System Builder Marathon, Sept. 2010: $1000 Enthusiast PC

[mcvf]

You do realize that price of Radeon 5850 dropped as well?
Also, why here you use Intel CPU for 197$ and in 2000$ build AMD for 200$? Am I missing something? So which one is better, because price you show is equal.

 

[IWC Member 23495867]

Not a bad rig at all. Seems like a well balanced system.

 

[Onus]

Very nice machine. The only thing it is missing is any upgrade room. I would likely have chosen a mobo with a second PCIE slot on it; even x4 would be useful for dedicated PhysX. On this budget though, that would have meant sacrificing something else and costing performance today.
I'd like to win this one.

 

[kilthas_th]

The 470 is a nice card, and much better at $300 than $350. Nvidia has really shored up its drivers and boosted performance quickly, and Fermi is looking like a hot, power-hungry, but effective architecture. It also doesn't hurt that Crossfire doesn't scale anywhere near as well as SLI and that the 5830 is closer to the 5770 than the 5850 in performance.

The disparity in platform is telling, too, though it is hardly a surprise that the 720BE only matches the 750 stock speeds. In most CPU comparison benchmarks I've seen pitting the 965BE and 750 together, they are neck and neck (aside from a few select titles) at stock speeds, despite the nearly 800MHz difference.

 

[cleeve]

Quick question: what's the setting for the gpu acceleration in adobe photoshop?

For the tests, GPU acceleration is enabled. GPU acceleration doesn't help much with rendering as I understand though, it mostly accelerates screen redraws and there's not much of that in our benchmark. It's mostly made around applying strenuous filters.

 

[cleeve]

This is a question you want to ask in the forums, rarely will people answer you here.

Hey! I can't spend all day on the forums, but I do try to ask questions about the builds when I see them.

 

[Shirosaki]

I'm regretting getting a 460 a month before the price drop in the 470 on my I5 build. It would have been much better. Hopefully, now when people come on the forums asking for new build advice for gaming with a budget of $1k, people won't be recommending an AMD build that is obviously going to perform worse than a I5 and 470 build.

I built a I5/460 system minus case for $850 after rebates. With a 470 it would be approx. $900, maybe less. I didn't get a combo with my 460.

 

[Rayburn6H]

I realize that each of the builds probably uses the same OS, it would be nice to see it affect the build cost. Last time I checked, the Egg still charges for Win7. Just a thought.....

 

[radiumburn]

I would like to see a 1055t with a 5850 thrown into the mix also for this price range.

I would like to see what stock cooler no case and a small ssd instead of the 650 gig drive would do to some of the scores.

 

[coldmast]

Why not opt for the Antec 300 illusion 2x 12cm LED fans for $10 more, and add one more side fan to cut down on the video card heat.

 

[buzznut]

[citation][nom]Shirosaki[/nom]I'm regretting getting a 460 a month before the price drop in the 470 on my I5 build. ...I built a I5/460 system minus case for $850 after rebates. With a 470 it would be approx. $900, maybe less. I didn't get a combo with my 460.[/citation]

I wouldn't regret a thing. The gtx460 is a great card, and your system likely runs cooler and with a lower power draw. I think for $850 you built a very nice system.

I guess you could say I regret that I can't afford a X6 1090T right now. But really, it wouldn't offer enough of a performance increase over my X4 940 to justify a $300 expenditure. I am waiting for a significant increase in speed before plunking any more money down on my system. In the meantime I can play anything I like at 1680X1050 and I am quite happy and proud of the system I built.
Not that you aren't proud, I'm just saying you could regret something 5 minutes after you built the system, but what is the point? Recognize that you built the best system you could at the time and enjoy.

 

[buzznut]

Yes, its true the i5 750 is faster than a $100 processor. Maybe if you chose a 740BE, you could afford a gtx 480. Perhaps that isn't "balanced" enough for some..
Its an apples to oranges comparison and I don't think it diminishes the viability of using a triple core CPU for a budget build. I probably wouldn't choose the 740BE (or any triple core) for an enthusiast build in the first place.

In the forums I mostly see folks looking to build in the $600-800 range. I very rarely see folks wanting to build a $500 machine, maybe once a week. Then it tends to jump to the $1500 range for enthusiast builds.

Please don't think I am suggesting changes to the quarterly builds, I love what you guys do. I think many Tom's visitors point to the SBM articles for recommendations. I just think that someone reading this article may walk away thinking its a bad idea to recommend the 740BE for $100, I don't believe it is. For the right budget, it may be perfect.

I would recommend it to overclockers over an Athlon II x4, since it is a black edition.

