System Builder Marathon, Sept. '09: $1,250 Enthusiast Build

[dirtmountain]

$140 or $20 more then the one you had in the build. What? It also won the Tom's hardware award? Of course you will need a single adapter, but that's ok, you have 4 of them.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ShowImage.aspx?CurImage=14-125-236-S06&ISList=14-125-236-S01%2c14-125-236-S02%2c14-125-236-S03%2c14-125-236-S04%2c14-125-236-S05%2c14-125-236-S06&S7ImageFlag=1&Item=N82E16814125236&Depa=0&WaterMark=1&Description=GIGABYTE%20GV-R485OC-1GH%20Radeon%20HD%204850%201GB%20256-bit%20GDDR3%20PCI%20Express%202.0%20x16%20HDCP%20Ready%20CrossFire%20Supported%20Video%20Card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817256045

 

[Kl2amer]

Another wonderful reply by cleeve. Always out to take shots at people. I don't like it on principle because we shouldn't have to buy 4 freaking graphics cards to enjoy a game. One should be enough, two is for those that like to go extreme. Yes you can do 3 or 4 or as many as will fit on the board for that matter. Nice that you selected one line out of my post to get on your soapbox since everyones complaining about the 4 cards. Don't be so defensive. We all new it would be an AMD SBM this month. My point was why all of a sudden you are throwing all these graphics cards into systems then comparing the gaming resuls of them to systems with less graphics cards (and ironically getting very minimal gains). Seems kinda funny. The comment on the six cards was directed at the next SBM article showcasing how many 4850's you can put into a $2500 AMD build. Personally, i found it amusing.

 

[proro1974]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817171032
$20 cheaper with 6 PCI-E connectors. Though I do prefer the PP&C PSU. just an option.

 

[proro1974]

[citation][nom]Kl2amer[/nom]Another wonderful reply by cleeve. Always out to take shots at people. I don't like it on principle because we shouldn't have to buy 4 freaking graphics cards to enjoy a game. One should be enough, two is for those that like to go extreme. Yes you can do 3 or 4 or as many as will fit on the board for that matter. Nice that you selected one line out of my post to get on your soapbox since everyones complaining about the 4 cards. Don't be so defensive. We all new it would be an AMD SBM this month. My point was why all of a sudden you are throwing all these graphics cards into systems then comparing the gaming resuls of them to systems with less graphics cards (and ironically getting very minimal gains). Seems kinda funny. The comment on the six cards was directed at the next SBM article showcasing how many 4850's you can put into a $2500 AMD build. Personally, i found it amusing.[/citation]

shouldn't have to? isn't that a bit dim? who's forcing anyone to do anything? i don't recall seeing anything in the article that said anyone has to do anything. it's just an idea they tried. if you don't like it just move on. it's not like they are asking for approval to do anything.

 

[Kl2amer]

Now one word is attacked, lol. I was stating my personal opinion which was not the "essence" of the post. Your point is valid and I appreciate you pointing out that i should keep my opinions to myself.

 

[FoShizzleDizzle]

People crack me up -- heck yes the i5 is a better CPU, but this is a gaming computer. I'd still rather get a DDR2 + Phenom II 955 system instead of the Core i5 and use the money saved on a better video card.

Yes, the i5 is about the same price for the processor alone, but the overall cost is still a bit more. A decent i5 build (mem + ram + CPU) still comes out to around $425, whereas the cheapest decent AMD 955 comes out to about $345. That $80 could put you from having a GTS250 to almost a GTX 275. You're going to tell me you'd rather have an i5 and a GTS250 instead of a Phenom II 955 and a GTX275? You'd be insane. That's a huge leap in graphics power (upwards of 30%) that should more than offset the i5 performance difference over the Phenom, especially in terms of minimum fps where the i5 really doesn't have much of an edge anyways over the AMD 955. Where it has most of an edge, that is hardly worth mentioning is max/average fps, which is a completely useless statistic as far as gaming goes.

The i5 will have better longevity in all likelihood, but the rule of thumb for building a computer is to build no more than what you need. If you have ability and resources to pay the premium for the i5's likely lengthier useful lifespan for gaming over the Phenom II, then you should consider doing it. But it shouldn't be the main driving force in considering a gaming build.

