PC Building Guide and Discussion #13

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Osprey

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Feb 18, 2005
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Gamers nexus got a 4.6 GHz overclock on the 5950X, so depending on the use case it probably won't be worth OCing, same as 3rd gen ryzen and the newer Intel's. They pretty much push them to the limit at factory settings.

If that's the base clock, that's a jump of 1.2 GHz over the base 3.4 GHz. If, instead, that's the turbo boost clock, then that's not an overclock at all because that chip boosts to 4.9 GHz. Anandtech even measured 5 GHz in their review:

AMD Zen 3 Ryzen Deep Dive Review: 5950X, 5900X, 5800X and 5600X Tested

BTW, it's nice to see that that review and most other reviews of the Ryzen 5000 series basically confirm that AMD delivered everything that they promised. There weren't any inflated claims or performance figures, which is a really refreshing thing to see from a marketing department. It's also, hopefully, a sign that AMD isn't exaggerating about how good the Radeon 6000 series of GPUs is, either.

Also, just like 3rd gen ryzen, the chiplet design makes it so that the lowest end ryzen performs basically the same per core for gaming, so if it's not a heavily optimized game, there's not much point in getting anything other than 5600

Yeah, that's why I almost bought a 4-core 3300X a couple of months ago. In games, it's just as fast as the 3600. It makes me think that we may see AMD release a 4-core 5300X that's as fast as the 5600X in most games sometime next year, but priced in the sweet spot of $150-200 that the more budget-conscious AMD fans love.
 
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aleshemsky83

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Apr 8, 2008
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If that's the base clock, that's a huge overclock of 1.2 GHz over the base 3.4 GHz. If, instead, that's the turbo boost clock, then that's not an overclock at all because that chip boosts to 4.9 GHz. Anandtech even measured 5 GHz in their review:
I'm pretty sure when you overclock a cpu it disregards the boost clock. So yeah, you actually lose performance in certain areas when OCing Ryzen.
 

Osprey

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Feb 18, 2005
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I'm pretty sure when you overclock a cpu it disregards the boost clock. So yeah, you actually lose performance in certain areas when OCing Ryzen.

Yeah, I'm not sure how that works. You could be right. Still, I think that the benefits would outweigh the drawbacks. AFAIK, the boost clock can be maintained for only a minute or two. If you're doing anything intensive for a lot longer that that--gaming, encoding, rendering, mining, etc.--you'd rather have a higher base clock than a higher boost clock. In fact, I've actually seen some benchmarks in which the 5600X and 5800X beat one or more of the higher models, including the 5950X, presumably because their base clocks are higher. One is Civ 6 in the review that I linked above. The 5600X and 5800X, despite having the two lowest boost clocks of the bunch, outperform the 5900X and 5950X, which have lower base clocks. Of course, that's probably an outlier because the extra cores put the others on top in most other benchmarks, but I think that it suggests that the boost clock is less important than the base clock.
 
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SniperHF

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I'm not totally up on all the latest CPUs but usually the boost clock at its highest is applied to only a single core.

Yeah you'd generally rather have all cores OCed rather than an extra 300mhz boost on top of your OC.

Pretty sure I read somewhere that the new CPUs can hold their boosts though they won't drop down (unless you hit thermal throttling anyway)
 
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Osprey

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Pretty sure I read somewhere that the new CPUs can hold their boosts though they won't drop down (unless you hit thermal throttling anyway)

Zen 3 can hold its boosts much longer than Zen 2, but it's still only about 60-90 seconds. At least that's what I remember reading in the pre-reveal rumors. I haven't read about it since the reveal, but I imagine that it hasn't changed.
 

SniperHF

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I'm still rocking Ivy Bridge, just haven't had the demand to upgrade with no new games looking all that interesting to me. All the interesting RPG studios sold to mega corporations. Literally no one makes a good shooter.

Even Cyberpunk seems kinda blah.


I am adding a DB9 port to my PC though so I can party like it's 1989 (and console into Cisco gear without a USB dongle so that's fun :laugh: )

And I'm looking at upgrading to 802.11ax soon.
 

aleshemsky83

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Apr 8, 2008
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Zen 3 can hold its boosts much longer than Zen 2, but it's still only about 60-90 seconds. At least that's what I remember reading in the pre-reveal rumors. I haven't read about it since the reveal, but I imagine that it hasn't changed.
I'm not totally up on all the latest CPUs but usually the boost clock at its highest is applied to only a single core.

