Did you or are you going to build your computer?

[BP_Tailspin]

Tell your story about your first and current “gaming computer”

If you have never built a computer give it a try, it’s not that hard just get a friend or your local shop to help. Don’t be afraid to build your own computer.

My first custom built gaming computer was built by a friend of mine; I was chicken and he owned a computer shop. I had other computers but this was my first one built for gaming. I had him build me an Intel Pentium III 866 MHz, 1gig of memory, NVIDIA 4600 video card. It was built for IL2 and handled it with ease.

I built my current computer; with IL2 CoD looming on the horizon I wanted a power house. My wife and son are gamers and always get my old hand-me-downs but this time I got “the look” … you know … hands on hips, cold stare, tapping foot … you’ve seen it. So I had to build three or there was going to be trouble. My best gaming computer was an AMD FX60 with a NVIDIA 6800, it was a great computer. I wanted to stay with AMD do to my past experience and they have great performance v $$$.

Here’s my new build:

MOBO: ASUS Crosshair III Formula,
RAM: 8GB G Skill DDR3 1333,
CPU: AMD 965 Phenom II - 3.4GHz Quad-Core,
Cooling: ZALMAN 9500AT,
HD: WD Black Edition, 1TB games and 500 GB operating system and programs,
GPU: EVGA GTX 470, (will upgrade to dual-core 590 by the end of summer)
CD/DVD: LG with LightScribe,
Sound: Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty Pro,
PSU: Corsair HX Series 850HX Modular,
Case: Cooler Master Centurion 590,
Windows 7 64-bit,



NOTE: This is not an AMD v Intel or NVIDIA v ATI thread.

[Tacoma74]

Yes, I built my current computer and I’m looking forward to my next build

My first build ever was really something quite special haha ;) It consisted of an AMD Duron 750Mhz processor on a really crappy old Socket A motherboard. Every part that i put into it were all old used parts I acquired from my high school electronics class when i was still attending 5 or so years ago. I knew nothing of what went where and what anything did. But after a couple months I finally got it all to work! It was quite an experience, and I'm very proud of that.

Ever since then I've been building rigs for myself and friends and family. It's amazing how much money one can save when building your own rig. I've come to find that Dell is junk, as is most of the consumer systems you'll find at your local store. Building your own is the only way to go!

My current system is in my signature. I built it back in July 2008 when most of it was new and pretty much top of the line parts. Not so much anymore, but it still plays IL-2 1946 like butter. Can't wait to see how CoD runs on it. Probably won't be all that great, but it will give me a really good basis for what I need to buy for my next rig. I will probably go with something as follows:

-Intel 2500k
-ASROCK Extreme4 P67
-MSI Gtx 570
-4Gb DDR3 1600Mhz (already have this)
-Corsair 750w PSU
-2 x 500Gb WD 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s (in raid 0)
-Win7 Ultimate x64

[desmodronic]

My first build was in the week before Christmas 1992 :)
I had spent the previous 3 months going to the shop on a weekly basis handing in £100 towards the total cost. I had asked that the shop would show me how to put it together myself. That Friday I finished my shift at 2pm and went to the shop in my factory blues and handed over the last installment. So £1150 got me the following:

AT Case
Some sort of PSU
Intel 486 SX 25Mhz
Trident Graphics (512KB)
80MB Hard Disk
Floppy Drive
AT Keyboard & Mouse
15' Monitor
DOS 5

