got a DS3 instead of DS3P

SooTyLaD · 24 Apr 2007 at 15:58

hi peeps...

ordered my setup last night and changed my mind on a few accounts this morning and one of those changes was to go from a DS3 to a DS3P... however due to my many finnicky changes this one slipped under the radar and the DS3 got dispatched...

so simple question really, should i live with it or send it back once it arrives (OcUK would have course be perfectly happy to do this) - worth the hassel?

schumi84 · 24 Apr 2007 at 16:16

Well if you dont need the Crossfire, Firwire or native 1333MHz support then i would stick with the DS3.

I have one and it is extremely easy to set up and use.

BUFF · 24 Apr 2007 at 16:33

schumi84 said:
Well if you dont need the Crossfire, Firwire or native 1333MHz support then i would stick with the DS3.

or Intel RAID

SooTyLaD · 24 Apr 2007 at 16:36

hmmm i could do with the firewire in all honesty...

also just read it has better onboard sound...

think i'll just get the ds3p ordered, hopefully ocuk will refund me the postage for the new one along with the full refund for the ds3... i'll ask em

SooTyLaD · 24 Apr 2007 at 16:41

since i'm gonna order the ds3p, is it worth the extra dolla for the ds4 for that heat pipe jobby?

BUFF · 24 Apr 2007 at 17:36

if your going there you might as well get a QuadGT

SooTyLaD · 24 Apr 2007 at 20:58

changed my mind... always easier to want the next one up, but i wanted to go with the ds3p and i'm sure it will be just perfect for what i want

WJA96 · 25 Apr 2007 at 08:14

As long as you don't open the box, you can just return the DS3 for a DS3P under the distance selling regulations.

SooTyLaD · 25 Apr 2007 at 08:51

WJA96 said:
As long as you don't open the box, you can just return the DS3 for a DS3P under the distance selling regulations.

well, they said as soon as it arrives, stick the rma on the ds3 and send it back... so i've purchased a DS3P which should come tomorrow and hopefully like i said in with the DS3 refund they will add the DS3P postage as the mixup wasn't my fault...

i would have thought there isn't an issue since i just spend £1400 odd quid...

Egon · 25 Apr 2007 at 10:21

ooh £1400.... :eek:

What setup have you gone for? I'm sure it'll dwarf my £550 setup i'm ordering today

SooTyLaD · 25 Apr 2007 at 11:10

EgonSpengler said:
ooh £1400.... What setup have you gone for? I'm sure it'll dwarf my £550 setup i'm ordering today

i actually think its reasonably modest :confused:

(in terms of picking things from the middle of lists instead of the top...) - but yes its a lot of money...

• Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.40GHz (1066FSB)
• Noctua NH-U12F (Socket LGA775/754/939/940/AM2) HS/F
• Gigabyte GA_965P_DS3P (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
• CellShock 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 PC2-6400C4 800MHz Dual Channel Kit
• BFG GeForce 8800 GTS OC2 320MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express)
• Western Digital Raptor 150GB WD1500ADFD 10,000RPM SATA 16MB Cache
• Western Digital Caviar SE16 500GB 5000AAKS SATA-II 16MB Cache
• Samsung SM-226BW 22" Widescreen LCD Monitor (Silver/Black)
• NEC ND3550A 16x DVD±RW Dual Layer Internal IDE (Black)
• Lian-Li PC-7 PLUS Aluminium Midi-Tower Case (Black)
• Lian Li C-01B Aluminium CD-ROM/DVD-ROM Bezel (Black)
• Corsair HX 620W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU
• Logitech diNovo Laser Media Desktop
• Microsoft Windows XP Professional Edition inc. SP2

should be sweet

Egon · 25 Apr 2007 at 12:22

Ahh ok, you're building an entire system from scratch including case, monitor, PSU and an OS etc.

I'm generally just ripping out the innards and replacing vital organs as such...

