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Just looking for a bit of advice.

Current PC set-up:
CPU: Intel i7 940
MB: MSI X58 Eclipse SLI
GC: Nvidia GTX 580
RAM: 6GB DD3 1600

I'm thinking of just updating my CPU, RAM and MB, however I know next to nothing about PC building. Is that a viable option or do I have to get a new case/RAM? Not sure how the motherboard/CPU attaches to it. Is there anything I should know or just get the new MB/CPU?

Nowadays, if you're getting a new CPU, odds are you're going to need a new motherboard. Because you're a neophyte, I'll assume that you have zero knowledge, so I apologize if any of this is "well, DUH" to you.

There are a multitude of pin configurations for CPUs out there. Because of this, motherboards and CPUs aren't interchangable between different brands and types. The pin configurations can vary based on how many cores the CPU has, what company produces it, etc... So, I highly recommend generally getting the two together. That also generally assures that you will be getting the same generation of motherboard of your processor so you don't end up with one that has features that the other doesn't support.

As for RAM, you just have to make sure that your new motherboard supporst DD3 RAM, which should be pretty much anything current out there. If you're really concerned about memory clock speeds and data pipelines, that's something to consider when getting the motherboard, but if all your really looking for is to have the memory work adequately, you don't really have to worry about anything but the size of the memory and the pin configuration (which is far more universal than CPU configurations).

Your graphics card isn't bad at all, so that's something I would only consider upgrading if you want to get in on a newer generation, but that card supports DX11, so you should be fine. I think that's the same graphics card I have and I'm just fine with running everything at max graphics settings, so if anything, I'd SLI before getting a whole new card.

Thanks for the info, that was actually really informative. I planned on getting a new MB/CPU combo but don't want to spend more than maybe 800? I went to Alienware to see what they're putting in their systems right now and since they don't show you the motherboard they're using I was only able to find out that they're using about 500-700 cpus. So I'd have to balance that price in with a motherboard and maybe add another 2gb stick of RAM to up the system to 8gb.

As for the video card, I think I might wait another generation or as you said, SLI another one because it seems to be handling itself well still:
http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/high_end_gpus.html

Really, for the money, it's one of the best cards out there.

Might just consider getting a second one for SLI after the MB/CPU purchase, depending on funds.

As far as a new case goes, if you have a good one, there's literally zero reason to get a new one unless you want it to look prettier. Same with monitor, mouse, keyboard, etc...

I wasn't sure how -attached- to the case the MB/CPU are.

If I want to go full blown upgrade on MB and CPU it's looking to be around $1200 but if I downgrade slightly on both it's around $800. Wondering if it's worth that much of a difference in price.

They're attached by nothing but screws

Any standard ATX motherboard will fit in a standard ATX tower. It's one of the few universally swapable components.

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel Core i7-3930K @ 3.20GHz
vs
http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel Core i7-3770K @ 3.50GHz

Is my debate at this point I think, as choosing one will of course choose the motherboard I pick.

The question becomes Quad Core with a faster speed or Six Core with a slower one.

Oh and my case is HUGE (double entendre ftw) so no worries about fitting anything in it. (I did it again )

Ok this is the plan, how's it looking:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116492
+
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131801
with
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820220710
and a second GTX580 for SLI.
Total cost is $1,300.

Your system is good enough now that unless you absolutely can't stand how your system is performing right now, I would hold off until mid-2013 for a new build.
Yes, really...there is expected to be a pretty big difference between the current sandy/ivy bridge and the upcoming Haswell architecture.

That said, upgrading to 3770 will net you a power savings (80W v. 130W) and about a 15-20% performance increase over your current 940, but would require replacing your motherboard to support it.
Upgrading to Haswell later would require another motherboard replacement (new socket) which is why I recommend holding off.
Best bang-for-buck is probably going the SLI route unless you find that you are primarily limited by your CPU (i.e., you play a lot of Starcraft II). Otherwise it's the GPU upgrade that will make the most difference.

--Patrick

I think my issue is that I'm not longer able to play games like FEAR3 and Call of Pripryat at 100% max settings. I can play them at about 1-2 settings drop in everything smoothly but full settings I get 30-50fps hits. The biggest issue for me is -stutter-. I want it GONE. When I play at 2 settings below max, it flows like water but most of everything gets a blurryness since I can up the sharpness settings.
I was considering the upgrade to the LGA2011 slot as it would hold me over longer with better RAM and faster processing on the CPU.

Waiting till mid-2013 could be an option but why is this new architecture so overwhelmingly better?

First, let me correct myself. I meant to say that the only upgrades I would do right now would be ones I would be sure I could take with me. SSD, RAM, GPU, etc. but nothing which is tied to a particular CPU or MLB.