Step forward to my current build almost 20 years later, which I've been quietly upgrading for the last few months in anticipation of COD, I've priced in the stuff less than 3 months old)
AMD Phenom II X6 1055 @ 4.2 (€140)
Asus M4A79T (€105)
16GB DDR3 Exceleram (12800 or 1600Mhz) (€165)
ATI 4870 (ordered a 6970 this afternoon :D (€289)
LSI 9240 -8i Raid Card (Ebay - €50)
4 * Samsung F3 1TBs in RAID 10 (€220)
2 * OCZ Vertex 60GB (these will be retired to notebooks once the Vertex 3s are available, use these for Linux and Ecomstation - OS/2 is hillariously quick on SSD)
2 * OCZ Vertex 2 80GB (RAID 0, main OS/Apps volume)
3 Radiators, 360, 240 & 120 (mixture of XSPC RX and TFC Xchanger) (€130 for the XSPCs)
2 Laing DDC 3.2 pumps on a EK Dual DDC Top (ordered the ver 2 this afternoon with a 250mm Res and full cover block for the 6970 oops another €200)
EK Supreme
EK Mosfet, SB and NB blocks for the Asus mb
be-quiet 650 P8 psu
Lian-li A70B
13 Noiseblocker PL2 120mm fans
24' LCD, 1920*1200
Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit

Sim Stuff
CH Products Fighter Stick, Pro Throttle and Rudders
TrackIR 4

[robtek]

Please edit the text in the poll, i am afraid of getting eye-cancer watching it. :-D

It' "current" and "forward"

[kimosabi]

I'm a builder if you could call it that, from just assembling a rig to complete casemods/scratch builds. Currently still rocking the 775 but will be moving to Sandy's Bride shortly. My first ever desktop was also a 775 E8200 though so I'm not a "veteran" geek. Only for like 3 years.

My current-ish rig:

http://www5.picturepush.com/photo/a/2944318/640/NorseRad/SDC10747.jpg (http://picturepush.com/public/2944318)

Specs:
Q9550
HD5870
24" 1920x1200
TX750
EP45 UD3P
8gb G.Skill PC8800
Blablabla

[Matt255]

The only computer i bought in a store was my very first one back in 1999 (Pentium 3 500 Mhz, a real powerhorse back then! :D).

Since then, i build my own computer. Most of the time, i only upgrade GPU and then mainboard + CPU later. I only upgrade parts that really need replacement for the games i play.

[Zoom2136]

My first PC was a IBM PS2 286 bought at the store (Computershop back then.. 88 or 89) NO HARD DRIVE, MCGA video, AND the a 3,5" FLOPPY DISC...

My first build was an Asus P5AD2 Premium Mobo, P4 3.4 CPU, 4 Gig RAM, and a ATI XT850XT VideoCard.

Then my second build was a Asus Mobo ???, Core Duo ???, 4 gig RAM, and a pair of 7900GTX in SLI.

My present rig is an Asus ???, I7-930 OC CPU, 6 gig RAM, 260GTX video card and a 1000W PSU. I'm planning on upgrading the video card to a 570GTX.

I guess it is true that you mostly remember your first time lol.

[IceFire]

I've built all but my very first computer. I think I'm on my fourth or fifth now :)

[JG1_Wanderfalke]

my baby´s heart will arrive tomorrow :grin:

[blampars]

Growing up, my father always brought home a computer from work. They were always good enough to play games like X-Wing, Tie-Fighter, DOOM and then various flight sims like Aces over Europe/Pacific and Red Baron. By the time Mechwarrior: Mercenaries came out the Dell 200mhz Pentium I had at the time just couldn't keep up properly so I purchased a 3DFX Voodoo graphics card and learned how to install it. I've been building my machines ever since.

My current rig was built in early 2009 but has been upgraded a few times:
Coolermaster Storm Sniper case
Coolermaster V8 CPU Cooler
Coolermaster 1000w PSU
AMD 955 OC'd to 3.7ghz (just can't get 3.8!)
Asus M3N72-D MB
4GB OCZ SLI-Ready DDR2 RAM @ 1066
Palit Sonic Platinum GTX460 x2 (SLI)
320GB WD HD @ 7200RPM
1.5TB WD HD @ 7200RPM w/ 64MB Cache
500GB Cavalry External (backup drive)
Samsung DVDR Drive
22" Samsung SyncMaster 2233
CM Storm Sentinel Advance gaming mouse
Crappy logitech backlit keyboard :P
Windows 7 64bit

CH HOTAS - Fighterstick, Pro Throttle, Pro Pedals
TrackIR 5 with Proclip

Hopefully this can get me through till March of 2012 without having to dump more money into it. I'd upgrade my MB/Memory/Graphics and possibly Processor next. My current wishlist at Newegg for upgrades would be around 1000 :( Could've saved a $100 or so if I didn't opt for the OEM Windows 7 copy. Oh well.

