$900 machine -- which option should I go with...

[v1ly4]

Hello everyone,

My Dad is a huge flight sim fan since forever, and has been playing FSX for a few years.  I help him as much as I can with most of his computer issues, and I'm looking for a new machine to recommend for him.  I put a Radeon 4850 512mb into his box last year, which helped, but the thing is a five-year-old single-processor machine (I forget the specific processor, Intel something at about 2.16 GHz), so it's obviously not going to work going forward with all the new terrain add-ons he would like to use.

I've been browsing this board for a while, and it looks like this is the community to find good advice on hardware, so hopefully someone can tell me what would run the FSX/FTX the best.  My tech skills are about mid-level maybe.  I'm comfortable swapping in and out graphics cards, but I've never tried overclocking or building my own system.

We have a budget of about $900 (less expensive would be nice), and here are the options I found on newegg.com:

Option 1: $745 (including shipping)

- AMD Phenom II x4 955 (3.2 GHz)

- 4GB DDR3

- GeForce 9800 GT 1Gb

- 700 W PSU

I would save enough money with this package, that I could probably afford a slightly better video card, like a Radeon 5770-1GB or a GeForce GTX 260-896Mb (the 260 is better, right?), but it does have a slower processor, and I don't know if that trade-off is worthwhile.

Option 2: $835

- AMD Phenom II x4 965 (3.4 GHz)

- 4GB DDR3

- GeForce GTS 250 1Gb

- 800 W PSU

The processor here is slightly faster than Option 1, and the video card is a small step up, but I wouldn't save enough $$ to get much more than what comes in the box, maybe another 2Gb memory stick.  Would that make a difference: 6Gb vs 4Gb?

Option 3: $895

- Intel Core i7 860 (2.8 GHz)

- 4GB DDR3

- GeForce GTS 250

- 700 W PSU

Slightly better processor than Option 2 (from all the benchmarks I Googled for), but it's right at the top of our budget.  It also has a 700 W PSU, compared to 800 for Option 2, so if I ever do decide to opt for a better video card in the future, we might be more likely to need a new power supply with this one.

---

The good news is that my Dad will be keeping his current (old) monitor.  It's a wide-screen flat-panel and it's pretty big (27" I think, more or less) but, being old, it only has a max resolution of about 1366 x 768. 

So, we don't have to worry about running FSX in super hi def, which I hope will help performance, even with a sub-$1000 computer.

I've read from a lot of people that FSX relies more on processor power than video card power, but, all else equal, what do you think would perform better: a Core i7 2.8 GHZ with a GTS 250, or a Phenom II x4 3.2 GHz with a GTX 260?

Maybe it doesn't matter with such a low-resolution monitor, so I'd be better off just getting him the better processor, keeping the GTS 250 for now, and saving money for a much better GPU in a couple years whenever he wants to get a higher-resolution screen.

Anyway, thanks for any advice you all can provide! 

Cheers

[John Dow]

I recently ran FSX with an i7 920 and an old GTS 7900 256MB video card.  The frame rates seemed fine, the big difference compared to a 1GB card was the detail radius.  The smaller card only showed detail to a couple of miles, and the textures were of a lower grade.  So I would think that a lower spec card with a good memory would be an OK choice.

Have you considered the i5 750 as an alternative?  It is supposed to be a good budget choice for computers that don't need  database and photoshop type power, ie FSX should be running within 5-10% of the i7 920 chips, and outside the densest scenery there should be no noticeable difference.

As for the PSU... you might not need as much as you think.  Your video card doesn't chew a lot and a non-overclocked CPU isn't a big drain either.  Until recently I had a dual core 3.2GHz Athlon, GTX 260+, 4 GB RAM, 5 hard drives and 2 DVD drives all running on an Antec 400W PSU and never had a moment's problem.

I would say stick with your current graphics card, get an i5 750 and a motherboard with inbuilt overclocking ability, and run it at 3.2 - 3.4GHz, spend $60 or so on a good CPU cooler such as the Zalman or one of the Thermaltake or similar, and the 700W PSU to keep it all running.  4GB DDR3 RAM is enough, eventually you'll probably bump that up to 6GB but I'm not sure it's needed.  If the grahics card struggles in denser scenery turn the level of detail radius down and the overall graphics qulaity down a notch.  In a year or two this system should still be good enough to invest in a good monitor and graphics card to run it.

[jnrjim67]

I agree get a i750 and i think you should put the extra money into a better video card like a gtx 260/275.

[v1ly4]

Thanks for the advice.

I think overclocking is a little beyond my knowledge level, as I've never tried it and wouldn't want to void the warranty or anything.  Maybe if it was my own computer...

Anyway, I found a deal listing an i5 750 for $755, which would probably leave almost enough money for a GTX 260, so, if I'd be better off with an i5/i7 than one of the AMD machines, I guess it comes down to:

i5 750 @ 2.66 GHz + GTX260

or

i7 860 @ 2.80 GHz + GTS250

Should I go with the better graphics card?

[jnrjim67]

Yes go with the better video card the 860 with HT ON makes no difference to FSX and essentially the i750 is the same architecture without HT, the GTX260 will perform better than the GTS250.

[BradHosking]

And if you do get the GTX260 ensure that it is with the 216 chipset. There were two revisioned of the 260 and the one without the 216 chipset didn't have a great performance.