new computer (help)

so my computer is getting kinda old and slow (4-5 years old now) and im thinking about getting a new one (pc), the thing is, i really can't be arsed to build it myself, since i haven't been keeping up at all with what's been happening the last 4 years, and it really doesn't interest me like it used to either, so im probably gonna get a pre-built one this time around (for the first time ever).

anyway, i have no idea what's awesome and what's not when it comes to computers these days, and back when i actually gave a shit about these things, pre-built/brand name computers were generally considered shitty compared to if you built one yourself. is this still the case? do they still ship with a bunch of pre-installed bullshit i don't need etc?

im mainly gonna be using it for making music, editing (hd) movies (which apparantly requires alot of power), and maybe gaming, though probably not.

amd? intel? radeon? nvidia?

i've been looking at this ($1732).

wtf is a core i5? what happpened to mhz?

looks decent but seems a little expensive, there has got to be something comparable at a lower price.

  On 7/12/2010 at 8:12 PM, data said:

wtf is a core i5? what happpened to mhz?

lol indeed. i am far from being updated on computers now. so these new isomething processors are chinese for me

The Core i5 750 is the best bang for buck CPU out right now... the new AMD 6 core processors are just as affordable but from the benchmarks Ive seen i5 750 is still the CPU to get. That ATI 5770 is a nice card.. you'll be able to do some decent gaming on it. I would not go for that kit though, as Bubba said it's overpriced.

You might see some advantages going with i7 if you are editing HD video, but I dont think it will justify the cost. Also the Core i5s use a new chipset that future i7s will use so you'll be able to upgrade down the road if need be without getting a new mobo.

  On 7/12/2010 at 8:42 PM, goffer said:

The Core i5 750 is the best bang for buck CPU out right now... the new AMD 6 core processors are just as affordable but from the benchmarks Ive seen i5 750 is still the CPU to get. That ATI 5770 is a nice card.. you'll be able to do some decent gaming on it. I would not go for that kit though, as Bubba said it's overpriced.

 

You might see some advantages going with i7 if you are editing HD video, but I dont think it will justify the cost. Also the Core i5s use a new chipset that future i7s will use so you'll be able to upgrade down the road if need be without getting a new mobo.

yeah i'd say this system is overpriced. something for 1700 bones should have 2 decent crossfire'd video cards (gaming, dual monitors) or 1 crazy vid card. but you said you don't want to do much gaming so your big things are processor and ram. the ram is ok, 8 gigs should be fine for most things, but it's important to find an expandable mobo. 16 max gigs of ram is the lowest i'd go for a system you want to hang on to for a while.

the i5s are decent like goffer said.

If you aren't going to be doing any x-treme gaming there isn't much point in multi-GPUs or really expensive cards. Just something fast enough with all the output sockets to do what you want, multi-monitor etc. My graphics card is about three years old and I don't feel an urge to swop it out. I haven't bothered following benchmarks or anything like that in a while but the basics seem to be you'll get more for you money with ATI, and nVidia's latest Fermi cards don't seem worth it but there are reasons to be interested in their CUDA technology (CUDA is available in older gen cards too, which is perhaps an option) if you're doing media stuff http://blog.krama.tv/hacking-adobe-premiere-cs5-to-enable-more-nvidia-cuda-cards/

Personally I'd be tempted to build around an i7 930. The computer would last you a long time and perhaps you'd be able to get some secondhand extreme chip like the i7 980X cheaper further on down the line when some fanatic ebays his bits to fund the latest and greatest build when a new enthusiast socket comes out. Sorry I've totally disregarded the fact that you've lost interest in building computers. I think the bother of getting yourself up to date on what's good/not so good and building for yourself pays off. You'll know exactly what's in the box, like I can't really tell what PSU is in that computer you're looking at. You'll be able to specify your storage setup and things like the exact type of fans and CPU cooler you want to put in it. When you're browsing around and putting together lists of potential builds you'll be able to mull over what you really need out of a computer. I haven't read up in some months so if what I'm saying is complete rubbish then please someone slap my shit.

That case is quite nice though, I was looking at that a while ago. The inside looks like it's coated with gorilla foreheads to stop noise. I found out it doesn't have a reset button though, so if it completely locks up then ah fuck.

I like my i7.

oh, wow, thanks for all your replies, and yeah, i understand the benefits of building it myself, i really just can't be bothered atm, even if it means i'll have to pay a little more.

i found this in pretty much the same pricerange as the previous one ($1773):

- Box Fractal Design Define R2 Black Pearl

- PSU Corsair TX 650W PSU ATX

- Motherboard Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD3R, X58 S-1366 (6 ram slots, 24gb max)

- Processor Intel Core i7 930 Quad 8MB

- Memory Corsair XMS3 DDR3 1333MHZ 6GB

- Graphics card ATI Radeon HD 5850 1GB GDDR5

- HDD Seagate Barracuda 1TB 7200RPM S-ATA

looks pretty good to me.

wow 6 ram slots, wish my shit had that much. do they give you 6x1GB sticks or what? cpu is nice, vid card is the one i have, i do a bit of gaming and have duals and it handles it just fine. PSU is fine and it's a decent size hard drive.

i think you might be able to do better for the price but overall it's a solid system that should last a while.

