New i7 rig, advice please?

-Mike-

-Mike-

-Mike-

Soldato
Joined
22 Dec 2002
Posts
10,165
Location
Minehead
Hi all, decided to spend a bit on upgrading my current pc, and have semi decided on the following spec, if anyone can offer advice or other suggestions then they'd be greatly appreciated. (Would like to overclock a wee bit)

Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD5
Intel i7 920
6gb Corsair pc12800
1tb samsung f3
5850 graphics card

My questions if any of you could answer i'd really appreciate it -

i7, that much better than the i5?
Have I chosen the best board for getting the most out of the i7 assuming I don't change to i5?
6gb that much of a difference over 4gb?

Whats the best reasonable price cooler for this setup?

Any other suggestions greatfully received, thank you :)
 
I forgot to add, I currently have and will be using again -

Coolermaster wavemaster
dvdrw drives etc
Unused Windows 7
600W enermax PSU

I hope all those bits will fit together :)
 
I heavily advise you research the differences between Core i7 and Core i5, by way of reviews, benchmarks and forums etc. You may well find what you're suited to is an i5.

Also, you might want to look at a different power supply. So many people buy these kickass gaming rigs, spend so much on graphics and processors- and then go all budgetmode on power supplies, which are one of the most valuable assets to a performance pc.

The hard-drive you chose is great and very fast- and I'm getting it too.

This is a great optical drive. Get this or something like it. Sony makes good optical drives, 24x is the best speed you can get. LightScribe is basically technology that allows you to burn images onto specialised discs. Google to find out more.

Also make sure you buy a good case. You don't want expensive furniture in a crap dusty house! I'm buying an Antec 902, though you may also consider a Coolermaster Storm Scout.

Remember peripherals like keyboards and mice are also a big part of your computer interaction, so get some good stuff.
 
Thanks for the reply dude, I'm clueless when it comes to this i5/i7 stuff, psu is a liberty so hardly sub standard and my case isn't too bad just a little small! I looked for differences between i5/i7 and I couldn't really see many!
 
That looks like a bang on i7 spec mate. If you are a gamer, the i5 750 would be the best choice as the performance for your money is incredable. When gaming, the i7 920 beats the i5 by 2 - 3 frame rates but you save £100+. The p55 offers 8 x 8 crossfire and sli where as x58 offers 16 x 16 but the difference is like 2% performance loss. If you want to be more future proof and money isn't an issue, i7 920 all the way but if you are just a hardcore gamer that doesn't need to video edit erc... i5 750 the way to go.
 
The difference between the two setups is just under £100! Am still undecided what to get as of yet :| I'm just hoping the board is a good'un :)
 
May I ask how it beats it?

Also to throw another motherboard choice into the mix, how about the
Asus P6TD Deluxe? Which is the better board of the two?
 
-Mike- said:
The difference between the two setups is just under £100! Am still undecided what to get as of yet :| I'm just hoping the board is a good'un :)
Click to expand...

And thats £100 you can invest elsewhere. I was in your position not long ago, I wanted the biggest and best, but I ended up buying an i5 and am perfectly satisfied. (Just about to place order)

I'd rather have a nice new keyboard, mouse, soundcard- than spend that extra money on going from i5 to i7 only to gain, well, not much.

i7 = multi-GPU and HARDCORE video editors, benchmarkers etc...

I think the best thing I got told was: if you have to ask why you should get an i7, then you don't need an i7. =P

Here, I made plenty of topics on my PC-building quest!
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?p=15007034
 
Last edited:
As I understand it....


You need to decide if you need hyperthreading. Hyperthreading is the main issue between i5 and i7.

If you NEED hyperthreading go i7. If you don't go i5

If you go i5 you will need an 1156 motherboard.

If you go i7 you will have to go 1156 or 1366 motherboard depending on which particular i7 you choose.

1366 motherboards use triple channel memory. 1156 motherboards don't.

If you go 1366 you might have an option to upgrade to a 6 core (very expensive) processor next year.