Looks like a nice rig, i'm actually going for a very similar setup, same MB and cooler... but i'm on a tighter budget so i'm plumping for the E4300, 2GB Cruicial Ballistix and the Western Digital WD3200AAKS (possibly 2500AAKS).

I was also thinking the EVGA 8800GTS 320mb Superclocked was a better option over the BFG and only an extra tenner... what do people think ??

Darg · 25 Apr 2007 at 13:16

Well you can probably overclock the BFG yourself just as far as you would the EVGA.

Nice setup quicksilver. Good components all round. The only thing I'd have changed would be taking out the raptor and putting the extra cash to a 640mb GTS or even a GTX.

WJA96 · 25 Apr 2007 at 14:24

QuiKsiLVeR said:
should be sweet

It's a very well thought through specification. It should work well together.

SooTyLaD · 25 Apr 2007 at 14:24

Darg said:
Well you can probably overclock the BFG yourself just as far as you would the EVGA.

Nice setup quicksilver. Good components all round. The only thing I'd have changed would be taking out the raptor and putting the extra cash to a 640mb GTS or even a GTX.

someone told me in another thread that 640MB was well ott considering the res of the monitor?

i stepped down on advice are you saying it was a mistake

chris74 · 25 Apr 2007 at 14:45

EgonSpengler said:
I was also thinking the EVGA 8800GTS 320mb Superclocked was a better option over the BFG and only an extra tenner... what do people think ??

Well worth it. I have the evga 8800gtx and the 10 year warranty which is the maximum allowed in the EU and the 90 day trade up program imo make it the best there is.

Chris74

WJA96 · 25 Apr 2007 at 14:54

I'd get the EVGA and I do think for most people the 640Mb card is OTT.

Darg · 25 Apr 2007 at 15:20

QuiKsiLVeR said:
someone told me in another thread that 640MB was well ott considering the res of the monitor?

i stepped down on advice are you saying it was a mistake

Not a mistake, it's just a different benefit to your system. You'll get faster harddrive access but slightly lower fps in games. Very slightly lower at your res.

To be honest I would go with the 640mb mainly for future use. I doubt there are many games out there at the moment that need more then 256mb of VRAM. However come Crysis and the swathe of UE3.0 games we'll be seeing a lot more texture space being demanded. High res normal and specular maps along with the standard colour maps take up quite a bit of space.

As a game designer my main issue is no longer low poly counts but more texture optimisation. Anything greater then a 7600GT can push way more polys then you should ever really need in a game. What we'll see with newer games (and this has been the case since HL2 and other shader orientated games) is a greater and greater demand for VRAM. You can expect Crysis on High settings to need 512mb of vram. On ultra settings I wouldn't be surprised if it needed 1GB.

Basically it is good game design to create all textures at double their intended size. So a 1024x1024 texture will be created at 2048x2048 and sized down thus reducing its necessary ram space by 75%. The same goes for 1024 -> 512 etc..

Now a 1024 texture on a weapon is perfectly acceptable and will look good. I doubt there are any games that use more then that. As it is you're looking at atleast 3x1024 textures for that weapon though. Diffuse (colour), normal and specular. We can assume that Crysis on medium-High settings will use 1024x1024 texture sizes for its weapons. Medium might use 1024 for the diffuse and 512 for the normal and specular. That would probably let them fit the game textures in 256mb of VRAM. High with all three on 1024 would result in probably needing 512mb VRAM.

On ultra settings however they probably just ramp all those up to their original 2048x2048 texture sizes which makes the VRAM necessary skyrocket. Obviously they would look much crisper and nicer but you'll really need a large large amount of memory to run it.

Please note I used weapon texture sizes as examples. Other textures in the game would be the same, those that use 256x256 would be upped to 512x512 and so on. If they upped the texture size like that for every texture in the game then that's quadrupling the amount of VRAM needed. 256 -> 1GB

But then again like I said, it doesn't make that much visible difference going from 1024 to 2048.