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Mid-Range Gaming Build

X

Xyrrus

n00b
Joined
Jun 5, 2007
Messages
4
I'm retiring a 2006 Mac Pro (dual xeon 5150) that's gone through about 4 video card upgrades (currently have a HD5770) and is currently rather CPU bound. All my day to day work has long since moved to an i7 Macbook Pro, but I've still been gaming on the MP. Needless to say it's time for an upgrade and I'm going back to a custom build for gaming.

One thing - my last home build (an Athalon 64) ended up being very loud (which is what I get for putting a cooler called a "Vornado" in it). The Mac Pro is pretty quiet, even at load. I'd like to keep the temps and noise as low as possible while sticking with stock parts.

1) What will you be doing with this PC?
Hello Kitty Island Adventure. :cool:

I'm not huge info multiplayer FPS gaming (especially multiplayer) so I don't require astronomical framerates. Diablo 3, SC2, MMOs (Star Wars currently), CivV, single player FPS. I'd like to be able to run those at high quality on a 27"

I suppose it's not out of the question that I'd do some fairly heavy photo processing at some point (Lightroom 4, Camera is 18MP, I shoot RAW) but I tend to do that stuff on my Mac.

2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
Ballpark $1200. That's not a firm number though.

3) Which country do you live in? If the U.S, please tell us the state and city if possible.
SF Bay Area

4) What exact parts do you need for that budget?
CPU, GPU, RAM, MB, Case/Fans/PSU

5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
- KB (Apple USB), Mouse (Logitech Laser something or other)
- HDD: I have a 1TB Caviar Black I'll be putting in there. I have a 120 gig Vertex 3 in my macbook pro that I'm going to swap out for a 240, probably in a few months. I'll move the 120 to the gaming rig when I do.
- Optical: Do people use these anymore? Anyways, I have an external. I suppose I could move the existing DVD burner out of my mac but it's IDE.
- GPU: I am considering keeping the 5770 for a month or two while prices stabilize and my wallet recovers and then getting a GTX680. But based on the 670 reviews it doesn't seem worth it. Budget does include the GPU though

6) Will you be overclocking?
Probably not at this point.

7) What is the max resolution of your monitor? What size is it?
Apple Cinema LED 27" 2650x1600 - NOT the thunderbolt version - Any issues w/ using this monitor on a homebuilt PC? I use it with my work HP elitebook over displayport w/o issues.

8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
Flexible. Within a month, probably.

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.
- SLI, USB3, SATA 6, optical audio (w/ 'advanced' codec passthrough) are more or less must haves.
- eSATA, F800 would be great. Display port for the onboard video would be great as well, as would audio over hdmi if I move this to a HTPC build at some point.
- I could see myself possibly going SLI at some point to pickup framerates on the 27"
- Easy OCing. If I go that route I'd like to have a decent BIOS to work with

10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If so, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?
Not sure; Roommate might have an extra license on his OEM 3 pack. Will go OEM Home Premium 64 otherwise. I was thinking about Win 8 Preview - will that work for this? (I'm a UI designer and would like to play w/ Metro)

When in doubt, I'd prefer to buy from amazon (prime shipping + no tax)

$190 CPU - 3570K from Microcenter. Am willing to entertain suggestions to go with the 3770 but the microcenter 3570 v. the newegg 3770 seems like a no brainer. Stock cooler is ok? The computer will be in a loft where it can hit 80 degrees, but anything above that I turn on the a/c. I'm willing to swap in a cooler at a later point if i decide to go with moderate OCing. Noise is a bigger concern though, my last non-retail cooler was VERY loud.

$115 MB - GA-Z77X-UD3H (microcenter bundle)

$399 GPU - EVGA GTX 670. Had an EVGA Geforce 6800GT way back on my last custom build and thought it was a great card w/ good support. (Looks like I missed the newegg in stock window, but I'm assuming these won't be too hard to snag if I'm signed up for notifications)

~$50 RAM - 2x4GB G.SKILL

$140 - PSU - SeaSonic X Series X650 Gold - Again, attempting to keep things a bit quiet. Overkill? I love the fully modular design.

$135 Update: Corsair 550D -- of all the suggestions below this seems to be the best alternative. The silverstones seem to be a bit pricey and I prefer the look of the corsair to the Fractal.

Alternate: $120 Case - Antec P280 - Seems well reviewed, recommended from the silent PC folks. Again, open to suggestions. Smaller is better than bigger (but I don't want airflow issues) and I don't tend to like elaborate-looking cases. *** I'll check out some of the corsair cases recommended below

Of all the components I'm most open to suggestions on the motherboard. None of them seem to be the right mix of value/features for me so I feel like I'm either overbuying or compromising.

Have at it and thanks in advance!

$1029 pretax/no OS

[Edit 1: Updated motherboard + RAM]
[Edit 2: Looking at the Corsair case instead]
 
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A "mid-range" system to me would consist of an ivy bridge i5, radeon 6850, samsung 830 128GB ssd.

Your system doesn't look too bad. I'm not a big fan of that case. Also not a big fan of the MSI motherboards.

