Posts by Adam Moore3

Yeah, go with the Intel Core i5-4460 if you want an Intel chip and aren't planning on overclocking anything. It really comes down to what kind of games you're playing and how demanding they are. If you're looking to tackle next-gen titles, you'd be better off prioritizing a beefier GPU since that's what actually carries the heavy lifting. In this specific setup, you're looking at either a GTX 970 or an R9 290. That second option from graniteharbor85 is especially impressive; even with an SSD, it still outperforms an R9 280 by a mile.

A slightly more extreme option if you max out the budget specifically to squeeze in a GTX 970🙂 You’re getting a cheaper motherboard, a standard HDD instead of an SSD, and a lower-tier case, but it’s still a very solid build.

1 x Intel Core i5-4460 Processor (3.20GHz,1MB,6MB,84 W,1150) Box
2 x DDR3 4GB (1x4GB) Crucial, 1600MHz CL11
1 x XFX TS Series 550W PSU -P1550S-GREEN
1 x Zalman Z3 mid tower case. 192(W)x465(H)x430(D)mm. MB standard
1 x Inno3D GTX970 4GB DDR5 256 bit
1 x Gigabyte GA-B85M-DS3H, Socket : 1150, Intel® B85
1 x TOSHIBA 1TB, 7200rpm, SATA 6 Gb/s, 32MB, DT01ACA100

$2144 USTech Forums

It feels like a waste to put together a $600 gaming rig just to settle for an R9 280. Personally, I wouldn't drop below an R9 290 given this budget.

You can find a much more premium Asrock for $6.75. Honestly, Newegg is terrible for building stuff; you'll get way better deals at other retailers.

Since that motherboard only has two RAM slots, if you go with dual Channel 2 x2gb right now, you'll be maxed out immediately. You won't have any room left to add more memory later without having to sell those two sticks just to buy larger ones. People usually go for dual Channel to squeeze out a bit of extra speed, but honestly, most users won't even notice the difference—it's mostly just something you see in benchmarks. It would be much smarter to just stick with a single 1x4GB stick like crimsonstag84 suggested.

Yeah, Intel definitely takes the win over AMD in this scenario. I'm assuming you've been looking at those APUs, but honestly, the Pentium G3220 and its crowd will wipe the floor with them when it comes to raw CPU performance 🙂

What my colleague meant was... 🙂 Compiling is basically just the process of turning written code into an actual working program. If she’s running heavy-duty software, the CPU is definitely going to be a bottleneck regardless, but upgrading to an SSD would probably give her the biggest boost, even if the CPU still plays a huge role. Right now, that's the weakest link in her build.

What are you picking up at Best Buy? FYI, HyperX is cheaper over at Amazon by about $60 🙂 Between those two, definitely go with Samsung.

Honestly, I think she’d be smarter just adding another 2 GB right now, then holding onto the rest to save up for a new processor. Adding 4 GB later on is easy enough, and upgrading the CPU will actually make a massive difference. That extra 4 GB she's looking at installing now would basically go to waste, making it a pretty bad investment at this stage. What is she even using the PC for?

And what exactly is the point of having 8 GB of RAM? When you pair it with that processor, I don't see where those extra 8 GB would even be used; honestly, 4 GB should be plenty enough 🙂

Well, that’s quite the rounding job you did there. 😬

mellowtiger83 said:Exactly, you're right. But honestly, every game should run on a roughly $300 gaming rig—something like an Pentium G3220, 4GB of RAM, and a Radeon R7 260. It’s just basic common sense. What I listed isn't even weak🙂. If they can't optimize code for that, then they're just incompetent as hell.

I don't have any issues running a powerhouse build, but for some people, it's a real struggle. Plenty of folks who actually want to play won't be able to, even if they have decent setups like the one I mentioned above.

An AMD 750k and a Radeon R7 260X? According to them, those shouldn't even launch the game?? Of course they should! People will scrape together every last cent to buy a PC like that, only to hit a brick wall immediately.

