KSP1 Computer Building/Buying Megathread

[SpaceplaneAddict]

Hi, I'm humbly just going to ask here what an FX 8350 and r7 370 are like for game playing. Cause those are what my dad bought me. Plox opinion? 

Edited July 10, 2016 by SpaceplaneAddict

[Alphasus]

42 minutes ago, SpaceplaneAddict said:

Hi, I'm humbly just going to ask here what an FX 8350 and r7 370 are like for game playing. Cause those are what my dad bought me. Plox opinion? 

They are fine for Kerbal. The r7 370 might be an issue for more intensive triple a games, but you can play most games that exist now.

[SpaceplaneAddict]

4 hours ago, Alphasus said:

They are fine for Kerbal. The r7 370 might be an issue for more intensive triple a games, but you can play most games that exist now.

Thanks! Did to circumstances, they were the only ones I was allowed to pick, so it's nice to hear they'll at least be good

*Determination.

[Camacha]

On 09/07/2016 at 9:02 AM, Toonu said:

Because I really thinked about instead of buying new PC just change GPU which is bit outdated...
 

It depends on your current hardware, but upgrading the GPU will often yield good results. What CPU do you have now?

7 hours ago, SpaceplaneAddict said:

Hi, I'm humbly just going to ask here what an FX 8350 and r7 370 are like for game playing. Cause those are what my dad bought me. Plox opinion? 

The FX-8350 will do well in properly multi-threaded games and programs. In single threaded applications, a modern Intel chip will slightly outperform it, but the AMD certainly is a fun CPU.

The R7 370 is roughly as fast as the 270X. By today's standard they are not monster cards, but fast enough to play most games at high settings and good framerates. For instance, the Fallout 4 auto-detection will probably set settings to the highest option. That is not bad by any standard and most will say it is pretty good.

You should have a lot of fun with that hardware

 

[E-Rikkie]

HI fellow computer builders. I'm gonna build a new pc for KSP, because the laptop is running a bit hot and i want to install mods.

Been reading around a bit and i selected the following components on which i like your opinions

• I7-6700K
• MSI Z170A GAMING M5
• Kingston HyperX Fury HX421C14FBK2/16

I will use my (old) radeon hd3870 in the beginning but will buy a rx-480 in a few months. And it will run linux on a ssd i already have.

Thanks in advance.

[Camacha]

24 minutes ago, E-Rikkie said:

HI fellow computer builders. I'm gonna build a new pc for KSP, because the laptop is running a bit hot and i want to install mods.

Been reading around a bit and i selected the following components on which i like your opinions

• I7-6700K
• MSI Z170A GAMING M5
• Kingston HyperX Fury HX421C14FBK2/16

I will use my (old) radeon hd3870 in the beginning but will buy a rx-480 in a few months. And it will run linux on a ssd i already have.

Thanks in advance.

Looks good. The i7 has internal graphics and the motherboard seems to be equipped with the appropriate ports, so using the HD3870 will probably be futile. Direct comparisons are a bit hard to find, but it probably would act as just a space heater.

[dewin]

2 hours ago, E-Rikkie said:

I will use my (old) radeon hd3870 in the beginning but will buy a rx-480 in a few months. And it will run linux on a ssd i already have.

It may have changed in the last couple years, but I remember people having very little luck getting KSP, Linux and ATI cards to play nicely.  When I dual booted Mint during 0.90/1.0 so I could run 64-bit KSP, I was glad to have the nvidia card

[Camacha]

17 minutes ago, dewin said:

It may have changed in the last couple years, but I remember people having very little luck getting KSP, Linux and ATI cards to play nicely.  When I dual booted Mint during 0.90/1.0 so I could run 64-bit KSP, I was glad to have the nvidia card

Why were you glad you have an Nvidia card? Did you have an AMD card before and trouble?

[E-Rikkie]

3 hours ago, Camacha said:

Looks good. The i7 has internal graphics and the motherboard seems to be equipped with the appropriate ports, so using the HD3870 will probably be futile. Direct comparisons are a bit hard to find, but it probably would act as just a space heater.

Oh i thought the 3870 would be better than the onboard, but a quick google learned me that it's roughly the same maybe a bit better.... good one, thnx

2 hours ago, dewin said:

It may have changed in the last couple years, but I remember people having very little luck getting KSP, Linux and ATI cards to play nicely.  When I dual booted Mint during 0.90/1.0 so I could run 64-bit KSP, I was glad to have the nvidia card

I tried the 3870 on a Q6600 with mint 18 cinnamon and the cinnamon desktop kept crashing when loading KSP, installed ubuntu 16.04 and i could run it.  prices of the gtx 1060 are still unknown here, but that could also be an option. i'll keep it in mind,

to you too,  thnx.