[swiss]

Which 955 is that, C3?


edit:
http://blogs.amd.com/play/2009/04/22/overclocking-101-with-the-amd-phenom-ii-x4-955-black-edition-processor/

[blampars]

Which 955 is that, C3?


edit:
http://blogs.amd.com/play/2009/04/22/overclocking-101-with-the-amd-phenom-ii-x4-955-black-edition-processor/

Yeah it's the C3. If I recall there was some kind of issue with the C2 and so I had made sure I got the C3.

I think the main problem is I'm not well versed enough in OC'ing to get 3.8 stable. Getting to 3.7 was as easy as changing the Multiplier and I was good. I've tinkered with it, but haven't had any success.

Gonna check out that article now, thanks.

Edit: Ah yeah, I've read that article a few times before but I thought I read somewhere you need a "Full AMD" system to use that software?? I'll have to have another look.

Edit2: yeah, I need an AMD Chipset and I have nvidia chipset with this MoBo. I'll have to try doing it through the bios some more today.

[maclean525]

I built my current machine:

i7 950
Asus Sabertooth X58 mobo
Xigmatec Dark Knight CPU cooler
6GB 1600mhz ram
64gb SSD for OS and iRacing, HDD for everything else
HAF 932 case
Asus HD5850 GPU
Triple 23" Dell screens running Eyefinity.
Corsair 750W PSU
Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit

I expect to be upgrading to an HD 6870 pretty soon. I'm not a fan of crossfire/SLI and prefer the single card solution.

[kimosabi]

I expect to be upgrading to an HD 6870 pretty soon. I'm not a fan of crossfire/SLI and prefer the single card solution.

I take it you meant 6970, as the 6870 is pretty much a hopped up 5770. :confused:

[maclean525]

I take it you meant 6970, as the 6870 is pretty much a hopped up 5770. :confused:

Yes, it was a typo :) 6970 for me!

[RedStarOverRussia]

Tell your story about your first and current “gaming computer”

If you have never built a computer give it a try, it’s not that hard just get a friend or your local shop to help. Don’t be afraid to build your own computer.


Not for myself but for my wife's gaming habits :) Reused her flat screen monitor, keyboard, speakers and mouse. All for under $500. Had a computer friend walk me through it in under 2 hrs. Loaded Win7 64-bit ($10 education copy through work). Runs like a champ!

CASE ROSEWILL
MB BIOSTAR A880G+
VGA SAPPHIRE| 100283VX-2L HD5770 1G
PSU ANTEC 430W
CPU AMD ATH II X3 450 3.2G
MEM 4Gx2 MUSHKIN 996770 DDR3
HD 1T WD 7K 32M SATA II
DVD BURNER LITE-ON

[klem]

Built my first rig about 13 years ago, current one is about my fifth. Actually I had it built for me to my spec as they gave it a guaranteed overclock which saved me faffing about this time:

ASUS Saberetooth motherboard
Intel i7 950 overclocked to 4GHz
Twin fan Megahalems cooler
6Gb DDR3 RAM
EVGA GeForce GTX 570 Superclocked 1280MB NVIDIA Graphics Card
Crucial 128Gb SSD, 355Mb/s(R)/145Mb/s(W) on 6Gb/sec SATA
..... Win7 64bit, IL-2/FSX/X-plane and soon.... BoB the CoD
Corsair CMPSU-750HXUK HX 750W Modular Power Supply
Coolermaster HAF912plus case with 200mm fans front and back
2 160Gb HDDs for other stuff
DVD R/W drive

[Tacoma74]

Yes, it was a typo :) 6970 for me!

Go with a 6950. Flashing the GPU bios up to 6970 is easy as pie!! and you'll save a bit of cash. Only if you feel confident though.

Edit: Oh! And i suggest the 2Gb version of the 6950. I have a feeling video memory might be a large factor in how well CoD runs. But we will see...