My specs 😍

Timothy Kim60 said:Take a G3220 or a G3258, for instance—they can't even get this to run. Plus, there were all those glitches, like the black screen issue with Far Cry 4, until they finally pushed a fix or patch.

Regarding these builds—man, it sucks, but it's just the reality of things. Why? Because hardware and games are primarily designed for the mainstream markets out there. Let's say Canada and the USA are the peak targets; a "budget" build here in America isn't the same thing as a budget build there. Their components might be up to 30% cheaper at worst, but their standard for what's considered "normal" is way higher. For an average worker making minimum wage over there, buying a decent PC is a breeze. For us, a budget build is exactly what I described, but they almost never buy stuff like that. For them, something like an FX 6300 + R9 270X is a budget setup, while an Intel Core i5-4690K + GTX 970 is just a regular PC. My god, for years, people over there have been mass-buying i7s, 16GB of RAM, and 700-1000W power supplies just for gaming...
It's true, mostly because people think they need it, but they don't really care once they have the cash. Nobody ever complained about having a PC that was too powerful.

A fix came out—not official, though; it's more like an injector that lets people run Dragon Age: Inquisition perfectly fine on Haswell dual-core CPUs. That proves it's not actually impossible to run the game on a dual-core CPU; it's purely an optimization issue. And honestly, it doesn't seem that far-fetched that they want to push people away from budget rigs and toward high-end, more expensive SKUs, which obviously lines the pockets of AMD, Intel, and the rest of the gang.

I know, but it’s honestly ridiculous. An i5 2500K, a GTX 660, and 6 GB of RAM just for the MINIMUM system requirements? That’s basically a PC worth at least $1333. You can't even build a budget gaming rig anymore and still expect to play anything decently... Seriously, just two months ago I put together an Athlon 740 and a 260X setup for a friend—that's a quad-core CPU paired with a card that's nearly $300—and according to their specs, he can't even dream of running it. It's absurd.

Yeah, I can see you're pretty hyped for The Witcher (like any sane gamer 😬). Honestly, maybe along with Dying Light or a few other titles, you might run into some trouble actually getting things to launch—though even that’s debatable. I seriously doubt a 660Ti will even hit the minimum requirements for The Witcher; that's just ridiculous. So, my take? You can probably hang tight until the game finally drops in May. Even now, the 7770 is still a decent enough card. 🙂

Kenneth Jackson3 said:What GPU would be worth picking up instead of the MSI Radeon R7 7770?

M5A97 R 2.0
FX 8350
8 GB RAM
CX 500

$1000-$500 max.
I have a feeling my power supply is weak since the CPU alone pulls 250W, but if there's anything worth grabbing in that range, let me know.
I'm not even sweating it until The Witcher 3 drops.
My current card doesn't support Crossfire

There is zero chance your CPU alone is pulling 250W; that's likely your entire system under a light load. You can easily upgrade to an AMD Radeon R9 270X without any issues.

Not really, honestly. They're basically the same cards; the X version just comes slightly more overclocked out of the box. If you actually want a noticeable, worthwhile upgrade, you should look at the R9 280. Back when they launched on Newegg, they were sitting around $500, which was an absolute steal since plenty of the 270X models were priced higher than the 280 despite it being the stronger card. 🙂 So, if you ask me, no—there's no real need. If you're dying to have that extra $67 in your pocket, go for it; you won't lose anything and you'll pick up a few extra FPS. 😉

darkmarlin16 said:And if I go with that AMD option, I can just buy a new processor and pop it right into that motherboard, right?

I'm thinking about playing games like FIFA, NBA2K, Formula 1, rFactor, NHL, NFL, NFS...

Mostly sports stuff like that.

That's an FM2 socket, so you don't have much room to grow. You can find some beefier processors that handle overclocking decently, but I'm not sure if it's actually worth the cash. Will anyone release serious six-core CPUs for FM2? Who knows, but personally, I highly doubt it. For the games you mentioned, this rig is totally fine. It'll only struggle once you try running next-gen titles like The Witcher 3 or Dying Light.

darkmarlin16 said:I need a gaming rig for about $1000, can anyone put one together for me?

