Gaming Rig based on GTX 750 Ti? Improvements on Specs?

CHorn

Looking to build a rig to play World of Tanks and some Steam titles. I'm building around the graphics card (which seems most important) and the GeForce GTX 750 Ti looks a good entry point and gets a good review here: www.tweaktown.com/reviews/6551/asus-geforce-gtx-750-ti-2gb-oc-edition-video-card-review/index16.html .

So a good place to start (admittedly vendor-sponsored) seems here: www.geforce.com/whats-new/guides/geforce-gtx-750-ti-mini-itx-pc-build-guide .

Budget is about what's in the guide (c500 $s or €s). Other than graphics card (and I remain open to suggestions on that, a second hand 270X?), I haven't really decided on much else, though the barebones ASRock H61MV-ITX mobo in the guide looks hard to beat @ c€50 (possibly a MSI H81M-P33 though I see some quality control issues?).

Any suggestions appreciated. Also where in this part of the world it might be best to source?

Digital Solitude

Hardwareversand. German site.

750ti 140
1tb HDD 55
Zalman T1 25
400w psu 50
H81 p33 50
8gb ram 60
I3 4160 115

Total 503 delivered

AntDub

If you're sticking with a 750Ti or a 270x and you wanna save a few euros you can sometimes get a 750Ti for €110 or a 270x for €140-€150 on adverts.ie, make sure you buy from someone with good feedback, says a lot of the person you're dealing with.

AntDub

Sorry, just spotted you've picked out a 400w PSU, 270x would need 500w.

Your ok for the 750Ti with 400w.

crazy7001

Hi I recently bought a rig off of hardwarever sand but I would not recommend it , they lost parts and the shipping was delayed a month and a half. Dont use them use a mix of different sites!

I have a 260x, it is rated just as good as the 750ti but the 260x is cheaper go with the 260x and maybe get the Amd Fx-6300. These two pieces of equipment would result in a mega pc for the price.

Conclusion:
Dont use hardwareversand
Get the 260x and amd fx-6300!

AntDub

crazy7001 wrote: »

Hi I recently bought a rig off of hardwarever sand but I would not recommend it , they lost parts and the shipping was delayed a month and a half. Dont use them use a mix of different sites!

I have a 260x, it is rated just as good as the 750ti but the 260x is cheaper go with the 260x and maybe get the Amd Fx-6300. These two pieces of equipment would result in a mega pc for the price.

Conclusion:
Dont use hardwareversand
Get the 260x and amd fx-6300!

TBH I've also been reading bad things about them recently. Hope you don't mind me asking, how much did you pay for your 260x?

Gumbi

Have used HWVS multiple times (5 or more), never had an issue. 400 watts is plenty for a rig like that, they recommend 500W PSUs to cover for trashy PSUs. A good 350W or more unit would do you fine.

Digital Solitude

350w would cover a 270x no issue, 400w for overhead.

Used HWVS myself, never had an issue, don't buy from multiple sources anyways, you'll get shafted for delivery. HWVS or an EU amazon are what I'd recommend atm

CraigM84

ive got an asus gtx 750ti running in my system, quite surprised by the card. ive never had any issue with it running any of the latest games. and stays quite cool and silent, very good card for it's price

my system:
MSI Z97 Gaming 3
asus gtx 750ti
G-Skill 8GB Ripjaws DDR3 2133
Intel Core i7 4770K
850W power supply cant remember name off (over kill for what i got now :P)
CoolerMaster Stormtrooper Case

cant post links to screen shots

CHorn

Thanks to all of you for your input/suggestions: appreciated. Here's what I'm currently looking at, based on latest prices:

MOBO/CPU/Graphics Card:
ASUS H81M-PLUS H81 Micro-ATX Motherboard - 1150 socket: €62.99 (it's more expensive than other H81Ms, but I've a PC World Gift Card to get rid of and that's all they got)
Palit GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2GB PCI-Express 3.0 HDMI StormX OC: €125.70
Intel Pentium Dual Core G3258 3.20GHz 3MB S1150 Pentium K Anniversary: €61.00
LoL, it's been a long time... My first machine was an Apple IIe... and I'd like to try overclocking...

RAM:
Corsair 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 1600Mhz CL9 Vengeance Low Profile White Performance Desktop Memory Kit: €55.88 (1.35v to help OC effort?)