If you want to keep it quite, you'll have to swap out every stock fan with an aftermarket. I typically budget $50-$100 for that.
 
af22 said:
Your system doesn't look too bad. I'm not a big fan of that case. Also not a big fan of the MSI motherboards.
Click to expand...

Are your issues with the case aesthetic or is it a pain to work with/loud/hot/etc?
 
The Fractal Design Define R3 line of cases are very quiet and have excellent cooling and cable management capabilities. You could probably get a cheaper quality PSU. Unfortunately, it's not always easy finding out which are the quietest, so I'd say go with what you know is quiet. Kingwin makes a good fanless PSU but it's more expensive and not as powerful.

I believe the GA-Z77X-UD5H has all the options you're looking for in a motherboard. It's a bit higher cost though to get all of those options as many don't have display port or e-sata.

I would also recommend an aftermarket CPU cooler such as the Cooler Master Hyper 212.

If you want everything to be quiet, replace all fans with Scythe Gentle Typhoon AP-15 fans.
 
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Actually the GA-Z77X-UD3H has what you're looking for as well. MicroCenter has it with the $50 off bundle when purchased with the 3570K cpu.
 
If you are going to purchase your CPU from Microcenter you should also take advantage of their CPU+motherboard bundle which will give you $50 off of your motherboard. From their available motherboards, the $160 ($110 bundled) Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD3H would fit your requirements.

edit:K1tty beat me to it :D
 
Xyrrus said:
Are your issues with the case aesthetic or is it a pain to work with/loud/hot/etc?
Click to expand...

I've built 2 systems using the P180, 4 systems using Antec Sonata's.

The factory Antec fans down right suck. They are loud, perform poorly for the amount of noise they generate, and they start to grind after a year of use.

4 decent replacement fans is easily $60. And i've had to replace almost ever Antec fan i've used.

You can get a Fractal R3 case for $99 that comes with 2 good fans and a decent design.

I'm a big sucker for the Silverstone RV02 or FT02 series though...
 
Also, if you want a quite high quality sounding computer, you will need better fans.

I personally own 5 Noctua fans, 2 Akasa Apaches, don't believe in the hype you read about these fans. They are indeed high quality and "quite", but nothing is truly "quite" when your pushing that amount of air flow. I ended up using them all on the low speed setting at 900 rpms.
 
I highly recommend the corsair 550d if you want a quiet case.

Get this ram instead so you don't have HSF clearance issues and they still look decent.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231416

Definitely go with the Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD3H

I just built the same system a couple days ago with a seasonic x-650 PSU and everything worked fine out of the box. You could save a couple bucks with a semi-modular psu but I must say the seasonic is nice although a tad expensive w/o any promos.

GPU looks fine, the 680 probably isn't worth the price premium, so I'd stick with the 670.
 
Thanks for the comments, all. I'll plan on grabbing the Gigabyte board bundle. The displayport and esata are nice to haves, not required, so at this point I'll just save the money with the cheaper board.

I'll check out the other recommended cases and will possibly budget in buying some aftermarket fans.

Will probably stick with the retail cooler and only swap it out if I'm really unhappy with the overall noise.
 
The stock cpu fan on my i7 930 and i3 2105 were not quite enough for me. I replaced them after a week. Your gonna need to do some work if your comparing the noise to a Mac Pro.

If i were you, i'd hold off on a GPU purchase (unless your buying a last gen) and use the 5770 until the pricing of the new gen matures. The 6950 is $199 right now on newegg, which is a pretty fantastic price.

Alot of [H] members here are also a big fan of the Corsair 650 case. You should check it out.
 
Since you live in California, try to buy as much of your parts as possible from Amazon.com or Tigerdirect as they do not charge CA residents sales tax. TD still has some GTX 670 cards in stock IIRC.

HSF wise, I'd spend the money for a quiet HSF up front considering how much of a pain in the ass it will be if you add one later on. A quiet HSF isn't that much anyway:
$27 - Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus HSF for LGA 1366 and LGA 1156

RAM wise, I recommend this:
$40 - Corsair CMV8GX3M2A1333C9 2 x 4GB DDR3 1333 RAM

As for quiet cases, personally, I'd look at the Silverstone RV02 or FT02. If looking for a more budget case, the 550D would probably be the better choice.
 
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Just as a followup I went ahead with some of this forum's suggestions:

Corsair 550D Case (based on this forum and the post on the case forum, which was really helpful)
i5 3570K + GB UD3H MB (microcenter bundle; I can't believe how cheap this combo was-big thanks for the heads up)
Corsair RAM but with a lower profile, which is good because the cooler has a pretty tight clearance if I ever want to put another pair in
Coolermaster 212 Cooler.
Seasonic X650 PSU

As mentioned, for now I'm rocking the Apple-spec HD5770 and a caviar black 1TB. I'm waiting for the 670s to be available a bit more widely. I do think I'll get an SSD sooner rather than later, though.

The overall build is went w/o a hitch and is very quiet. My elitebook at idle is louder.

Thanks for all your help/suggestions
 
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