I think I am going to upgrade my PC, I currently have a Phenom II X4 965 BE, and an older Asus Motherboard (dont remember the model), a ATI 7950 3GB and 8GB of RAM. I think I am going to upgrade to a i5-4670k, ASRock Z87 Extreme6 and add a 2nd ATI 7950. I may also upgrade to 16GB of RAM. I am not 100% sure about the motherboard, as I have not use ASRock before, but they seem to be getting good reviews. Plus Newegg had a deal on the Processor and the Mobo. I am looking for another set of eyes and some suggestions on an upgrade path. I am not keen on getting rid of the 7950, simply because I do not think I will get much money for it. I am trying to spend around 650 or less, but I could spend a but more if something is worth it. I did not see any reason to go with the i7 Haswell, and it seemed silly to drop to an Ivy bridge processor when that socket will be going away. One note, I was thinking about the Asus Z87 Pro, but I have no need for the wireless, but I do have more experience with Asus.
This is what I came up with based on your wants: PCPartPicker. The price comes out to $795.94. It may go down once you find a matching video card.
Gihzmo, where in VA do you live? My brother lives in Nova and has used the microcenter there. I love microcenter, but you have to be physically close enough to get to one, most of their good deals are in store only. For instance, they have the 4670k for $199, and then you can bundle it with a MB with an additional $40 discount. So you could get both at Microcenter for $381 (w/ tax). $258 seems like a great price on a 7950, that's about what some of the OCed 7870s were selling for earlier this year. The Nvidia 760s have really pushed the price down on the 7950s. I hear there can be quite a few problems with Crossfire setups and drivers though. Can your psu handle two 79xx series cards? They're not terribly power efficient, so two of them with any kind of overclock might be a problem w/o a high quality psu.
NCIX has a US store I used recently. They care some items that other places don't and have competative prices. The web site isn't the simplest to get around in but I did not have any issues with my order or items that I ordered. Shipping was a bit slow compared to Newegg but I think NE has a facility closer to me. NCIX seems to be out of one location. Just be sure if you go their that your on the US site as they are primarily a CA company. I went their for some BeQuite! products.
I live in southern VA, so that would a bit of a trip. Newegg has basically the same deal (384), which is why I was looking at the ASRock http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.1413783. I have a 750W PS http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371026 I checked a PS Calculator with the setup and it said 510W ATI Just reelased a beta driver that they are starting to use frame pacing that should be fixing some of the issues CF has had vs SLI, apparently because SLI has been using it for a while. This is the one I am going to get because it matches my existing http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125414 Through Newegg, I can get everything for 639.97. I was hoping I could sell some of my old stuff to a buddy of mine, but I think he is going to go on Ebay and order an older Dell Xeon Workstation. Plus through Newegg you get http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16800995173
I was just looking at the current results (well the gtx 780 tests on tom's hardware) and started to think about going with ATI even with already having a watercooling system waiting for me to buy a 680 to use it with. Looking at the crossfire and specifically the Cry3 results had me going with the 680 with no second thoughts. Hopefully ATI improves the performance of the crossfire (my mb is cf only no sli) but I'm not counting on it. Between MWO and SC using Cryengine I'm building specifically for it and Nvidia seems to be winning at it.
Here is some info on what ATI has done http://www.amdoverclock.net/amd-frame-pacing-explored-catalyst-13-8-brings-consistency-to-crossfire/
good info, thats looking much better. This is the one I read http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/geforce-gtx-780-performance-review,3516.html its from late may so it shouldn't be totally on target now. The frame time variance was one of the big things I had been looking at for favoring the 680 over the 7970 along with the slightly stronger frame rate. I'm also planning on running surround so the ability to do with the single 680 is nice to save some money
From reading on others experiences and some of my own, I am not going to go with an Asus board. Their customer service is not any better then it used to be. So I think I am going to go with an MSI board: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00D12OBYK/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER Any thoughts?