Yeah you'd generally rather have all cores OCed rather than an extra 300mhz boost on top of your OC.

Pretty sure I read somewhere that the new CPUs can hold their boosts though they won't drop down (unless you hit thermal throttling anyway)

Gamers Nexus is pretty good with testing this and it actually comes close. The 5600X essentially holds 4.4 GHz all core pretty consistently. They're really pushing the chips to the limit out of the factory these days, both intel and AMD. The gamers nexus OC I was talking about basically got like 0.5-1% extra performance out of the 5600X by overclocking it to 4.8 GHz (which is actually above the boost clock of 4.6) while using double the power.



I had a similar experience with the 3600, the factory settings were literally better than any OC I could get.
 
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Morbo

The Annihilator
Jan 14, 2003
27,100
5,734
Toronto
I'm going to build a 2K resolution gaming box for my son, passing on my 1080TI to do so.

any recommendations on a build?
 

Theosis

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Mar 11, 2009
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Question about my CPU.

I'm currently running an i7 7700K with my 1080.

I purchased a MSI RTX 3080 Trio from Amazon (not sure when it will come as of yet)

Do I really need to upgrade the 7700K or do you think I can keep it for a little while longer before I build a new PC in maybe 1-2 years?
 

SniperHF

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Do I really need to upgrade the 7700K or do you think I can keep it for a little while longer before I build a new PC in maybe 1-2 years?

Well since you bought it already, the best way to is to try it and find out :P

I think it would be fine for a little while, you certainly will hit CPU bottlenecks in some games but most likely you are already hitting those with just the 1080. If you were shooting for high refresh rates it would be a bigger problem.

If you are an enterprising sort, a little overclocking helps a decent bit with the older 4c/8t cpus. Even a stock voltage OC can get you a decent bump sometimes.
 

SniperHF

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Mar 9, 2007
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Decided to clean my CoolerMaster Storm Trigger one more time (Full clean, remove all caps, toobrush, etc). Though the Das Keyboard 4 was mighty tempting.
 

mouser

Business of Hockey
Jul 13, 2006
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Starting to think about building a new gaming system for Cyberpunk 2077. Used to build new systems every ~4 years, but amazingly made it 10 years with my current rig. Paying a premium for the 1st gen Core i7-950 (4 core, 3.07GHz) turned out to be an expensive but solid long term investment. Been through a couple GPU upgrades, currently a 1070Ti, and some SSD swaps.

The extraordinary longevity of my older system probably reflects the shift in CPU design from focusing on raw core speed to more cores and efficient power consumption profiles. Gaming performance tends to be dominated more by single core speed then total CPU power across multiple cores/threads. Used to have to upgrade regularly mostly because core speeds were increasing much quicker,


My first pass looks like:
- CPU: i5-10600 or i7-10700
- Mombo: Something from MSI, still sorting out the options, overclocking nice, but not a huge deal, doubt I’ll ever care about SLI.
- Mem: 64GB, probably Corsair
- CPU Cooler: prefer a self-contained water system, probably single radiator fan depending on the case, perhaps a Corsair H80i, need to research more.
- Drives: 500GB SSD system boot, 1/2TB SSD game drive, 3/4TB spindle drive for other low latency stuff. Random DVD writer. Likely Samsung on the SSD’s.
- PSU: 750/850 likely Corsair, decide after checking final power consumption. Prefer overpowering PSU, less likely to stress them out and breakdown.
- Case: haven’t researched yet. Something mid-tower with very good airflow.
- GPU: EVGA 3070 of some variation.

Rough estimates look like about $1200 USD + the GPU. Wish the 3070’s had better supply, would have been nice to see some Black Friday discounts.
 
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Osprey

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Feb 18, 2005
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Gamers nexus got a 4.6 GHz overclock on the 5950X, so depending on the use case it probably won't be worth OCing, same as 3rd gen ryzen and the newer Intel's. They pretty much push them to the limit at factory settings.

I just read an article from a different site that overclocked the 5600X to 4.6 GHz and said that it netted only a 3% gain. What I didn't realize when I replied to you before is that all of the Zen 3 CPUs can boost up to and run at 4.4-4.5 GHz indefinitely (i.e. only the fastest boost of 4.7-4.9 GHz can't be maintained longer than a minute or two), so 4.6 GHz is hardly an overclock at all, hence the negligible gain. I'm sure that you already understood that. I'm just acknowledging that I understand it now, too, and that you're right that there seems to be no point in overclocking Zen 3.
 
