First desktop in years, what to expect.

Phat Momma Hoe · 17 May 2010 at 17:00

Greetings !

Been using laptops for the last couple of years and my old Dell XPS m1710 was starting to get a bit long in the tooth to play games on when called for, so I thought I'd bung a cheapish machine together as I only play occasionally on the PC, most of the time its on consoles.

What Ive knocked together is -

Q6600 @ 3.2
Corsair H50
Asus P5Q
2x2 Kingston 8500 Hyper X
2gig Radeon 4870x2
Antec 1200 Case
Antec CP850 PSU
Sidewinder X6 Keyboard
Logitech MX mouse

Just wondering what kind of gaming I should expect at 1920x1080, hopfully with a little eye candy turned on with it.

CAT-THE-FIFTH · 17 May 2010 at 17:01

You should be able to run many games at high settings with your setup IMHO.

This review was done with a QX9650 overclocked to 3.66GHZ:

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/athlon-ii-x2-250u_3.html

However the drivers will have improved by now so you should expect better framerates IMHO.

thepeganator · 17 May 2010 at 18:50

What's your budget like?

Don't spend that much on a 4870x2 now as they're outdated, get a 5xxx series.

And you have be better going i7/i5, core2 is outdated too, although if budget dictates, my q6600/gtx260 will run most modern games on high/very high mixtures at 1680*1050.

CAT-THE-FIFTH · 17 May 2010 at 18:51

I got the impression the OP already had bought the setup! :confused:

thepeganator · 17 May 2010 at 18:53

Hmm maybe.

Expect quite a bit, as I said my rig handles almost everything out there on pretty high settings, and you should get more than me!

Phat Momma Hoe · 17 May 2010 at 20:56

Yeah already got it / waiting on bits to arrive. It was all done on a budget of 2nd hand stuff except the case & psu so the budget was really quite cheap.

Dont know if I got it across in my opening post, but I spend most of my time on consoles to game. The laptop has really only seen WoW and Football Manager over the last year but I miss the tinkering of a desktop and just wanted to knock something cheap together that could do ok with modern games.

I'm not expecting i5/i7 & 5970/480 performance, as I paid a fraction of the price. Just hoping for something that can play most stuff that takes my fancy at a resonable, playable level

CAT-THE-FIFTH · 17 May 2010 at 21:02

Phat Momma Hoe said:
Yeah already got it / waiting on bits to arrive. It was all done on a budget of 2nd hand stuff except the case & psu so the budget was really quite cheap.

Dont know if I got it across in my opening post, but I spend most of my time on consoles to game. The laptop has really only seen WoW and Football Manager over the last year but I miss the tinkering of a desktop and just wanted to knock something cheap together that could do ok with modern games.

I'm not expecting i5/i7 & 5970/480 performance, as I paid a fraction of the price. Just hoping for something that can play most stuff that takes my fancy at a resonable, playable level

If you look at this review you can get an indication of how well the HD4870X2 performs against an HD5870:

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ATI/Radeon_HD_5870/6.html

No doubt there will be some more performance gains with the HD5870 as the drivers mature but still the HD4870X2 is a very good graphics card.

Gundog48 · 17 May 2010 at 21:04

For gaming, it will be pretty beastly. What games do you play. My little rig in my sig plays MW2 maxed out @ 1440x900 at 80+ FPS. Games like Crysis or BC2 are more demanding though.

Phat Momma Hoe · 17 May 2010 at 21:28

Plan to hook up with old mates on BF:BC2 and L4D2 really.

If you look at this review you can get an indication of how well the HD4870X2 performs against an HD5870:

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/A...HD_5870/6.html

No doubt there will be some more performance gains with the HD5870 as the drivers mature but still the HD4870X2 is a very good graphics card.

Quite pleased with that really, I paid a lot less than the cheapest 5850 for a card that can still push some respectable numbers.

thepeganator · 17 May 2010 at 21:52

L4D2 will max out easy, I do on mine

doiks14 · 20 May 2010 at 00:01

I can max out L4D2 no problem with mine.... so yours shouldn't have problems at all...
as for BF:BC2... I've got it at 1920x1200 running on medium settings... plays smoothly enough for my taste, although I prefer lowering the res down to 1680x1050 as it runs a lot more smoothly, but in your case, it should handle 1920x1200 fine.

Yakyb · 20 May 2010 at 13:56

my first concern is that each component youve selected is 2yr old tech

i would personally advise looking towards more of a i5 750 p55 58** build

i dont think it would cost any more (unless your buying second hand)

having said that tho the components you have selected are all v good and will be fine for you

nayenshah · 20 May 2010 at 15:33

CAT-THE-FIFTH said:
I got the impression the OP already had bought the setup!

I agree - the setup is fine i was using 9400 with 2x 4870 and this served me superbly. was playing CoD at 1920x1080 but there was the occasional lag that popped up which i still cant seem to figure out ? :confused:

oh well! good luck with the build anyway!

skippy2421 · 20 May 2010 at 16:36

Yakyb said:
my first concern is that each component youve selected is 2yr old tech

i would personally advise looking towards more of a i5 750 p55 58** build

i dont think it would cost any more (unless your buying second hand)

having said that tho the components you have selected are all v good and will be fine for you

And this is why you should read threads people.

To the OP. I can run most games i want on high on your res and i have just over half the firepower you have in terms of graphics and nigh on the same in terms of the rest of the rig. It'll fly mate. No reason you can't max out everything really (with exception to DX11 for obvious reasons).