The Computer Megathread

[Ethan]

how good is this for the price wise

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136533 

and this
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814500202

That's an extremely expensive hard drive, but it's good quality. I would not spend that, though. Much cheaper ones here:
http://us.ncix.com/products/?minorcatid=109
Just don't get a Green for consumer use. They are more for backups and not for running programs off.

Also, if you can't take advantage of the rebate, get this for a little bit more instead:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150561
However if you can, it's decent.

Ok, I'm looking for a pair of 1067 mhz ddr3 memory sticks for my late 2008 MacBook, both with 2gbs each. (I don't know anything about memory so I might have gotten that wrong)
Preferably something that's cheap

Couple of these 2GB sticks:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820146877
Question, how much RAM is in it now?

[Ad Bot]

[Mr.jacksaunt]

Couple of these 2GB sticks:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820146877
Question, how much RAM is in it now?

2 GB RAM installed currently. Two 1 GB sticks

[Ethan]

2 GB RAM installed currently. Two 1 GB sticks

And you're gonna replace it with 2x2GB for 4GB total?
Good idea.

[Mr.jacksaunt]

And you're gonna replace it with 2x2GB for 4GB total?
Good idea.

Thank you for the help, $60 was my budget for an upgrade, and you significantly decreased that ammount.

[mlockha]

I need a good pre-built desktop pc under 800$. Do you have any good ideas ethan?

[Teneksi]

What's the difference between AMD and Intel? Is AMD magically far superior?

I'm having people flipping their stuff because I bought Intel and Nvidia.

[Ethan]

What's the difference between AMD and Intel? Is AMD magically far superior or am I just experiencing insulted fanboy attacks?

Different brands. Different technologies to solve the same problems.
AMD used to dominate the CPU market in the days of the Athlon 64. Then in the Core 2 Duo days, Intel really won performance, and AMD hasn't had any big architecture changes to combat that, even right through Intel's changing from Pentium, to C2D, to C2E, to i3, i5 and i7, and even Sandy Bridge.
Until AMD Bulldozer, released a month or so ago. These are the 8 core Zambezi's that you see. This is the first major architecture change on AMD's side for about 8 or so years. However this is the first stage of this architecture so it's not beating Intel's Sandy Bridge in gaming, but it is beating them in multitasking and stuff like encoding due to its number of cores. Apparently the next refinement of this architecture will be next year, and will really blow away Intel. We can only wait and hope.
Intel is coming out with another refinement soon as well, called Ivy Bridge. Should be interesting.

[Legodude77]

Yeah but why bother.

Because I kind a like small computers. :c

[Nickelob Ultra]

What's the difference between AMD and Intel? Is AMD magically far superior?

I'm having people flipping their stuff because I bought Intel and Nvidia.

I bought Intel and Nvidia.

As far as I'm concerned I prefer them because I think they are higher quality.  Various users, research, etc. will argue otherwise and I highly encourage choosing on your own based on what you want.  I just prefer Intel/Nvidia.  However I would never make a build with Intel/AMD graphics just out of personal experiences with other people.

[Ethan]

I need a good pre-built desktop pc under 800$. Do you have any good ideas ethan?

Look in to an iBuyPower. I configured one with a Phenom 925 BE, and a HD6950 that came to about $850. But, if you want to strictly keep it under $800, you could drop $100 off for a HD6870, and then chuck a flash case and some nice lighting or something on.

[Ethan]

I bought Intel and Nvidia.

As far as I'm concerned I prefer them because I think they are higher quality.  Various users, research, etc. will argue otherwise and I highly encourage choosing on your own based on what you want.  I just prefer Intel/Nvidia.  However I would never make a build with Intel/AMD graphics just out of personal experiences with other people.

I prefer AMD for both CPU and GPU.
I won't interfere with your opinion, but I will add that my Intel 990X with 2 x 6990's in CF performs pretty well, better than I expected, and isn't that much worse/less compatible than my AMD 8150 with 2 x 6990's in CF, although AMD does prefer AMD GPUs.
Which I think is a good thing because nVidia signed a deal first with Intel about their platforms being more compatible than with AMD alternatives.

[Otis Da HousKat]

I prefer AMD for both CPU and GPU.
I won't interfere with your opinion, but I will add that my Intel 990X with 2 x 6990's in CF performs pretty well, better than I expected, and isn't that much worse/less compatible than my AMD 8150 with 2 x 6990's in CF, although AMD does prefer AMD GPUs.
Which I think is a good thing because nVidia signed a deal first with Intel about their platforms being more compatible than with AMD alternatives.

What do you use your fancy $1000 CPU for? I have one too is why I ask.

[Ethan]

What do you use your fancy $1000 CPU for? I have one too is why I ask.

It's my gaming machine.
My 8150 isn't that great for gaming and the next one down, a Phenom 8650 tri-core unlocked to quad-core, and overclocked from 2.3GHz to 3GHz isn't very good, lol. Yay athlon technology.

So yeah, I quite spontaneously feel like playing a game quite often, so I don't want to swap from computer to computer so I just stay on this one (990X). My 8150 is beside me as a kind of second computer where it does the grunty stuff, like some photo editing that I do etc. I must say it's an improvement over the old Phenom for that kind of stuff :D

[mlockha]

Look in to an iBuyPower. I configured one with a Phenom 925 BE, and a HD6950 that came to about $850. But, if you want to strictly keep it under $800, you could drop $100 off for a HD6870, and then chuck a flash case and some nice lighting or something on.

I'm liking that site. The prices are pretty high there but they look good. Thanks!

[Otis Da HousKat]

The 990X seems a bit excessive for gaming only. I use mine for live streaming 1080p videos where it would literally be impossible to do with any other processor out there right now.