CASE/POWER:
Zalman T3 Black Mini Tower Case (M-ATX/M-ITX): €22.88
CORSAIR Builder Series CX430 Fixed ATX PSU - 430 W: €49.99 (more expensive than elsewhere, but I still gotta get rid of that PC World Gift Card)

OTHER:
Microsoft Wireless Desktop 800 for Business (Keyboard/Mouse): €21.73
Arctic Cooling MX-4 4gm Thermal Paste: €3.82 (I need this for my laptop too)

TOTAL: €403.99 (c€500 with VAT & Delivery)

Any thoughts/improvements/suggestions appreciated.

Digital Solitude

Get a Cooler Master Hyper Evo 212 if you want to do a large overclock. €30.

Won't need the paste if you use stock fan

Jaafa

CHorn wrote: »

Thanks to all of you for your input/suggestions: appreciated. Here's what I'm currently looking at, based on latest prices:

MOBO/CPU/Graphics Card:
ASUS H81M-PLUS H81 Micro-ATX Motherboard - 1150 socket: €62.99 (it's more expensive than other H81Ms, but I've a PC World Gift Card to get rid of and that's all they got)
Palit GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2GB PCI-Express 3.0 HDMI StormX OC: €125.70
Intel Pentium Dual Core G3258 3.20GHz 3MB S1150 Pentium K Anniversary: €61.00
LoL, it's been a long time... My first machine was an Apple IIe... and I'd like to try overclocking...

RAM:
Corsair 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 1600Mhz CL9 Vengeance Low Profile White Performance Desktop Memory Kit: €55.88 (1.35v to help OC effort?)

CASE/POWER:
Zalman T3 Black Mini Tower Case (M-ATX/M-ITX): €22.88
CORSAIR Builder Series CX430 Fixed ATX PSU - 430 W: €49.99 (more expensive than elsewhere, but I still gotta get rid of that PC World Gift Card)

OTHER:
Microsoft Wireless Desktop 800 for Business (Keyboard/Mouse): €21.73
Arctic Cooling MX-4 4gm Thermal Paste: €3.82 (I need this for my laptop too)

TOTAL: €403.99 (c€500 with VAT & Delivery)

Any thoughts/improvements/suggestions appreciated.

I'm looking at a similar build except in a mITX case. I've read that to achieve good overclocks (4.7Ghz) on the g3258 you need a pretty pricey motherboard 90+ euro, though I suspect this is probably not entirely true. Do you or anyone else have any idea of what would be a decent motherboard to get for the g3258 if I want to overclock to around 4.7ghz and possibly also upgrade to a better CPU in a couple of years?

Digital Solitude

€90 isn't a pricy board, its pretty standard among low end boards.

mITX boards on HWVS are over €100 if you want a Z97.

mATX boards might be a better idea, €80-90 for a selection.

Cooling is the main thing with overclocking, more so than Motherboard quality. Open to correcting there though.

If its for gaming, get an i3, if you want to experiment with over clocks then an AMD might be worth looking at either

Jaafa

Digital Solitude wrote: »

You want a Z97 for over clocking first off.

€90 isn't a pricy board, its pretty standard among low end boards.

mITX boards on HWVS are over €100 if you want a Z97.

mATX boards might be a better idea, €80-90 for a selection.

Cooling is the main thing with overclocking, more so than Motherboard quality. Open to correcting there though.

If its for gaming, get an i3, if you want to experiment with over clocks then an AMD might be worth looking at either

Well pricey relative to the g3258 which is only 60/70.

Really wanna go with a mITX build so trying to stay away from AMD purely due to temps and power. My current ATX build is all AMD.

I was thinking just getting the i3 but I figured an overclocked g3258 would out perform it and even though I'd be buying an expensive motherboard that would lend itself to future CPU upgrades.

However looking at this review: http://www.anandtech.com/show/8232/overclockable-pentium-anniversary-edition-review-the-intel-pentium-g3258-ae

It seems the g3258 is a bit pointless to get really.

So could you perhaps an i3/mobo combination that would be around 150 euro for an ITX build?

Digital Solitude

Jaafa wrote: »

Well pricey relative to the g3258 which is only 60/70.

Really wanna go with a mITX build so trying to stay away from AMD purely due to temps and power. My current ATX build is all AMD.

I was thinking just getting the i3 but I figured an overclocked g3258 would out perform it and even though I'd be buying an expensive motherboard that would lend itself to future CPU upgrades.

However looking at this review: http://www.anandtech.com/show/8232/overclockable-pentium-anniversary-edition-review-the-intel-pentium-g3258-ae

It seems the g3258 is a bit pointless to get really.

So could you perhaps an i3/mobo combination that would be around 150 euro for an ITX build?

