Post your setup!

[BTGBullseye]

But I want to be able to use Vulkan drivers which Nvidia doesn't support.

Nvidia has had native Vulkan support since the 600 series... (it's built into the regular Nvidia drivers) Whoever told you they didn't either doesn't know, or is lying.

 

The 1050 or the 1060 would likely serve you well for the foreseeable future.

[Heliocentrical]

Did SLI/Crossfire stop being a thing? I can't seem to find any SLI/Crossfire ports on the GPUs I've looked through.

 

Will the GTX 1050 be able to handle things such as recording raw gameplay footage or emulation?

 

What about the GTX 1050 Ti? The GTX 1050 Ti looks really appealing with 4 GBs of RAM for $150 whereas the GTX 1060 only has 3 GBs of RAM for $200. Seems like I would be paying more for less with the GTX 1060.

 

Is the GTX 1050 Ti overclocked by default or are there non OC versions? What does Ti mean?

[BTGBullseye]

SLI/Crossfire has always had its own slew of problems, not limited to some games/programs not even being capable of utilizing more than 1 GPU. (that effectively makes the SLI/Crossfire setup a complete waste of time and money)

 

The 1050 should be able to handle recording on most older games at maximum settings and 1080p resolutions. If you're wanting to do the same for newer games, I'd say to go for a 1060 or better.

 

The 1050 Ti is in the middle between the 1050 and the 1060 for performance, it has about 5% better performance in benchmarks than the 1050, and the 1060 is about 33% better in addition to having better benchmarks than the best consumer-grade AMD cards. Also, there is usually a discount deal on Newegg for the 1060 that puts it down around $185. (it just tends to rotate between what vendor is doing the deal, but I have yet to see a single day in the past 2 months without a $185 or lower 1060 on Newegg)

 

The main difference between the 1050 and the Ti is the number of Cuda cores. The 1050 has 640, and the Ti has 768. For reference, the 1060 has 1152 cores. Also, overclocking isn't what it used to be. All modern GPUs have a built-in overclocking ability, and they OC on the fly without any user input. (in reality they are all underclocked, and then switch to their full clock speed when they move into 'overclocking' mode)

[Heliocentrical]

Well I have been looking into some more recent games like Dark Souls II, Witcher 3 and Kingdoms of Amalur. They're comparatively new amongst my library of games.

 

Does that mean the 1060 is 28% better than the 1050 Ti? Is there a reason I would want 4 GBs of VRAM over the better hardware of the 1060?

 

If SLI/Crossfire is a waste of money do you have any suggestions for what I could do with that other x16 PCI Express slot on my H170M Pro4?

 

Edit: Now I'm really unsure if I want to get an Nvidia GPU. Nvidia just added Telemetry to their latest drivers. Better performance or not I don't want anyone spying on me. http://www.majorgeeks.com/news/story/nvidia_adds_telemetry_to_latest_drivers_heres_how_to_disable_it.html

[BTGBullseye]

Fairly easy to disable the telemetry... http://www.ghacks.net/2016/11/07/nvidia-telemetry-tracking/ If you use CCleaner, it's really easy to disable these in its Tools>Startup>Scheduled Tasks section.

 

First off, the 6GB 1060 actually has a higher benchmark rating than the 3GB version. (about what you'd expect from slightly faster RAM, about a 2% difference) The 3GB is ~36.6% higher benchmarked performance over the Ti. (the Ti only has ~6.5% better performance than the 1050) http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/compare.php?cmp%5B%5D=3596&cmp%5B%5D=3595&cmp%5B%5D=3566

 

There are really only a couple reasons to go for more than 3GB RAM on a consumer GPU at this time:

1. You are running with very high-resolution textures on a 4k screen.

2. You're doing VR gaming with very high-resolution textures.

3. Your scientific program requires higher GPU RAM for optimal processing. (this probably doesn't apply to 99.999% of the people that purchase this card)

 

As it is, I would suggest leaving that extra PCI-e slot empty. As I said before, those 16 lanes have to be shared between all the slots, (and the USB 3 ports) so putting ANYTHING at all in the second slot is going to limit the GPU. 8x on that slot won't slow the card noticeably, (it'll drop 0~3% on most benchmarks) but if for some reason the slot switches down to 4x, (like if you have a USB 3 external drive as well as a second something in the other slot) you're looking at getting between 20~80% performance reductions. The only device I would even consider putting in a PCI-e slot on a modern system, apart from a really super-expensive SSD or GPU, is a sound card. (and unless you're shelling out $120+ for a nice Xonar to use with your studio-grade Sennheisers, you're probly not going to notice a difference between the PCI-e card and the integrated sound)

[Heliocentrical]

The Mushkin Enhanced Redline is out of stock on both Newegg and Amazon. Do you have any other suggestions for other DDR4 RAM? I still want those lower timings.