[T}{OR]

Go with a 6950. Flashing the GPU bios up to 6970 is easy as pie!! and you'll save a bit of cash. Only if you feel confident though.

Nice as it sounds - this will kill the card quickly. I wouldn't recommend it. 6970 already runs hot as it is. Besides that, there are power limitations for running 6970 BIOS on a 6950 card.

[tintifaxl]

I've built a new machine just a few weeks ago for DCS-A10 based on Sandy Bridge (2 days before the SATA bug was brought to our attention).

* coolermaster haf 932
* scythe stronger 600 psu
* i5-2500k
* asus p8p67
* msi gtx 570
* 8 gig ram
* 120 gig ssd
* 1 tb hdd

It flies pretty well :grin:

[Koyan]

Yes, except for the first one i'm always building new rigs myself. I'm not going for the most recent top o/t line components but one generation before them. This way i save money and am still uptodate for about 450 Euro's, each upgrade. Current machine:

Q9650
Gigabyte P35C-DS3R
Sapphire HD5870
4 Gigs DDR3 ram
2 small HD's 80 and 275 G (don't need much)

[Tacoma74]

Nice as it sounds - this will kill the card quickly. I wouldn't recommend it. 6970 already runs hot as it is. Besides that, there are power limitations for running 6970 BIOS on a 6950 card.

Ah, I had no idea. I'm more of an nVidia guy myself. Just read something about it awhile ago in a video card shootout. Shows how much i know about ATI stuff ;)

[mazex]

My first home built rig was a 486 Dx50 - this is the one I'm itching to buy now when the B3 chipsets arrive (and I know how demanding CoD will be):

Intel Core i7 2600K 3,4GHz Socket 1155
Noctua NH-D14
Asus P8P67 Pro B3
Corsair XMS3 DDR3 PC12800/1600MHz CL9 2x4GB DDR3
Gigabyte GeForce GTX 570 OC HDMI Dual-DVI 1280MB
Antec P193
Antec TruePower New Series 750W

Maybe going for a GTX580 instead... Or... Mmm...

[kimosabi]

Nice as it sounds - this will kill the card quickly. I wouldn't recommend it. 6970 already runs hot as it is. Besides that, there are power limitations for running 6970 BIOS on a 6950 card.

The deal is that the cards have differently binned memory chips. It is a bit of hit and miss but in most cases you won't "kill the card quickly". Many does get artifacts though and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who's not overclocking on a regular basis as it includes using MSI Afterburner/Asus Smartdoctor, BIOS flashing and modding scripts to get a good shader activation.

Or, if you're unlucky, you get a card which is among the least scoring cards at the factory test. Most chips are good enough for a 6970 but any chips with least amount of imperfection will be used in a 6970, not 6950, so a 6950 is pretty much chips who didn't make the cut to be mounted on a 6970. The shaders are locked for a reason.

[T}{OR]

I didn't feel like writing that much, so "killing it quickly" filled the description. :)

Maybe going for a GTX580 instead... Or... Mmm...

Switch that 2600k for 2500k and get yourself a 580 instead of 570.

[mazex]

Switch that 2600k for 2500k and get yourself a 580 instead of 570.

Yep - that could be a good solution... The HT sure is useless for gaming today at least - don't know about the larger cache though?

EDIT: nah, the cache sure does not seem that important. Either I'll follow you advice or go for both ;)

[T}{OR]

EDIT: nah, the cache sure does not seem that important. Either I'll follow you advice or go for both ;)

Or wait and see how 590 performs (due out on 22nd), since you have money for both. :)

[mazex]

Or wait and see how 590 performs (due out on 22nd), since you have money for both. :)

Well, it may become a screaming toaster like the 6990 :) At least it could make the 580 drop in price a bit...

EDIT: and yes I have the money but I like to feel like i don't waste them for no good (and therefore you i5 advice really fits the bill :))

[T}{OR]

Np.

... At least it could make the 580 drop in price a bit...

That is what I am waiting for too. :)