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Girlfriend's Thesis + Gaming Rig

T

tonytnnt

Gawd
Joined
Jun 30, 2004
Messages
871
This is a rig for my girlfriend. She's contributing $450. I can throw in another $100 or $200 if need be (but don't tell her that -- it's a surprise... the Internet is good for secrets right?)

Be sure to read the text below the sticky responses before anyone makes a full build list.

1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc
She's a PhD biology student. Reading PDFs, storing PDFs, and cataloging PDFs will be the main use (anyone know of a Windows version of Papers?) General internet and Word/Excel type stuff is secondary. And thirdly, she's expressed an interest in playing games with me. Borderlands would be the most graphically demanding game that she's mentioned, but Team Fortress 2 will probably get installed on there, and I wouldn't be surprised if she gets into Diablo 3 or some other forthcoming RPGs. She doesn't currently game so I don't want to put too much money into the gaming side of things, but she did play games growing up, so the possibility is there.
2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
$450 to $650, but below budget is ideal.
3) Where do you live?
Omaha, NE -- there's chance I can get to a Microcenter in the Chicago area next week. And a very slim chance I can get there in the middle of August. Otherwise the usual suspects for etailers.
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, Motherboard, RAM, GPU, HDD, DVD, PSU, Case, OS, (potentially 1080p monitor if budget allows)
5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
She has a 17" or 19" LCD that makes me very sad to look at. She also has a generic keyboard and mouse.
6) Will you be overclocking?
Doubtful. I suspect this computer will remain at stock speeds. If the opportunity is there, I might fool around with it, but probably not.
7) What size monitor do you have and/or plan to have?
Some 1440x900 LCD. I would prefer to get her to a 1080p display since she'll be doing so much reading/writing, but I don't know if that can fit in the budget. Maybe I've solved what to get her for Christmas...
8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
Between now and mid-August, and built before school starts (3rd or 4th week in August.)
9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? etc.
USB 3.0, SATA 6Gb/s preferred. I doubt that any addin cards will be used, and really SATA 3Gb/s is probably okay as I doubt she'll get an SSD. eSATA might be nice, but I think USB 3.0 would be all she really needs. RAID, Crossfire/SLI, and Firewire are not necessary.
10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If so, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?
She will need an OS, but it's only $20 through her school. Please include the $20 in the budget.


My main concern is the CPU, GPU, and to a lesser extent the motherboard. I'm intrigued by what AMD's Llano chips have to offer, but I can't help but feel they're overpriced. To get the A8 GPU working to its full potential you need to get DDR3-1866 RAM, which on top of the FM1 motherboard price premium, results in me being able to get an Athlon II x4 and a 5570 for the same price with cheaper DDR3-1333 sticks. Then there's Sandy Bridge to consider as well. Especially the $100+tax Core i3-2100 at Microcenter.

Since I'm going to Chicago next Monday, and have a chance to run to Microcenter that week (it's not far from my hotel), I'd like to at least get the CPU and motherboard sorted out since they have such great bundles.

So, any ideas? Opinions on Llano? Sandy Bridge? GPU ideas?
 
tonytnnt said:
So Llano with DDR-3 1866 is out?
Click to expand...

Yup. The price of DDR3 1866 as well as how much RAM you get for that much cash effectively just kills whatever cost to performance advantage the Llano platform may have.
 
So far I recommend the following parts:
$65 - Samsung Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
$19 - Sony AD-7260S-0B SATA DVD Burner
$50 - Antec NEO ECO 400C 400W PSU
---
Total: $134 shipped.

As for the CPU and mobo, it's largely dependent on whether or not USB 3.0 is really needed. Without the USB 3.0 requirement, I'd recommend getting the Phenom II 965 + any of the AM3+ mobo combos that MC has for about $130 to $140. With the USB 3.0 requirement, I'd recommend getting the Core i3 2100 + a suitable H67 motherboard with USB 3.0 for about $200. Main reason being that once you factor out the MIR price on the motherboards with USB 3.0 + Phenom II 965 combos, it's almost as much as the Core i3 + decent H67 mobo setup. Considering that the Core i3 is significantly faster than the Phenom II 965 in games, the small price difference is well worth it.
 
Eesh, so the Microcenter I'd be going to has the Core i3-2100 and the MSI H61M-P23 available for $120 before tax (about $130 after.) That might be too hard to pass up, even without USB3.

In fact, for $25 I can get a USB 3 add in card, or an eSATA add in card. The only thing I think she'd use USB 3 for is an external hard drive or flash drive so it should be okay going through a PCI Express 2.0 x1 slot. Has anyone ever used a SATA to eSATA pass through? Do they work?
 
tonytnnt said:
Eesh, so the Microcenter I'd be going to has the Core i3-2100 and the MSI H61M-P23 available for $120 before tax (about $130 after.) That might be too hard to pass up, even without USB3.
Click to expand...
Oooh. I'd get it.
tonytnnt said:
In fact, for $25 I can get a USB 3 add in card, or an eSATA add in card. The only thing I think she'd use USB 3 for is an external hard drive or flash drive so it should be okay going through a PCI Express 2.0 x1 slot. Has anyone ever used a SATA to eSATA pass through? Do they work?
Click to expand...
Haven't used one TBH.
 
EDIT: I always take too long to type these things out, I would probably go with that i3 combo


Case Lian Li PC-K58 $65-
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811112238

I like this cpu+psu combo for $143 AR.

Add the DVD and HD from Danny's post for a total of $357 so far.

I like this board for $65-
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813138318
Or this one for $85 AR-
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131654

Leaves at $422/442 (with $20 for OS).

Then you can do this card for $35 AR (GT 240)-
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150553

Would put you near your $450 mark, or splurge on a higher end one. The card will be ok for basic gaming.

This would be a step up ($53 AR) 5670
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150535

This is probably as high as you can go ($95 AR) 6770-
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131434
 
tonytnnt said:
To get the A8 GPU working to its full potential you need to get DDR3-1866 RAM, which on top of the FM1 motherboard price premium, results in me being able to get an Athlon II x4 and a 5570 for the same price with cheaper DDR3-1333 sticks. Then there's Sandy Bridge to consider as well. Especially the $100+tax Core i3-2100 at Microcenter.
Click to expand...

Recently released review showed that there is VERY little to be gained with the 1866 RAM on Llano. DDR3 1333 is best money bet for Llano or SB.
 
wwischerath said:
Recently released review showed that there is VERY little to be gained with the 1866 RAM on Llano. DDR3 1333 is best money bet for Llano or SB.
Click to expand...

? The Anandtech review of Llano's GPU performance suggests there's about a 20% performance gain over DDR3 1333. However, I think I'm going to go with the Core i3-2100 and $20 motherboard anyways, with a dedicated card that is still to be determined (mostly on how much is left over in the budget.) When I can get a Core i3 and a motherboard for less than the cost of the A8 APU, how can I pass it up?
 
Any case recommendations for under $60? (maybe $80...) The HAF912 is high on my list, but I'd like to get her some choices so she can choose. The motherboard will be mATX so feel free to shoot out those in addition to regular ATX cases.
 
Recently released review showed that there is VERY little to be gained with the 1866 RAM on Llano.
Click to expand...

No

Any case recommendations for under $60? (maybe $80...) The HAF912 is high on my list, but I'd like to get her some choices so she can choose. The motherboard will be mATX so feel free to shoot out those in addition to regular ATX cases.
Click to expand...

Do you have any preferences for windowed, lights, size, etc?
 
tonytnnt said:
Any case recommendations for under $60? (maybe $80...) The HAF912 is high on my list, but I'd like to get her some choices so she can choose. The motherboard will be mATX so feel free to shoot out those in addition to regular ATX cases.
Click to expand...

For under $60:
$50 - Cooler Master Elite 335 RC-335-KKN1-GP ATX Case
$50 - Xigmatek Asgard II B/O CPC-T45UE-U01 ATX Case
$50 - Cooler Master Elite 330 RC-330-KKN1-GP ATX Case
$50 - Cooler Master Elite 430 RC-430-KWN1 ATX Case
$50 - Thermaltake V3 Black Edition VL80001W2Z ATX Case
$55 - Cooler Master Elite 341 RC-341C-KKN1-GP mATX Tower Case

For $60 to $80:
$65 - Lian Li Lancool PC-K58W ATX Case
 
tonytnnt said:
Has anyone ever used a SATA to eSATA pass through? Do they work?
Click to expand...

Yes. You just have to make sure you have AHCI enabled on your board when you install Win 7 (probably should anyway), and the Asus H67 boards I've been building with lately also require you to enable Hot Plug capability for the port you plug the passthrough into. Otherwise, you have to have it plugged into the passthrough on boot for Windows to detect.
 
tonytnnt said:
? The Anandtech review of Llano's GPU performance suggests there's about a 20% performance gain over DDR3 1333. However, I think I'm going to go with the Core i3-2100 and $20 motherboard anyways, with a dedicated card that is still to be determined (mostly on how much is left over in the budget.) When I can get a Core i3 and a motherboard for less than the cost of the A8 APU, how can I pass it up?
Click to expand...

I got my information from TechReport, with this quote:

The CPU cores on this chip are based on, uh, a proven-technology microarchitecture, and that architecture doesn't appear to extract much additional instruction throughput from a higher-performance memory subsystem. One might expect Llano, with no L3 cache, to benefit more than most processors from faster RAM, but these days, it seems CPUs with larger caches and aggressive pre-fetching make the best use of additional memory bandwidth when it becomes available.

More unexpectedly, even Llano's IGP doesn't churn out substantially higher frame rates in the presence of 1866MHz memory. At its relatively low core clock speed of 600MHz, the Sumo IGP appears to be getting most of what it needs from 1333MHz or 1600MHz memory.

Last I am going to say and let thread get back to its original topic :D
 
I just wanted to point out something rarely taken into consideration. If she's doing a lot of "reading and writing" as you said, she probably won't like a 16:9 display (1080P). Get her a 16:10 display. I switched over to a 1080P display and that's the one thing I regret. It feels as though the screen real estate is too small, and I find myself extremely frustrated writing papers on it or reading long documents. It's just too short.
 
wwischerath said:
Last I am going to say and let thread get back to its original topic :D
Click to expand...

No worries, that's definitely still relevant to my topic. Since the earliest I can pick the motherboard and CPU up is on Monday, and Microcenter will only hold items for 3 days, I don't actually have the Intel combo in hand yet. So if Microcenter doesn't pan out, Athlons and Llanos might come back on the table. Plus I need to know that stuff for when I help piece together builds. :D

xDezor said:
I just wanted to point out something rarely taken into consideration. If she's doing a lot of "reading and writing" as you said, she probably won't like a 16:9 display (1080P). Get her a 16:10 display. I switched over to a 1080P display and that's the one thing I regret. It feels as though the screen real estate is too small, and I find myself extremely frustrated writing papers on it or reading long documents. It's just too short.
Click to expand...

That's a very good point. I'd forgotten about that. I only wish 16x10 was cheaper. Or that multimonitor stands were cheaper (I can almost get two 23" 1080p panels for the price of one 1920x1200 screen.)
 
Get a 21 or 22", 1650x1050 resolution screen. They're extremely cheap. I honestly think I was more productive on that smaller screen than my current 23" 1920x1080 LCD. Plus, there's an additional benefit of not being so resource intensive. The less pixels, the better your gaming experience will be (performance wise). :)
 
xDezor said:
Get a 21 or 22", 1650x1050 resolution screen. They're extremely cheap. I honestly think I was more productive on that smaller screen than my current 23" 1920x1080 LCD. Plus, there's an additional benefit of not being so resource intensive. The less pixels, the better your gaming experience will be (performance wise). :)
Click to expand...

Good point. Right now, the build is tentatively shaping up like this:

Purchased:
$45 - G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory Model F3-10666CL9D-8GBXL

Unpurchased:
$108 - Intel Core i3-2100
$21 - MSI H61M-P23 (price is due to a combo deal with the processor)
$20 - Windows 7 (through school)
$20 - DVD Burner
$60 - Samsung F3 1TB 7200 RPM (it's $55 at Directron.com -- anybody ordered from them before?)
$50 (with promo code Julsv10) - Antec High Current Gamer Series HCG-520 520W
$60ish case (still need to get her input on them.)
Total before GPU: $384

Current GPU possibilities:
$120 - Radeon 5770
$130-140ish - GTX460 (if I can still find them for this cheap -- cheap Asus cards seem to come and go very quickly)
$50-100 -- Unsure, any ideas? 5670?
 
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You can get a Gigabyte H67 mITX motherboard for $55 with a SB combo from Microcenter. Much better than the $21 MSI.
 
Case suggestion: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119068

If you had a preference to form factor somewhere, I missed it. This one is a pretty standard / generic ATX mid tower. Watch out for the corners inside, as they are sharp, but I've used it in a couple builds for people and they seem to like it. I haven't had any heat problems or anything with it either, and they've held up nicely over the past few years. If your video card isn't known for running extremely warm, I would think it'd be a good option.
 
Well, as for cases go, it turns out we like entirely different things. I love sleek, unobtrusive cases that blend in.

She seemed interested in a window and color accents. I'm kind of dreading a windowed case because that means I have to actually do cable management (definitely not my strong suit.)

This is the one she picked out when I showed her a few cases. But since I'll be the one putting the computer together, I'm totally open to nicer case that's easier to work inside of.

She likes this too...

And this.

Now I just have to find a well built case she likes.:confused:
 
tonytnnt said:
Well, as for cases go, it turns out we like entirely different things. I love sleek, unobtrusive cases that blend in.

She seemed interested in a window and color accents. I'm kind of dreading a windowed case because that means I have to actually do cable management (definitely not my strong suit.)

This is the one she picked out when I showed her a few cases. But since I'll be the one putting the computer together, I'm totally open to nicer case that's easier to work inside of.

She likes this too...

And this.

Now I just have to find a well built case she likes.:confused:
Click to expand...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811156063
Have you looked at the RaidMax Smilodon case, it looks really sleek and isn't too expensive, while it also from the layout seems to be a nice case for installations. The nice part about it is the mobo side of the case comes out for easy work.
 
Color accents eh? I always thought this case looks pretty good:
$143 - NZXT Phantom PHAN-002OR Black Finish w/Orange Trim Full Tower ATX Case
 
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