E8500 vs X2 7750

[spathotan]

I dont see how your build is comming to $1400.

 

[spathotan]

Ok, I used the specs listed by you and built your system in the cart on newegg. I even included some things you didnt list (power supply, case), and I used a $300 24" monitor and it came to only $1120. This was the AMD build.

With this build here, you could drop $100 by using a 22" monitor with 1900 x 1080 support. The zerotherm nirvana is expensive at $50 and really isnt all that great, you can save $30 here by switching that for a Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro. Drop one of the 640gb harddrives in exchange for a single 1TB drive to save another $60.

Just those simple susgestions there cut $200 off the final price, and you havnt really lost anything. You can use this money saved to upgrade the video card, as I mentioned about a 4830 wont be able to handle modern games at 1900 x 1080 with decent performance without sacrificing all visuals.

 

[spathotan]

The Intel build comes to $1150 in my cart, once again using the specs you listed and adding a case and PSU, same I used in the above AMD build.

Same rules apply here, can cut $100 off by switching monitors, and another $30 by switching CPU coolers. Once again use this money saved to upgrade the video card.

 

[nsimo86]

Since the OP's main uses are multimedia and photoshop first and casual gaming second, I think he should be looking at the Q6600 instead of the E8500 for about the same price.

 

[kirvinb]

ok so what im understanding is i should go down on processor (E8500 vs E7300) to go up on video card power (4850 vs 4830)...so now i got an intel system as follows

Intel Core 2 Duo E7300
HIS Hightech H485QT512P Radeon HD 4850
LG 22X DVD±R DVD Burner
ARCTIC COOLING Freezer 7
ASRock P45XE-WiFiN LGA 775
Crucial Ballistix 4GB DDR2 800
1x SAMSUNG Spinpoint F1 1TB
LG Black Blu-ray/HD DVD-ROM & 16X DVD±R DVD Burner


This equals about 900...when i add all the other goodies...tv card.. monitor..keyboard..then it equals 1400...i didnt think about that...

the amd setup is about same with a different mobo with an added wifin card...and 2x WD Black 640 drives instead of 1x TB samung drive

 

[kirvinb]

and im kind of worried about getting the Q6600 since its been out over a year...its kinda of dated...so idk if i should consider it....considering its age on the market....

 

[nocteratus]

The Q6600 even 1 1/2 year old is still one of the best out there... there're the q9X50 that are better and the I7, the Q8200 and even the Q9X00 are either on par with or a little behind.

I have 1 Q6600 and I won't upgrade that CPU until the Q9550 or Q9650 come down to about the same price.

To save on cost get the P5Q... the regular 8 phases not the deluxe or any other. If you OC it'll be a lot better than the ASrock you picked.

And if you wait a week or so the Phenom 2 will be out and might drive the price of some CPU down a little and enough for you to save a few $$ and upgrade your Videocard.

 

[kirvinb]

OK so i think ima just wait a few weeks to see if AMD new cpus are any threat to intels dominance at mainstream level...hopefully it will be good enough to drive intel's prices down...i refused to pay more than 200 dollars for a processor when the performance isnt greatly increased...

im findin that a 150 cpu greatly outperforms and 80 cpu usually...but a 500 dollar or 1000 dollar cpu...jus barely outperform the 150 cpu...mayb by 10 to 15 percent while costing 200 to 500% percent more.

But i do thank everyone for helping...!

but that dont mean stop helpin by all means keep the comments coming!

 

[nocteratus]

It's a good idea to wait a week or 2 for the Phenom 2 to come out... it's not like waiting a few months...

The early unofficial review of the P2 show it should be between the Q9x50 and the I7.

Correct me if I'm wrong but the NDA for the P2 official review is Jan 8th.

 

[Malcolmk]

If your worried about performance in Photoshop spend more money on hard drives because that is the biggest limiting factor and not cpu performance. Thats why I am running an Areca 1231 raid card with eight hard drives in a raid 5. BTW I have an Intel 3gig dual core and an AMD 9350e and I know which one is faster. The AMD is clearly faster and out performs it in COD4. When converting RAW files in Photoshop the AMD is %15 faster than the Intel. I realise the pricing in the states is different but personally after using both platforms I would go for a cheap AMD cpu so you have an upgrade path when the Phenom II comes down in price. Also save up for an Areca raid card. The 1210 is cheap in the states and will give you the biggest performance improvement. You will get a %50 improvement in drive performance just by connecting a single drive to the Areca raid card. Run four drives in a raid 5 and you will have five times the drive performance compared to a single drive connected to the onboard controller.

 

[kirvinb]

ok then now thats something i never heard...maybe i should look into that...would it be wise to get maybe at 100 dollar ssd...

i dont really understand this whole raid talk.. ima have to do some research on it

 

[spathotan]

SSD's are a waste of money. If you dont understand RAID, just go with a single 1TB drive like I susgested above. It will be cheaper than two drives and you wont have to worry about a RAID setup.