 

Are you sure about the Kingston HyperX RAM? I went to Kingston's HyperX website and as far as I can tell it lists all the specs of their RAM. I'm wondering if lack of information provided on their Newegg page is Newegg's fault.

 

http://www.hyperxgaming.com/us/memory/savage-ddr4

[BTGBullseye]

The HyperX Savage line is brand new. (no time to determine their reliability, the FURY line was not that good) That said, they look nice, and they do have true 13-13-13 timing sticks. Unfortunately, you're looking at a $20-$40 premium to get them over other brands.

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820225068

 

Patriot Viper Elite 8GB 2133MHz, 14-14-14-32 timing. Grab 2 and you should be set. ($90, make sure to read the motherboard manual to put them in the right slots for only using 2 sticks)

[Heliocentrical]

Unfortunately, you're looking at a $20-$40 premium to get them over other brands.

Seems more like $5-10.

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820104673

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820104596

 

Now that I think about is there really any noticeable difference in performance between 13 timings and 15 timings? Will I see it when I'm recording and editing? If not I might as well get 2 8 GB G.SKILL memory kits ($90) and call it a day.

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231958

 

I don't need anything higher than 2133 as I don't care for overclocking. I'm pretty sure My Asrock H170 PRO4 isn't capable of doing so even if I wanted to.

 

Also weren't you saying I should get 4x4 GB RAM sticks instead of 2x8 RAM Sticks since they'll be much faster? My Asrock H170 PRO4 has 4 RAM slots.

[BTGBullseye]

4x4 is faster only if the motherboard is specifically designed to run a quad-channel RAM set, otherwise a 2x8 set will perform identically to a 4x4, and the 2x8 is less expensive right now.

 

That first link you gave is $8 more expensive than the link to the Patriot RAM that I gave... $16 + tax difference in final purchase price.

 

The second link is $13 more expensive than the Team brand RAM here... $26 + tax difference in price.

 

It is a very low likelihood that you will notice the difference between 13 and 15, unless you are transcoding a very long video. The same could be said about 2 or 4 sticks of RAM difference, provided your motherboard has a RAM controller that does quad-channel properly. That said, here is what I recommend for making the most bang for your buck for 16GB of RAM...

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820226745

 

Mushkin Enhanced Blackline @2400MHz. If side-by-side, you would notice a difference between 2400 and 2133 RAM, it will reduce the time it takes to do stuff with large files, (like videos) and even if your motherboard can't handle the 2400MHz natively, the RAM can handle the underclocking to 2133 just fine. (all RAM is fine with being underclocked)

[Heliocentrical]

I would much rather buy an 8gb dual channel kit or single 8gb stick and then buy another 8gb dual channel kit or single 8gb stick sometime down the road. I really don't want to have to spend $70 all at once if I don't have to.

[BTGBullseye]

The problem with that is that modern versions of Windows, despite doing just fine starting with lower RAM, ends up with a significant performance impact after a few months post-upgrading the RAM. (I've seen as much as a 10% RAM performance drop) It probably isn't an intentional thing, (who really knows for sure?) but Microsoft has deleted several reports of this issue from their report sections, and it hasn't been fixed since W7 SP1 came out. (that was the first time I noticed it)

 

With multi-channel sets, you definitely want to get the full set all at the same time, as the set sticks are specifically chosen to be of identical performance. Single sticks can vary significantly, and even conflict with each other in rare circumstances. (the performance impact can vary from 0%-100% performance drop, and in extremely rare circumstances one stick can actually permanently kill other sticks attached to the system)

 

If you don't mind the risks, (they are relatively small, though I'm one of the fortunate ones that manages to hit all of them at some point) then by all means, do what you are going to do. I'm providing as much helpful info as possible, not trying to push you to do something you don't want to.

