Death of a Computer Options

[Lionhearted]

Save the money and treat yourself to a nice dinner or something? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[StealthSigma]

I feel like the dual GFX era is already past, however. You just generally get better bang for your buck with a single, higher end card than 2 lower end ones gated together.

I agree, that's why I generally suggest you reserve dual GFX for doubles of the previous generation of cards. We're not seeing things like 100% improvement in power between generations of the same version card, the gains are maybe around 20-30% with perhaps a 50% here or there. At the moment, I just don't see the level of game rendering coming out for PC gaming that would justify the dual setups. A single GTX570 can run BF3 (just over a year old) on it's top end graphics settings @ 1920x1080 resolution without issue and that is a game that was designed for the PC first rather than consoles (console versions of BFBC2 and I think BF3 had their max player count in matches lowered in order to preserve graphics quality) and the MP version of BF3 was tested without issue for significantly more than 64 players. They just found through testing that having more than that did not really add anything and if MAG serves a case study on >64 players in a MP FPS, then that's likely a pretty safe assumption.

So what we have is an environment where we can pump out higher quality 64 person MP FPS without making significant headway into the GFX power we have available. There is one way forward that I think will begin to leverage that power, but it really requires developers to leverage particle level physics, like the frostbite engine does, to simulate truly malleable environment.

Now. I do admit that the linked card power is definitely useful when you get into tri-monitor setups and higher resolutions than 1920x1080 as well as 3D gaming, but I also believe those are edge cases and not necessarily what is being marketed towards for PC gaming with any huge amount of pressure.

[Stahlseele]

A single of these: Gigabyte Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition would have done it.
It's the fastest single GPU card from ATI and reasonably cheap to boot.
Everything with more than one GPU is for me completely ludicrously overbuilt.
If you want to do stuff that's gonna eat VRAM, there are cards with 6Gigs of RAM, but usually not worth it . .

[_Pax._]

No. Ludicrously overbuilt would be (from teh same OEM I've bought from) the Erebus "signature" series computer - all custom liquid cooling, video cards included. And three GTX 690's in triple-SLI. Well ... like this:

Case: iBUYPOWER Erebus GT Full Tower Custom Liquid Cooling Gaming Case - Black
Internal Expansion: [6-Port] NZXT Internal USB Expansion System + Bluetooth & Wireless N Modules
Processor: Intel® Core™ i7 3970X Processor Extreme Edition (6x 3.50GHz/15MB L3) - Intel Core i7 3970X w/
Overclock: PowerDrive Level 3 - Up to 30% Overclocking
Processor Cooling:
... Custom Liquid Cooling w/ Triple + Single + Dual Radiators (There's a triple radiator at the top, a double on the bottom, and a single on the front of the case.
... High-Performance Coolant powered by Koolance - UV Red
... Tubing Wraps (Anti-Kink Coil) powered by Koolance - Red
System Memory: 32 GB [4 GB X8] DDR3-2133 Memory Module - Corsair Vengeance
Video Card: [Liquid Cooled] NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 - 4GB - SLI Mode (Dual Cards) (Note, each of these is the dual-GPU model!)
Motherboard: ASRock X79 Extreme11 -- 7x PCI-E x16, 10x SATA 6Gb/s, and 2x Gb LAN
SSD Cache: 60 GB Intel 520 Series
Power Supply: (1200W) Thermaltake Toughpower Grand-1200M
Primary Drive: 480 GB Intel 520 SSD
Data Drive: 2 TB WD Black HARD DRIVE -- 64M Cache, 7200rpm, 6.0Gb/s
Optical Drive: [12X Blu-Ray] LG BLU-RAY Re-Writer, DVD±R/±RW Burner Combo Drive - Red
Other: 12-In-1 Internal Flash Media Card Reader/Writer - Red
Other: AeroCool V12XT Touch Screen Fan, Temperature Control & HDD Working Display
Sound Card: ASUS Xonar Essence STX
Network Card: Intel Pro 10/100/1000 Network Card
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate + Office Starter 2010 (Includes basic versions of Word and Excel) 64-bit
Keyboard
iBUYPOWER Standard Gaming Keyboard
Mouse
iBUYPOWER Standard Gaming Mouse - Blood Red
1st Monitor: 27" LCD 1920x1080 -- ASUS VG278H 3D-Ready 120Hz w/ 3W x2 Stereo Speakers
2nd Monitor: 27" LCD 1920x1080 -- ASUS VG278H 3D-Ready 120Hz w/ 3W x2 Stereo Speakers
Speaker System: Logitech Z506 5.1 Surround 3D Sound Speakers + Subwoofer Black
Power ProtectioN: Mighty Voltage Regulator - Opti-UPS SS1200-AVR
Advanced Build Options
... Tuniq TX-2 High Performance Thermal Compound
... Professional wiring for all cables inside the system tower

