System Builder Marathon, March 2012: System Value Compared

[Raiddinn]

The $1300 PC is something that I would never suggest to anybody and I spend many hours a day suggesting parts to people.

It tries way too hard to be something it isn't.

Top mount PSU case? That is just completely unsatisfactory. A year or two from now, when people have gone to this SBM and bought those components because they thought they wouldn't be bent over by such a high profile competition, the systems section on the forums will be overrun with people asking why they bought the $1250 build and stuff is already breaking.

That just isn't OK, not even a little bit.

Could you guys please do me a favor next time and let me pick parts for these builds?

 

[Crashman]

[citation][nom]Raiddinn[/nom]The $1300 PC is something that I would never suggest to anybody and I spend many hours a day suggesting parts to people.It tries way too hard to be something it isn't.Top mount PSU case? That is just completely unsatisfactory.[/citation]I have an engineering background, and can tell you that it's completely satisfactory. In fact, it was one of the primary features of original ATX tower ventilation.

 

[Onus]

If I won the $650 PC, I would build it without the GPU for my father, who is not a gamer but still messes with big spreadsheets. He's still rocking an old C2D E6750 I built in 2007; it's enough for his needs, but although I picked its parts for quality, five and a half years is still a pretty good run.
The $1300 PC I would build as an upgrade for my wife, but I'd use her Antec Sonata III case; since she is also not a gamer, I'd re-use her HD4650 and use the HD7970 myself. I'd put her 720BE into the Apevia case, add a GPU (perhaps a HD6790) and give it to my nephew (if my sister will allow it).
Assuming it survived my drooling, I would happily build the $2600 PC for myself. I would add most of the drives from my existing system to it, including a pair of 2TB drives in RAID-1. My Sabertooth would go into my test rig (or I'd revisit bitcoin mining or some other GPGPU project since it can take up to four GPUs), but I'd probably give its 970BE to my wife.

 

[gidgiddonihah]

My school's internet stinks and threw a fit when I hit enter. So who knows if it got submitted.

 

[pauldh]

[citation][nom]lunyone[/nom]I still think you should have a real "Budget" gaming build at $500, FIRM! This would force the builder to make hard choices to make the budget, thus selecting quality products for less.[/citation]
Whether $500 or $650, the builder is still forced to compromise and make hard choices, every single time. At $500, it's just done with even cheaper parts.

As already mentioned in the text and comments, $500 is the anticipated target for next round. However, most readers seem to value some flexibility within that budget. If a much better build can be done for $510-515, than for $500 firm, then it makes sense (for anyone) to raise the extra 2-3% required to meet system goals. Yes, a firm line has to be drawn somewhere!

So I'm curious: Do you agree or would you like to see a FIRM $500 CAP? Meaning the system may likely be worse, and weigh in somewhere below $500. I hope those who want $500 firm, would then stand up for that choice in the comments, when others say "Horrible build, you should have done ____ for $10 more (rather than cheap out)." And that is a WHEN not an IF, because it WILL happen. =) Since it was increased, I decided to make this build’s $650 budget a firm cap this time, and folks still commented it doesn’t pay to be cheap (aka. spend a bit more).

(Just some other thoughts) We could build cheaper if capitalizing on all of Newegg’s discounts (like other shoppers), rather than just flexible starting (or instant) prices. Either way, our prices will likely change for every build. So is it wise to be handcuffed by a firm budget? Often the more expensive rigs drop in price by the time the series goes live, because they are less likely to choose just amongst currently “discounted” items. Budget builders do not have that luxury, and instead look for better parts knocked down within their low budget.

Oddly, this $650 build had actually dropped $14 when the story was finished because the CPU was down $15 for one week. That price climbed back to $650 by the time the story went live. Now the reason it did not go up this time is I didn’t use an Antec EarthWatts PSU. Selecting one of those (for $40) was a bargain, but would have again jumped this rig $20 over budget by the time this Value Conclusion rolled around. I do not avoid them for this reason, but it is a very common penalty I’ll pay for using those very attractive Quality/Price PSUs.

