Building a new system... Need help

S

Slappi

n00b
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Jun 7, 2008
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I am out of the loop on builds and I am taking 19 hours this semester and have no time to research everything. Can you guys help me out here? Please? I haven't built a system in 3 years and I think it is time to make a new one.

What should I buy with a budget of $3000? I don't need to spend that much but that is the max I will spend. See I have no idea what is out there these days.

I will be getting back into gaming (after the semesters over lol) and I will be doing regular stuff also.... nothing professional.

I just want the fastest setup for the money but I don't want to spend like $1000 more just for like 2% more speed lol..... so price/performance is important and I'll only mildly OC the system.

AMD/Intel, ATI/Nvdia... I don't care.... I do want a good sound system though.... nothing like good sound in-game.

I am going to use my old setup as a media server..... also how would I go about that to convert it over??

I am not in that big of a hurry so if anything new is coming out before December I can wait on some of the parts.


You guys are the bst.... Thanks!
 
Well with your budget, Core i5 750 with 4 GB or 8 GB of ram, 5850, pair of 60 GB SSD in Raid 0 and 1 TB Hard drive for storage.
 
Wow I really need to read up on this stuff... lol.

Core I5 huh... ok I'll look into which MB and MEM and SSD to get.

Thanks.
 
for the media center i would suggest:

-tv tuner card
-sound card
-graphics card

with a tv tuner card i would suggest getting a dual tuner so you can watch and record on differant channels, i would also recommend a unit with hdmi or VGA or a usable input (this could come in handy if you want to record old VHS movies to your hard drive (i did this with some old home moves and cleaned em up.. great x-mas present for mum).... preferably get a unit that has a pci interface as this has more bus width to the board.... pcie and usb are limited and can result in lower quality picture or poor frame refresh rates.

sound card, this is essential for a media center if its built into the current system and multi channel then you are good to go otherwise invest in a sound card.....

graphics card, if the mobo is three years old its probably got an AGP graphics card socket.... AGP interface cards are becoming less common so your options may be limited. however pci form cards are still floating around on the market so you may not be completely out of luck.... as for card specs you should consider outputs like hdmi and dvi. VGA ports are still being used and one of the many interfaces in flatpanel tvs but i wouldn't count on this over the long haul......

maybe also get a 1terrabyte hard drive..... recording movies can well consume a hard drive quite quickly......
 
Wow I'm really out of the loop....

So we got the i5 750.... is that just like the i7 860 and i7 920 or what? I noticed they are all within a $100 of each other. Should I go for the 5850 or 5870? Also for the SSD should I go for one large one like the Intel 160gb x25-m or go with 2 of the 80gb in raid or two 60gb in raid of the other brands?

Also what size and make PSU would be good for all this stuff?

Is there a difference in games between 4 and 8GB memory?

Also what about sound? Is onboard sound the way to go or is an addin card the better option?

Do you need a 64bit OS to handle more then 4gb ram?

Thanks guys.
 
So we got the i5 750.... is that just like the i7 860 and i7 920 or what? I noticed they are all within a $100 of each other.
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i5 750 is within 0-5% performance of 920 in gaming, 860 is little faster because of the higher clock speeds but nothing worth $80

Should I go for the 5850 or 5870?
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5850 should be more than enough from the early benchmark we have seen. -5 to 160% faster than GTX 285.

Also for the SSD should I go for one large one like the Intel 160gb x25-m or go with 2 of the 80gb in raid or two 60gb in raid of the other brands?
Click to expand...

Raid 0 option gives great boost in speeds.

Also what size and make PSU would be good for all this stuff?
Click to expand...

Antec New truepower 650 watt

Is there a difference in games between 4 and 8GB memory?
Click to expand...

Not much

Also what about sound? Is onboard sound the way to go or is an addin card the better option?
Click to expand...

its up too you but if you want addin card. ASUS Maximus III Formula is better option for the X-fi sound card bundle with the board and great overclocking options.

Do you need a 64bit OS to handle more then 4gb ram?
Click to expand...

Yes 3.5 GB is the limit a 32 bit OS can see.
 
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