Gilgamesh said:

why is this new architecture so overwhelmingly better?

Click to expand...

The Haswell architecture will have PCIe 3.0, SATA-3, and USB 3.0 right on the chipset (no extra chips needed). It will support the new AVX2.0 instructions and 256-bit integers (which promises speedup of between 1.5x-2x for integer operations). The newer integrated graphics will support newer video format decode and will be 50-100% faster than current Ivy Bridge (3770k) at both graphics speed as well as quick sync video conversion due to an increase in the shader count from 16 (top-end ivy bridge) to 40 (haswell). They are supposed to all support DDR3-1600 natively (rather than requiring an over clock). A lot more logic moves to the CPU, meaning more of a reduction in motherboard chip count, which means tighter control and less power use by MLB (though it also probably means less leeway for over clocking). Oh, and Haswell is supposed to better support the new Thunderbolt standard, also.
Basically Haswell will be a faster CPU with the faster technologies (USB3, etc) baked right in rather than having to put additional bridge chips between your stuff and the CPU.
Disclaimer: So far it's all theoretical and based on specs, as the people with the chips aren't talking yet (still probably all under NDA).

Source1 Source2 Source3

--Patrick

I think it will be awhile before I even think about upgrading anything. In the last year, I've replaced nearly all the innards of my computer out of necessity (HDD, Mobo, GPU, CPU, power supply). Everything seemed to just go kaput on me this year. On the plus side, I now have a nifty modular power supply, a more powerful processor, and better graphics card, so I aint complaining. Oh, and I also added 16GB of ram.

Bowielee said:

They're attached by nothing but screws

Any standard ATX motherboard will fit in a standard ATX tower. It's one of the few universally swapable components.

Click to expand...

Agree, however there is one component that's notorious for not being universally swappable for cases: the video card. Some of those things are really REALLY long, and only some cases can hold them. Hell, there's even a few motherboards that "behave badly" and have connectors/capacitors off the end of where the card should be seated, meaning only certain length cards work with it. That's about 50/50 the card's fault versus the mobo design's fault.

So never really fret about "will my mobo fit in my case?" They all will. Fret over "will my mobo block my video card, and is my video card too f'n big?" That's the most frequent issue IMO.

That can be an issue, however, if the video card that he currently have fits in his case, a new one will not be an issue unless he's got an extremely funky case. The acutual positioning of the PCIe slots will be just as standard as the rest of the motherboard for the most part.

Obviously, as with anything there are exceptions, such as funky cooling aparatus, or custom cases, or really old cases, but if his current setup fits a current gen motherboard this won't be a problem.

I DO remember the days when they would put the PCI and VGA slots all over the damn place, but that's really not so much an issue anymore.

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/motherboards/2008/12/08/msi-eclipse-sli/2

This is my current board, and with the chunky video card that the GTX580 is, I'm not 100% sure I could fit a second into the case.

The issue he's addressing is the case moreso than the motherboard. Seeing as the positioning of the slots is pretty much the same nowadays, if you want to know if you can fit a second card for SLI, simply take your existing card and move it to the lowest PCIe slot and see if it fits. If it does, you're good. FYI, the reason you'd use the bottom PCIe slot is that the SLI bridge is designed that way. Some of them are made of hard plastic and require it, however some of the newer SLI bridges are ribbons. Either way, I'd use the bottom PCIe slot even if the connector is a ribbon because that way you don't have any slack on it that can cause physical space issues with closing your case and such.

I'm wondering if that second GTX580 will stop the issues I'm having with newer gen games. If that's the case I can spend the $350 and be done with it for a while longer (till the new MBs are out).

Well, it would depend. When I was using SLI with my old GeForce 8800 cards the biggest benefit was from having one card be dedicated to PhysX. Of course, that only played a part in games that were programmed for PhysX (most modern PC games are).

The only thing that SLI will give you (aside from a slightly larger power bill) is a higher frame rate.
However, the frame rate will be a bit stuttery, which may or may not drive you insane.

--Patrick

Well the issue is random frame rate drops. Most new games I'll be at 60-100fps but everytime stuff starts to happen or get crowded it'll dip between 20-100 randomly. The only way to resolve this is turn down everything graphically so that when stuff does start happening, it stays smooth.

That might not be your GPU. The hard part is going to be profiling your system to see what was really being taxed...your GPU, your CPU, or your HDD. Then upgrade as appropriate. If someone else has a higher-end GPU you could test with, that could work, but it's just as likely that your CPU is being swamped and unable to keep the GPU fed fast enough to keep your frame rates up.

--Patrick

Also, 6GB of RAM isn't a lot nowadays.