Anyway, just picking your brain while sharing what bounces around in mine. Point is, given all these realities, do you like Firm Caps, or slightly Flexible Budgets? Officially, our budgets are flexible. We do not have to spend it all, and can break it, within reason, for good reasons.

 

[pauldh]

[citation][nom]RedJaron[/nom]Indubitably, good sir! I would hazard a guess that many people do the same at the $1200 bracket too. Sacrifice a bit on the GPU and perhaps the mboard to get a better case, a few accessories, and the numerous little things that make you proud to have built the machine.[/citation]
First, I 100% back the $2600 builder for giving attention to perceived quality at the expense of hurting measureable bang/buck. More CPU than I could afford, but as built, that rig was a pure beauty IMO.

Next, I agree with you and jtt, and would say at pretty much any price point, (not all, but) most buyers will value more than just raw CPU and GPU performance per dollar. What good is a $500 rig, if the $20 case is an eye or ear-sore. Less common now, but how much of a bargain is it to buy the cheapest Graphics card (within your GPU choice) if it comes with a deafening fan or other known shortcomings.

 

[pauldh]

[citation][nom]jtt283[/nom]If I won the ....[/citation]

Interesting. I hope you at least enter ever time trying to win, because you certainly support every one of these SBMs by first reading the stories and then adding your own constructive input. thx!

I'm signing out for the weekend, so just a final .... Good Luck (to All who enter)!

 

[Onus]

While I'd like to see lower budgets, I also think a little flexibility (max 5%) is okay. An actual builder on a tight budget will scour for deals, maybe risk the rebate game, perhaps re-use a part, etc. and allowing that flexibility can account for things like that. Just make it clear that the intent was the $500 budget, not $525 or $510. After all, the line does need to be drawn. Saying "skip McD's once or twice this week" sounds easy, but the guy may have already given it up for six months just to afford the build in the first place.

 

[lunyone]

I'm all for a "Firm" budget. $500 is what I like to see, because there are some harder choices to do than at $650 or so. I think you should allow "Bundles" if you can get them, but I think rebates are just icing on the cake, if you believe your going to get them (but don't use it in the equation of the budget). I really enjoy the challenge of getting a specific system "within" budget.

 

[eddieroolz]

It's amazing how much performance $650 gets you nowadays, as long as one doesn't care too much about its looks.

 

[RedJaron]

Next, I agree with you and jtt, and would say at pretty much any price point, (not all, but) most buyers will value more than just raw CPU and GPU performance per dollar. What good is a $500 rig, if the $20 case is an eye or ear-sore. Less common now, but how much of a bargain is it to buy the cheapest Graphics card (within your GPU choice) if it comes with a deafening fan or other known shortcomings.

My focus in my build last year was to make it as quiet as reasonably possible. I spent extra on a case that had better acoustic isolation and quieter third party fans. This pushed my budget a bit and I settled on a 6870 instead of the 6950 I was hoping for as well as a non-modular PSU. I can't quite max out all my games, but the acoustic, thermal, and electrical requirement levels are all quite low for the performance I get.

While I'd like to see lower budgets, I also think a little flexibility (max 5%) is okay. An actual builder on a tight budget will scour for deals, maybe risk the rebate game, perhaps re-use a part, etc. and allowing that flexibility can account for things like that. Just make it clear that the intent was the $500 budget, not $525 or $510. After all, the line does need to be drawn. Saying "skip McD's once or twice this week" sounds easy, but the guy may have already given it up for six months just to afford the build in the first place.

Yeah, but judging from the amount of comments we've seen here about why the 680 wasn't included and why the X79 was used, you KNOW that even if you spell it out in some new rules, a lot of people will still find something to complain about. Perhaps if there were some weighted bonuses/penalties for staying under or going over budget.

