System Buyer’s Guide: $1700 Performance Midrange
by Mike Jones and Jarred Walton on May 12, 2010 4:52 AM ESTClosing Thoughts
As usual, with the passage of time the amount of performance you can get for your dollar has increased quite a bit, and there are a ton of options. The choice today between midrange AMD and Intel platforms is really a question of priorities. Intel still wins the performance crown in single-threaded performance and has a commanding lead in many of our gaming results. Intel also appears to benefit from application specific optimizations in a few tests (i.e. 3dsmax). However, for thread-heavy work the AMD 1055T generally beats out Intel, sometimes by a large margin. Your choice boils down to 10~25% better multithreaded performance on AMD versus gaming performance that's anywhere from 5% to a whopping 60% faster on Intel. In most other areas, performance is close enough to not worry too much, which means we need to look at other factors.
For the same price, you can get similar features like SATA 6Gbps and USB3 (SATA6 is native with the 890GX on AMD, though). The Intel platform does use around 15W to 40W less power, however, so for a 24/7 system that works out to $13 to $35 per year--or just $4 to $12 per year for a system that's on eight hours per day. That being the case, depending on your particular needs you can go with either system and be happy. Gamers and "greenies" will likely prefer the Intel system while the content creators and video editors will like the AMD setup.
If you're not sure which system is right for you, again, we suggest you look at our complete Bench results. We've included the above chart with some of the more popular benchmarks to give you an idea of what to expect. While the components aren't the same as what we recommend in this guide, most of the differences will be slight. The Bench setup uses an appropriate motherboard/chipset for each platform, with an HD 5870 GPU and an SSD. The performance difference in gaming will be lower than what we show in our Bench results, mostly because the GPU becomes more of a bottleneck, but other than that, the performance will be very similar to what you see in those results.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
102 Comments
View All Comments
7Enigma - Monday, October 4, 2010 - link
Just wanted to update this build guide (since it's the last) with some words of caution. I built my dad a rig 4 months ago with many of the parts on this list (actually pretty much all of them). The Gigabyte UD3 mobo was a great piece that after some initial trouble (mobo and case didn't have a speaker so I couldn't hear the beeps) seemed to work great. I left everything at stock speeds since my dad uses this as a gaming rig exclusively and is only on a 24" LCD with the 5850. Since nothing he was playing was taxing the system I left everything stock.So I get a call a couple weeks ago that he was getting a power cycling issue. He tried it the next day and it worked again. 2 weeks later though everything stopped working and it would just cycle on and off....I came over and removed the heatsink and CPU and there was a pin just lying in there disconnected from the mobo!!!
Contacted Gigabyte through newegg.com's reviews and have received no answer from them. To top it off there are a SLEW of 1 and 2 ratings in the last couple months of dead and faulty boards, most with the exact same issues my dad's system had. I'm fine with a defective part, but will not stand for poor/no customer service to make things right.
I've built my last 3 systems with Gigabyte mobo's and loved the frequent bios updates and quality of the boards. But I've had to switch (to an Asus also recommended in this review), and will not be going back unless I see the PR and customer service improve drastically from this company.
You have been warned.
Williamhoalo - Tuesday, June 9, 2020 - link
How to establish a Great ProfileFinding the man of your dreams on the internet is possible with just a few clicks of the mouse! If you sign up for a online dating site your cold, Lonely night times might soon be over. With just some amount of money, You could be a member and obtain various eligible bachelors profiles. appear that you opt for a paid https://myspace.com/datingmoldovawomen">moldova beauty dating site, As it is much safer and people are seriously interested in finding a partner. Your profile is the first thing people get to see about you so creating a great https://www.behance.net/moldovawomen">moldova brides profile is important you ought to succeed in online dating as the number of replies you get basically depends on what you have written on your profile. This is where men get their first impression of you and what you are offering so make sure you keep them wanting more!If you have no idea how to write your profile these tips may help you get started:1 Avoid disbelief in your profile because negativeness doesn t get a man s interest. instead of putting your dislikes, Put your favs on your profile. A guy is that are turned off if you just whine and complain in your profile. 2 Be former! toy trucks funny, sensible headers. with the exception of your photo, Your header will be the basis for a guy s judgment. If you write the same boring header so many other women have used already then a guy isn t going to notice you either. 3 Your photos is recent. If you use a photo from years ago a guy isn t going to recognize you when you meet up and going on a date in real life is the whole point of online dating service. This is what you look like now and will when you meet up eventually might as well let him know what you look like in the first place. 4 Be honest in your appearance and civil status; stated, sustain your full name, Work and home talk about, And home number confidential. Just remember when you read your own profile you should want to get to know that person better and not feel like you know all to know.