... $8,748, plus shipping and handling. O_o

[Stahlseele]

Yeah, get rid of at least the Video-Cards for a strong single GPU, change the CPU for a Quad-Core Model, that's still plenty, exchange the primary drive for one half the size, replace the PSU with one that's a third to a half as strong and get rid of the periphery and that's a system i'd buy.
And it'd cost about half, probably not even a third of that price.

[Lionhearted]

Bet you could home build something similar/better for 2/3rds of the price.
Cutting out the mouse, keyboard, sound system and soundcard and you're already ahead.
Who doesn't already have the first three of those and you don't need a soundcard unless you're doing sound design, the sound quality of the integrated mobo soundcard is more then sufficient.

Edit: Woo! point proven before even posted

[All4BigGuns]

No. Ludicrously overbuilt would be (from teh same OEM I've bought from) the Erebus "signature" series computer - all custom liquid cooling, video cards included. And three GTX 690's in triple-SLI. Well ... like this:

Case: iBUYPOWER Erebus GT Full Tower Custom Liquid Cooling Gaming Case - Black
Internal Expansion: [6-Port] NZXT Internal USB Expansion System + Bluetooth & Wireless N Modules
Processor: Intel® Core™ i7 3970X Processor Extreme Edition (6x 3.50GHz/15MB L3) - Intel Core i7 3970X w/
Overclock: PowerDrive Level 3 - Up to 30% Overclocking
Processor Cooling:
... Custom Liquid Cooling w/ Triple + Single + Dual Radiators (There's a triple radiator at the top, a double on the bottom, and a single on the front of the case.
... High-Performance Coolant powered by Koolance - UV Red
... Tubing Wraps (Anti-Kink Coil) powered by Koolance - Red
System Memory: 32 GB [4 GB X8] DDR3-2133 Memory Module - Corsair Vengeance
Video Card: [Liquid Cooled] NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 - 4GB - SLI Mode (Dual Cards) (Note, each of these is the dual-GPU model!)
Motherboard: ASRock X79 Extreme11 -- 7x PCI-E x16, 10x SATA 6Gb/s, and 2x Gb LAN
SSD Cache: 60 GB Intel 520 Series
Power Supply: (1200W) Thermaltake Toughpower Grand-1200M
Primary Drive: 480 GB Intel 520 SSD
Data Drive: 2 TB WD Black HARD DRIVE -- 64M Cache, 7200rpm, 6.0Gb/s
Optical Drive: [12X Blu-Ray] LG BLU-RAY Re-Writer, DVD±R/±RW Burner Combo Drive - Red
Other: 12-In-1 Internal Flash Media Card Reader/Writer - Red
Other: AeroCool V12XT Touch Screen Fan, Temperature Control & HDD Working Display
Sound Card: ASUS Xonar Essence STX
Network Card: Intel Pro 10/100/1000 Network Card
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate + Office Starter 2010 (Includes basic versions of Word and Excel) 64-bit
Keyboard
iBUYPOWER Standard Gaming Keyboard
Mouse
iBUYPOWER Standard Gaming Mouse - Blood Red
1st Monitor: 27" LCD 1920x1080 -- ASUS VG278H 3D-Ready 120Hz w/ 3W x2 Stereo Speakers
2nd Monitor: 27" LCD 1920x1080 -- ASUS VG278H 3D-Ready 120Hz w/ 3W x2 Stereo Speakers
Speaker System: Logitech Z506 5.1 Surround 3D Sound Speakers + Subwoofer Black
Power ProtectioN: Mighty Voltage Regulator - Opti-UPS SS1200-AVR
Advanced Build Options
... Tuniq TX-2 High Performance Thermal Compound
... Professional wiring for all cables inside the system tower

