All currency is meant to be seen as USD. Ok, I am building a new PC next year (hopefully...) and I would like to know the fallowing info. All good Motherboard makers. As far as features and specs, I can go from there. I know ASUS and Gigabyte are good, but the more names the better for comparison and costs. The most powerful thing I will use it for is HD video watching, so I would like to know a MINIMAL CPU speed to start out with. I am thinking a dual core at about the AMD Athlon 64 X2 5200+, but I am not locked onto AMD or that model. Any decent/OK video card will work just fine obviously. Now that that's been said, I have a budget. I would like to spend around $400 max, but can go to about $500. I do plan on getting a board that supports a lot for future upgrades. I plan on starting with 2GB RAM, and I am going to be running Windows XP Pro, NOT Vista. At least for now... The fallowing will be moved form my PC now : Sound card, HDD's, FDD, optical drives, video capture card, and anything external. That's 2 PCI devices. I am thinking about getting a new PSU as well, I have the ThermalTake PurePower 560W. The only reason is for the multiple 12V rails. I am not sure if I really need one, but it's out there. For the purpose of estimated cost (if needed) here is what I will NEED to get for the build : MOBO RAM CPU Video What I am thinking about are as fallows : PSU Case Now, for the explanation of why this is happening : My board's thermal censor is a little wacky now, and it keeps alerting me to a CPU overheat. The board will also shutdown if needed. It never shuts down, as there is no real issue. Never the less, it's a high pitched beep from the PC speaker, and it's mounted on the board. I can't have this happening because of location, so I have my CPU underclocked to a 1500+ for now. Much slower with things, and real annoying. This is as of now the ONLY issue. I clean my system out once a year, meaning I pull everything out and dust it. I did this earlier, with no luck. I also checked for an updated BIOS. On the plus side, I will be selling my RAM, and Video card to help pay the cost of the new system. If I get a new PSU, I will sell that as well.
mobo: Newegg.com - MSI P43 Neo3-F LGA 775 Intel P43 ATX Intel Motherboard - Intel Motherboards video: Newegg.com - XFX PVT84JUDF3 GeForce 8600 GT 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 SLI Supported Video Card - Desktop Graphics / Video Cards ram: 2x FRYS.com*|*CRUCIAL cpu: FRYS.com*|*Intel psu: Newegg.com - Rosewill RX750-S-B 750W ATX12V v2.2 & EPS12V v2.91 SLI 8800GTX SLI CrossFire Ready Active PFC PFC Power Supply - Power Supplies (overkill?) not so sure with the board though, some can be downgrade for better cost
Newegg.com - Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 Wolfdale 3.0GHz 6MB L2 Cache LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor - Processors - Desktops Newegg.com - ASUS P5Q SE PLUS LGA 775 Intel P45 ATX Intel Motherboard - Intel Motherboards Newegg.com - SAPPHIRE 100255L Radeon HD 4670 512MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card - Desktop Graphics / Video Cards Newegg.com - G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory - Desktop Memory Total: $409.99 What PSU are you using now?
Lol, I hope it's realised I want to have a good board, and close to minimal components to start with. I plan to upgrade down the line. Is Intel really that much beter in terms of playing HD media, and do I really need that much power from the video card? I don't need or want to overkill at the start. When I watch anything on my system, the only other things running are the background programs.
No, pretty much any decent dual core with do, whether it's Intel or AMD. You won't need a 4760 to play HD video's either. Just need one that can accelerate H.264 so your graphics card will take most of the load off the CPU.
I thought so, but that leaves me with the original question on board brands. No overclocking is needed. I just want a solid board, this one lasted for a while now, I think reaching 5 years. That's decent, and good enough considering it's had 4 different CPU's, 6 RAM configurations, and the annual clean up. This little board really went far. Just wish it would KEEP going until a little into next year.
Pretty much every motherboards will do if you don't want to overclock except those very cheap ones. You only got half of it correct. It depends on what decoder you are using. Even a decent AMD processor will fail big time if you use a decoder that is not optimized properly for dual core, unless you overclock it to 3.0GHz. Intel FTW I say. One more thing about off-loading H.264 processing to your graphics card. The decoding software only supports a very limited range of video formats like mov mp4 and avi. It won't accelerate your H.264 video if the video format is not supported. It's the same for both ATI/NVIDIA, remember that.
Hey, if I need to get a 3GHz minimal, that's fine. Info on other sights don't help as they are talking about the minimal with nothing else running, even in the background. As of now, most of the HD stuff I want to watch is WMV HD. So I pump the CPU a little. The less money I need to spend the better unfortentally. I would LOVE to get a quad core and not worry about anything preformance wise, but I can't aford that. You can expect me to list that parts I will be looking at. IE, this video card : An ATI HD 3450. Newegg.com - SAPPHIRE 100234VGAL Radeon HD 3450 512MB 64-bit GDDR2 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card - Desktop Graphics / Video Cards
Even with 3450, you'll be fine watching x264 rips at 1080 Hang on a minute, 3450 supports mpeg 4 decoding anot?
mobo: Newegg.com - GIGABYTE GA-MA78G-DS3H AM2+/AM2 AMD 780G HDMI ATX AMD Motherboard - AMD Motherboards video: HIS Radeon HD 3450 iFan Video Card - 256MB DDR2, PCI Express 2.0, CrossFireX Ready, (Dual Link) DVI, VGA, TV Out, HDMI Support, Video Card H345F256NS at TigerDirect.com ram : 2x FRYS.com*|*CRUCIAL cpu: Newegg.com - AMD Athlon 64 X2 5200+ Brisbane 2.7GHz 2 x 512KB L2 Cache Socket AM2 65W Dual-Core Processor - Processors - Desktops total = $303 not including tax + shipping total + rebate = $233 not including tax + shipping
I was referring to H.264 full HD videos. If it's WMV, you don't need to worry anything. Even "lowly" processors such as A64 X2 or E1200 can play it easily. It does but like I said, you need to have the right video format, right decoding software in order to make it work. It won't just magically decodes your x264 videos after you installed it into your PC. It really depends on what kind of video format do you mostly watch, for me it is useless because most of my videos are h.264 encoded and in .mkv format, and it is not supported by the decoding software. Thanks to the misleading ATI/NVIDIA PR, a lot of people believed that their cards can accelerate H.264 playback with codec packs such as k-lite/CCCP installed
Well then Max, what's the CHEAPEST Video card and CPU rating I could get for H.264 HD decoding? Yes, most will be WMV HD, but I occasionally have used H.264. If possible, I will just get it with the system instead of an upgrade. Also, for this does it matter if I have an ATI or NVidia based GPU? I am going into the quality of the playback with this, as I know sometimes a GPU can render the video differently depending on the design.
If you want proper HD decoding, get a good C2D like E8400 or faster, ignore the graphics card unless you want gaming.
All the newer generation graphics card supports H.264 decoding, even down to the lowest end card. But like Chai said, it's still the best to get a proper CPU for playing full HD H.264 videos, because the decoding software (for ATI/NVIDIA cards) only supports a very limited number of video formats. Not to mention you even need to pay for the decoding software (both ATI/NVIDIA) As for playback quality, I have no idea if the ATI/NVIDIA's decoding software actually changes/enhance the video image or not. I do not know which one is better even if it does that.