Looks good!

ordered. thanks people.

i just noticed there's no cpu fan listed. uhm, does core i7 cpu's ship with one? does it suck? it probably does, fuck.

it'll probably be the stock one, and it'll be fine. If you find it too noisy you can always get a third party one - check the bios for fan profiles first though. There's probably a silent option where the fan will spin slower, but still spin up if the computer reaches temps you don't like. You might be able to tell the case fans to do the same too.

  On 7/13/2010 at 9:38 PM, data said:

oh, wow, thanks for all your replies, and yeah, i understand the benefits of building it myself, i really just can't be bothered atm, even if it means i'll have to pay a little more.

 

i found this in pretty much the same pricerange as the previous one ($1773):

 

- Box Fractal Design Define R2 Black Pearl

- PSU Corsair TX 650W PSU ATX

- Motherboard Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD3R, X58 S-1366 (6 ram slots, 24gb max)

- Processor Intel Core i7 930 Quad 8MB

- Memory Corsair XMS3 DDR3 1333MHZ 6GB

- Graphics card ATI Radeon HD 5850 1GB GDDR5

- HDD Seagate Barracuda 1TB 7200RPM S-ATA

 

looks pretty good to me.

Wait - when you said you didn't want to build it yourself, I thought you meant a retail computer - basically you're paying for some other company to build you a PC from teh looks of things...

Is that USD?

  On 7/13/2010 at 10:53 PM, Joyrex said:

  On 7/13/2010 at 9:38 PM, data said:

oh, wow, thanks for all your replies, and yeah, i understand the benefits of building it myself, i really just can't be bothered atm, even if it means i'll have to pay a little more.

 

i found this in pretty much the same pricerange as the previous one ($1773):

 

- Box Fractal Design Define R2 Black Pearl

- PSU Corsair TX 650W PSU ATX

- Motherboard Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD3R, X58 S-1366 (6 ram slots, 24gb max)

- Processor Intel Core i7 930 Quad 8MB

- Memory Corsair XMS3 DDR3 1333MHZ 6GB

- Graphics card ATI Radeon HD 5850 1GB GDDR5

- HDD Seagate Barracuda 1TB 7200RPM S-ATA

 

looks pretty good to me.

 

Wait - when you said you didn't want to build it yourself, I thought you meant a retail computer - basically you're paying for some other company to build you a PC from teh looks of things...

 

Is that USD?

that's pretty much it yeah, i couldn't really find a hp/compaq/whatever i was satisfied with, so i found these guys ..they're selling it as a "package", im paying a little bit extra to have them put it together for me.

yeah, that's usd.

  On 7/13/2010 at 9:38 PM, data said:

oh, wow, thanks for all your replies, and yeah, i understand the benefits of building it myself, i really just can't be bothered atm, even if it means i'll have to pay a little more.

 

i found this in pretty much the same pricerange as the previous one ($1773):

 

- Box Fractal Design Define R2 Black Pearl

- PSU Corsair TX 650W PSU ATX

- Motherboard Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD3R, X58 S-1366 (6 ram slots, 24gb max)

- Processor Intel Core i7 930 Quad 8MB

- Memory Corsair XMS3 DDR3 1333MHZ 6GB

- Graphics card ATI Radeon HD 5850 1GB GDDR5

- HDD Seagate Barracuda 1TB 7200RPM S-ATA

 

looks pretty good to me.

Thats more like it, still might be a little overpriced but better that the last one you showed.

soo, the store i was gonna order ^this from turned out to be shite and totally not serious, and i couldn't be bothered to find another one like it.

i started looking at some again tonight though and found this:

cpu Intel Core™ i7-processor 950 (3,06 Ghz, 8 MB cache)

motherboard ASUS P6T DELUXE V2

memory CORSAIR Intel Core i7 6GB Kit PC3-12800, 1600MHz

hdd 1,5 TB SATA2 7200rpm, 64 MB cache Western Digital

gpu ATI® Radeon® 5850 1 GB 2xDVI/HDMI + HDTV/HDCP (Gigabyte)

dvd 22x DVD+/-RW

psu CORSAIR Power Supply 550W VX

$1795 USD

yes? no? im about to click the order buttonnnnn

edit: nevermind, ordered.

dont' buy that! you can get that for half the price!

edit: nevermind.

Order all the parts from an online store then ask them to build it for you, it's miles better than buying a pre-built computer.

that's what i did. by pre-built i simply meant im not the one putting it together.

Gotcha, I'm building my own PC next week, I've spent an whole week reading reviews, checking benchmarks, it was way simpler in the PIII-Athlon XP days.

yeah, im not sure it was really simpler back in the day though, i think it's just that i haven't kept myself updated on what's been going on in recent years, so i have no idea about anything.

my "research" is just me googling whatever product im interested in + "review", clicking random reviews and scrolling to the bottom of the page for the score.