xsadrulesx

i'd say a good quality 850w would be good. it's not nice to stress you psu. they're not even that expensive anymore. you can usually find a good 850w in the sub $100 range.

i had to go to 1.35 to hit 4.5ghz that was the max i was comfortable with.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/New-YAMAKASI-Q270-2B-Extreme-OC-120Hz-IPS-2560x1440-PC-Computor-Monitor-/111399826194?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item19eff27312

Doubt it, that Xeon is basically a locked i7.

Try forcing constant voltage in your gpu and see if it you get the same results. Don't keep it like that just for a comparison. You can do this with Precision X (K Boost)

Get the ichill. i've heard nothing but good things of that card.

if you factor in the price of a good motherboard (which you will need to get a good stable overclock on the fx cpus) and an aftermarket heatsink (you will also need one of these to overclock) it will cost you about the same as a locked i5 with a budget board on the stock cooler. In a lot of cases you will get much better gaming performance with the i5.

I had the same issue. It was caused by prime95 not your cooler. i even had the voltage set to manual (not adaptive) and it still did it. Use intel extreme tuning utility instead. it didn't overvolt my cpu like prime95 did https://downloadcenter.intel.com/SearchResult.aspx?lang=eng&keyword=extreme+tuning

for that price range i'd say just bite the bullet and get yourself a korean 1440p monitor off ebay. the 970 makes for a great 1440p card. you could then just OC the monitor as best you can (a lot of people say 96-120hz is possible depending on the monitor you get) and there you have it, best of both worlds. The only downside is a crappy bezel, no height adjustment, not a lot of display connectors, and of course that it's being shipped from overseas. From the reviews i've personally read/seen though most people love them. i think in this case the risk to reward is worth it. http://www.ebay.com/itm/Perfect-Pixel-QNIX-QX2710-LED-Evolution-2-27-2560x1440-PLS-Monitor-Glossy-/140934439651?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item20d058e2e3 check that one out. it has a glossy screen though (i love glossy screens) if you don't they also have matte versions.

i've seen those benchmarks. that's what convinced me to get the 8 core. however once i put my 8 core to the test i wasn't very satisfied with the smoothness of the gameplay. i think this might have been due to a bigger fluctuation in fps. like i said once i was able to compare it to my i5 the minimum fps on the 8 core was much lower. With my i5 the gameplay is soooo smooth. Also it ran hotter and the heat threshold is significantly lower to the i5 as well. my fans were going loud as hell so i could try to keep the thing just under 70 C while gaming. As opposed to my i5 which i have the fans running whisper quiet and can it runs at low 70s while gaming which is perfectly fine for that cpu. That's with both of them OC'd at 4.5ghz btw @ stock the fans weren't going so loud on the 8 core. i'm just putting in my 2 cents, everyone is free to buy what they want. i just don't want any gamers to make the same mistake i made. if you're going to be doing a lot of rendering and stuff though the 8 core definitely starts becoming a more viable option. It's hard to beat it at that price range. However i only use my pc for gaming.

i've used both the 8350 (8320 @ 4.5ghz) right now i have the i5 (4690k @ 4.5ghz) the i5 bitch slaps the 8350/20 no competition. in almost every game i played the minimum frames were significantly lower on the 8 core. i can't really speak for those youtube benchmarks but for a strictly gamer the i5 is the only way to go.

i want to return mine. not because of the memory issue but because the damn thing has had a coil whine since i bought it at launch. i don't want to be without a gpu for that long though

Some of those Korean monitors overclock really well. I was reading a lot of people where getting at least 96hz stable. Is yours a poor overclocker?

144hz is a much smoother experience. Going in from 80+ fps the difference is really clear compared to 60 and below. I know because i own both 60hz and 144hz panels. If you play a lot of fps and even more if you like to do so competitively then 144 is the way to go. The colors are bad though, be ready for that. I switch between my panels. 144 for competitive fps and 60 for the rest of my games and movies, browsing etc.

yeah you're right it was just prime95 i guess it overvolted my cpu even though i had it set to manual (consistent voltage) so i ran the utility and the stress test and it's just as you said and as i thought. it needs to be under more stress for it to run at a consistent 4.2. When it was under full load it sat at 4.2 the whole time. So my question has been answered. Thank you for all the help.