My new PC rocks

10 08 2009

After probably seven years since buying my old PC I decided to get a new one. I really don’t like to put money into hardware, but since my HDD started to report bugs every time I turned on my PC it was probably the final moment before loosing some critical data like source codes.

Before I went to the shop I browsed hundreds of reviews. I didn’t want to buy high end stuff, but I also didn’t want to buy crap, and I didn’t want to pay for power that I won’t need. And it had to be silent!

Finally I decided to buy AMD Phenom II X3 720 processor with GeForce 250 GTS, 4GB of RAM, 300 GB HDD. I also got Be-Quiet DarkPower power-supply. Processor came with box cooler, but it was too noisy and I decided to replace it with Scythe Ninja II. It is a huge monster and can operate in fan-less mode. After replacing processor cooler the next noisiest thing was gfx card… it had built in dynamic speed cooler, but even at the lowest speed it was too noisy for me. I replaced it with the one that came with Ninja cooler (12 cm).

Now the noisiest element is HDD… but only when it’s reading or writing stuff  and it doesn’t do it often :)

It probably wouldn’t be worth investing 1000$ only to get more quiet working space, so let’s talk about performance. How does 10 times faster  sounds to you? It exceeded my expectations. I was killing myself developing Pony World Deluxe with over 10 minutes compilation times in debug mode and now it’s less than a minute. I hesitated to add music to my games because decoding ogg’s took to much time when loading the game 100 a day, now I don’t care.

Will it help me sell more games? I don’t know, but for sure I increased comfort and performance of my workplace.



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2 responses to “My new PC rocks”

10 08 2009
Darek Rusin (14:58:28) :

I don’t think I ever lasted 7 years on one PC, but still, 3-4 years is not uncommon for me. And each time I replace the hardware I ask myself: why the heck didn’t I do it earlier?! It’s such a productivity boost and the price is not really that big these days. Must be a lesson here, somewhere… ;)

16 08 2009
Jake Birkett (02:57:16) :

I just upgraded my PC too for the first time in 5 years, which is the longest I’ve ever waited. It’s now an Intel Core 2 Duo at 3Ghz with 4GB RAM and a Geforce GTX 275 + new motherboard. Price = $700 CAD ish. Totally worth it, it’s really nice now and I can play modern games again.