[dewin]

2 hours ago, Camacha said:

Why were you glad you have an Nvidia card? Did you have an AMD card before and trouble?

I did, yes.  But again, long time ago so the landscape may have changed since then.

[cantab]

The most recent tests I've seen of AMD cards on Linux show utterly abysmal  underwhelming, but better than it used to be, gaming performance. I strongly advise would still rather favour an nVidia card if you have any interest in Linux gaming.

Edited July 12, 2016 by cantab

[Camacha]

8 minutes ago, cantab said:

The most recent tests I've seen of AMD cards on Linux show utterly abysmal gaming performance. I strongly advise an nVidia card if you have any interest in Linux gaming.

Would it be possible to provide a link to those tests?

 

[cantab]

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=amdgpu-rx480-linux

More recent than I last checked, and it looks like things have improved, especially for the RX 480. But it's still underperforming, lagging behind the GTX 970 on Linux when the RX 480 is typically the stronger card on Windows.

[Toonu]

Hi, I have problem with my PC for shorter time. Simply, everytime in any game(mostly KSP) when something is smoking/gas/clouds the pc(fps) start going down pretty fast. I have not the newest i5 processor and HD 5570 GPU. Latest drivers of course...where can be problem? Is the GPU old and not powerful enought or something?

[Elthy]

The HD 5570 is an extremly old low end GPU, meaning its propably the bottleneck.

[Endersmens]

Ok guys. I'm back again. And @Camacha, I have the money now so I'm not recruiting you guys for nothing.  

I have two builds in mind. AMD and Intel. They have changed since I originally posted this, and I'm pretty sure I'm going with the intel build. But for the sake of review, here they are.

AMD build: http://pcpartpicker.com/list/DkFHhq

Intel build: http://pcpartpicker.com/list/X7kzYr

Edited July 13, 2016 by Endersmens

[E-Rikkie]

The parts i listed are ordered, including a scythe cpu cooler \o/

It'll be a spacy weekend.

 

 

[Alphasus]

2 hours ago, Endersmens said:

Ok guys. I'm back again. And @Camacha, I have the money now so I'm not recruiting you guys for nothing.  

I have two builds in mind. AMD and Intel. They have changed since I originally posted this, and I'm pretty sure I'm going with the intel build. But for the sake of review, here they are.

AMD build: http://pcpartpicker.com/list/DkFHhq

Intel build: http://pcpartpicker.com/list/X7kzYr

I did edit your intel build.

http://pcpartpicker.com/list/vgnw6X

Now it has a more modern, faster CPU, more modern motherboard with modern features, slightly cheaper RAM(if you have a preference, you can change that), a non-Sandforce SSD to allow better performance(ask @Camacha about Sandforce), and a semi-modular PSU more fit for your wattage.

http://pcpartpicker.com/list/fw3dXH

Now it has an even faster CPU, more modern motherboard, more expensive but compatible RAM, a non-Sandforce SSD, and the same PSU. 

And here's your AMD build:

http://pcpartpicker.com/list/TL7ZRG

That could take a GTX 1060 instead(like a GTX 980 according to NVIDIA, likely closer to a GTX 970)with the cost savings.

The AMD build will be faster for your video streaming because of the extra cores, and the 1060 can render faster. The Intel build will likely play KSP faster.

Edited July 13, 2016 by Alphasus

[Endersmens]

@Alphasus I was looking for i3s, but I kept forgetting that I was editing a parts list, so compatibility check was on the whole time. That's why I ended up with that processor. So the second intel build, how much better would that be compared to my previous intel build? I'm mostly wanting this computer to be a rig that I can game and record off of, and possibly stream as well. I will also be doing blender renders, and video editing. I'm not really worried about KSP potential, more of just modern computer intensive games that I can't play right now. 

 

Also I don't have a preference for miniITX, in fact I think I would rather go MicroATX instead, if that's a possibility with those other parts.

Edited July 13, 2016 by Endersmens

[Camacha]

27 minutes ago, Endersmens said:

@Alphasus I was looking for i3s, but I kept forgetting that I was editing a parts list, so compatibility check was on the whole time. That's why I ended up with that processor. So the second intel build, how much better would that be compared to my previous intel build? I'm mostly wanting this computer to be a rig that I can game and record off of, and possibly stream as well. I will also be doing blender renders, and video editing. I'm not really worried about KSP potential, more of just modern computer intensive games that I can't play right now. 

Also I don't have a preference for miniITX, in fact I think I would rather go MicroATX instead, if that's a possibility with those other parts.