 

[proro1974]

[citation][nom]FoShizzleDizzle[/nom]People crack me up -- heck yes the i5 is a better CPU, but this is a gaming computer. I'd still rather get a DDR2 + Phenom II 955 system instead of the Core i5 and use the money saved on a better video card. Yes, the i5 is about the same price for the processor alone, but the overall cost is still a bit more. A decent i5 build (mem + ram + CPU) still comes out to around $425, whereas the cheapest decent AMD 955 comes out to about $345. That $80 could put you from having a GTS250 to almost a GTX 275. You're going to tell me you'd rather have an i5 and a GTS250 instead of a Phenom II 955 and a GTX275? You'd be insane. That's a huge leap in graphics power (upwards of 30%) that should more than offset the i5 performance difference over the Phenom, especially in terms of minimum fps where the i5 really doesn't have much of an edge anyways over the AMD 955. Where it has most of an edge, that is hardly worth mentioning is max/average fps, which is a completely useless statistic as far as gaming goes.The i5 will have better longevity in all likelihood, but the rule of thumb for building a computer is to build no more than what you need. If you have ability and resources to pay the premium for the i5's likely lengthier useful lifespan for gaming over the Phenom II, then you should consider doing it. But it shouldn't be the main driving force in considering a gaming build.[/citation]

the i5-750 is $160 + tax at Microcenter in-store, using the highest state tax rate of 9.5% in CA thats about $176 OTD. a decent P55 mobo like the ASUS P7P55D is about $150, 4GB RAM is about $80. call it $400. the phenom II 955 is $190 at newegg, a decent 790x, 790gx or 790fx mobo starts at about $100. lets use the GA-MA790XT-UD4P at $125 at the egg, 4GB RAM is about $80. thats $395 not much different from a comparable i5 build, the i5 build could even be cheaper since $150 isnt the cheapest price for a P55 mobo. The counterpoint could be that you could use a $60 AM2+ mobo with the 955 but i dont think anyone buys a 955 to handicap it with a cheap mobo. Even if you dont have a Microcenter nearby the price difference between MC and online stores is only about $25 once you consider tax @ MC. You can build an decent i5 build for the same as a decent Phenom II X4 build. I'd expect the prices of the 945,955 and 965 to fall again, they can't really compete with the i5-750 on price.

 

[anamaniac]

Quad crossfire on this kinda budget!
!!
!

Damn!

 

[avatar_raq]

I don't see how the writer of this article considers the current system is winning over the previous core i7 one! The ONLY win I see in the last page's chart is the (gaming of OCed current system 112.3% VS gaming of OCed April system 109.8%), the difference is so small and it came 6 months later, so the drivers are supposedly more optimized and if we rerun the benchmarks on the April build we may get different results..Nevertheless, that's one win and everything else is in favor of the old system's performance.
I believe AMD H/W is suited to the budget builds (~$650 system in this SBM) while mid-range and high end builds should use intel stuff.

 

[anamaniac]

Wow...
4x4870 1GB or 1x 5870 1GB.. that's a hard one. The quad crossfire is a lot more badass, no matter which way you put it.
Though a quad 4890 2gb all watercooled would be the most badass of all. (Until a 2GB 5870/5890 is released).

Making my regret my system here... I went high end on all but the GPU...

 

[cleeve]

I don't like it on principle because we shouldn't have to buy 4 freaking graphics cards to enjoy a game.

You don't 'have' to do anything, Kl2amer. But because you don't like it on principle, that doesn't mean the rest of us 'have' to dislike it, either.

I like it on principle because it works, doesn't create too much heat, use too much power, or cost too much compared to other solutions.

The number of graphics cards is irrelevant to me as long as it does the job.

 

[kaihekoa]

$1265 budget and you choose FOUR Radeon 4850 1GB cards with poor scaling and 3GBs of wasted VRAM and a Phenom II X4? These choices are ridiculously irrational. This is supposed to be an enthusiast system, but performance should not be sacrificed at the cost of AMD favoritism or a "Woah, four video cards are cool!" effect. A system with an i7 and dual Radeon 4890s or GTX 275s overclocked is a much better option for this budget.

 

[Onus]

Another person who didn't read the article...