[Heliocentrical]

I'll just wait to build my PC till I have the full 16gbs of RAM.

[sheridanm962]

CPU: Intel Xeon X5450 Quad Core (LGA 771 to 775 mod)

GPU: Asus Geforce GTX 760

PSU: Corsair CX750W

RAM: 8GB DDR3

OS: Windows 7 Ultimate (64bit)

Monitor: BenQ V2400W (1920x1200)

Motherboard: Asus P5G41C-M LX

Keyboard: Logitech G810 (Breathing mode with red, I am a sith lord)

Mouse: Logitech G400S (3600 DPI, switched to 800DPI Gaming)

Controller: Logitech F310

Headphones/Speakers: Sennheiser HD 202 / Focusrite Scarlett Solo --> Line6 Spider IV

HDD1: WD 80GB

HDD2: Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM 2TB

HDD3: Hitachi 5400RPM 750GB

HDD4: Hitachi 7200RPM 320GB

[BTGBullseye]

Not bad...

 

I'd recommend upgrading the processor and motherboard before anything else though. (those are OLD)

[sheridanm962]

Not bad...

 

I'd recommend upgrading the processor and motherboard before anything else though. (those are OLD)

 

I am so late for replying...

 

Yeah. While you are correct. It still runs every game I throw at it (Seriously, even ARMA 3). The only problem I faced was that the whole system is confined to 8GB of RAM Max on DDR3 since it's Hybrid DDR2/DDR3 on the motherboard (not together that is, that would be impossible).

 

The other thing is that it doesn't support single sided DDR3 RAM.

 

I haven't got any newer titles, but I would have to upgrade if I were to get Dishonored 2

[Ikthias]

CPU: AMD FX-4350 4.2GHz

GPU: SAPPHIRE NITRO+ Radeon RX 480 8GB

MB: ASUS M5A97 R2.0

RAM: 4 x 2GB Team Elite DDR3 1333

PSU: CORSAIR RMx Series RM650X

HDD: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200rpm

OS: Windows 10 Pro 64bit

Case: CoolerMaster Elite 431 Plus

 

The display, mouse, and keyboard aren't even worth mentioning and desperately need to be upgraded. I"ll take a picture later.

[BTGBullseye]

Not bad, should be able to do any modern game for the next 5 years. (unless some serious tech breakthroughs occur)

[Luis]

CPU: Intel Xeon X5450 Quad Core (LGA 771 to 775 mod)

GPU: Asus Geforce GTX 760

PSU: Corsair CX750W

RAM: 8GB DDR3

OS: Windows 7 Ultimate (64bit)

Monitor: BenQ V2400W (1920x1200)

Motherboard: Asus P5G41C-M LX

Keyboard: Logitech G810 (Breathing mode with red, I am a sith lord)

Mouse: Logitech G400S (3600 DPI, switched to 800DPI Gaming)

Controller: Logitech F310

Headphones/Speakers: Sennheiser HD 202 / Focusrite Scarlett Solo --> Line6 Spider IV

HDD1: WD 80GB

HDD2: Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM 2TB

HDD3: Hitachi 5400RPM 750GB

HDD4: Hitachi 7200RPM 320GB

 

Nothing like a good ol' audio interface to beef up your PC's audio game. My music has NEVER sounded clearer than when I used a Digidesign MBOX as my soundcard. I recommend keeping that part of your setup for all of eternity.

[Ikthias]

CPU: AMD FX-4350 4.2GHz

GPU: SAPPHIRE NITRO+ Radeon RX 480 8GB

MB: ASUS M5A97 R2.0

RAM: 4 x 2GB Team Elite DDR3 1333

PSU: CORSAIR RMx Series RM650X

HDD: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200rpm

OS: Windows 10 Pro 64bit

Case: CoolerMaster Elite 431 Plus

 

The display, mouse, and keyboard aren't even worth mentioning and desperately need to be upgraded. I"ll take a picture later.

 

UPDATE:

Display: 29" LG Ultrawide IPS Monitor with Freesync

Mouse: Logitech G600

[BTGBullseye]

Not bad at all... Should be able to do almost any game maxed 1080p@60Hz. (a few exceptions, but then again there are always exceptions)