You can check out the Intel option from the admin:

1 x ASUS H81M-K, 1150, Intel ® H81 express chipset, DDR3
1 x Intel Pentium G3258 (3.20GHz,512KB,3MB,54 W,1150) Box
1 x DDR3 4GB (1x4GB) Crucial, 1600MHz CL11
1 x TOSHIBA 1TB, 7200rpm, SATA 6 Gb/s, 32MB, DT01ACA100
1 x Power Supply FORTRON 400W, HEXA 400, 12cm fan, Active PFC 1 x MS PHOENIX
1 x MS PHOENIX case without PSU, Midi tower MBO: ATX, mATX
1 x Sapphire R7 260X 1GB GDDR5 OC, 1GB GDDR5 128bit, 28nm
1 x Spire Kepler Rev.2 cooler, 1156/775/FM1, 96.5×51×125 mm, 92mm

$1012

It's a dual-core processor that overclocks like crazy and will actually outperform an AMD Athlon in many scenarios. HOWEVER, it only has two cores, which might prevent you from even launching certain games. A recent example is Dragon Age: Inquisition—dual-core systems just won't run it. On the plus side, you get a slightly better GPU here than with the AMD build.

The AMD option from futur:

1 x AMD Athlon ii x4 740 Processor, 3.2GHz (3.7 GHz) Box
1 x Crucial 4GB DDR3 1600 Mhz (PC3-12800) CL11
1 x GIGABYTE Motherboard AMD A78 (SFM2+,DDR3,DVI/VGA,USB3.0/USB2.0,SATA III,RAID,LAN) mATX Retail
1 x HDD TOSHIBA DT01ACA100 (3.5", 1TB, 32MB, SATA III)
1 x MS PHOENIX case without PSU
1 x Fortron Hexa+ 400W, 80+, active, 12 cm
1 x LC POWER LC-CC-95, socket 775/1155/1156/AMD
1 x MSI R7 260 OC, 1GB GDDR5, VGA, DVI, HDMI

Total: $1019

You get a quad-core FM2+ processor with limited upgrade room, plus a slightly weaker GPU—just a tiny bit. But hey, it's a quad-core processor; a real quad-core.

It's up to you to decide. 😉

Robert Rodriguez2 said:Sean Garcia3, are you actually serious right now? Why, and I mean why on earth, would you swap out a platform that offers basically zero advantage over what he’s already running?

He’s got an LGA 1155 processor, yet you're handing him a platform meant for LGA 1150... he'll have a motherboard, an SSD, and the rest of the rig 😁 but what happens to his CPU?

Actually, no—that's an H61 LGA 1155 motherboard. Sure, it's bottom-of-the-barrel, lacking both SATA3 and USB 3.0, but it works. Still, it wouldn't be my choice. Pairing a GTX 970 and an i5 with the absolute worst motherboard available? Nope. It'll run, sure, but it’s just completely unbalanced.

Ryan Gonzalez4 said:A buddy of mine suggested this setup instead, claiming the synergy here is much better:

Sapphire R9 285 2GB OC, 2GB GDDR5 256 bit, 28nm, 2xDVI + HDMI
Intel Core i3-4160 Processor (3.60GHz,512KB,3MB,54 W,1150) Box
Gigabyte GA-H81M-S2PV, Socket 1150, Intel ® H81 express, 2 x 1.5V

What's your take?

Nah, you already have a great motherboard. It'd be a waste to swap platforms right now, especially just to move down to a low-end H81 chipset when your current board is more than capable. You could always look into an FX 8320 later on; that would be a solid upgrade for you.

crimsonstag84 said:I built a rig at Micro Center, but they used the HexaV1 version there—it’s got slightly lower-tier capacitors, lacks the 8-pin EPS, the cables are shorter, and it has fewer connectors and less overall wattage compared to the Hexa+ 😉

Actually, it is the Hexa+. I just finished building a PC for a buddy through them, and they delivered the Hexa+. I have no idea why their website lists it as the standard Hexa; they probably just forgot to update the listing. The box my friend has clearly says Hexa+