New Build for X-Plane 10. A few choices i need to make...

[immortal 0]

Hi,

 

Going to build a new PC this week to use X-Plane 10 and just after some advice.

 

Processors: Intel i5 3570k OR Intel i7 3770k OR AMD Piledriver 8350. All will be overclocked. Is the i7 ALOT better than the i5? Is the AMD better as its 8 core?

 

Graphics Card: NVidia 2GB 660 TI OR Nvidia 2GB 670 OR AMD 3GB 7970. Ive heard AMD aren't as good for X-Plane but not sure.

 

Hard Drive: Going to get a 256GB SSD for the Windows 8 and another 256Gb SSD just for X-Plane 10. Will an SSD make a lot of difference if I was to use a dedicated 1TB 7200rpm Hard Drive instead?

 

Any help really appreciated

 

Matt

[immortal 0]

Anyone?

[ryanbatc 12,841]

Hardware for XPX functions far differently than FSX.

 

Really you want the most powerful hardware you can afford.  I'm not even sure if XPX uses hyperthreading (3570 vs 3770K).  I'm completely unsure about AMD as I left them behind along with my AMD6000 rig 5 years ago.

 

The x64 version can eat RAM for breakfast... eat video card triangles for lunch, and CPU cycles for dinner...

 

If it were me I'd get the 3570K, GTX 670, and 16GB of RAM.  Since you're going to run ivy bridge make sure the ram is fast, like DDR3 2400.  The SSD will help for the long load times of XPX.  Unsure about performance.  I have my copy on a 7200 rpm HDD.  The load times are enormous... usually around 3 minutes for me.

[immortal 0]

_{So something like the following...}

 

_{Intel i5 3570k overclocked to 4.6ghz cooled by Arctic Freezer 7 Pro}

_{Asus Sabertooth Z77 Motherboard}

_{Nvidia GTX 670 2GB Overclocked}

_{16GB DDR3 2400mhz Samsung Green Ram}

_{256GB Crucial M4 SSD for Windows 8 64 bit}

_{256GB Crucial M4 SSD dedicated for X-Plane 10}

_{EVGA 730w Fully Modular PSU}

 

_Matt

[AVSIM Admin 4]

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[airlinejets 709]

A couple of tips for X-Plane. Get a 3 or 4 GB card. A 2 GB card is too close to the threshold. For the hard drive, favor lots of GBs, I mean lots. Some guys have 150 GB of scenery and growing every day. You'll run out of space soon with a 256.

[steve310002 1,198]

New Nvidia cards (700 series) are due out this week. You might want to wait and get a 770 or 760 as they will be close to the 680 and 670 respectively and a similar price.

[Swe_Richard 1,172]

Hi,

 

Going to build a new PC this week to use X-Plane 10 and just after some advice.

 

Processors: Intel i5 3570k OR Intel i7 3770k OR AMD Piledriver 8350. All will be overclocked. Is the i7 ALOT better than the i5? Is the AMD better as its 8 core?

 

Graphics Card: NVidia 2GB 660 TI OR Nvidia 2GB 670 OR AMD 3GB 7970. Ive heard AMD aren't as good for X-Plane but not sure.

 

Hard Drive: Going to get a 256GB SSD for the Windows 8 and another 256Gb SSD just for X-Plane 10. Will an SSD make a lot of difference if I was to use a dedicated 1TB 7200rpm Hard Drive instead?

 

Any help really appreciated

 

Matt

 

 

You might already have decided on the hardware but I would go nVidia myself. I have the 7970 and it's a really fast card. However for XPX I'm a bit underwhelmed. Shimmering is rampant, turning up AA murders performance. Clouds REALLY murders performance for me. Not at all happy with the performance. 

 

I would go for a 4gb nVidia card. 

[alainneedle1 97]

Hi,

 

Going to build a new PC this week to use X-Plane 10 and just after some advice.

