From my perspective: AMD CPUs : I've owned a few, but never actually purchased one. They've all come from either reclaimed systems or been given to me to evaluate. Side by side, I find Intel has always outperformed them, usually by several orders of magnitude. They are, however, generally better when it comes to overclocking, and seem to be made specifically with this in mind, which is fine, if that's something you really want to do. I do not. I have done plenty of overclocking as well as designed several cooling systems, including liquid ammonia, PAO, and glycol. Overclocking also reduces the overall lifespan of components, even with exceptional cooling systems. Those microcircuits are only so good in the first place, and manufacturing-wise, AMD's tolerances are fairly loose. AMD GPUs: Depending on the model and the application, these can be stellar or abysmal. The Radeon CGN-based GPU's use in the PS4, for example, are quite good, as are a number of their mobile GPU's used in some laptops and hand-held devices. These generally run cooler than comparable nVidia, and anything is better than Intel integrated graphics, yuck. In the PC front though, AMD continues to hold and set new world records for some of the WORST drivers ever. Between features that simply do not work to features that cause access violation errors, or simply cannot be found, despite having step-by-step instructions from AMD, because it is discovered during the course of a two-hour support call that someone simply "forgot to include" a specific feature in a driver release. Also, their support leaves a bit to be desired, and I generally find people from India to be both polite and patient. Windows vs. Linux vs. IOS vs. Anything Else: Hands down, Windows is easiest route to go. Most developers develop in it. Most software is developed for it. Most things designed for it work. Linux... eh. It's the number one choice of operating systems for people with no money, terrorist organizations, and high-level network administrators who want something that, once the final compile is done, can be turned on and forgotten about until the hardware running it dies. I have several linux-based routers, a mail server, have build several PXE-boot solutions for mass PC imaging, rugged laptops for field operatives, and security systems in linux. As for gaming in linux, it can be done, but most of the time I find by the time I figure out which repositories have the things I need, and I've recompiled everything at least eight times enough to at least get to the main menu of a game I was thinking about playing, I've lost interest in playing it. It's just more work than it's worth to me. Your mileage will vary. IOS, on the other hand, being an Apple Product, is great for running other Apple Products. Doing anything of use, value, or for entertainment is simply not worth the hassle. It's also built on top of a linux shell, so see above where that is concerned. As for anything else out there, good luck. Most of the remaining OS's are not built with gaming in mind, so if you get something to run, pat yourself on the back, you've accomplished something. On the subject of Windows... I have not ever owned a "Home" version of any Microsoft OS. I simply cannot fathom wanting to have all the bells and whistles built in already, then hobbled by code so Microsoft can squeeze me for an extra $100 for their "Professional" versions, though to be fair, I also have not purchased any version of Windows since Windows 2000 Advanced Data Center. I am a Microsoft Gold partner, as receive regular "Action Packs" of Microsoftware for my own personal consumption and evaluation in varying work environments. I've been running Windows 10 Enterprise for years, without a hitch. In fact, I find the Enterprise edition to be vastly superior to either their Home or Professional versions, if for no other reason, selecting "Do Not Install This Update" really means "do not install this update at this or any future point in time, especially without telling me you're installing this update that I either do not want, or know will break some other function." Of course, this also has the singular drawback of, when I need to contact a vendor for support and they see I'm running an Enterprise version, they tend to shut down, as they've either never heard of such an edition, or simply do not understand how to support it (it's Professional that works, I always explain). So take what you want from this - I don't particularly advocate for one OS over another, I just know which ones hold how much of what markets and where the design focus lies. Other Components: Let's start with Motherboards. I have only built systems using Gigabyte boards for the past 15 years. All of those systems are still stable and operational. With native dual BIOS, sturdy construction, and solid performance, it's hard to really want to look at anything else. They also consistently offer some of the widest certified hardware support for processors, memory and other expansion cards. I've seen far too many other popular boards, Asus, MSI, and even Intel boards failing at the component-level far too often, or having far too many incompatibility issues to really want to change. Of course, this is a matter of personal preference, I just prefer stability. RAM: Where to begin? There's as much to say about choices of RAM as their companies who make it, and they are not all made the same. I've had good experiences with Kingston, Crucial and Corsair. Pick one you like, buy as much as you can afford and your motherboard can support. It's just too hard to have too much RAM, especially these days when modern operating systems use as much RAM for their idle states as datacenter servers