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BlueKnight

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Apr 19, 2015
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Starting to think about building a new gaming system for Cyberpunk 2077. Used to build new systems every ~4 years, but amazingly made it 10 years with my current rig. Paying a premium for the 1st gen Core i7-950 (4 core, 3.07GHz) turned out to be an expensive but solid long term investment. Been through a couple GPU upgrades, currently a 1070Ti, and some SSD swaps.

The extraordinary longevity of my older system probably reflects the shift in CPU design from focusing on raw core speed to more cores and efficient power consumption profiles. Gaming performance tends to be dominated more by single core speed then total CPU power across multiple cores/threads. Used to have to upgrade regularly mostly because core speeds were increasing much quicker,


My first pass looks like:
- CPU: i5-10600 or i7-10700
- Mombo: Something from MSI, still sorting out the options, overclocking nice, but not a huge deal, doubt I’ll ever care about SLI.
- Mem: 64GB, probably Corsair
- CPU Cooler: prefer a self-contained water system, probably single radiator fan depending on the case, perhaps a Corsair H80i, need to research more.
- Drives: 500GB SSD system boot, 1/2TB SSD game drive, 3/4TB spindle drive for other low latency stuff. Random DVD writer.
- PSU: 750/850 likely Corsair, decide after checking final power consumption. Prefer overpowering PSU, less likely to stress them out and breakdown.
- Case: haven’t researched yet. Something mid-tower with very good airflow.
- GPU: EVGA 3070 of some variation.

Rough estimates look like about $1200 USD + the GPU. Wish the 3070’s had better supply, would have been nice to see some Black Friday discounts.

I'm currently building a new gaming rig with similar specs to what you have here. As for cases I recommend Fractal Design. My work pc uses a Fractal Design Meshify it has high airflow and I'll be using the same case in my new build.
 

Bruins4Lifer

Registered User
Jun 28, 2006
8,744
718
Regina, SK
Starting to think about building a new gaming system for Cyberpunk 2077. Used to build new systems every ~4 years, but amazingly made it 10 years with my current rig. Paying a premium for the 1st gen Core i7-950 (4 core, 3.07GHz) turned out to be an expensive but solid long term investment. Been through a couple GPU upgrades, currently a 1070Ti, and some SSD swaps.

The extraordinary longevity of my older system probably reflects the shift in CPU design from focusing on raw core speed to more cores and efficient power consumption profiles. Gaming performance tends to be dominated more by single core speed then total CPU power across multiple cores/threads. Used to have to upgrade regularly mostly because core speeds were increasing much quicker,


My first pass looks like:
- CPU: i5-10600 or i7-10700
- Mombo: Something from MSI, still sorting out the options, overclocking nice, but not a huge deal, doubt I’ll ever care about SLI.
- Mem: 64GB, probably Corsair
- CPU Cooler: prefer a self-contained water system, probably single radiator fan depending on the case, perhaps a Corsair H80i, need to research more.
- Drives: 500GB SSD system boot, 1/2TB SSD game drive, 3/4TB spindle drive for other low latency stuff. Random DVD writer.
- PSU: 750/850 likely Corsair, decide after checking final power consumption. Prefer overpowering PSU, less likely to stress them out and breakdown.
- Case: haven’t researched yet. Something mid-tower with very good airflow.
- GPU: EVGA 3070 of some variation.

Rough estimates look like about $1200 USD + the GPU. Wish the 3070’s had better supply, would have been nice to see some Black Friday discounts.
I think you'd be better off going AMD for a CPU right now. The 5600X with a B550 Tomahawk motherboard would be a great bang-for-the-buck combo.
 

mouser

Business of Hockey
Jul 13, 2006
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South Mountain
I think you'd be better off going AMD for a CPU right now. The 5600X with a B550 Tomahawk motherboard would be a great bang-for-the-buck combo.

Certainly an option. More research to do. Did see some interesting speculation on whether the 5th gen consoles (especially Xbox) with 8 cores may have an impact on PC games in the not too far future where gaming cores typically go 2-4 at most currently.
 

Osprey

Registered User
Feb 18, 2005
27,091
9,353
Certainly an option. More research to do. Did see some interesting speculation on whether the 5th gen consoles (especially Xbox) with 8 cores may have an impact on PC games in the not too far future where gaming cores typically go 2-4 at most currently.