... $8,748, plus shipping and handling. O_o

That's just ridiculous... SkyNet waiting to happen, I say.

[_Pax._]

Yeah, get rid of at least the Video-Cards for a strong single GPU, change the CPU for a Quad-Core Model, that's still plenty, exchange the primary drive for one half the size, replace the PSU with one that's a third to a half as strong and get rid of the periphery and that's a system i'd buy.
And it'd cost about half, probably not even a third of that price.

Bet you could home build something similar/better for 2/3rds of the price.

NZXT Phantom 410 full tower, in white;
Intel Core i7 quad-core CPU, with overclock protection plan
20% overclock
the same 6-port internal USB expansion card as above
Corsair Hydro series H60 liquid cooling for the CPU
a single NVidia GTX 680 (2GB) video card
16GB of DDR3-2133 memory, Corsair Vengeance
Gigabyte GA-X70-UP4 motherboard (saves $374, right there!)
750W Corsair 80+ rated PSU (card & overclock require a minimum of 650W)
180GB Intel 520 SSD primary drive
2TB WD Black HDD
LG Blu-ray rewrite drive
12-in-1 media card drive
Aerocool VX12 fan control panel
no discrete sound card
Win7 Pro 64
just one of the 27" 3D monitors
... otherwise the same as above.

$3,411, plus S&H.

See, there's "lightly overbuilt", and there's "how many souls did you have to offer up to Satan to get this made" overbuilt.

The one I actually ordered is more the former, than the latter, IMO.

[_Pax._]

That's just ridiculous... SkyNet waiting to happen, I say.

IT is. But then again ... two 3D monitors, each with it's own set glasses. Think of the split-screen FPS gaming you could do on that beast ...

[X-Kalibur]

The really overpriced part is the liquid cooling. I tried it out one time. It was more of a hassle to set up without seeing any real improvement plus it was extra noise. My current computer doesn't make almost any noise and runs cool with just heatsinks and a fan (admittedly, going to SSDs cut a lot of noise).

[Stahlseele]

You can't, actually.
for propper multi monitor gaming, you need an uneven number of screens.
2 screens sucks because the center is where the hole between the screens is.
and 3D-gaming . . no, thank you, very much. 3D HALVES FPS because everything has to be done twice slightly different.
and it does not look any good either. it halves the light from the screen too, because, technically, half of the time you don't see anything at all, because the shutters in the glasses are shut to produce the 3d effect.
27" is for a single screen a good size, but as long as the resolution does not go up accordingly, i'll stay at 24" Full HD. Better DPI etc.

i see the 2nd system actually uses a Corsair Hydro H60 AIO water cooling solution. I'd have gone for a different one, but that is at least a pretty sensible choice, not many OEMs do that sadly . .

[StealthSigma]

No. Ludicrously overbuilt would be (from teh same OEM I've bought from) the Erebus "signature" series computer - all custom liquid cooling, video cards included. And three GTX 690's in triple-SLI. Well ... like this:

Processor: Intel® Core™ i7 3970X Processor Extreme Edition (6x 3.50GHz/15MB L3) - Intel Core i7 3970X w/
Overclock: PowerDrive Level 3 - Up to 30% Overclocking
Processor Cooling:
... Custom Liquid Cooling w/ Triple + Single + Dual Radiators [/i](There's a triple radiator at the top, a double on the bottom, and a single on the front of the case.
... High-Performance Coolant powered by Koolance - UV Red
... Tubing Wraps (Anti-Kink Coil) powered by Koolance - Red
Video Card: [Liquid Cooled] NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 - 4GB - SLI Mode (Dual Cards) (Note, each of these is the dual-GPU model!)[i]

And they're not OCing the GFX cards. What a waste of that water cooling.

