Widescreen Gaming Forum

Please excuse if there's already a thread on this (I've looked for it, but couldn't find it)

I've been console gaming for the last ten, or so, years, so I'm not totally clued up about PC gaming (specs etc.) yet. I've been reading up about PC gaming for triple monitors but it's not that simple to get comprehensive, and easily comprehensible, info on this.

I want to get a PC for triple monitor gaming. I'd like to play triple A games (driving sims especially, e.g. Project CARS) on it.

Could someone please recommend me a set up (GPU, CPU, RAM and other issues I may be less aware of) so that I can play at high settings with a high (60 to 90 or more) framerate on three monitors?

My budget's not tight but, obviously, I'd rather not spend more than I have to. I'd be starting from scratch.

Well, after posting my question here, I posted the same question on Tom's Hardware. I got a quick and complete reply which is as follows:

CPU: Intel Xeon E3-1230 V3 3.3GHz Quad-Core Processor
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z87X-UD4H ATX LGA1150 Motherboard
Memory: Kingston Black 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory
Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 120GB 2.5" Solid State Disk
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 780 3GB Video Card (Crossfire AMD 290s would be possible too, I was told)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 780 3GB Video Card
Power Supply: XFX ProSeries 850W 80+ Silver Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224DB/BEBE DVD/CD Writer
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (OEM) (64-bit)

They also gave me merchants and prices. The whole thing comes in at $1830, more than half of that's just for the two video cards. (Ouch! But fair enough, I suppose).

If anyone here has views on the above list of parts (is it a good choice?), I'd be happy to hear what you think.

The spec listed looks fairly good, Xeon tend to offer more cache and ECC RAM not that this motherboard supports ECC RAM, and also generally tend to lack at overclocking compared to the i7-4770, the i7-4770 comes with an integrated intel HD4600 GPU which would power the various graphics ports presented on the motherboard, such ports would not function with the E3-1230V3, which I understand you might not be using, but is something worthy of noting.

Otherwise all in all it looks ok.

My own rig spec for 3x1080p gaming is in my sig below and it handles most of what I throw at it at a good playable freamerate, although I am starting to see room now in some games for a need for a 2nd card should i wish to keep the setting up at max.
One thing I am currently waiting out for however is AMD's driver update with frame pacing support, to minimize or solve the microstutter rendering issues.

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| Gigabyte X79S-UP5-WiFi Skt2011 | i7 4820k @4.4GHz Watercooled (Ivy Bridge-E) | Corsair Vengence 32GB @2133MHz 11-11-11-27 2T Quad-Channel (8x4GB) | AMD R9-Fury-X 4GB @1140/505MHz + EKWB Watercooled | 256GB Crucial MX200 SSD | 8x 1TB Samsung F3 SATA-II | Corsair 850W TX PSU | 3x Dell S2209W 22"wide TFT's (5760x1080res) | Logitech Z-5400 5.1ch speakers | Win7 Ultimate x64 |

The specs look good. I'd personally only really change the PSU, at 850W it is a little to overpowered... But on the other hand, who knows what is coming with the next generations. Oh, and I'd use Win 8.1 instead of Win7.

And Xeon versus i7: If you plan to use onboard graphics, which I personally do, you should definitely go the i7 route, because Xeons don't have iGPUs. Other than that, the Xeon is a good and reliable price/performance choice.

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He intends to run Crossfire. Therefore a 850W is the Minimum.
I'm currently running two 290s with lot of over clocking I come of peak 880W system usage! But thinking that all PSUs have 10-30% reserve that should not be a Problem!
Beside IMHO always get the biggest PSU you can afford! the efficiency of a huge PSU can still be platinum and beat this silver certified one! It just costs more!

For the CPU I would also recommend core i7, just because you have unlocked Multiplier (on K version) for Overclocking and an iGPU that does QuickSync video transcoding.
The xenon mentioned here is just recommended because he has a really good performance/price rating, on stock clock speed.

I'd also recommend go with the 240gb EVO SSD, 120gb are just way to fast full!
Same goes for the 1tb HDD, why not 3tb? Would cost around 50$ more, enough space is always useful in the Future!

If you want to go Crossfire 290 or SLI 780 is entirely your choice!
Just one thing you should know. If gaming on one GPU means new game released, start game and it works. Then dual GPU means wait for optimized driver and crossfire profiles! This might come pre release or a week later!

Oh, and also about GPUs make sure you don't buy a reference card! They make way to much noise and have heath problems with two of em!
There are special coolers such as MSI lightning or sapphire twinfrozer, which sometimes do a better job. To be certain about that you'd need to find a test/review about the card you'd like.
Cards that do great single might overheat in dual.

Oh, and p.s. Micro stutter is no more an issue on 290 cards because they use a different way to exchange the pictures with each other.

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I'm running CrossFire with two 7970s and other stuff on an Enermax 625W. And it isn't a new one, it is "only" 82+ Bronze.
A 700 to 750W PSU should be more than enoough for 290X CF or 780 (Tis) SLi, including an overclocked CPU.

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Well yeah, my system runs on an average of 600-660W, and that's 290cf +3930K
But where is the fun if you don't over clock your system
As stated before the only place a bigger PSU hurts is the Wallet!

P.s. undervolted 7970CF 440W peak system usage

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600W from the wall outlet? Then, that's before the PSU efficiency. 800W PSU means, it can deliver 800W. It might be draining more from the the wall outlet.

Here in Germany, electricity is quite expensive. I always recommend smaller PSUs, so that it works with optimal efficiency. (Typically at at least 50% load)

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Thanks for your views on this.

It seems the Xeon may not be available in France, so I've been recommended this one: i5 4670K. Any views? Both of you, Falcon and Haldi, are recommending i7 which seems to be a little (€30 to €60 ) more expensive. But you both seem to agree on using preferably th i7, so I'm inclined to follow your advice (hesitant about budget though).

Thanks, Haldi, for tip about not getting reference card. I'll check reviews.

I personally use a i5 4670K, and it's a very fine CPU. The i7 series has HyperThreading, which can be a plus sometimes. Hyperthreading doubles your virtual threads, for a total of eight threads/virtual "cores" (Both the i5 and i7 have four real cores). I think the i7 is little bit more future proof, especially considering upcoming multi-platform games, because both PS4 and X1 have eight cores.

But, as we all know, future-proof is something that doesn't exist in IT. You might as well save the extra money and get a replacement CPU a year or a half earlier.

It depends on whether you are willing to spend the extra bucks for an about 11% faster CPU (i5 4670K vs i7 4770K), or not.

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