The 6-core 5600X is almost as fast as the 8-core i7-10700 in multi-core tests, so even if games eventually make full use of 8 cores (which I doubt), you won't be much worse off. In the meantime, though, you will be much better off with the 5600X's single-core performance, especially in games.
 

Kairi Zaide

Unforgiven
Aug 11, 2009
104,788
12,221
Quebec City
Not really a PC building question since it has to do with controllers.

I'm looking for a new PC controller (yes, I hate using mouse+keyboard!). I don't really play FPS games, but some games I play do have some sort of aiming (Genshin and WD Legions right now).

My current controller, Logitech F310, which despite being cheap has served me well over the past few years, is starting to have some responsiveness issues sometimes.

I was thinking of going with the DualSense 5, which I've heard has some highly precise joysticks. However, I have 3 pet peeves with it :
- Compatibility. I've read Steam is already offering near flawless compatibility (besides the controller's gimmicks that I could not care less about), but unsure about where the development of that 3rd party driver for Sony Controllers is. I'd like to be able to use the controller right away without having to switch whether I'm on Steam or another launcher. I'm also wondering whether the PS button in the center of the controller can bring up the Steam Overlay (I like to take screenshots sometimes), and whether the Create button works as a "Back" button on PC, since it's used in some games I've played,
- The name of the buttons. I know this is dumb, but when I used to use my PS3 controllers years ago, I would always get confused since games use the ABXY buttons, while my controller would have X, O, Square and Triangle. :laugh:
- I've read that for the moment (a Git fork from the DS4Windows driver), it only works via bluetooth, not wired. I tend to prefer not having to deal with charging and stuff, so I'd at least want to be able to plug it at all time.

If anyone has tried the DS5 on PC already (and preferably on games outside of the Steam Launcher), any review would be greatly appreciated.

Otherwise, any suggestion of controllers would also be appreciated. My criteria would be as follow :
- Precise joysticks
- PlayStation controller layout (that is, for the position of the left joystick and of the D-pad - I just hate the Xbox layout, and any controller with that layout is a big no)
- Can be wireless, but at least possible to play wired
- Quality build and comfortable grip
- Ideally less than $100 (CAD), but I could live with up to say $125.
- I want to avoid gimmicky controllers with stupid stuff like Turbo options.

I've found the SteelSeries Stratus Duo controller, but I feel like the ABXY buttons might be a little too big. :laugh: And it's like the only one I've found so far - outside of the DS5 controller.

Of course, the DS4 could be an option, but considering its price and the price of the DS5, and considering the DS5 just looks 100 times better, I'd rather go with the DS5 assuming the compatibility is there.

The Logitech F310 (and it's wireless more expensive version) is also an option, but having used it for a while, I often get hand pain after extensive use because it's so bulky. :(

Thanks!

tl;dr : looking for PC controller suggestions that have the same layouts as the PS controllers
 

Soedy

All Hail Cale
Nov 27, 2012
2,625
2,073
Hamburg, Germany
Question about my CPU.

I'm currently running an i7 7700K with my 1080.

I purchased a MSI RTX 3080 Trio from Amazon (not sure when it will come as of yet)

Do I really need to upgrade the 7700K or do you think I can keep it for a little while longer before I build a new PC in maybe 1-2 years?

Depends what you play and at what FPS but I would try it out first. If you're constantly in the CPU limit and have stuttering, go for it. Most games should be fine for now though if you play above 1080p.
 

Osprey

Registered User
Feb 18, 2005
27,091
9,353
tl;dr : looking for PC controller suggestions that have the same layouts as the PS controllers

I'm not much of a controller user, but I bought an 8BitDo controller last year for platform games and like it. It has what I guess is the "PS controller layout," can be used wired or wireless and has no gimmicks. I got the N30 Pro 2, which is modelled after the original NES controller, but there's also the SN30 Pro+, which is modelled more after the SNES controller and has the hand grips that you're probably expecting. I think that it has the same internals as mine, just different exterior. You might want something less retro inspired, but I figured that I'd throw it out there as an option, since it does seem to check a number of your boxes.

8BitDo SN30 Pro+ | 8BitDo
 
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mouser

Business of Hockey
Jul 13, 2006
29,284
12,583
South Mountain
Not really a PC building question since it has to do with controllers.

I'm looking for a new PC controller (yes, I hate using mouse+keyboard!). I don't really play FPS games, but some games I play do have some sort of aiming (Genshin and WD Legions right now).

My current controller, Logitech F310, which despite being cheap has served me well over the past few years, is starting to have some responsiveness issues sometimes.

