PC Overhaul Help?

C

CardiaK

Limp Gawd
Joined
Oct 27, 2004
Messages
153
Thanks in advance to Danny Bui and others, you guys are the best!!

1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc

Gaming will be the primary purpose, (A lot of WoW for now, but certainly Diablo III later and I will dabble in other games) there will be Photoshopping and Video Production/Editing as well.

2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?

I'm not super strict on a budget; if I can swing under $1000 all told that would be great. I have Amazon Prime.

3) Where do you live?

Connecticut; I have a Microcenter within driving distance, but no Fry's.

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
RAM
Video Card
OS/Apps Drive (SSD)
Optical Drive (Black Bezel and Blu-Ray would be nice)


5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.

PSU: PC Power & Cooling 750W Silencer Quad
Case: Antec P180
Sound: ASUS Xonar DX
Storage Drive: WD Caviar Blue 640GB 7200rpm SATA 3gb/s

6) Will you be overclocking?

Wasn't planning on it; but if it's very easy and reliable I would consider it.

7) What size monitor do you have and/or plan to have?

37" LCD Panel @ 1920 x 1080

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

Next couple weeks; shortly after my tax return arrives. ;)

9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? eSATA? Onboard video? etc.

I would consider Crossfire/SLI, but the last few mobos I've gotten have had the second pci-e x16 slot and I've never used it.

eSATA and USB 3 would also be nice features to have.

10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If yes, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?

I have a Windows 7 64-bit license.


Here's what I'm looking at right now; but I haven't built in a long time, so I probably got some things off: (I'm a little shaky about my video card choice.. I've read mixed reviews on the new Ti cards but it looked pretty decent on anandtech's benches)

$180 (@ Microcenter) CPU: Intel i5 2500K (Figured I might as well go for the unlocked one as it's only a couple bucks more)

$140 Mobo: MSI P67A-G45 (B3)

$95 RAM: G.SKILL Sniper Low Voltage Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3 1600

$218 (after rebate) Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 560 Ti FPB (Fermi) 1GB

$180 (after rebate) SSD: OCZ Vertex 2 OCZSSD2-2VTXE120G 2.5" 120GB (I thought about getting a SATA 3 drive, but I figured what I may do is go with this for a bit, then when SATA 3 drive prices come down, put this drive into my laptop, and get a new SSD for my desktop. This was the reasoning behind going with the 2.5" version.)

$80 Optical Drive: LG WH10LS30 10X Blu-ray Burner - LightScribe

$893 Total

I would appreciate any comments and input you guys may have!
 
Save $15 on the RAM and get G.Skill 1333 MHz DDR3 CL9 sticks for $80 on Newegg.

For a graphics card consider getting a Radeon 6950 1 GB or preferably a 2 GB card. Consider this Samsung Bluray drive for $65 instead.

Consider a Crucial C300 instead of that OCZ SSD. It's more expensive, but it's faster. Oh, and if you don't need Firewire, the MSI P67A-G43 is currently on sale for about $125 at Newegg with a promo code in their emails.
 
Thanks for the comments tonytnnt.

I see that the cpu and mobo combo I was looking at is exactly what you have in the machine in your sig. Everything's working well with that I assume?

And I guess you were suggesting the same RAM you have as well. Would I not see any performance improvement with the 1600 FSB ram? Will that 1333 RAM run at 1600? Or can I not run RAM at that speed with that cpu? I've seen that a lot of you guys are suggesting 1333 speed RAM to folks who are looking at 1600, and I'm just not sure why.

The FSB/Multiplier tweaks are really what I'm totally out of touch with nowadays. I was really just planning on getting that proc/mobo and just letting the MSI board do it's OC Genie magic and seeing what I get out of it.
 
I agree with all of tonytnnt's recommendations.
CardiaK said:
And I guess you were suggesting the same RAM you have as well. Would I not see any performance improvement with the 1600 FSB ram? Will that 1333 RAM run at 1600? Or can I not run RAM at that speed with that cpu? I've seen that a lot of you guys are suggesting 1333 speed RAM to folks who are looking at 1600, and I'm just not sure why.
Click to expand...

Because there's no difference whatsoever in real world performance between 1333 and 1600 RAM. In addition, the Sandy Bridge CPUs do not use the RAM at all to overclock. As such, you can reach a 5Ghz OC and still be ok with DDR3 1333 RAM. THis is unlike past Intel CPUs where you would need RAM as high as DDR3 1600 to 2000 to reach a high OC.

So yeah you''ll be fine with DDR3 1333 RAM
 
With the P67 you can get about 2 or 3 MHz faster FSB speed. Otherwise it's all multiplier based. My rig is running very well, though I admit I haven't tried to OC it yet. So far I've been having way too much fun playing Bad Company 2 and Portal 2 with all the settings on high. The G45 is a very good board. My only complaint is that the front audio header is in the lower left corner of the board (left being the I/O side of the board.) I got the G45 over the G43 because at the time it was only $5 more and I have a couple Firewire devices. It even unofficially does SLI (though it lacks a SLI bridge connector.)
 
Thanks for clearing that up on the RAM.

As for the video card choice, I was considering an nvidia card partially because of the sli potential of the board.

I don't think I'll ever do any eyefinity or anything, are the amd cards just generally better for the price?
 
The GeForce 560 Ti is a good card at 1080p. The motherboard is the issue since SLI is a possibilitiy. The G43/G45 will do SLI, but you have to come up with your own SLI bridge connector. If you'd like the SLI bridge included with the motherboard, you have to look at the MSI GD series. The P67A-GD55 or GD65 would be good fits. Basically for Crossfire X the bridge comes with the card and for SLI the bridge comes with the motherboard. Since the G series doesn't come with the SLI bridge, it's easier to do Crossfire on them since you don't have to find an SLI bridge.

If you look at the price difference between a G43 and a GD55, it's enough to get a Radeon 6950 2GB instead of the GTX 560Ti. The 6950 2GB is capable of having additional shaders unlocked for higher performance (but you have to be somewhat careful about card selection and even then there's no guarantee it'll work.)
 
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The lack of an SLI bridge isn't really a deal-breaker. You can buy one separately.

Grab the board with all of the features that you need, not the "extras" that it offers.
 
Thanks again for your thoughts and comments.

As long as one SLI bridge is the same as the next one, I definitely have one or two lying around, from previous motherboards.

I'll have to go digging through my PC wasteland closet to verify, but I seem to recall having one that was a fixed width hard PCB one, and another ribbon style flexible one.

And given that I may never actually do SLI on this board (I never did on either of those previous boards) I'm not hugely concerned with that. My larger concern is if the Radeon is really a much better card.

I was looking at the GPU benches on anandtech, and it seemed that the 560 Ti and 6950 1GB were about even overall at 1920 x 1200.

I do like the EVGA nvidia cards because of the lifetime warranty; which was one of the reasons I was leaning that way.
 
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