Where should i buy parts for a new build? Apparently MSY is the cheapest but there isnt one up here in the NT.
I've been looking at www.pccasegear.com and www.auspcmarket.com.au, they both seem decent but PC Case Gear appears to be a bit cheaper.
Here's the build.

PCCaseGear = $1310 (Including shipping, not sure what the go is with GST)
AusPCMarket = $1500 (When including GST and shipping of bulky items)
I'm swaying towards PCCaseGear obviously, but i'm not sure how trustworthy they are.
Any other sites (That ship around Aus) i should take a look at, or anything in the build i should reconsider?
Looking to play ArmA II, CODMW2, MS Flight Sim ect.

Thanks.

http://www.staticice.com.au/advanced.html

Just search and isolated your area.

you could try umart

www.umart.com.au

they are in QLD but they post to anywhere as far as i no, might wanna give them a call and find out how much postage would be.

They are close to MSY price.

Yeah, had a look before and i think it will shave an extra $100 off going with Umart.
But now i've kinda been persuaded to go Intel (The cheapest i7, which is the 920 at $400) but thats an extra $100 over the Phenom II 955 itself.
Then the motherboard and DDR3 RAM, racks up to be a fair bit more.
Dont wanna go LGA775 because thats a deadend socket.

Well fuck.
Thanks for the help, though.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/phenom...us-i7,2360.html

http://www.modreactor.com/english/Reviews/...ore-i7-920.html


From these two tests, the amd does hold it's own..

yer and i doubt that postage will be anywhere near that.

hahah yer so many choices hahah, aparently the cheapst i7 is still pritty good and canbe over clocked pritty good, haven't used one yet.

no worries mate.

Thanks, i checked a few benchmarks on tomshardware earlier and it was that that worried me, it was CPU against CPU benchmarks, rather then CPU gaming benchmarks.
But the single 4890 lacks a bit in places. Going with an AMD tri-core and 4890's crossfired still adds a hefty price.
Ill go with the single for now, then later ill probably buy another.

Another question.

4870 or 4890? They seem practically the same but the 4890 is $50 more. Maybe i should just get a 4870 till DX11 cards are released?

4890 has bit higher of clock speed and freq..

average 5-10fps more in the 90 compared to 70.. 5-10fps for $50..

Hmm, ill go with the 4890. Will stick with it for a while and hope DX11 cards go down in price pretty quickly.
Will be buying off Umart in a few days.

which brand you going?

I would go sapphire or xfx.. but just check out which one performs better.

Sapphire, but now that i've looked at XFX.
XFX
Memory Clock - 3900MHz
Sapphire
Memory Clock - 975 MHz (3.6Gbps)

Ok, what?

The difference between the two is that XFX has composite out but Sapphire has OpenGL3.0 support (XFX OpenGL2.0), but i'm not sure what that is.
I'll probably go with Sapphire because i dont need composite, i'm not sure what the Memory Clock is about, though.

This is what i've got so far.

Its way over budget (Was originally trying for $1000, give or take $100) but because i'm not sure weather i will Crossfire another 4890 its gone to $1500. Mainly because of the 650W PSU, Motherboard that supports 2 PCIE x16 (Instead of x16 + x8), which then makes me buy DDR3 RAM.
Its hard because i dont like spending money on things i dont need.

Screw it, one 4890 is fine.

8gb quad core

Righto.

so give us the news..any benchmark results?

Curious on the hd4890, looking to put my shitbox 8800gts to rest.

Arrived at Toll today, will pick it up tommorow.

It does pretty well, a bit better than the GTX 260.

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF

At the last minute, i bumped the CPU down the the X4 940, not realizing its an AM2+ only processor and the motherboard AM3.
WELL FUCK.
Hopefully Umart will take it back and let me pay an extra $100 or so for the 955, probably not because i opened the box. I'm so fucking damn motherfucking stupid.

Anyway, anyone want to buy a cheap AMD Phenom II X4 940? $200, never even been turned on

I put the thing together though, all i need is to stick the CPU and HSF on and i'm away. Cables are fairly neat, surprised how fucking heavy the thing is once all together.

If UMart don't take it back, i might just use it for another cheaper build. Its a bit of an overkill though.

Well i sold the X4 940 a few days ago, and got the 955 today.
Got Windows 7 going, installing GTA IV now and run that benchmark.
Heres Windows Experience Index's benchmark.


Why is the HDD so slow?

why not just buy a system from ibuypower.com ?

how has your experience been with the 4890? i'll probably be picking up the exact same card as yours today.

I haven't had any other GPU before so i can't really compare it to anything.
But its a solid card. Runs Crysis at mostly full, same with GTA IV.
Easily over clockable with ATI Catalyst Control Center, which can adjust the fan speed manually as well (Needed when playing Crysis or GTA IV because its constantly at full load, stock speeds can see it touching 70C-80C).
The fan it pretty damn noisy. Noticeable at 35% speed and quite loud at 45%. That's just a reason to bump up the sound a bit more anyway.

thanks. i just picked up mine, although i opted for the Vapor-X

From what ive been told, 5.9 is the highest rating possible for HDDs. Higher rates are reserved for SSDs.

I too got a 5.9 for my HDD.

Yeah, i guess we'll have to wait till SSD tech becomes a little cheaper.

Indeed. When i heard that i priced up some SSD's. $1k for a 160GB drive, no thanks.

You can get Intel 160GB SSD's for about $500-$600USD now.
Still, i can justify the speed for that price just yet.

my SSD scores 7.1