Rate my PC?

[Cirty Dunt]

CPU: Intel Core i5 2500k Quad-Core

Motherboard: GIGABYTE Z68-AP-D3 Motherboard (LGA 1155 Chipset)

RAM: 16GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 RAM

Power Supply: 850-Watt Power Supply (I'm unsure of the manufacturer ~ I'll update this later)

Video/Graphics Card: XFX Radeon 7770 Black Edition

Operating System: Windows 7 Ultimate.

 

Please rate and provide comments ^_^

[Humin]

With windows 7 ultimate I would go with something higher than a 7770.

What's the CAS latency rating on the RAM?

[Obsidian]

Looks like a slightly-above-average system to me. Decent quad core CPU, above average but by no means amazing GPU, lots of RAM. I'd say it's a solid 7/10 system.

[Cirty Dunt]

above average but by no means amazing GPU

 

It's actually a great GPU, besides from the known problems with Java and the Radeon series' cards. Only problem I've run into are slight video problems running Spiral Knights. I get around 50-60 FPS Running Unreal Tournament Black Edition while recording with FRAPS. I think it's good, but I hope to upgrade at some point in the future.

 

With windows 7 ultimate I would go with something higher than a 7770.

What's the CAS latency rating on the RAM?

 

I'm not too sure, however, here is the link to where I purchased the RAM kit.

 

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2952374&CatId=4534

[Obsidian]

above average but by no means amazing GPU

 

It's actually a great GPU, besides from the known problems with Java and the Radeon series' cards. Only problem I've run into are slight video problems running Spiral Knights. I get around 50-60 FPS Running Unreal Tournament Black Edition while recording with FRAPS. I think it's good, but I hope to upgrade at some point in the future.

 

Eh, I personally can't call anything that's not a dual 7970 or GTX 690 an amazing GPU. By that measure, even my 7950 isn't amazing, but it's still pretty damn good.

 

At least you have one of the better 7770's available. Personally, I probably would've gone with the Asus card because they have one with a 2gb frame buffer over the standard 1gb.

[Cirty Dunt]

Eh, I personally can't call anything that's not a dual 7970 or GTX 690 an amazing GPU. By that measure, even my 7950 isn't amazing, but it's still pretty damn good.

 

At least you have one of the better 7770's available. Personally, I probably would've gone with the Asus card because they have one with a 2gb frame buffer over the standard 1gb.

 

Meh. It was a good card for the price I got it at. My build ran about 2 grand, and I'm saving my money in hopes of getting a GTX in Tri-SLI. I think I might need a better processor for that, and a better motherboard so it's a bit beyond my reach at the moment.

[BTGBullseye]

Eh, I personally can't call anything that's not a dual 7970 or GTX 690 an amazing GPU.

From a lot of benchmarks I've seen, a triple GTX 680 setup can outperform a dual GTX 690 system for about 3/4 the price. Yes, I know, less CUDA cores, but still... From what I hear it's the difference between running an 8x/8x/8x/8x quad-SLI and a 16x/16x/16x tri-SLI. (it only outperforms if you can run all cards at 16x speeds)

 

A dual GTX 680 will max out any game currently on the market, and only drops below 60 FPS if you're running a triple monitor setup with the biggest performance hogs there are. Triple 680 will bring it back up to 60 FPS on a triple monitor system. (or so the benchmarks I've seen seem to say)/

[Obsidian]

Eh, I personally can't call anything that's not a dual 7970 or GTX 690 an amazing GPU.

From a lot of benchmarks I've seen, a triple GTX 680 setup can outperform a dual GTX 690 system for about 3/4 the price. Yes, I know, less CUDA cores, but still... From what I hear it's the difference between running an 8x/8x/8x/8x quad-SLI and a 16x/16x/16x tri-SLI. (it only outperforms if you can run all cards at 16x speeds)

 

A dual GTX 680 will max out any game currently on the market, and only drops below 60 FPS if you're running a triple monitor setup with the biggest performance hogs there are. Triple 680 will bring it back up to 60 FPS on a triple monitor system. (or so the benchmarks I've seen seem to say)/

 

Very true, but my original statement was for single-cards only. I'm a firm believer in buying one powerful single card and not bothering with multi-GPU setups, even it it is multiple top-tier cards.

