 8 hours a day, probably not that high in real life scenarios) in the USA if you're overclocked to 5ghz (250-300w power consumption @ 5ghz on Vishera 8 core vs 100-150w @ 4.5ghz on Ivy Bridge i5. [to compare performance levels] USA energy costs at most are $0.15/kwh), but then if you spend that much on cooling and have tweaked to overclock that high are you really caring? Europe is another story of course given how much higher they are in comparison in terms of energy costs.

Math for the 5ghz calculation:
Dfference in power in watt-hours: 150wh
Cost per kilowatt-hour: $0.15/kwh (maximum, USA power costs range from $0.06-0.15/kwh. Average is actually $0.10/kwh)
w --> kw = 0.15kw
translated to 1 cent / hour in use
365 days per year * 8 (hours per day) * $0.01 = $29.20/year (Average in USA would be about $20)


In terms of value, let's take the FX-8320 for example. (given if you're overclocking this will save you money)
Overclocked to 4.5-5.0ghz, you get the performance of a ~4.0-4.5ghz quad core i7 in multithread, and a little behind the i5 in lightly threaded tasks. (you beat out the i5 in multithread.) At $180, you've got a CPU that is $40 cheaper than an i5-3570k and $140 cheaper than an i7-3770k. It takes two years to cost the same as the i5, and seven years to cost the same as the i7 when overclocked. Without overclocking, it would take eight years to equal the cost of the i5, and 28 years to match the price of the i7. (assuming no inflation of energy costs)

Not exactly a bad deal in my opinion.

Point 2: Yeah I am poking fun at everyone who freaks out too. But given how many humans are fools these days, I have a feeling a good number will be among those freaking out. As such, I will be laughing quite a bit.

Edited by Vulpesveritas, 02 December 2012 - 04:28 PM.

[Sen]

And how do I know your math is right? Source or it didn't happen!! I say vizshera costs $500/month more than an Intel!

Actually I trust vulp's informaion, but I just can't resist tweaking his nose on occasion. On the plus side,I give him great opportunity to make his case :-)

[Vulpesveritas]

Sen, on 02 December 2012 - 05:19 PM, said:

And how do I know your math is right? Source or it didn't happen!! I say vizshera costs $500/month more than an Intel!

Actually I trust vulp's informaion, but I just can't resist tweaking his nose on occasion. On the plus side,I give him great opportunity to make his case :-)

http://www.eia.gov/e...m#tabs_prices-3

Prices went up since the 2011 charts where prices were lower. Can't say it's all that surprising though, except for Hawaii. Hawaii's electricity prices are considerably higher than 2011, just about doubling.

Spoiler

http://www.npr.org/b...y-in-your-state
(October 2012 reports)
-42/50 states are still below the $0.15/kwh mark.
-17 states are below the $0.10/kwh mark.
-of the Continental 48, New york is the highest at $0.181/kwh.
-Hawaii is the highest at $0.332/kwh

Edited by Vulpesveritas, 02 December 2012 - 05:56 PM.

[Sen]

Wow man. . I just meant benches on Vizshera power consumption, you didn't have to dig out the US power map

EPIC THOUGH!

[Vulpesveritas]

Anandtech;

Techpowerup! 5ghz FX-8350;

Edited by Vulpesveritas, 02 December 2012 - 07:45 PM.

[Staplebeater]

you two are hilarious

[Sen]

http://www.tweaktown...iew/index8.html

or a little over 60 watts less than a stock 3930k. according to tweaktown.

what cracks me up though. . the i5 3570k uses HALF the power stock for stock. HALF!!!!!!! one THIRD if you overclock the AMD!!! You're killing the planet man. . HUGE CARBON FOOTPRINT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ok, I have no real point, I apologize. . I knew they weren't exactly efficient, but wow. . I hadn't dug up the actual numbers yet.
Considering that they're essentially multi-threaded quad cores. . my mind is blown

Edited by Sen, 02 December 2012 - 09:09 PM.

[Vulpesveritas]

Sen, on 02 December 2012 - 09:08 PM, said:

http://www.tweaktown...iew/index8.html

or a little over 60 watts less than a stock 3930k. according to tweaktown.

what cracks me up though. . the i5 3570k uses HALF the power stock for stock. HALF!!!!!!! one THIRD if you overclock the AMD!!! You're killing the planet man. . HUGE CARBON FOOTPRINT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ok, I have no real point, I apologize. . I knew they weren't exactly efficient, but wow. . I hadn't dug up the actual numbers yet.
Considering that they're essentially multi-threaded quad cores. . my mind is blown

Yeah SB-E isn't exactly the best platform for treehuggers. Then again, neither is overclocking.
Too bad vishera isn't on that comparison list. Though at stock there isn't that much of a difference vs an i5-3570k at both load and idle in non-maxed out loads.


And what carbon footprint? We should be on nuclear power by now... oh wait there is all those misconceptions and public fears in the way of us killing our carbon footprint. I mean honestly, with modern tech Nuclear plants are quite safe. -rants more on the lack of adoption for nuclear power due to public misinformation-


Other bits for power consumption from the FX-8350 at stock from TPU;


vs overclocked;

So +~100w for overclocking to 5ghz, equating to $12-$26 more per year in energy costs vs stock in the USA (sans Hawaii)

Edited by Vulpesveritas, 02 December 2012 - 11:15 PM.

[TheFoxyShortBus]

The point of this post wasn't a game of what if's. its a post about facts or myths when it comes to computers, and I just proved that one of your myth's is actually a fact. As I stated several times, most people won't see the difference in the lane difference, but those who do things at very large resolutions will when the game is demanding enough.

Saying that "well most people won't see it" doesn't mean that it isn't any less fact. It would be the same as saying "I can't see gamma radiation so it must not exist" is a comparable to dismissing something because most won't see it.

Also it isn't a Margin of error, a margin of error is considered less than 5% on loose scientific explanations. Not upwards of 25% or higher. There is a effective boundary here. As to this.
""
That makes absolutely no sense... This has been a problem long through out PCI-E's history, you can do it with 480's or 590's etc etc. And just because something isn't "cost effective" doesn't meant it won't be in real life, I will bet you there are over 5,000 people with those types of set ups and that can push 16 PCI-E lanes past through intended throughput.

I'm not trying to rag on you, but you said provide evidence (which I did) Explained it in a clear and reasonable manner that in fact one of your myth's wasn't a myth at all, but is a fact. Your dismissal was inaccurate because there is a large difference between PCI-E 2.0 and 3.0 (its a factor of 2 improvement) so saturating 16 PCI-E 2.0 lanes is roughly the same as saturating 8 PCI-E 3.0 lanes. SO obviously it will be harder to saturate 16 PCI-E 3.0 lanes (which hasn't been done). SO it only applies to PCI-E 2.0 lanes, which a lot of people who've built a PC in the past couple of years are probably still on because most people won't see the advantage of 3.0 on their systems, but a few can over saturate the lanes and see a performance decrease.