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Shopping list for Future Build (Read 580 times)
Jun 2nd, 2010 at 10:04pm

Dan Morera   Offline
Colonel
John Howard flying with
angels.
Heredia, Costa Rica

Posts: 323
*****
 
Hi guys, like some of you I'm dreaming of building a better rig for my flight simulator (see if I can finally go to fsx). So I came up with a list of parts that I like, made up of brands I have used before and feel comfortable using. Also I'm limited to what I can get as I am located outside of the US.

I have never built a computer before, but I did change my current computers: power supply, video card, and ram. Maybe some other minor stuff. So keep in mind I'm a newbie at computer building.

So I just wanted to ask you guys, if this list of parts makes sense, I'm particularly interested in compatibility, as I think performance should be ok.

Here it is, let me know what you would change or what am I missing (I know I'm missing video card still thinking which nvidia, suggestions?)

motherboard EVGA P55 FTW Edition SLI Mainboard 132-LF-E657-KR
Cooler Master 120mm Silent Case Fan 4-in-1 Value Pack - (R4-S2S-124K-GP)
Syba SY-CAB65007 3 Pin Female to 2 x 3 Pin Male Connectors Fan Power Extension Y Cable (7.75 Inches)
Cooler Master RR-B10-212P-G1 Hyper 212 Plus 775/1156/1366/AMD/AM2/AM3 Universal Direct Contact Heat-Pipe 120mm Fan CPU Cooler
Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound, 3.5 Grams
Intel Core i7 860 Processor 2.80 GHz 8 MB LGA1156 CPU I7-860BOX
Corsair XMS3 4 GB PC3-12800 1600Mhz Dual Channel Core i3 i5 i7 DDR3 Memory Kit CMX4GX3M2A1600C9
Corsair CMPSU-850TX 850-Watt TX Series 80 Plus Certified Power Supply compatible with Intel Core i7 and Core i5
Antec Nine Hundred Steel ATX Ultimate Gamer PC Case (Black)
GeForce GTX 465  ???

Hard disk have not decided, would like your advice
I run one 32" LCD vis HDMI and then one 19" via DVI (no plans to change either soon)
Resolution 1920x1080 and 1280x1024

Thanks in advance,
Dan
 
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Reply #1 - Jun 3rd, 2010 at 3:34am
NNNG   Ex Member

 
Change power supply to an Enermax MODU87+, Corsair AX-series, Corsair HX-series, or Seasonic X-series. Get a 600 - 750 watt power supply, 850 is overkill for that computer even overclocked UNLESS you plan on using SLI or Crossfire with power hungry graphics cards. I would recommend a modular PSU for cable management.

If it's not too much more then try and get RAM with slightly tighter timings, other than that RAM is good.

Wicked motherboard although it is expensive.If you don't need features then maybe go with something cheaper. FSX has no use for SLI or Crossfire although other applications do get significant gains.



Core i7 9xx series on LGA 1366 socket overclocks slightly better than Core i7 8xx series on LGA 1156 socket but it is more expensive. Your choice.

Cases already come with fans so you shouldn't need to purchase any more. In any case Coolermaster fans are not very good so look at Scythe, Noctua, or maybe Xigmatek fans.

I am not sure if you should change videocard or not. Apparently Nvidia performs better than ATi in FSX, although I can't find any benchmarks. However on the other hand in non-fsx benchmarks the Radeon 5850 is faster than the GTX 465 while consuming much less power. Nvidia 400 series is an epic fail hence I bought a Radeon 5770 (and people call me an nvidia fanboy?  Roll Eyes )

CPU cooler is good although it is cheap.

Not sure about case. Don't know what's better though.

Any good 7200rpm hard drive of appriopriate capacity should do. However if you want to help eliminate microstutters you can increase price a bit and get a Raptor. However with the advent of the Solid State Drive the Raptor is pretty much redundant. In my opinion if you want a faster drive get a 64gb SSD for windows + applications and a big 1tb storage drive for everything else.

Essentially:

Core i7 860
2x2gb DDR3-1600 CL7 or 8.
ASUS P7P55D PRO
GTX 465, GTX 470, Radeon 5850, or Radeon 5870.
Enermax MODU87+, Corsair AX-series, Corsair HX-series, or Seasonic X-series
big hd of any size, or ssd + big hd. Intel X-25M is a good SSD, and Western Digital, Seagate, and Samsung all make good drives.
coolermaster hyper 212+ or maybe Megahalems or something
« Last Edit: Jun 4th, 2010 at 1:38am by N/A »  
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Reply #2 - Jun 6th, 2010 at 3:11pm

hhomebrewer   Offline
Colonel
Sticking with FS2004
United States of Good Beer

Gender: male
Posts: 607
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Per hard drives, buy only Western Digital Caviar Black. The thin, lightweight ones offered by WD and everybody else are, to be charitable, "not a good investment." I'd get one of the dual-slot Thermaltake Blac-X external docks. Makes copying and swapping files around very easy. Also a good way to create and maintain a drive with all your precious stuff backed-up. I was using Acronis 2010 until I buggered-up something in January. I still have not yet figgered out what I did and have not set it up again. I am backing-up with the Win7 Pro utility. Take my advice: Get a back-up solution. It will save you tears and anguish later on...
 

I am homebrewer. I had 633 posts when for some unknown reason, my account disappeared...
AMD Phenom II X4 940 (Deneb), Asus M3N72-D motherboard, 2 x nVidia 8800GTS @640MB RAM, 1 x Seagate Barracuda 500Gb HDD (storage), 1 x Western Digital Black 250Gb HDD (boot), 12Gb 800Mhz G.Skill RAM (5-5-5-18), 2x Sony DVD writers, 28-inch ViewSonic monitor given to me by my computer guru, FS2004, Windows 7 Professional (64-bit), 850-watt Thermaltake modular p/s, 7 x 120mm fans to cool it...
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Reply #3 - Jun 12th, 2010 at 3:52pm

Dan Morera   Offline
Colonel
John Howard flying with
angels.
Heredia, Costa Rica

Posts: 323
*****
 
Having second thoughts on the gtx 465, but the gtx 2xx are much more expensive, and I would rather stay with nvidia.

Any thoughts? 

Oh I probably won't be overclocking this machine, either CPU or GPU, I don't know how so don't want to screw it up.
 
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Reply #4 - Jun 13th, 2010 at 1:30am
NNNG   Ex Member

 
Your choice.

Stock cooling is sufficient so you won't need to buy a new cooler like the Coolermaster Hyper 212+.

Get the GTX 470 then IMO.

I don't like the Velociraptor since it's loud, and expensive. Sure it's fast but it's redundant with the advent of the SSD. My advice: Get 1 terrabyte Western Digital Blue or Black, or Samsung Spinpoint, or some kind of Seagate. Do NOT get anything with 'Green' or 'eco' or 'ecogreen' on it and make sure it's a full 3.5 inch drive (as opposed to 2.5 inch UNLESS it's an SSD).
 
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