[BTGBullseye]

To each their own... I would rather pay the same for 2 680s as I would a single 690, and get better performance even if I have to do a little work to get them to SLI properly.

 

670s are about 3/4 the performance of a 680, and can be OCed to beat the non-OCed 680s, so I'd personally recommend the 670 for a single card solution.

[Cirty Dunt]

It sounds like a matter of personal preference. If I were to run a single card, what would give me the most "bang for my buck" so to speak?

[Humin]

Either the 670 or 660Ti

 

You didn't mention your HDD and/or your SSD.

[Cirty Dunt]

You didn't mention your HDD and/or your SSD.

 

Sorry. I knew I was forgetting something.... Anyway,

 

I have a SeaGate Barracuda 1TB HDD

[Obsidian]

For Nvidia, I'd say the 670 is at a sweet spot for price/performance that isn't common in the 660ti or 680 right now. You can get a modest overclock from a 670, at best, since Nvidia has started locking down what you can do with their cards and limiting how much of an overclock you can get from their newer cards in general. Higher-end Nvidia cards usually come with a free game, I think it's Assassin's Creed 3 right now.

 

For AMD, I'd say the 7950. Overclocks very well to match, if not slightly exceed, the performance of a 7970 at stock, and cheaper by about $50. I'm not sure if this is still going on, but AMD is also giving away three free games (Sleeping Dogs, Far Cry 3, and Hitman: Absolution) with the 7950/70.

[BTGBullseye]

Last I saw AMD had Sleeping Dogs or a CPU Magazine subscription if you go for a lower end card, whereas Nvidia is the magazine, Borderlands 2, or Primal Carnage. (as of now, on Newegg)

 

I am in agreement for the GFX card choices, though I must mention that right now the only ones that will offload the physics computations off the CPU are the Nvidia cards. (AMD still hasn't gotten it integrated into their stuff, despite the fact that they could quite easily) So if your CPU is getting maxed out in games that have physics, you might want to try getting an Nvidia card.

[Cirty Dunt]

So if your CPU is getting maxed out in games that have physics, you might want to try getting an Nvidia card.

 

My CPU is doing quite the opposite. It doesn't really get strained in any games I play. Maybe it's because I don't have a lot of newer games; most are old Steam games (HL2, TF2, etc,.) The newest game I have is Sleeping Dogs. That, and Minecraft. But I wouldn't consider Minecraft to be a CPU-straining game by any length.

[BTGBullseye]

Sleeping Dogs can be a hog, but it doesn't use GPU hardware accelerated physics, so you don't have a reason to shell out for an Nvidia card unless you plan on getting some other games that support Nvidia's PhysX acceleration.

 

I personally love PhysX, it seems to get closer to real physics than Havok or any other physics engine I've tried. (and I have quite a few games that use it, including Borderlands 2)

[Humin]

Does it even beat source physics?

[BTGBullseye]

Yes, at least out of the box it does... I know of a few ways to tweak Source physics to make them closer to real, but it takes a long time, and nearly 10GB of additional HDD space per-game. (not to mention only Tesla servers have the computing power to run the games afterwards... lol)

[Cirty Dunt]

so you don't have a reason to shell out for an Nvidia card unless you plan on getting some other games that support Nvidia's PhysX acceleration.

 

I'm thinking of saving up for big multiplayer games like CoD. I've run MW3 on my current setup and it looked kinda nice. Although I did experience a little lag when people are their usual and spam grenades all over the map, however I can't say for certain that it was my GPU or CPU under strain.

[BTGBullseye]

The CoD series doesn't use PhysX to my knowledge... (when I type "PhysX" I mean the Nvidia technology, when I type "physics" I me the process of simulating real life physical reactions)

 

By the way, MW3 isn't that big of a GFX hog... I can max it out (except shadows or MSAA) on my laptop. (i5-3210m CPU, GT 630m 2GB GPU, 8GB 1600MHz RAM)