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Build for the Father!

S

Stiffy

Limp Gawd
Joined
May 3, 2006
Messages
278
Hi everybody. Back again for the wonderful advice I always get. So, this time I am building a computer for my dad. He has always been a huge MAC fan and has stuck with them forever. I introduced him to oblivion a couple years ago, and he fell in love. I made a windows partition on his hard drive and hes been playing it every day since. Well, Skyrim came out today and his new i7 macbook pro apparently isnt cutting it. He complains about lag on low to medium settings.

Sooo, basically, he asked me to build him a computer to play Skyrim. Muahahaha! Let me answer the questions:

1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc
GAMING
2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
$800
3) Which country do you live in? If the U.S, please tell us the state and city if possible.

Oklahoma
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.
Case, Mobo, CPU, Ram, HDD, GPU, PSU, CD Drive..
5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
Monitor, Keyboard, Mouse
6) Will you be overclocking?
Probably Not
7) 7) What is the max resolution of your monitor? What size is it?
23" 1080p
8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
ASAP - He needs his new fix, haha.
9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? eSATA? Onboard video? etc.
Nothing special, like I said it's for one purpose only, to game.
10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If so, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?
Yes, Win7 64bit


One more thing...about the case, I've always worked with fairly good size full towers. He doesn't have a lot of desk real estate, especially with all of his macs. He would like a small tower, but something large enough obviously to fit a huge GPU in it.and stay cool.

I was thinking maybe a 6950 or a 570 for the GPU? I would like to build a sandy bridge if it's possible in the budget as well.

Thanks you guys!
 
Any chance of the budget being upped by another $100?
 
All righty then:
$252 - Intel Core i5 2300 + Biostar TH67+ Intel H67 mATX Motherboard
$45 - G.Skill Ripjaws Series F3-12800CL9D-8GBRL 2 x 4GB DDR3 1600 RAM
$250 - XFX HD-695X-ZNDC Radeon HD 6950 1GB PCI-E Video Card
$156 - Hitachi Desktar 7K1000.D HDS721010DLE630 1TB SATA 6.0Gb/s Hard Drive
$18 - Samsung SH-222AL/BSBE SATA DVD Burner
$73 - Antec NEO ECO 620C 620W PSU
$100 - Lian Li PC-A04A Silver mATX Case
----
Total: $894 plus tax and shipping.

Went with a mATX build here since your father doesn't have a lot room on his desk. I chose that Lian Li case since it's closer to the look of a Mac than other cases out there.
 
Thanks as usual, Dannybui!

A few things:

Holy shit hard drives went up!?!? I bought a Spinpoint F3 4 months ago for $50. I got it because I know you used to recommend it. Why the choice of this one? Less expensive by $10?

Also, about the case, lol nice consideration for looking like an apple. That part really doesn't matter, what I'm more concerned about is enough space for everything and proper airflow without buying extra case fans. Do you know if that case will achieve it?
 
Also, Biostars scare the shit out of me for their past reputation, or at least the horror stories I've heard. Are there any alternatives? The deal is good though....
 
Stiffy said:
Holy shit hard drives went up!?!? I bought a Spinpoint F3 4 months ago for $50. I got it because I know you used to recommend it. Why the choice of this one? Less expensive by $10?
Click to expand...

It's not so much the price as it is sequential performance, in this case. The Samsung F3 is now no longer the fastest of the 7200 RPM hard drives on the market nowadays since it still uses two 500GB platters. The new Hitachi 7K1000.D packs in 1 entire TB onto a single platter.
 
Oh nice, well thank you for enlightening me. :) Either way, damn those floods. :O
 
Stiffy said:
Also, about the case, lol nice consideration for looking like an apple. That part really doesn't matter, what I'm more concerned about is enough space for everything and proper airflow without buying extra case fans. Do you know if that case will achieve it?
Click to expand...
That case will achieve that since it comes with three 120mm fans to begin with and can fit video cards up to 14.5 inches long. So there is plenty of space for everything.
Stiffy said:
Also, Biostars scare the shit out of me for their past reputation, or at least the horror stories I've heard. Are there any alternatives? The deal is good though....
Click to expand...
There are alternatives but they cost more:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.763267
 
Ok great! Thank you Danny Bui, you always help me out tremendously. I'll run this by the dad tomorrow see if he likes, and if so I'll go ahead and order. I'll repost if anything changes or when I complete the build.
 
Ok so I ordered everything! I ended up going with the combo with the ASUS motherboard. Also dropped the price a bit by going for the same HDD but the 750gb one, it was $50 less and he won't need a whole terabyte. Even the 750 is probably too much but oh well.

I'll repost when it's all in and I have it completed.

Thank you again!
 
Thanks again for the help Dannybui.

My pops is happily playing Skyrim at 1080p with max settings!
 
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