 

[Oscarcharliezulu]

The system builder articles are great, thx. They highlight the different assumptions and goals and then demonstrate the outcomes which is superb. Its the process and not the individual parts that are important here - Like many readers I'd probably chose different parts but this does help me decide where to spend my money. It's definitely time to upgrade the velociraptor for an SSD and a new graphics card for me. I can wait the extra minutes handbrake takes on my old Q9650 (which refuses to overlock at all even on my ASUS ROG MB). Great writing, brave too given the expected trash talk from the forums.

 

[Guest]

Let me propose a workstation PC build for you:
AMD octocore CPU-great for most professional applications and adequate for games(unless you want 4 GPUs and 6 monitors)
16 GB of RAM
a quality motherboard
a high end ATI/AMD graphics card like 7970
2 professional 2560*1600 monitors
a 7+1 sound card and 7+1 speakers
a high end tv tuner card(PCI-E x1 preferred)
a nice looking case(not gray or black)
3 or 4 case coolers and a Noctua air cooler on the CPU itself
foam for isolating sound coming from inside the case
an illuminated keyboard,white preffered
a laser mouse
and you are good to go

 

[brucek2]

It seems this series always starts by establishing a budget, then selecting parts to fit the budget. That's interesting, but I wonder if there are other approaches that could be even better.

What if, for example, the starting point was defined performance levels on certain games? Ie the low end could be playable frames of each of several current titles at a lower resolution. The higher end could be defined as as a minimum frame rate that never goes below 60 at a high resolution. The builders would then be challenged to reach those performance levels as efficiently as possible.

The advantage is it gets around an important issue that is not well shown in the value-for-money graphs. The thing is that, for gaming at least, there are absolute levels of performance that are either too low (can't play current games), or too high (performance levels resulting is no perceptible difference past a certain point).

There's a decent amount of room between $650 and $1300, and a lot of room between $1,300 and $2,600. The current format isn't very helpful at dialing in the right budget in between.

 

[llguitargr8]

Does anyone know how we contact TH if we are selected as a winner? I know I'm getting my hopes up, but it never hurts to be prepared! lol

 

[Raiddinn]

I have an engineering background, and can tell you that it's completely satisfactory. In fact, it was one of the primary features of original ATX tower ventilation.

Be the engineering background as it may, the original ATX specifications were designed for a completely different time, to address completely different problems, and they didn't account for completely different needs.

At the time the ATX specifications were originally designed (1995), nothing was remotely like it is today.

Are you trying to argue that top mounting a PSU is fine in 2012 because it was fine in 1995?

That was shortly after the Pentium 1 was created. The Pentium 1 was 60 Mhz single core, now we have out of the box processors that are commonly 3.1 Ghz quad cores. I don't remember exactly, but I am going to go out on a limb and say the Pentium probably used all of 15 watts of power. Now 10x that on an OCd processor doesn't shock anyone.

Video cards today can easily pass 500w of power usage. Video cards back then could get by on about 25w.

That difference in wattage shows up as heat inside the case.

I don't think there is anyone who would even try to competently argue that today's computers are not hotter than those of 1995.

The designers of the ATX specification in 1995 didn't need to account for huge amounts of heat inside the case because there wasn't huge amounts of heat inside the case. Their plan was clearly to efficiently move a bare minimum amount of air through the case to get the mare minimum amount of heat out of the case.

Indeed, the PSU exhaust fan was usually the only fan on a computer from 1995, even if it was a gamer PC.

These days, that would be a good way to experience all kinds of stability problems.

Fast forward to 2012 and it just doesn't cut it to have only one fan on a PC unless it is a super low power HTPC and sometimes not even then.

It also doesn't cut it in 2012 to have all the heat from inside the case sucked into the PSU, again especially not for gamer cases since they generate so much more heat than HTPCs.

Having all that heat go into the PSU has an immediate effect of reducing the maximum wattage that the PSU can sustain and a long term effect of degrading the PSU internals at a much faster rate than they otherwise would.