were built with just 10 years ago. Video Cards: Like RAM, a lot of this comes down to personal choice. I have never been disappointed by nVidia's hardware, only had one bad driver issue, which just leaves the actual manufacturer. I was a huge fan of BFG for a very long time, as they offered Lifetime Warranties on their graphics cards. They do not any longer. The biggest things to look for in modern graphics cards are the card profiles (how big are they, will they fit, can I reach the power port with the cables I have?), and the fans. The number one cause of graphics card failures is overheating, and the number one cause of overheating is fan failure. Again, I find Gigabyte makes very reliable cards, with reliable fans. No thin, flimsy, white polycarb plastic that shatters like glass after being heated up by more than 10 degrees, and reasonably decent bearings that are growling in six months. I have never liked AMD, and their drivers have a long history of being some of the worst, as noted above. Again, this largely comes down to preference and budget. I'll talk more about budget shortly. Lights and Colors and Remote Controls and Glass Side Panels: Don't waste your money. Really, these are some of the most worthless things you can clutter up your PC with and most importantly, waste power. All these things require power, and power is finite, which brings us to.... Power Supplies: Open your wallets wide, dig deep, fish the couch cushions, but whatever you do, do NOT go cheap on your power supply. Also, don't buy your power supply first, buy it last, because you'll need to know what your power demands are going to be from all your other components, and be sure to leave yourself some reserve here. Don't throw a 500 W power supply in a system that demands 500 W and think you're good. Get an 800 W instead. I haven't used anything smaller than 1000 W power supply in almost a decade, with the singular exception of a 500 W power supply in a very simple kiosk. And if you can, get a modular power supply, and only install as many cables as you absolutely have to - it helps tremendously with internal airflow. Disk Drives: For your operating system, you simply cannot beat Solid State. For long-term storage, a tradition hard drive is fine, in fact, I recommend at least one traditional hard drive in any system, if for nothing else, to keep your paging file or other virtual memory. Why? The more you read and write, especially write, to an SSD, the sooner it will fail. Hot-swap internal over fixed internal, and fixed internal over external are my preferences here. Any specific questions, I'm glad to provide whatever answers I can.
Seems wise choice, depending on your needs, budget and well future performance of the components of course....
Seems like a solid choice @Fractalite early information certainly suggests these will be solid products. In the market for a GPU myself still, so will eagerly watch / read 6800/6800XT/6900XT reviews. Hopefully they actually have stock, unlike the 30 series from NV. Also, I think I mentioned, I always wanted to wait until Zen 3 before upgrading, but got the 3900X when my 2600K system started getting unreliable - it's been as good as gold since mind you lol. If the uplift in gaming is sufficient, I will look at getting perhaps the 5900X or the 5800X. I had plans to push the 3900X when I got it, but have done very little of what I set out to do other than play games lol. Still, my internet is decent now (it wasn't for ages) so I have more options than I did. To be totally honest, it's ONE game in my collection that'd benefit from that near 20% single Core boost...everything else is just waiting for a better GPU. I should really save my money... Scoob.
Well, ****. Last night before I even saw this video I had already ordered a 5950X... but wow, the 5000 series is even better than I thought it might be.
A few years ago AMD had a laptop CPU that looked OK on paper, but performed the half when it got tested. Some models with it were HP 725 and 745. Only time the company I worked for tried something other than Intel. Check proper ( ? ) benchmark pages and reviews, AMD performance GPU/CPU's should be an option in general.
So I tried to get a 6800 XT today. I went to all the various sites that might have them - amazon, best buy, b&h, etc. Turns out they were only available from AMD itself because the AIB models are only available from the other sites with the AMD card to join them later(Specifically the 25th?) I, understandably, feel like an idiot, but, I am also really pissed. I know that AMD wants to do most of the sales through their AIB, but, there wasn't really a communication about all the locations to get cards. I was "in time" so I could have gotten one, but I was prevented from doing so because I did not know where they were. I occasionally use an Emoji or two, but I greatly prefer animated Gifs and this is how I am feeling right now: Since I have to wait till mid December for the CPU anyways, my hope is this situation resolves itself; meaning I could still get one in conjunction with the CPU, but this is awful.
I'm resigned to waiting too. Have my eye on a 5900X and a 6800XT / 3080 class card. However, with NV due to counter AMD with Super/Ti (whatever they call it) stuff, I'm tempted to wait a little longer. That said, current system is fine, just have to turn a few graphical settings down in various titles. I only have one game that's totally CPU bound and that's X4 - it doesn't really multi-thread so well, relying heavily on ONE Core for the bulk of the load. A 5900X would give me a 20-25% boost... Zen 3 is also the CPU I wanted to wait for of course, but bought early due to my old 2600K being a bit flaky. Scoob.