PatrThom said:

That might not be your GPU. The hard part is going to be profiling your system to see what was really being taxed...your GPU, your CPU, or your HDD. Then upgrade as appropriate. If someone else has a higher-end GPU you could test with, that could work, but it's just as likely that your CPU is being swamped and unable to keep the GPU fed fast enough to keep your frame rates up.

--Patrick

Click to expand...

That's why I was thinking of focusing on CPU/MB/RAM....

You'd be amazed how much doubling that ram may improve your performance.

Yeah was thinking of going from 3x2gb sticks to 2x8gb sticks. However I wanted the higher end RAM that would require a new MB and if I'm doing a new MB I need a new CPU blah blah blah

I'm currently running 16GB of ram with four 4GB sticks. I did get the higher clock speed due to a new motherboard. Sometimes when upgrading a computer, there's a technological domino effect.

Bowielee said:

Sometimes when upgrading a computer, there's a technological wallet domino effect.

Click to expand...

FTFY

(This is what tends to kill it for me, btw. You go to change your HDD and then realize your MLB won't do Sata3 or some junk, and 2 weeks later you'll find yourself sitting in the middle of a bunch of NewEgg boxes crying over the smoldering remains of your credit card)

--Patrick

I don't mind the spending of money (as I only upgrade once every 3 years) as long as the tech I buy will hold it's own for 3yrs. If I buy a MB/CPU/RAM this month, I know it'll hold it's own for 3yrs. However, usually there's only a small jump in tech over the course of my 3yr wait. From the way PatrThom put it, it seems the tech coming in March of next year is much bigger and worth waiting on instead of upgrading now to hold me over.

Just took a run through the manual. If you're interested in trying to run down your bottleneck, try the following:
-I am assuming you have 3x RAM sticks. You have all 3 of them installed in the 3 black slots, I hope?
Doing so will make sure you are in 3-channel RAM mode, eliminating RAM bottlenecks.

The following should be done as a group.
-Disable any overclock you might be using (DIP switches on the board, BIOS FSB/bclk boost, whatever)
-Turn off hyperthreading in the BIOS (Adv Bios Feature -> CPU Feature -> Hyperthreading function -> OFF/Disabled)
-Disable phase switching (Green Power -> set all 4 phase controls to "Disabled")
-Disable CPU power saving (Cell Menu -> Intel EIST -> "Disabled")
-Disable SSC (Cell Menu -> Spread Spectrum -> "Disabled")
Doing the above will lock out the "fake" processor cores (the Hyperthreaded ones) which are only 30% as good as a "real" core anyway, lock your motherboard's CPU power supply at max, turn off the ability for the CPU to throttle way down when not busy, and smooth out the jitter in your clock speed. Doing all of this will see if your pauses are due to lags/latency in the switching of the processor back and forth from low to high power/speed. If your FPS smooth out, then that IS your culprit. You can also use this tool to see if anything shows up. If not, try the following (after restoring all your old settings back from the above, that is).

-Lower your bclk to 100MHz (Cell Menu -> Base Clock (MHz) -> "100")
(if you can't set it below 133, then you won't be able to do this test)
This will run your processor 25% slower than normal. Even if the performance is lower across the board, if you are still running into moments where the FPS ramp up and down (though you'd be swinging from 80 down to 20 instead of your current 100 down to 30), then it is not your CPU's speed which is the problem.

With me so far? Good. Turn your bclk back up to 133 (or wherever you had it) and then try this unusual test.
-Remove your sound card (or tell the game to play with the sound off. Not just with the volume turned all the way down, I mean with sound actually disabled in the prefs or in your device manager if the game has no such option).
Turns out your X-Fi sound board is a software codec, not a dedicated sound card. This means that if the game suddenly has to add another 20 channels of polyphony or something, that's a big dump on your CPU, which will look and test exactly like your CPU is too slow, but in reality just getting a relatively inexpensive hardware-based sound card would fix it.

Keep us posted?

--Patrick

I actually am going to work on this, thank you so much for the help PatrThom. Will report in the results for sure.

I'm trying to think up tests you can do without borrowing new components to test with, that's what makes it so hard.

--Patrick

I do know that I had someonelse overclock this sytem. Not 100% sure how they did it, or even if they did it correctly. Any way to quick check what the CPU is really running at?

The BIOS should tell you if it is a hardware overclock (the speed displayed in Cell Menu will be higher than the stock 2.93GHz). This could be either because the base clock is set to something higher than 133 in the BIOS, or also could be because the DIP switches are set to boost the speed (see page 30 in the manual for details). Otherwise it is some kind of software overclock, but you should see whatever overclock program loading on startup if this is the case.

For the record, remember to write down any settings you change if you want to be able to remember them later.

--Patrick