 

Processors: Intel i5 3570k OR Intel i7 3770k OR AMD Piledriver 8350. All will be overclocked. Is the i7 ALOT better than the i5? Is the AMD better as its 8 core?

 

Graphics Card: NVidia 2GB 660 TI OR Nvidia 2GB 670 OR AMD 3GB 7970. Ive heard AMD aren't as good for X-Plane but not sure.

 

Hard Drive: Going to get a 256GB SSD for the Windows 8 and another 256Gb SSD just for X-Plane 10. Will an SSD make a lot of difference if I was to use a dedicated 1TB 7200rpm Hard Drive instead?

 

Any help really appreciated

 

Matt

 

GTX 780  http://www.techpowerup.com/184311/geforce-gtx-780-pricing-revealed.html

 

If you have the money go for the Titan, as I always said (again if you have the money) there is no such things as overkill in PC's world, get the fastest and badest hardware you can buy.

[XPX64man 130]

Get LOTS of RAM because XPX64 will make good use of it.  I have 16Gigs and I'm waiting for the cost to come down a little, and I will say "Fill-er-Up!"

[starflight 8]

A couple of tips for X-Plane. Get a 3 or 4 GB card. A 2 GB card is too close to the threshold. For the hard drive, favor lots of GBs, I mean lots. Some guys have 150 GB of scenery and growing every day. You'll run out of space soon with a 256.

 

Agree on the 4GB video card--I've already gone past 2 GB on some settings and custom scenery.

 

OTOH, I have both Win7 and XP10 sitting on a single 256 GB SSD. I actually have *three* copies of XP10 on it-- different versions for testing and backups. I still have plenty of space. If original poster isn't planning to jump straight into the deep end of custom and ortho scenery packages, I'd stick with 256 for now, and get a larger one when you need it. For me personally, this'll be at least a year from now.

[fvapres 7]

The breakdown of features between i3/i5/i7 is pretty simple. Basically, you take a base processor and call it the i3. Then you give it the ability to self overclock (3.3gHz to 3.8gHz) and call it an i5. Then you add hyperthreading and call it an i7. So basically, an i5 is an i7 with the only exception being the ability for hyperthreading. There are a few differences between an i3 and i5 that make the i5 more stable for overclocking for gaming, but sometimes the i7s are vastly more expensive than the i5s, so I went with an i5 quad-core. The first version i3/i5/i7 was slightly different where the i3 was dual-core, i5 was dual-core with overclock and i7 was quad-core with overclock and hyperthreading. Now its a bit more simple, but there are also 6-core i7s out there, but the expense can be put into a better video card or new yoke/joystick/peripheral.

 

The setup you described above looks pretty good. I have a 128GB SSD for my OS, 256GB for Battlefield 3, Star Wars The Old Republic, FSX and XP10 all installed. I also have XP10 installed on a 2TB 7200RPM HDD. The boot time and loading time in XP is VASTLY better (4-5 min for loading on HDD versus 45sec-1min SSD) and in FSX, no blurry textures at all as they are ready for use. Take a look at the buffer size and read times. Those will show you the better SSDs. Also, make sure it's SATA6 capable as the motherboard you picked out is SATA6 and the bandwidth provided is substantially higher than a SATA3 connection.

 

nVidia vs ATI, I have the GTX 670 DirectCU II from ASUS. The one thing I love about it is the non-reference coolers. I hate how most of the cards out there utilize that tiny fan to suck in cool air to put along the hottest parts of the card. With the abuse that we can put them through, I want as much cooling as I can get. It's a 2GB card, but couldn't afford the extra $200 for a 4GB 680. Now with the 700 series cards coming out, I'm interested to see what kind of specs they'll have versus the 670/680. Base models may be 2-4GB GDDR5 with higher-end ones being 4-6 based on how the previous generations of cards have gone. That would be the last component I would select and select carefully.

[rogerlimakilo 33]

This is good stuff, Aaron, thank you!

 

The breakdown of features between i3/i5/i7 is pretty simple. Basically, you take a base processor and call it the i3. [...]