Looking to hunt for new hardware in WA, AUS, News of new hardware welcomed

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Built my rig around 2010 using mid tier parts after my lappy's graphics card had a meltdown followed by the whole lappy blowing up and it's already looking like a time to give it an upgrade.

Mainly looking for a new graphics card (currently using ATi HD5770) perhaps a new motherboard (some cheap ASUS low mid tier motherboard, burned one of the sata2 ports already) and a chipset (currently on i5 [email protected]). This goes without saying I have already given a thought that I would possibly need to get new RAM depending on the new hardware bought (currently 4gb ddr2? or was it 3?) and a new x64 window 7 OS. Closet is cramped with not-dead bodies and not-weapons so I'm too lazy to dig the boxes out and specify the model for now.

New semester is already cramping up my timetable like no tomorrow and I've got tons of stuff to play catch up with. If any Australian peeps manage to find a good offer/sales for the parts I specified, please do leave a post here for me to see it too. Would appreciate managing to scrounge up parts without putting too much time hunting for it.

Edit : I would also appreciate anyone dropping a link or two on newer or upcoming hardware.
 
There's a tendency to drop new hardware in tiers. When there's a new chip generation, you'll have to upgrade everything. Video cards run on a separate pattern, so if you're looking for something to upgrade, and not get a whole new computer, look there.

If you're an ati fan, 7950 is a great card, comparable to a 580.

Not sure where you buy **** upside down, so I'll let you google it, or
 
Ivy bridge should come out this month (1155 socket). New Nvidia cards may or may not come out this month (been reading reports that they plan on releasing lower tier cards first which you might be interested in).

Other then that there would just be the usual new arrivals of ram, hard drives ssds and the like. If you just need a new graphics card though a good mid tier one is the 560, I posted a link in a similar thread showing a driver update they did to it which made running skyrim 45% better in some settings.

Not sure what sites give good deals in Australia so I have no clue what anything would even cost.
 
I could find out the cost and do further pondering when I have the time to fix up the damn box, but for now, product updates would do great. I'm just keen to hear if Moss or anyone else in Australia know some good deals.

Also might be looking to get something a bit on the higher end for graphics card this time round. Last time it was because I was in a rush for a working computer that I just went out and bought every mid range item I could get my hands on. I regret not picking up a x64 windows 7 OS immediately after that. I should still have a few thousand bucks to spare by the end of this semester, hopefully.

As a benchmark of sorts, I'm looking for something that would at least be able to support thousand men battles on Warband. That sort of calculating computing power possible yet? It should be, my 2 year old rig could easily support 250 on Brytenwalda with minimum lag.
 
Game would crash most likely before obtaining those results. I'll see how high I can get tonight in my 580.Best single card on the market right now is the amd 7970 which go for around $700 us. In a few months Nvidia will have their new products which should be better but who knows. Getting a card before the highest is probably wiser unless you have tons of cash since there is minimal performance gains usually the higher up you go.
 
1155, motherboards for current 1155s will still work but will require a chipset update. The only benefit of waiting on the new motherboards would be more up to date features like usb 3 and probably other minor stuff.

I'm still waiting on the 3770k to come out before buying any new computer parts right now since the longer you wait the cheaper prices get.
 
They already have USB 3 on some of the higher end Motherboards. But yeah, heard new Nvidia's gonna roll out soonish as well. Contemplating whether I should wait until XBox 720 to appear before upgrading.
 
$500 is the price I am seeing for the new 680. If that is the case expect amd to lower their prices too, or get demolished by nvidia.
 
hmm, looking to get this power supply because the one I've gotten from the last purchase was a real cheap 550w one, not even sure if it's gonna blow. RAM and currently undecided whether I should get Motherboard A, Motherboard B, or Motherboard C.

I'm partial toward A, because provided that the Gigabyte Motherboard lives long and prospers, I can actually upgrade to better RAM the next time round without dumping the motherboard.
 
DDR4 will probably be out before you need to upgrade again though :p

I don't really have a favorite between any of those motherboards (man I hate those color schemes they use). I would say not to get the second one unless your building your computer in a smaller case since it is a micro atx which is quite small.
 
Full size case that I've got for 6 dollars. Man I just don't care bout looks. :lol:
I'll screw the motherboard on the wall if my tenancy agreement allowed me to drill holes. Seriously, I have nailguns, drills and other stuff that I can't use.

B's out then, didn't like it much. I think it'll boil down to which one is in stock when I'm up for the purchase, but it'll be A preferably.

Edit : Apparently Ivy i7s require a Z77 motherboard. Updated motherboard choice A and B. Also have my eyes fixed on GTX 670 if money happens to be no object. Currently looking at i7 3770k but that might prove to be too expensive.
 
Unless you're a video editor, then I'm not sure it will even use more than 4 cores (not that many games use more than 2 anyway)
 
i5 and i7 are both 4 cores, with i5 having 4 thread and i7 having 8. And I have no idea what differences them thread make.

Also I'm curious of the next generation console's performance requirement since I'm not planning for another overhaul for at least another 3 years after this purchase.
 
I was under the impression that threads were virtual cores, i.e. the I7 has 8 virtual cores, where as the i5 has 4.
 
The i5 has 4 physical cores whereas the i7s have 4 physical and 4 virtual (hyperthreading they call usually).


Cookie Eating Huskarl said:
Edit : Apparently Ivy i7s require a Z77 motherboard. Updated motherboard choice A and B. Also have my eyes fixed on GTX 670 if money happens to be no object. Currently looking at i7 3770k but that might prove to be too expensive.

Don't need z77, any previous board will work with a bios update. The new boards have better memory overclocking and most have sata3 and inboard usb3.

If your just using it for games don't bother with an i7. Only useful for cpu intensive programs that can handle multiple cores which is usually photo and video editing. I had to turn off hyperthreading before since bf3 in an earlier version didn't like it very much.

I was waiting for the ivy bridge chips to come out but they overclock poorly compared to sandy bridge so I may just buy a 2500k instead.
 
Still need to replace the motherboard since I burned some of the ports already. But I think since the z77 is quite cheap now, I'll just grab it to ensure compatibility should I upgrade the chip down the line. Also I don't overclock my stuff, so on default raw performance of the third gen chips should top second gen chips right?

Also saw some benchmarks a while ago, was weird that third gen chips didn't seemed to like running games much. Most of the third gens produced slightly lower FPS than second gens for some reason.
 
Benchmarks for what :???:

Unless the 2nd gen was overclocked the third gen would outperform it in anything. They have a new graphic chip integrated into them which makes them better at running games (without the use of a third party card) so I find that hard to believe.

Z77 is probably more expensive now then the others but probably not by much, depending which board and manufacturer of course.
 
Obviously not going for high end ones. I'm a poor student remember? :lol:

It wasn't much difference (1-4 fps and not in the noticeable range, plus the benchmark did not account for heavy loading and stuff like that. I would love a stable 48 more than a 60 that plunges every now and then) and you're right. It's a benchmark of overclocked 2nd gens vs the overclocked 3rd gens. The other parameters are constant, including a 3rd party graphics card since they are advising upgrades I believe.

Damn, both my preferred motherboards are out of stock. Well better pick up the 3570k before they go out of stock.

Edit : bought this, this and this today. Motherboard's out of stock and the staff refuse to tell me when is the new Nvidia's coming.

Edit 2 : Gotten the motherboard and a generic 2TB HDD. Just waiting for them to stock up on GTX 670.
 
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