I was thinking of going with the DualSense 5, which I've heard has some highly precise joysticks. However, I have 3 pet peeves with it :
- Compatibility. I've read Steam is already offering near flawless compatibility (besides the controller's gimmicks that I could not care less about), but unsure about where the development of that 3rd party driver for Sony Controllers is. I'd like to be able to use the controller right away without having to switch whether I'm on Steam or another launcher. I'm also wondering whether the PS button in the center of the controller can bring up the Steam Overlay (I like to take screenshots sometimes), and whether the Create button works as a "Back" button on PC, since it's used in some games I've played,
- The name of the buttons. I know this is dumb, but when I used to use my PS3 controllers years ago, I would always get confused since games use the ABXY buttons, while my controller would have X, O, Square and Triangle. :laugh:
- I've read that for the moment (a Git fork from the DS4Windows driver), it only works via bluetooth, not wired. I tend to prefer not having to deal with charging and stuff, so I'd at least want to be able to plug it at all time.

If anyone has tried the DS5 on PC already (and preferably on games outside of the Steam Launcher), any review would be greatly appreciated.

Otherwise, any suggestion of controllers would also be appreciated. My criteria would be as follow :
- Precise joysticks
- PlayStation controller layout (that is, for the position of the left joystick and of the D-pad - I just hate the Xbox layout, and any controller with that layout is a big no)
- Can be wireless, but at least possible to play wired
- Quality build and comfortable grip
- Ideally less than $100 (CAD), but I could live with up to say $125.
- I want to avoid gimmicky controllers with stupid stuff like Turbo options.

I've found the SteelSeries Stratus Duo controller, but I feel like the ABXY buttons might be a little too big. :laugh: And it's like the only one I've found so far - outside of the DS5 controller.

Of course, the DS4 could be an option, but considering its price and the price of the DS5, and considering the DS5 just looks 100 times better, I'd rather go with the DS5 assuming the compatibility is there.

The Logitech F310 (and it's wireless more expensive version) is also an option, but having used it for a while, I often get hand pain after extensive use because it's so bulky. :(

Thanks!

tl;dr : looking for PC controller suggestions that have the same layouts as the PS controllers

FWIW, I hooked up a DS4 to my steam link system a couple years ago (using bluetooth). Connectivity was perfectly fine and it was fully functional. Where I ran into issues was twofold:

a) While Steam has functionality to map keyboard or xbox controller keys to the DS4, you often had to find mapping files for each individual game created by users or make your own. This was problematic, especially for many older titles where no one had created a map yet.

b) All of the ingame notification displays and configuration options will still show xbox buttons.

I tried for a couple months to get used to it and make it work for me. In the end those two annoyances were enough that I gave up and went with a xbox controller. Maybe the Steam mapping experience has improved since then, though I don't recall hearing of major changes.
 

Kairi Zaide

Unforgiven
Aug 11, 2009
104,788
12,221
Quebec City
FWIW, I hooked up a DS4 to my steam link system a couple years ago (using bluetooth). Connectivity was perfectly fine and it was fully functional. Where I ran into issues was twofold:

a) While Steam has functionality to map keyboard or xbox controller keys to the DS4, you often had to find mapping files for each individual game created by users or make your own. This was problematic, especially for many older titles where no one had created a map yet.

b) All of the ingame notification displays and configuration options will still show xbox buttons.

I tried for a couple months to get used to it and make it work for me. In the end those two annoyances were enough that I gave up and went with a xbox controller. Maybe the Steam mapping experience has improved since then, though I don't recall hearing of major changes.
I read something similar about people hooking up the DS5 a week or so ago (since the controller was available before the PS5 launch for some reason). That was my main worry, and it's definitely something I want to avoid having to do.
I'm not much of a controller user, but I bought an 8BitDo controller last year for platform games and like it. It has what I guess is the "PS controller layout," can be used wired or wireless and has no gimmicks. I got the N30 Pro 2, which is modelled after the original NES controller, but there's also the SN30 Pro+, which is modelled more after the SNES controller and has the hand grips that you're probably expecting. I think that it has the same internals as mine, just different exterior. You might want something less retro inspired, but I figured that I'd throw it out there as an option, since it does seem to check a number of your boxes.

8BitDo SN30 Pro+ | 8BitDo
It looks nice but I feel it could be a bit bulky for my hands, to be honnest.

Thanks for the inputs to you two. :)
 
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