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First Budget Build

C

Cod

Gawd
Joined
Mar 21, 2003
Messages
642
1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc
Kids' homework, software development (including graphics programming), 2D work w/ GIMP, Inkscape, etc., limited 3D w/ Maya or Blender, possibly animation in the future

2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
~$600 USD (would like to stay lower if possible)

3) Which country do you live in? If the U.S, please tell us the state and city if possible.
Honolulu, HI, USA

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.
CPU, Mobo, PSU, GPU (not a workstation card), SSD

5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
- Corsair 330R case
- 8GB Corsair Vengeance RAM
- 1TB Seagate HDD
- Blu-Ray Reader

6) Will you be overclocking?
Nope

7) What is the max resolution of your monitor? What size is it?
2 x 23" monitors (currently 1920 x 1080); however, will be upgrading soon

8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
NLT September

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.
Nothing that current motherboards are lacking.

10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If yes, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?
64-bit Windows 7 Professional, 64-bit Windows 8.1 Professional, any Linux distro


Of note, I'm not a "fan boy" of either Intel or AMD. I've never owned an AMD processor, just GPU. Any thoughts / advice is greatly appreciated as this will be my first budget build.

Thanks!
 
Cod said:
2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
~$600 USD (would like to stay lower if possible)

3) Which country do you live in? If the U.S, please tell us the state and city if possible.
Honolulu, HI, USA
Click to expand...

Please tell us if tax/shipping are included in the budget. Last time I checked, it's expensive to ship to Hawaii.

Also, since you are not requesting a professional graphics card, do you have any tools in your pipeline that a Cuda-only? Otherwise you can use anything.

And do you game AT ALL? And is 3D modeling a priority?

If nobody has helped you yet, I'll attempt a build when I get home.
 
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I can go a little higher to cover shipping cost; however, shipping out here isn't too bad if you have more than one item. Also, only Newegg has "outrageous" shipping prices for here. If worst comes to worst, I can ship to a family member and pay them to ship to me. The budget isn't really a budget, its a wife restriction :)

No Cuda-only things. I've been looking at the R7 270's.

The only gaming that will be done on this computer is by my kids. They don't play anything a 270 couldn't handle easily.

Thanks for offering to help. In the past, my budget was a lot higher for builds (primarily my gaming rig).
 
Okay dude, got you all the parts through Amazon to avoid big shipping hit:

Core i5 4430 - $185
http://www.amazon.com/Intel-i5-4430...id=1407276614&sr=8-2&keywords=core+i5+haswell

Gigabyte H97 MicroATX: $90
http://www.amazon.com/Gigabyte-Grap...id=1407276781&sr=8-1&keywords=h97+motherboard

Corsair CX500: $55
http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Build...F8&qid=1407276913&sr=8-5&keywords=corsair+psu

MSI R9 270 Gaming: $170
http://www.amazon.com/MSI-Computer-...TF8&qid=1407277252&sr=8-2&keywords=amd+R9+270

Crucial MX100 256GB: $108
http://www.amazon.com/Crucial-MX100...F8&qid=1407277032&sr=8-1&keywords=mx100+256gb

Total: about $600 before shipping.

If you must cut because the shipping adds too much, I would suggest an older B85 motherboard. You can also save 12 bucks with the 430w version of the PSU I picked. See those alternatives here:

http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Build...&qid=1407278117&sr=8-1&keywords=corsair+cx430

http://www.amazon.com/MSI-Computer-...7278170&sr=8-8&keywords=gigabyte+b85+microatx
 
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Thanks! I'll take a look at everything when I get home from work.
 
There's only one change I would make to defaultluser's build: I recommend spending the extra $5 for the XFX 550W due to its significantly higher quality:
$60 - XFX TS Series XFX TS 550W PSU
 
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Dangman said:
There's only one change I would make to defaultluser's build: I recommend spending the extra $5 for the XFX 550W due to its significantly higher quality:
$60 - XFX TS Series XFX TS 550W PSU
Click to expand...

Good suggestion!

Based upon the forum discussions I could dig up, that's a potentially excellent upgrade over the Corsair in terms of quality, but I would really like a full-on review from someone reputable to be sure before I start recommending this myself.

It's a shame that they've made what seems like a real quality push for these latest Seasponic-built PSUs, but have not bothered to send them out for any major reviews. But their older entry-level Seasonic-built PSUs have not been perfect either:

http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story4&reid=225

Is the TS reeally better? I would like to know. I'd rather recommend the CX with the lower-quality capacitors (*could* die early, but that's all) than something that could potentially have voltages way out of spec.
 
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defaultluser said:
Good suggestion!

Based upon the forum discussions I could dig up, that's a potentially excellent upgrade over the Corsair in terms of quality, but I would really like a full-on review from someone reputable to be sure before I start recommending this myself.

It's a shame that they've made what seems like a real quality push for these latest Seasponic-built PSUs, but have not bothered to send them out for any major reviews. But their older entry-level Seasonic-built PSUs have not been perfect either:

http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story4&reid=225

Is the TS reeally better? I would like to know. I'd rather recommend the CX with the lower-quality capacitors (*could* die early, but that's all) than something that could potentially have voltages way out of spec.
Click to expand...
The TS, from what I can tell, is actually a renamed Core Edition 550W, the same one in that JG review.

While the XFX does have some wonky +12V regulation, overall, its quality of parts are better and it should be rated at a higher temperature (40C) than the CX500 (30C). I've never seen any Seasonic design rated for less than 40C.
 
Dangman said:
The TS, from what I can tell, is actually a renamed Core Edition 550W, the same one in that JG review.

While the XFX does have some wonky +12V regulation, overall, its quality of parts are better and it should be rated at a higher temperature (40C) than the CX500 (30C). I've never seen any Seasonic design rated for less than 40C.
Click to expand...

Okay, I'll agree with the recommendation. Even though those voltages look a bit wonky, they're still within spec, and the rest of the PSU build looks quite good :D
 
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