Yeah that's fair enough! Meh, newer games won't even launch on the G3258, and even at say 4.5ghz it won't be too far ahead of an i3 due to hyperthreading and turbo mode.

I3 4160
ASRock H81M-ITX

Is 175

Genghiz Cohen

Digital Solitude wrote: »

Yeah that's fair enough! Meh, newer games won't even launch on the G3258, and even at say 4.5ghz it won't be too far ahead of an i3 due to hyperthreading and turbo mode.

No. That's not true.
The G3258 can go blow for blow with an i7 when paired with a 750Ti.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUlS5Q7tEJI

Digital Solitude

I never said it would lag, I said it wouldn't be far ahead.

Plus you've the effort of having to over clock it, stability test and making sure all your temps are grand, its not worth it IMO.

lickme

Digital Solitude wrote: »

You want a Z97 for over clocking first off.

€90 isn't a pricy board, its pretty standard among low end boards.

mITX boards on HWVS are over €100 if you want a Z97.

mATX boards might be a better idea, €80-90 for a selection.

Cooling is the main thing with overclocking, more so than Motherboard quality. Open to correcting there though.

If its for gaming, get an i3, if you want to experiment with over clocks then an AMD might be worth looking at either

No you don't need an Z87 or Z97 to overclock. You can over overclock on most H81 motherboard these days. I have my g3258 overclocked to 4.3 Ghz on a MSI h81-c. Perfect motherboards for budgets bills

Digital Solitude

lickme wrote: »

No you don't need an Z87 or Z97 to overclock. You can over overclock on most H81 motherboard these days. I have my g3258 overclocked to 4.3 Ghz on a MSI h81-c. Perfect motherboards for budgets bills

Wasn't aware of that, I'll fix my post above.

Seems the Pentium's can be over clocked on H series, but Cores need a Z, which I hadn't realised!

TerrorFirmer

Genghiz Cohen wrote: »

No. That's not true.
The G3258 can go blow for blow with an i7 when paired with a 750Ti.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUlS5Q7tEJI

It can in single player. It can't touch the i7 in multiplayer. I did pretty extensive benchmarks with the GTX980 and a G3258@4.4Ghz a while back on this forum.

It does offer insane performance for the price though. 80% of games it performs as good as the i7 with a good card. That other 20% show it's weaknesses pretty badly though.

CHorn

Jaafa wrote: »

I'm looking at a similar build except in a mITX case. I've read that to achieve good overclocks (4.7Ghz) on the g3258 you need a pretty pricey motherboard 90+ euro, though I suspect this is probably not entirely true. Do you or anyone else have any idea of what would be a decent motherboard to get for the g3258 if I want to overclock to around 4.7ghz and possibly also upgrade to a better CPU in a couple of years?

In my reading for this project not at all- here is an example of 4.4Ghz on a Pentium using an H81M, and he suggests 4.7-8 is possible. Others have used a Z97M-PLUS to also get to 4.7, but then you're paying significantly more for the MOBO and this makes little sense for my objectives (cheap and cheerful bang for buck OCing down memory lane to play World of Tanks++).

The G3258 (btw it's Intel's Pentium 20th Anniversary Edition and a present to enthusiasts in that's is specifically made overclockable) is about the cheapest piece of kit on the list @ €61, and for c€40 you can get an H81M (I'd have picked the ASRock H81M-DGS R2.0 Intel H81 1150 Micro myself personally if I didn't have to go through PC World with a gift card). That's €100 for MOBO AND CPU plus this indicates this combo can get i7-4770K performance on the types of games I'd play.

Going up on MOBO you're looking at Z97 it seemed to me, and I've no interest in dual video card gaming or most of the other bells and whistles a Z97 offers. The H81M and G3258 seem ideally suited, one of the few drawbacks I can see (for me) is a 1600Mz limit on RAM. When I look again at upgrading, both MOBO and CPU will be throwaways or ebays. The rest of the kit is pretty cheap and cheerful, excepting the GTX750 ti, which the system is really built around.

I've found (with my work Dell Inspiron N5050 into which I recently piled an i5-2540M) that HEAT IS THE #1 ENEMY. I've spent hours with various cooling attempts on that to stop thermal throttling, ranging from milk bottle tops to keep the thing off the ground to a cooling pad to cleaning the internals/fan to Arctic Silver. 1 reason on a desktop build I didn't go micro. Also why I didn't go AMD and looked for low power parts. And if you're apprehensive about OCing (I am) there's an awful lot of material and help available out there.

I've done a lot of research myself on this and am happy to share the rationale behind any piece of kit I'm buying (and links behind it), especially given the amount of help I've received here- and thank you all.