Top mounted PSUs will perform worse than the same PSUs bottom mounted every single time as long as the PSU on the bottom is capable of intaking air like it is supposed to be able to. It isn't even a competition, I seriously hope nobody tries to argue this point.

In 1995, using the PSU fan for double duty to suck the heat out of the case just oozed efficiency. There was no good reason to bottom mount the PSU and force PC makers to add an additional fan up top.

In 2012, one fan can't even power optimal airflow and it is about the least efficient way to do it to use the PSU fan to suck all the air out of the case.

My case, which is attached to a computer worth maybe $600 has 7 fan mounts, all of which have attached fans. For a computer valued at twice as much you should be able to expect at least as much. The HAF 912 would not have been too much to ask for the $1300 PC.

That all wouldn't be so bad if the $1300 PC had a PSU that was really conservative for the PC that it was running, but it doesn't. The PSU is actually pretty aggressive.

It is advised by the PSU manufacturers that people should generally run their PSUs at approximately 50% load in order to the the maximum longevity out of the PSU.

Obviously, there is a wide range of power values used by a computer, idle load is going to be about 100w and max load for a computer with a 7970 is going to be more like 500w not OCd.

Since the strain at load is more than the strain at idle, it is better to err in keeping the max load value closer to the 50% wattage mark than to err toward keeping idle load closer to the 50% wattage mark.

In this case, the max load is is 77% of stated wattage. That is more than 1 standard deviation away from what is considered a good idea.

All that heat in the case that was getting sucked into the PSU that I mentioned earlier, that would ruin the efficiency to the point that the max load is more like 100% of the PSUs wattage.

In fact, I wouldn't be surprised at all to hear that the PSU in the $1300 PC breaks in a matter of 3 months or 6 months. In fact, I would count on it.

Whoever gets this $1300 PC shouldn't have to pay $100 for a new PSU in 6 months give or take because the PC designer didn't want to spend another $20 on a good case. That is just not doing right by the person who wins.

Not only that, but these articles set the bar for PCs that people like me troubleshoot in the forums on a daily basis. These articles need to show people what a well designed computer looks like and if ill conceived PCs show up in the SBMs then my work (that I am doing for free, btw) is that much harder.

It makes people completely new to computer hardware think that Apevia cases are OK for enthusiast builds and that is not just something you can overlook. Hundreds of gamers might buy that case since it has the SBM stamp of approval and it will likely hurt every one of them to do so.

Not to mention my work is made harder because I can't just direct people to buy what is in the SBM for their budget range (makes my job easier), because I actually care about if those people come back in 6 months.

If someone does come back in 3 or 6 months because of what I advised them to do, that looks bad on me and all of Tom's Hardware.

The only PCs we should be putting in people's hands are ones that will work beautifully until the person wants to upgrade because the computer's performance isn't adequate. That generally means at least 5 years. I guarantee that $1300 PC won't make it anywhere close to 5 years before it has stability problems.

So no, it is not completely satisfactory that a top mount PSU case was selected for this PC. It is not even the tiniest bit satisfactory.

The reason that I suggested that I should make these builds is because I actually care about more than a couple more FPS. I care about the whole end user experience from day 1 to day 1500. Getting a good FPS on day 1 just plain isn't enough to qualify a computer for the SBM in my opinion and I would set the bar a whole lot higher than that. I believe the bar should be set a whole lot higher than that.

Tom's Hardware clearly has the capacity to set the bar higher than that and it owes it to the world at large to do so.

I guarantee you that a committee of addict or above level support staff made up of people who primarily spend their time in the Systems forum would never let a computer like that fly.

Any of us would straighten that PC out before the person bought it if they came in and asked if those parts were OK for a new build they wanted to do.

A committee of 3 of us would never even have to debate over this sort of problem because none of us would even suggest using such a case for a SBM even in jest.

I am honestly kinda sad that I have to discuss this now.

- Edit - Typo