Mass multi-tabling+new gaming computer

[Poker Orifice]

Shops in my area will put a build together for you for $50. There's a couple good places to grab parts. I would put money on finding better deals online and once again, if you have half a brain, you can put a computer together If you want some ideas for what parts you'll need you can give me a pm (if you want?). I planned on building one for myself awhile ago but didn't get around to it (yet) but looked into what I'd need.

Lastly, if you want it to ZOOM!!! Then you really should go with a SolidState Drive. You should be able to put together a poker beast for ~$800 (& this will still probably be overkill even if you're running PT4, a half-dozen sites and a few dozen tables along with other software, etc. etc. You don't need a real lot to play poker).Not very well... Especially since you're suggesting a SSD which a decent one is going to cost around a 1/4 of what your apparent total build price would be...
You've obviously misunderstood what I've said here.


There are a few guys here where I live (in shops & who work on computers independently) who will put your build together for $50. Can you get a better deal online? I'm talking about MYSELF ordering up the parts I want from Newegg & then they will assemble & set it up for me. (he has no experience & seeing as he seemed possibly interested in having someone else do it for him, I felt like giving him an idea of what people will potentially charge him for that service).

1/4 of $800 = $200
I've seen Samsung 840 (120 GB) SSD on sale for $99.

 

[Gorak]

3 important things:

1- Make sure your motherboard can fit at least 2 PCI-E video cards

2- Chose video cards with at least 2 ports each the are compatible with your monitors

3- Make sure your power supply can handle the 2 graphic cards 600W is minimum, go higher if you can

 

[ayrton]

you could always buy a 40-50 inch normal television then get a hdmi lead and connect it from computer to tv that's what I do

I always found that TVs lack the detail of computer monitor because of the resolution. Depends on the TV though, but most are not suited for anything other than watching films and games.

 

[absoluthamm]

You've obviously misunderstood what I've said here.


There are a few guys here where I live (in shops & who work on computers independently) who will put your build together for $50. Can you get a better deal online? I'm talking about MYSELF ordering up the parts I want from Newegg & then they will assemble & set it up for me. (he has no experience & seeing as he seemed possibly interested in having someone else do it for him, I felt like giving him an idea of what people will potentially charge him for that service).

1/4 of $800 = $200
I've seen Samsung 840 (120 GB) SSD on sale for $99.

I wasn't saying I could get a better deal online for putting the computer together, but that I would rather spend the $50 online to add or upgrade one of my components instead of give it to someone to do something medial and that there are literally hundreds if not thousands of help guides across the net(many with good quality pictures to go along with them) on how to do if you can't figure out the "Plug component A into Slot B" step by step guides that already come with most Mobos. But I understand to each their own, but if you're trying to keep some cost down, you can learn something at the same time...

As for the 840(the regular, not the Pro or Evo), there is a reason that it's always on sale, in fact, I've even seen them cheaper than $99, because it's junk and you get what you pay for. Those things have terrible problems with just dying or showing up dead on arrival. My boss just ordered 2 dozen of them a couple months ago against some people's advice and 5 of them needed to be shipped right back the day they were delivered because they wouldn't work at all. Within a month, another 3 died. He eventually sent them all back and swapped them for the 840 Pro series and haven't had any issues in the last month and a half or so.

Also, when I was talking about the 1/4 of your build price, I was factoring a 256GB SSD as that's what I have and is about as low as I would personally go at the moment just for the future.

 

[dmorris68]

Not bothering to quote all the relevant posts but will address some of the things posted through the thread. TL;DR so be warned.

Concur on the building your own PC thing. I've been cobbling together PC's since before there was really a BYO industry, back in the early-mid 80's where we built salvaged parts and built frankenstein machines out of IBM, Compaq, and Packard Bell components. The only off-shelf branded PC's I've bought in the last 25 years or so have been laptops, one Mac, and a cheap PC I bought for a far-away family member (so they'd have a phone number to call for support instead of me, lol).

PO, I have 3x 24" monitors but don't tile poker across all 3. I found that the constant and rapid neck swing required to keep up with the action across all 3 monitors was literally painful. So I tile across 2 monitors and use the 3rd for anything else I having going on during a session -- web browser, Spotify, videos, etc. It's a lot more convenient to have all that stuff on its own monitor so that you're not constantly competing for foreground focus with the poker tables. A 30" @ 2560x1600 or a 27" @ 2560x1440 would be some improvement, but I think you'll get more tiling across two 24" models (a virtual 3840x1200 or x1080) than across a single bigger monitor because your vertical resolution is too constrained. And at much lower cost too. A 2560x1440 monitor has only 240 more vertical lines of resolution than my 1920x1200 24's, and that's not enough to fit an extra row of tables at a size that I can easily see. Going from a 1080p monitor, it will look like a significant increase though at 360 extra pixels.

When I mass multi-tabled on FT several years back, I could get 3x3 tiled on each monitor so I could 16-table (FT max) across 2 monitors, but the tables were smaller than I really liked. Nowadays I don't play as many tables (mainly because I don't play cash much anymore and can't get that many SNGs going on intertops) so I go for 3x2 on each display but seldom play more than 6-8.

BTW my triple-monitor setup was not done for poker. In my line of work multiple monitors are a godsend and I used them daily for other stuff, so for poker it was just a bonus. If I had a 4th installed I'm sure I could fine a use for it, but so far I've avoided tempting myself.

On the SSD thing, a couple observations. If you're like me and require gobs of drive space, I recommend using the SSD for OS and critical high-I/O Apps only, such as PostgreSQL for your poker tracker. Keep everything else on a traditional HD. In my main rig I have a 256GD SSD that I boot the OS from and install select apps on, then I have a fast WD Black 1TB drive for most everything else, and a 500GB drive dedicated to My Documents. And if you think that's a lot, I won't mention the 16TB NAS. Most users won't need that much storage though. I've seen people getting by still on an 80 or 120GB HDD for everything they do, so for them a 128GB SSD might be plenty.

As far as SSD brands, I'm not a huge fan of OCZ's since their Vertex 2 line had issues (I have one that reported 40% life remaining after only a year in use, it's still working but in a system that won't be a big deal if it dies, as I don't trust it). But today PCMall has a 480GB Agilty 3 for $259. Same on Amazon is around $285 I think. Great price on such a big SSD, and it gets decent reviews. Last-gen technology but still SATA 6Gps and plenty fast for most people. If I didn't already have several and could justify a new one, I'd probably spring for one.

Me, I'm a fan of Crucial M4 SSDs. I own 2 of them, a 256GB and a 128GB, as well as a 115GB Corsair, and 2 of the aforementioned OCZ Vertex 2's (60GB and 180GB). Been very happy with the Crucial and Corsair models. I think the M4 would be my go-to brand again just from experience, but the new Samsung Evo line looks very promising. I'm sure Crucial will have a competing line for that new-gen tech soon, if not already.

Finally, as to using a TV for a monitor, as some mentioned it's typically a sub-par experience. It's might be logical to think that because a full-HD TV has the same 1920x1080 resolution as a 1080p computer monitor that it's just as good for computer use. It's not. Refresh actually isn't the problem, as 99% of computer LCD's refresh at 60Hz anyway, no matter the resolution. It's actually a problem with pixel density and convergence. TV's are designed to show moving video, not static fine detail. In particular, fine text resolution suffers greatly, as if you're trying to read through a screen door. TV's generally suck as computer monitors for all but video games and photo/video playback.