Advise

[kyfire]

Ok, going to be setting up a new system for the new year. With the following parts,
GIGABYTE GA-970A-D3 AMD 970 Chipset Socket AM3,
AMD FX-6300 3.50 GHz Six-Core,
8gig Corsair Vengeance DDR3/1866MHz Dual Channel Memory,
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 650 1GB 16X PCIe,
Asetek 570LX Liquid Cooling system w/ 240MM Radiator and Dual Fans,
1TB Western Digital Caviar Blue SATA-III 6.0Gb/s 7200 RPM HDD,
Corsair CMPSU-600CXV2 Builder Series CX600 V2 80 Plus Certified Power Supply,
Azza Fusion 3000 Full-Tower Gaming Case

My big question is should I go with 2gigx4 or 4gigx2 on the memory?

 

[Finch]

I would go with 2x4gb as it will mean you will be able to upgrade more easily should you want to at a later date.

 

[SPS]

I think all these parts could do with a rethink

 

[kyfire]

I think all these parts could do with a rethink

I'm open to suggestions, so go right ahead and suggest.

 

[SPS]

What's the budget and purpose?

 

[kyfire]

Budget is around say $800 possibly as high as $1000. Will be used for general web suffing, email, Steam games (Metro 2033, Company of Heros), some photo and video editing, and in virtural worlds such as InWorldz and SecondLife as a DJ using SAM broadcaster.

 

[ccaution]

I'd skip the fancy watercooling, for an ssd, on a heartbeat

 

[SPS]

I'd say something along these lines (taken from newegg)

All you need on top of this is a cpu cooler and a case

 

[kyfire]

SPS, nice suggestion. But I prefer AMD cpus and Nivida gpus.

 

[SPS]

AMD cpus are terrible... why do you want to waste your money?

 

[Finch]

The 3570k is better than more expensive AMD cpu's for gaming. So you really should consider one. If you don't like AMD gpu's you could go with a 660 Ti or 670 instead.

 

[kyfire]

AMD cpus are terrible... why do you want to waste your money?

Interesting comment coming from someone with an AMD cpu.

From what I can see the FX 6300 sticks pretty close to your Phenom II X6 1090T in benchmarks ( http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/699?vs=146 )

 

[G-sus]

AMD cpus are terrible... why do you want to waste your money?

Says the guy with a 1090t in all honesty, AMD CPUs might not be as good as Intel, buy they're cheap and they do the job just fine.

 

[SPS]

Exactly, which proves i'm not an intel fanboy. My CPU was good when it came out.. nowadays it doesn't even stand close to an intel chip. If I was to upgrade I would go for an intel chip.

 

[G-sus]

Everyone keeps saying AMD CPUs are bad. They're not bad, they're just worse than Intel, doesn't mean they don't perform well, as far as gaming goes, they're more than enough.

 

[SPS]

They're not as good as their intel counterpart, so why would you choose AMD?

 

[kyfire]

Well, I'll be the first to agree Intel blows AMD outta the water in a purely gaming machine, in most benchmarks and is better fold folding. But, for my purposes AMD does fine. Hell, I play Metro 2033 and Company of Heros on my current system with an Athlon 64 X2 2.20ghz and Nivida 8400 GS on medium settings with no issues. So, if I can do that along with everything else I do on that cpu a FX 6300 should do fine. besides, I've always been one to lean towards supporting the underdog.

 

[njallday]

Honestly just go for the Intel, you won't have any second thoughts.

Also, I'd definitely go for an AMD video card right now. The 7950 is in between the 660ti and 670 performance wise, but is at or below the 660ti price. I prefer Nvidia myself, but I'm upgrading from a 570 to 7950 in a few weeks.

 

[Stevo]

and you get 3 free games !

 

[Deejeta]

:noobsign:metro 2033 on a 650.

unless you like 15fps then go for it.

3570k or non k
decent motherboard - depends on if you want to overclock
7870 or 660ti minimum
ram - whatever (less sticks can make overclocking easier on certain boards)
ssd - intel, samsung, crucial, new corsairs
1tb black
decent psu - corsair, seasonic
shinobi case - cheap, good build quality and look great plus great features


There is a reason why there are so many AMD haters, because there used to be so many fans. I was one of them. They really kicked sand in the face of everyone who has supported their enthusiast cpu market of recent years.
A low end intel will wipe the floor with a mid-range amd in this current market.
If you are dead set on going current AMD, go for a trinity processor - A10 5800k. Great overclocking with the right board plus a decent onboard gpu. Paired with fast memory even this would be better than a gtx650.