 

[Malcolmk]

Yes I agree the SSD's are a waste of money but if your handelling a lot of files or like your games loading up quick get the Areca raid card. My workstation will load a COD4 map in 4 seconds. If I get on someone elses machine even if they are running a q6600 @3.8gig I think gee this is a slow piece of ****. Ever since the first P4 the biggest limiting factor to system performance has been drive speed. It took me two weeks to convince a friend of mine to try my spare four chanel raid card. Now he wants to buy both of my cards. Raid 5 is a great way to go because if one drive fails you don't loose anything. Just replace the drive and it will rebuild the array and keep going. If you run four Samsung F1 drives or Western Digital Black drives in a raid 5 you will get roughly 400 mb/s read and write speed and a file copy speed of 120 mb/s. A single drive connected to the onboard controller is good for 110 mb/s read and 25 mb/s file copy. If you then run the OS on a 200gig partition you will drop the drive latency from 13ms to 8ms which is the same as the 10000rpm drives. It's a lot of performance out of four standard drives.

 

[spathotan]

Yea, and for a hefty price. Raid cards arent cheap, not to mention the multiple drives. Hes on a budget

 

[radnor]

Yea, and for a hefty price. Raid cards arent cheap, not to mention the multiple drives. Hes on a budget

pretty much. Unless the board comes ready to raid 0. Most of them come.

A 2x640GB WD Raid 0 was a good choice.

To the OP, for you use, i would simply forget dual cores. Q6600, 9850 are good choices. Or wait for phenom 2 and see the Phenom 1 prices fall. And then grab one.

I was going for a 7750 also, but ill wait and in meanwhile ill hope my cpu just fries (4800+ X2 Oced to 3Ghz, 1.35v) in the process. And remember get a nice GPU !!!!! Adobe CS4 already uses it a OpenCL is here !!

 

[Malcolmk]

I have picked up Areca 1210 cards off ebay for $200 and new there $290. I just can't get them in Australia for that price. He is already looking at buying two drives. One more drive and he has a raid 5. Ok I just added up a list on Newegg based on a intel dual core.

Areca 1210 Raid card $290
Intel E5200 $84
4gig A-DATA ram $35
Powercolor 4850 $145
DFI P45-T2RS $110
LG DVD burner $20
3x 640gig Caviar Black $240

Total $924

Just remember it is easy to upgrade a processor or ram down the track. You could do the same with the AMD 7750. Get it now and upgrade to the Phoeom II in six months. That's why I went for the 9350e. In OZ it's the same price as the E7300 and better suited for what I do. I can also upgrade the processor to the Phenom II without having to change anything else. Just a bios update and drop the new CPU in. Also if you get a 22" screen there will be no difference between the Intel and AMD for gaming. It just depends what your using it for.

 

[spathotan]

Add another $70 for a PSU, $50~ for a case, and $300 for his 24" monitor to your list Malcom, and you are at $1400. He needs to buy a complete build.

 

[nsimo86]

Plus another $200 for Windows and the Blu-ray drive he wanted.

I dont see the point in spending $290 on a raid card and have to drop down to a E5200. Is it worth it to have lower FPS in a game just so a level will load faster? I certainly dont think so.

 

[spathotan]

RAID isnt a great as everybody thinks, its something you use if youre impatient.

Also, dropping down to a E5200 shouldnt even be considered.

 

[Malcolmk]

Ok, I will say this one more time. On a 24" screen there is no difference between any of the current cpu's because the biggest limitation is the graphics card. My 9350e runs at %50 cpu usage during COD4 and is a **** more playable than the intel 3gig dual core. And yes the raid card is worth the money. If your handling a lot of files it gives you superior system performance and redundancy. If you run a raid 0 with your onboard controller either of the drives can die or if the board dies you loose everything. With the raid 5 you just replace one drive and it rebuilds itself or if the motherboard dies you just replace it and away you go. Priceless really.

 

[Malcolmk]

I would also like to add there is only 1mb of cache difference between the E7300 and E5200. The E5200 has the advantage an 800 fsb so all you have to do is set the fsb to 1066 and you have the E8500 clockspeed all for $84. Also the cpu is easy to upgrade and your not going to care if you loose $40 in value over the next six months.

 

[nocteratus]

Usually any C2D @ 3.0Ghz with a good VC like the 4870 1Gb with a 24" screen will play most games at max setting, and depending of the game you can enable AA...

So a E5200 oc @3.0Ghz should be enough if the VC is right.

 

[nocteratus]

Another thing you could try is http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/vista-workshop,1775.html

you'll need 8Gb of ram but with the low price on memory right now, it shouldn't be expensive and you'll get a very quick and responsive system.

I'll have to try it myself...

 

[Malcolmk]

Yes I am running 8gig of ram with the 9350e on Vista 64bit and I am amazed at how good it is. DDR2 is dirt cheap so try it out. I just wish I had purchased a gigabyte motherboard so I could run 16gig. One other thing about the Areca raid card. I started using them two years ago and in that time I have changed the board and processor in my workstation three times and I will still be using it untill pci-express is phased out. $290 is dirt cheap for something that performs so well and outlasts many generations of cpu's. Like I said it's priceless.

 

[spathotan]

If he wants RAID 5 that bad he can just get a P5Q Pro or a handful of X38/X48 boards, which supports it.

Just stressing that the last thing he needs on a budgeted build is a $300 RAID card and 3 harddrives.