 

[cleeve]

$1265 budget and you choose FOUR Radeon 4850 1GB cards with poor scaling and 3GBs of wasted VRAM and a Phenom II X4? These choices are ridiculously irrational. This is supposed to be an enthusiast system, but performance should not be sacrificed at the cost of AMD favoritism or a "Woah, four video cards are cool!" effect. A system with an i7 and dual Radeon 4890s or GTX 275s overclocked is a much better option for this budget.

There is no wastage of 3 GB of VRAM, VRAM doesn't work like that. And once again, there is an assumption that the 4850s are scaling poorly. Where is your review showing 4 4850's vs. two 4890's or two 275s?

If we don't try stuff like this, we never know. And the funny part is, a lot of you are assuming a foregone conclusion without evidence.

As far as AMD favortism in an AMD-only review... I don't even think that justifies a response, since the next one will be intel-only. Looks like equal billing to me.

 

[cleeve]

I don't see how the writer of this article considers the current system is winning over the previous core i7 one!

I don't remember declaring an overall winner. I believe I said the AMD system was a marginally better gaming machine for high resolutions, and has the potential for further relative gains at 2560x1600.

 

[cleeve]

$140 or $20 more then the one you had in the build. What? It also won the Tom's hardware award? Of course you will need a single adapter, but that's ok, you have 4 of them.

Still glossing over the most important point, Dirt: we don't have data proving that 3-4870s will beat 4-4850s.

You are proceeding on that assumption, it's not a foregone conclusion.

That's why I do stuff like this - so we can see how it'll far against three 4890s, which should give us an idea how well it'll do against 3-4870s, too.

 

[Gulli]

Why not an i5 system with two 4890's or one 5870? I mean four 4850's with an AMD CPU is just ridiculous, especially since that $1250 doesn't even include a monitor, hell, you could probably get an i7/5870 system for $1250...

 

[grimjester]

I don't understand the complaints about crossfire scaling at all. Just compare to the $650 machine. Crysis on high settings 2560x1600, 25,4 vs 44,7 fps. That's a 76% gain. For a comparison to 2x4890 (1920x1200 only), check the Phenom II 955 vs. i7 920 article here. 42,1 vs 43,8 fps w very high settings.

It's cool that the SBM tries out new and interesting things. A 4-way xfire without exhausting the heat from the case sounds like a recipe for disaster, but now we know it works. At high resolutions and settings 4x4850 even outperforms 2x4890 slightly.

 

[Gulli]

Just checked: you can get an i7/5870 system for $1250.

 

[verrul]

amazing how many intel fanboys there are flaming a build that states this is an AMD build then bitching that they didn't use i-7 for an AMD build... Hellooooooo, Mcfly... Helloooo

 

[Onus]

Just checked: you can get an i7/5870 system for $1250.

Irrelevant. Not only were these parts not available when this article was conceived, as was explained, this series was planned to be all-AMD. While at first glance I'm not sure I care for that either, it seems it may settle a few things. After the next round, which will supposedly be all-Intel, hopefully the SBM builds will get back to bang for buck without concern for brand.

 

[grimjester]

5870 numbers here, tested with i7 @ 4GHz. 2560x1600, 21.9 vs 25.4 fps, 1920x1200, 35.1 vs 44.5 fps. In high-res gaming, 4x4850 beats 1x5870, although not by much.

 

[Gulli]

5870 numbers here, tested with i7 @ 4GHz. 2560x1600, 21.9 vs 25.4 fps, 1920x1200, 35.1 vs 44.5 fps. In high-res gaming, 4x4850 beats 1x5870, although not by much.

The difference will be small and four 4850's are actually more expensive than one 5870! Not to mention the extra costs for a bigger PSU and problems with heat, noise, games that don't do well with crossfire and lack of DX11...
I could've gone with it if they chose two 4890's, but that horrible contraption they conceived here will never be recommended by me.

 

[verrul]

again it was something different. which i think is very cool and the builder gets kudos for thinking outside the standard box now all we need is quad vs tri vs dual round of tests in a similar machine and see what we find out for real.

 

[DokkRokken]

I commend the reviewer and Tom's for doing something different and interesting; this is a nice change from the often formulaic reviews I find on hardware sites. Here, you guys have buckejavascript: void(0);d the trends, and thought outside the box, making for a fun read!