You seem to have conflicting interests and therefore parts.

- Do you want to stream with hardware or software recording and encoding? The latter requires a more beefy processor, so I would suggest the former. People claim hardware encoding has less quality, but the performance impact is minimal when compared to software encoding. The performance impact of software encoding while also gaming will be significant with an i3.
- An i3 is not ideal for video editing, rendering and software recording and encoding. You typically want as much power as you can get for that. Fast threads are good, but having many of them is also a requirement.
- Gaming, rendering and encoding are typically workloads that mean long periods of sustained CPU or GPU load. A small case heats up quickly, a large case heat up more slowly. You will need excellent airflow either way, but small cases will exacerbate any airflow issues. Will you be CPU or GPU rendering?
 

Edited July 13, 2016 by Camacha

[Endersmens]

1 minute ago, Camacha said:

You seem to have conflicting interests and therefore parts.

- Do you want to stream with hardware or software recording and encoding? The latter requires a more beefy processor, so I would suggest the former. People claim hardware encoding has less quality, but the performance impact is minimal when compared to hardware encoding. The performance impact of software encoding while also gaming will be significant with an i3.
- An i3 is not ideal for video editing, rendering and software recording and encoding. You typically want as much power as you can get for that. Fast threads are good, but having many of them is also a requirement.
- Gaming, rendering and encoding are typically workloads that mean long periods of sustained CPU or GPU load. A small case heats up quickly, a large case heat up more slowly. You will need excellent airflow either way, but small cases will exacerbate any airflow issues. Will you be CPU or GPU rendering?
 

You conflicted yourself a few times, but I think I understand. Maybe. I figured with a 4gb 960 I could GPU render. So are you saying the skylake i3 isn't enough for what I want? Would the Athlon be enough?

[Camacha]

1 minute ago, Endersmens said:

I figured with a 4gb 960 I could GPU render. So are you saying the skylake i3 isn't enough for what I want? Would the Athlon be enough?

I think you are wanting a bit much for the budget you have. They are typically tasks done on beefy systems and among the more demanding tasks people do. You can do them on lighter systems, but the results will scale accordingly.
 

Quote

You conflicted yourself a few times, but I think I understand. Maybe.

 

Hardware rendering is cheap and fast. People claim the result has slightly less quality.
Software rendering eats up CPU power, but has the best quality available. The difference is, in my opinion, somewhat marginal.

 

[Madscientist16180]

Hello everybody!

I'll start by the basic. I have an ageing computer that i want to upgrade à bit. It is a Acer aspire 5811 (Intel Icore5 at 3,2gHz/ 8gb RAM/ 1 terra HDD, gpu Gforce220). The gpu is not original, first one died and i used what i had at the time as replacement.

 

Fact is, i'm à bit lost looking at cards spec. I do not intend to throw hundreds of $ at this, but if i can find something better for let say 100$, i'd be happy.

I play just about only ksp, so getting better performance out of it would be the aim. 

Am I right to just look at number and think à gt220 gotta be worst than à gt610 which should be worst than à gt710?

Best buy got a GT710 for 69$ i simply do not know how to judge. It does look better all around, but will it give me anything like à noticeable improvment in the game? I mean, just being able to use better résolution and maybe some visual mod would classify as Big improvment in my opinion! Lol

 

Tks for advising a lost Kerbal!

 

[Camacha]

3 minutes ago, Madscientist16180 said:

Am I right to just look at number and think à gt220 gotta be worst than à gt610 which should be worst than à gt710?

Never look at numbers! Always look at real world benchmarks. Those are superior and the only way to truly establish performance.

[Endersmens]

2 hours ago, Camacha said:

I think you are wanting a bit much for the budget you have. They are typically tasks done on beefy systems and among the more demanding tasks people do. You can do them on lighter systems, but the results will scale accordingly.
 

Hardware rendering is cheap and fast. People claim the result has slightly less quality.
Software rendering eats up CPU power, but has the best quality available. The difference is, in my opinion, somewhat marginal.

 

When I said you conflicted yourself, you said hardware twice. I bolded it in my quote. You said hardware, as compared to hardware. But I get it now. The thing is, I do these tasks on my current laptop. Which is awful compared to those options. intel core i-7 740QM (That's right, first generation) quad core at 1.7GHz, 4GB RAM at 1066, and a gt330m graphics card. And this is what I currently use for: Gaming, Recording, Blender rendering. I just wanted a big step up. I don't wanna be the very best, obviously, since I have a budget. I want the very best for my budget, and I want something that will be a lot better than my current setup. Something that doesn't drop the framerate to 15fps when I record and the game is already on a lower graphics setting. Does that make sense?