$1200 gaming build

[canoj]

1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc
Gaming, Web browsing, music, video, gns3

2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
$1200. Tax and shipping is included in that.

3) Which country do you live in? If the U.S, please tell us the state and city if possible.
US, Alaska, Anchorage 99505

4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. The word "Everything" is not a valid answer. Please list out all the parts you'll need.
Monitor, KB/M, Tower, ram, cpu, gpu, hdd, dvd, mobo
For the KB/M, I want to purchase the g9x and g110

5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
Corsair 650w
http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Enthu...5AZY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1332531939&sr=8-1
Headphones and speakers

6) Will you be overclocking?
Yes.

7) What is the max resolution of your monitor? What size is it?
I don't have a monitor. I want to game on 1920x1200 if the budget allows. If not, at least 1920x1080

8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
I plan on ordering by May 5th

9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? eSATA? Onboard video (as a backup or main GPU)? UEFI? etc.
CF/SLI (I wont be cf or sli right away, but want that option for the future), USB 3.0, Sata 6gb/s, Onboard video isn't necessary.

10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If yes, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?
Windows 7 64 bit


I would prefer ordering off of amazon because I still tend to get free 2 day shipping from them.

Thank you.

 

[Dangman]

8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
I plan on ordering by May 5th

Considering that you're planning on buying so late, I recommend coming back and asking for advice when you're about 1 to 2 weeks away from buying the parts. Intel is planning on releasing new CPUs in late April/early May. In addition, video card prices and availability are a tad high at the moment.

 

[tiraides]

If you're ready to order everything now, like this weekend, please let us know. We're more than willing to help set up a good system for your budget. Having said that, I concur with Danny Bui and suggest that you wait for Ivy Bridge to arrive.

In the meanwhile, I have a few additional questions to ask you:

When you talk about GNS3, do you mean this?

How old is your Corsair power supply?

Which games are you (planning on) playing? At what level of visual quality?

Out of curiosity, which headphones and speakers are you using?

 

[canoj]

Considering that you're planning on buying so late, I recommend coming back and asking for advice when you're about 1 to 2 weeks away from buying the parts. Intel is planning on releasing new CPUs in late April/early May. In addition, video card prices and availability are a tad high at the moment.

Cool. I probably will hold off a while than.

If you're ready to order everything now, like this weekend, please let us know. We're more than willing to help set up a good system for your budget. Having said that, I concur with Danny Bui and suggest that you wait for Ivy Bridge to arrive.

In the meanwhile, I have a few additional questions to ask you:

When you talk about GNS3, do you mean this?

How old is your Corsair power supply?

Which games are you (planning on) playing? At what level of visual quality?

Out of curiosity, which headphones and speakers are you using?

Yes I do mean that gns3. My power supply is brand new. The box is still sealed.

Games, sc2, tf2, diablo 3, total war series. Nothing too intensive, but I do want to max them.

My speakers are the z-5500 and the headphones are the dre pros.

 

[tiraides]

I should warn you now that a good 1920x1200 monitor using an IPS panel will eat up at least 25% of your total budget. I've found a couple from Amazon that have also been extensively "reviewed" in the Displays forum:

$340 - Dell UltraSharp U2412M 24" E-IPS (third party; may not be covered under Amazon Prime)
$350 - HP ZR24w 24" S-IPS LCD (third party; Amazon has it for around $450)

There are other 16:10 IPS panel monitors available, like the Asus PA246Q, but they eat up a lot more of your budget. For example, the Asus PA246Q normally retails for around $500.

You should also consider the additional costs of buying a DisplayPort cable (or a DVI or HDMI adapter or cable) and a monitor calibration kit (like the recently released Datacolor Spyder 4). These are often recommended to maximize the performance (and quality) levels of monitors like these, but they're not requirements to get them up and running right away.

What's the priority for you? Do you want a good IPS monitor? Or would you prefer an excellent video card?

 

[canoj]

I found out that I'm not going to have internet access from May 7 to 18 so yes I have decided to wait for the ivybridge cpus to release, so I will be able to increase my budget to allow for both the dell and an excellent gpu.

I can go with around $1600 now. And I'll grab the calibration kit the following month. Thank you both for the input. And I will bump this thread sometime in May (if it's still around)

 

[Dangman]

And I will bump this thread sometime in May (if it's still around)

Just go to your profile, select the statistics tab, and click "Find all threads started by canoj". That'll let you find the link for this thread.

And see ya in May.