 

[krogtheclown]

Not really sure why COD is always on these benchmarks other then so many people having the game. That's not much of a test! Graphic's benchmarks should be turned up just enough to keep it around 60fps or under, other wise it becomes more of a cpu benchmark...whats the point in that? AMD will all ways fall short there.

 

[IzzyCraft]

I really enjoy the

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I think the person entering this in needs to disable their intrusive skype plug-in

 

[cleeve]

[citation][nom]IzzyCraft[/nom]I really enjoy theI think the person entering this in needs to disable their intrusive skype plug-in[/citation]

No kidding... fixed!

 

[rwmunchkin12788]

[citation][nom]nerrawg[/nom]... all overclock similarly (3.6-3.8 Ghz reliably) and offer the same tier of gaming performance when overclocked. Likewise the Intel quad core I5 and I7's appear to be one tier above at least - especially when overclocked. Then you just have to sit back and ask yourself what you budget is. In this regard the article appears to me to support the notion that if you are going to spend more than $1000 you should spend some extra cash on getting intel - even when going for a gaming build[/citation]


This article shows that even spending slightly less than 1000 dollars, you can still get that kind of performance. The other great thing about this article is that it used a single graphics card instead of two. This allows for a great upgrade option later on, which the i5-750 will still support without bottlenecking it much (if at all). The AMD processors just don't seem to measure up in that regard.

 

[Onus]

[citation][nom]rwmunchkin12788[/nom]...single graphics card instead of two. This allows for a great upgrade option later on, which the i5-750 will still support without bottlenecking it much (if at all)...[/citation]
I agree with this reasoning, but it would not work on this mobo, with its single PCIE slot. To go with my earlier comment, I would likely have chosen a different (perhaps pricier) mobo, even if it meant dropping back to a GTX460. Of course, I don't think they were available when this build was done, but that's probably what I would do if I were building today (but I'd rather wait for SB/Bulldozer to see what they bring).

 

[rwmunchkin12788]

[citation][nom]jtt283[/nom]I agree with this reasoning, but it would not work on this mobo, with its single PCIE slot. To go with my earlier comment, I would likely have chosen a different (perhaps pricier) mobo, even if it meant dropping back to a GTX460. Of course, I don't think they were available when this build was done, but that's probably what I would do if I were building today (but I'd rather wait for SB/Bulldozer to see what they bring).[/citation]

Ahh ok. I kinda glazed over the motherboard on my first readthrough. It seems to me though that you would only need to spend another 20 dollars or so to get the added PCI-e slot and maybe a few more more minor upgrades to boot. This to me does not seem out of the question, especially if you want to build a computer that will last you 5+ years and still have functionality for newer games/programs.

 

[mosu]

Why do you compare a 2 year old processor with a recent one from Intel?What's the point?and why not a motherboard with a newer chipset like 890x, not from MSI but from Gigabyte.You should compare 200$ processors on similar priced motherboards with the same graphic card and memory.When you compare efficiency keep in mind that Intel uses more efficient 32 nm process

 

[spirit123]

This tests just proves that Crossfire or SLI should be avoided for any new builds.There are single cards for the price of sli or crossfire that can do the same performance without any side effects 100% of the time.
SLI or crossfire are almost never 100% improvements for 100% more money.However on some oldder pc's it might be better to add second card.

 

[youssef 2010]

[citation][nom]E_man[/nom]Wonder why the i5 vs the 1055t? I mean, the 1055t is pretty close to the i7 in multithreaded apps, and enthusiasts tend to run multithreaded programs.[/citation]

because 1055T is more suited to productivity tasks than gaming

 

[cleeve]

[citation][nom]mosu[/nom]Why do you compare a 2 year old processor with a recent one from Intel? What's the point?[/citation]

In the system builder marathons we compare based on total system cost, not component cost. This is why the Phenom II system had the benefit of two graphics cards in CrossFire while the Intel system had a single card.

The i5-750 is a year old, by the way. 😉

 

[cleeve]

[citation][nom]spirit123[/nom]This tests just proves that Crossfire or SLI should be avoided for any new builds.[/citation]

it does not prove that at all, and that's a sweeping assumption based on comparing only these two builds.

We recently proved that SLI'd GTX 460 cards are cheaper and faster than a single GTX 480.

 

[duk3]

Good article.
I think that a 1tb spinpoint/7200.12 would have been better.

 

[spirit123]

Cheaper not, faster a little .Single card can go with way cheaper motherboard,also cheaper PSU .Are this included in cheaper ?
I define cheaper by total cost of the system and this 2 items make single card cheaper for me .

"it does not prove that at all, and that's a sweeping assumption based on comparing only these two builds.

We recently proved that SLI'd GTX 460 cards are cheaper and faster than a single GTX 480."