Building a gaming rig! Need assistance

AstaLaVista said:

Again, with the games being what they are, spending that much money on a super card is just a waste of time IMHO, look at my system specs, as of today, I can play any game (shooter game that is, as that is all I play) at max w/o a single problem... anything else is just overkill.

Being said that, if that is well within your budget... why not!

Amen, brother. In fact, my system is very close to what hjonesMCT posted. The only "problem" I've ever run into with any game is the Crysis series (gee, what a surprise) at the absolute highest settings at 1600x900. I play them at the next-highest settings and I guess the water doesn't look as pretty as it could. Frankly, I don't give a $#!t. But if you do, buy what you can afford. The way things are now you don't have to go nuts.

If you're not OCing but will later, I wouldn't use stock coolers. In fact, I don't OC and I chucked the stock fan, got a Freezer 7 Pro, bought some arctic silver and my CPU almost never goes beyond 29 C.

BarTmaN said:

I want to build a rig that will be able to pretty much handle any game. I don't need something that is over-the-top crazy, but something that can run any game good! I need everything, including a case.

-I prefer an Intel processor (unless someone can sell me on an AMD one)
-I prefer Nvidia video card(s)

I don't know if it's better to run one beastly video card, or setup SLi with two. I will only be running one monitor if that matters at all (Sony Bravia 26" LCD HDTV).

I don't really know much about motherboards

Can you guys reccommend me some hardware for a rig?

Budget ~$1500 (possibly a little more if needed)


Sorry if this is the wrong section. Feel free to move, or even lock if you don't 'allow' threads like this.

Thanks

Little late to the party, but this is what I would go for:

CPU: Intel Core i5-2500K
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212+
Motherboard: ASUS P8P67 Pro
RAM: 4GB Corsair XMS3 DDR3 1600
GPU: ASUS GeForce GTX 570
SSD: OCZ Vertex 2 60GB (OS + few games)
HDD: Samsung F3 1TB (Storage)
Case: Corsair 600T
PSU: Seasonic X Series 650W
Keyboard: Logitech G110
Mouse: Logitech MX 518
Sound Card: ASUS Xonar DS

TOTAL: $1480.88

SICK... SICK build.

hjonesMCT said:

Slacker, great build-- but I'd go with i5-2600K.

Nahh, both the 2500K and 2600K have basically the same gaming performance.

It wouldn't be smart to spend an extra ~$100 (and compromise elsewhere) on something that would net you pretty much zero performance advantage when gaming.

Only in highly threaded applications the 2600K will pull ahead thanks to it's HT tech (but not by much).

SlackerITGuy said:

Little late to the party, but this is what I would go for:

CPU: Intel Core i5-2500K
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212+
Motherboard: ASUS P8P67 Pro
RAM: 4GB Corsair XMS3 DDR3 1600
GPU: ASUS GeForce GTX 570
SSD: OCZ Vertex 2 60GB (OS + few games)
HDD: Samsung F3 1TB (Storage)
Case: Corsair 600T
PSU: Seasonic X Series 650W
Keyboard: Logitech G110
Mouse: Logitech MX 518
Sound Card: ASUS Xonar DS

TOTAL: $1480.88

SICK... SICK build.

Looks like a very nice build also! Ahh, so many options, I am going to try and piece together another build and see if it works out to be good!

How does this look?!

CPU: Intel Core i7-2600K Sandy Bridge
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212+
Motherboard: ASUS P8P67 Pro
RAM: 8GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600
GPU: EVGA GeForce GTX 570 Superclocked
SSD: OCZ Vertex Agility 2 100GB
HDD: Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB
Case: Antec 1200 V3 ATX Full Tower
PSU: Antec TruePower 750W Continous Power
CD/DVD Burner: Samsung

BarTmaN said:

How does this look?!

CPU: Intel Core i7-2600K Sandy Bridge
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212+
Motherboard: ASUS P8P67 Pro
RAM: 8GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600
GPU: EVGA GeForce GTX 570 Superclocked
SSD: OCZ Vertex Agility 2 100GB
HDD: Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB
Case: Antec 1200 V3 ATX Full Tower
PSU: Antec TruePower 750W Continous Power
CD/DVD Burner: Samsung

Excellent.

Nice build mate.

The one thing I'd change is the video card, reference GTX 570s are known to have weak VRM's, meaning that in the case that you might want to overclock it, it's a possibility that it might die.

The one to get as of right now, is this one (just came out today):

Newegg.com - MSI N570GTX Twin Frozr III PE/OC GeForce GTX 570 (Fermi) 1280MB 320-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card

Superb cooler, 6+1 phase, plus... It looks bad ass.

Okay, I will check that card out when I get home (on my phone now).

I'm not missing anything right? Just want to double check that I have everything for a COMPLETE build.

Thanks!!

With regards to your video card I say go with what you're comfortable with. Everyone has an opinion on video cards and their performance.

Example: If you're not going to overclock the card.... does a supposed issue with VRM really matter to you? And is it a guarantee that you'll run into the issue if you do?

My point is we can get so caught up in so many what if's that we paralyze ourselves from getting anything.

Most items just work; they only don't work when we push them outside their design limits. Point: nothing is guaranteed to "overclock" - that is your warranty doesn't say we guarantee our product will overclock past its design specification.

It's always good to get advice but remember – you are the one who has to live with the purchase.

Just something to think about.

You probably ought to order some thermal paste in case you ever need to remount the heatsink. Arctic Silver 5 is the standard recommendation.

I'd get some cable ties so I could keep the case as uncluttered as possible and improve airflow a bit. You can get them at Home Depot.

You may end up ordering replacement fans later if you have cooling issues.