It needs x2 i7 3970s for it to be overbuilt.

Also, it looks like those 3970s are OCed to about 4.5GHz and that's a six core CPU with hyperthreading. Yep. Need two. Nothing says overbuilt like 24 virtual processors for your computer.

[_Pax._]

I was thinking, run two separate iterations ofthe FPS - one on each monitor, separately. And, LITERALLY split-screen. Hah.

[Lionhearted]

Sure you don't know about these things Pax?

[Bigity]

Would be fun for games that support the POV thing. Like Mech games. I guess you'd want at least three for that.

[_Pax._]

Sure you don't know about these things Pax?

Eh?

I know about what's nice to have, just fine. What I don't know is how to put it together - which parts are compatible in the same computer.

Would be fun for games that support the POV thing. Like Mech games. I guess you'd want at least three for that.

Yeah, if IW as going to try to put an entire game across multiple monitors, I woudl want to find a way that didn't have the center of yru FOV fall between the monitors. A three-monitor setup is one way. Using one monitor for your FOV, and another for somethign else - resource management, inventory, etc - would be another way.

There's a huge jump in price to go from "the best Radeon and a nice monitor" to "a good NVidia and 3D monitor/glasses", though. OR else I'd've gone that way, even if it was for just one monitor.

[X-Kalibur]

The 3D is just a good way to get a headache, both literally and financially.

[StealthSigma]

Supreme Commander had an awesome setup for two monitors. Primary monitor had your UI but either monitor would let you interact with the map at exactly the same level. So you could be zoomed in on battles in two areas at once or just use the second monitor as a huge friggin minimap. That's in addition to the fact that you could partition a display into at least two parts.

http://baksteenbrick.files.wordpress.com/2...09/p1030100.jpg

[Iduno]

I know about what's nice to have, just fine. What I don't know is how to put it together - which parts are compatible in the same computer.

Honestly, I'd rate it a bit easier than putting together a good SR4 character. And that's coming from someone who quit watching DVDs because it's too big of a pain to get the DVD player working (stupid composite cables).

[_Pax._]

Different folks find different things to be easy or difficult.

[Stahlseele]

I was thinking, run two separate iterations ofthe FPS - one on each monitor, separately. And, LITERALLY split-screen. Hah.

Doesn't work i'm afraid.

Supreme Commander had an awesome setup for two monitors. Primary monitor had your UI but either monitor would let you interact with the map at exactly the same level. So you could be zoomed in on battles in two areas at once or just use the second monitor as a huge friggin minimap. That's in addition to the fact that you could partition a display into at least two parts.

http://baksteenbrick.files.wordpress.com/2...09/p1030100.jpg

Sadly, that's the ONLY game i know of that has something like that . .
You can't even put the menu on one screen and the field of view on the other in most games . .

[StealthSigma]

Doesn't work i'm afraid.

Sadly, that's the ONLY game i know of that has something like that . .
You can't even put the menu on one screen and the field of view on the other in most games . .

It's either one display or link multiple displays to present a a more panoramic view.

[All4BigGuns]

Hearing the talk of multiple monitors, I just have one question. What the heck is the point?

[CanRay]

Hearing the talk of multiple monitors, I just have one question. What the heck is the point?

When one is an HDTV...

[_Pax._]

Hearing the talk of multiple monitors, I just have one question. What the heck is the point?

Have you played MWO? If you have ... picture a three-monitor setup, giving you an entire 150-degree undistorted FOV.

Even without that; it can be very handy to have a second area to your desktop, for things like:

• playing a full-screen game on one, while keeping a Skype video chat open on the other;
• playing a full-screen game on one, and having a walkthrough / strategy guide up on the other;
• running any full-screen application on one, and having various monitoring software running on the other (SpeedFan, etc).

None of that is necessary, of course. But some of it can be rather convenient.