This is my current understanding. Hope I'm right :)
 
As you've described it is also how I understood it, I shall go off and research hyperthreading and form some sort of conclusion from that :)
 
Same situation right now, i5/i7 build :)

I'm going i5 no doubt, as has been said i7 is a hardcore processor, not really needed by most people and certainly not for me. The way I've always build/designed PCs in the past is to choose the CPU first and work from there.

Your roots are:
i5, 2/4/8/16gb RAM (dual channel DDR3) using socket 1156. Pretty easy to overclock from what I've read. Fans are quite cheap but harder to come by (for now only maybe? May see more coming out soon). Single PCI-E cards work perfectly well, however when using SLi/XFire you only get half the bandwidth? 4 cores (all physical).

i7, 3/6/9/12gb RAM (tripple channel DDR3) using socket 1366. Even easier to overclock from what I've read. Fans are more costly but easier to come across. Single/Multiple PCI-E cards work perfectly well, using SLi/XFire is optimal on these boards. Hyperthreading possible (gives a small improvement in multi-threaded use). 8 cores (4 physical, 4 emulated).

The only thing that does concern me is that some 1156 boards have fried their CPUs... just a heads up if you haven't read one of the multiple threads on this already.

I think that about sums up the CPU, or at least, sums up what I know about each CPU :)
 
I'm still undecided which setup to go for at current :) Guess I best factor a new power supply into the equation too as 500w enermax liberty isn't going to be enough really (Thought it was 600w but realised i replaced it when it went down with this one)
 
-Mike- said:
I'm still undecided which setup to go for at current :) Guess I best factor a new power supply into the equation too as 500w enermax liberty isn't going to be enough really (Thought it was 600w but realised i replaced it when it went down with this one)
Click to expand...

Do you want to be an early adopter of new technology? Do you want to go for something a year or so old where the motherboards all have loads of BIOS fixies and the hardware is a known quantity - or do you want to go i5.
 
Last edited:
Wow, now that's a biased outview if I ever read one ;)

Way I look at it, for a little extra you can get an i5 which means significantly faster RAM, easier overclocking, and all the parts are going to be available for longer as it's new tech.

Being an "early adopter" may mean a few slight issues with software at first, but its hardly going to kill you is it? Also as I see it, the 1156 mobos are the first hardware issue in new tech for a looooong time.
 
Auraomega said:
Wow, now that's a biased outview if I ever read one ;)

Way I look at it, for a little extra you can get an i5 which means significantly faster RAM, easier overclocking, and all the parts are going to be available for longer as it's new tech.

Being an "early adopter" may mean a few slight issues with software at first, but its hardly going to kill you is it? Also as I see it, the 1156 mobos are the first hardware issue in new tech for a looooong time.
Click to expand...

How does the i5 mean significantly faster ram? I read the i7 was the easier clocker, and parts won't necessarily be available longer because the newer stupidly expensive cpu is 1366?
 
-Mike- said:
How does the i5 mean significantly faster ram? I read the i7 was the easier clocker, and parts won't necessarily be available longer because the newer stupidly expensive cpu is 1366?
Click to expand...

The performance difference between Dual-Chan / Tri-Chan memory is negligable.

4GB is plenty of RAM for today. When needed, just add 4 more GB. By the time 8GB becomes mainstream- todays tech will be obsolete and you'll be overdue for a complete upgrade anyway.

Hyperthreading- games don't use it. It's too troublesome for games developers and so they don't bother, but this may change in the coming years. In some games I think hyperthreading actually slows your performance, in World of Warcraft for example. So people turn it off.

Are you a proffesional video editor? Are you a professional 3D graphics modeller or photo editor? If not, then do you REALLY need to spend £100~ for a little speed bonus in applications that use hyperthreading, such as Photoshop and Sony Vegas?

Core i5 will still give you great speed and performance in these applications. So unless you are planning to really max out your systems resources by intensively using certain applications then i7 isn't for you.

Between i5 and i7 you will not notice a performance difference on your desktop or games. You'll only notice i7's speed increase when intensively using certain applications.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom