Looking to do barebones + semi-decent video, $600 Budget

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Punkrulz

[H]ard|Gawd
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Nov 11, 2001
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Hey guys,

A friend of mine has tasked me with building him a computer with a semi-decent video card. We're pretty sure that his son plays both Oblivion, as well as World of Warcraft. It's been a long while since I've done this, and I know that typically going the barebones route is going to be the cheapest route for building the computer. At this point I kind of need to build it around the video card.

What is going to be the "best bang for the buck" video card out there now that would play those games pretty well?

Where is the best place to basically get a bare bones system with most of the stuff that I need for this?

As long as I can stay around $600 I should be good, so that shouldn't be an issue.

I look forward to your responses or any questions that you may have for me!
 
It would help if you answered the stickied "ANSWER THESE QUESTIONS FIRST" so that we can help you better.
 
1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? PC will be used for gaming.
2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included? Budget is +/- $600, including tax & shipping
3) Where do you live? USA, NJ
4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. Please be very specific. CPU, PSU, Memory, HSF, Case, Mobo, Video, HD (Was looking at Barebones and the installing rest
5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? No parts will be reused.
6) Will you be overclocking? No overclocking will be done.
7) What size monitor do you have and/or plan to have? I believe nothing more than 21"
8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC? Cutting it close by getting it done before Christmas
9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? etc. No particular features needed.
10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? I do have a usable OS
 
Well first and foremost: Most barebones comes with PSUs totally unsuitable for a gaming PC. Only a few actually comes with a decent enough PSU for a office rig. The rest are pretty much shit especially the ones on Tigerdirect.

Anyway here's a quickie build:
$194 - AMD Phenom II X3 720 CPU + Gigabyte GA-MA790GPT-UD3H AM3 AMD 790GX Motherboard
$55 - G.Skil 2 x 1GB F3-12800CL9D-2GBNQ DDR3 1600 RAM
$100 - XFX 9800GT 512MB PCI-E Video Card
$70 - Western Digital WD6400AAKS 640GB 7200RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
$100 - Antec Three Hundred Case + Antec NEO ECO 520C 520W PSU Combo
---
Total: $520 plus tax and shipping.

Should be under $600 once you factor in tax and shipping.
 
Thanks Danny. Silly me forgot to factor in a CDROm which would probably put it over budget, but not by much. Looks good to me but will run it by the man!

Edit: Stock HSF?
 
Punkrulz said:
Thanks Danny. Silly me forgot to factor in a CDROm which would probably put it over budget, but not by much. Looks good to me but will run it by the man!

Edit: Stock HSF?
Click to expand...
A DVD burner is only $28:
$28 - LG GH22NS50 DVD Burner

Unless you're overclocking or live in a particular hot place, no need for a 3rd party HSF.
 
Heh, I was about to suggest an HD 4850, but I guess they're all gone. :p Danny's build is good.
 
Thank you so much for the system recommendation guys. The guy was able to get it before Christmas, even after they sent me a defective hard drive. The only crappy thing was that he didn't ask me for the DVI to VGA adapter and had to buy it the day after Christmas, even though one was sitting in the video card box I gave him. Oh well.

System was running fantastic, thank you for all of your help!
 
Punkrulz said:
Thank you so much for the system recommendation guys. The guy was able to get it before Christmas, even after they sent me a defective hard drive. The only crappy thing was that he didn't ask me for the DVI to VGA adapter and had to buy it the day after Christmas, even though one was sitting in the video card box I gave him. Oh well.

System was running fantastic, thank you for all of your help!
Click to expand...

Cool. Nice to hear!
 
Hehe, yah, when I do builds for people, I typically grab all the leftover accessories/manuals/discs and toss 'em into the mobo box; then I tell 'em if you need anything, everything is in THIS box. ;)
 
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