Topic: My Planned First Build

[karx-elf-erx]

SC makes use of multiple cores. Suggesting involvement of multiple cores includes their usage, me thinks. Ghz aren't the only measurement for a CPU's speed. A Core i7 CPU is superior to an equally fast clocked C2D CPU (not to speak of Pentiums) for many tasks - even in single threaded applications.

[Matthew]

Yes, but it only uses 2 cores. So a phenom II 3.4ghz dual-core would work just as well as a penom II quad core.

[karx-elf-erx]

Are you sure of that, and how do you know that?

[Matthew]

Because I've asked people. It's dual-threaded.

[karx-elf-erx]

U-hu. And how did they know?

An acceptable proof would be to run SC on a quad core system and having the task manager show only two cores being really busy.

[Matthew]

Because they run quad-cores and they see the game only using 2 of them?

[karx-elf-erx]

Does the question mark at the end of your sentence mean you don't really know?

The information supplied in this article suggests it does.

Please regard that with quad cores enabled the testers were using better settings most of the time, resulting in similar fps for quad and dual cores. Where they were using identical settings, quad cores were yielding significantly better frame rates.

[Fennecfox]

 Thanks for the replys everyone!  Even the unrelated discussion is intresting and useful. 

So, (assuming all of this talk of how games use hardware is related to my rig) do you guys think that anything is under/over powered or there any bottlenecks.  Like for internet browsing, and games?



Also, I switched to OCZ Obsidian 4GB ddr3 from G.SKILL 2GB (2 x 1GB)

I notice the G,Skill is faster and cheaper, but the 4 gigs feels worth it.

The Obsidian gets really cheap at times with rebates (sometimes coming down to $60 if I wait) but still is over $30 more.

If there is any other ram you guys want to recomment at a good price you can, otherwise which is better?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227495
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231134&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-_-Memory%20(Desktop%20Memory)-_-G.SKILL-_-20231134&AID=10440897&PID=3335429&SID=

Lol long link

[Matthew]

Nothing will ever be a bottleneck just browsing the internet.

[-<WillyP>-]

You are comparing DDR3 1600 to DDR3 1333...

[D2Disciple]

I'd certainly go with 4GB of DDR3 1333 over 2GB of DDR3 1600. Sure, the 1600 is faster, but you'd be trading off an immense performance increase related to space for a tiny performance increase related to speed - which means that, overall, it would be wise to buy the 4GB.

[karx-elf-erx]

X2.

[-<WillyP>-]

That may be true, but guess again... he is comparing 2 gigs of 1333 to 4 gigs of 1600.

If he goes with 4 sticks of the 1gig sticks @1333, it would be cheaper to buy the 4 gigs of 1600.
My comment was in response to his statement that the 'G.Skill is faster and cheaper', if you compare 2 gigs at 1333 to 4 gigs at 1600, yes it is cheaper but certainly not faster. The mother board he listed in his first post can run 1600 oc'd. So if he's planning on oc'ing anyway the 4 gigs at 1600 would be a much faster choice than 2 gigs at 1333, and a cheaper and faster choice than 2 kits of the 2 gigs at 1333.

[Crash]

I'd just like to echo a previous poster who was talking about MSI mainboards.
They used to be almost the only option for AMD processors so I've had a couple and they're not bad, but they're also not great. If you can stretch yourself to an Asus, I doubt you'll be disappointed.

Usually an increase in the number of cores, past a certain point doesn't have much impact on games. Most games only use at most 2 cores and many don't use more than 1. That's why the new 6-core Phenom isn't that impressive at gaming. Although I dare say if you plugged it into a server it'd be pretty good.

[Matthew]

Exactly. However, the new quad-cores ALSO tend to be more efficient and faster on each core than dual-cores. Sure you can buy a dual-core version of the new Phenom IIs, but honestly it's a better value to just get the quad-core for only marginally more money. Quad-cores also help by shunting background processes over into the unused cores, leaving the first 2 cores entirely for the game.