Custom Build - I need Advice!

Dragovich although you did not include/may not want advice for the hard drive hopefully you already own or are planning to upgrade to an SSD as Spinner drives are painfully slow (Like XP) and your computer upgrade may seem to be not worth the money you invested.

SSD's are a lot faster opening programs and loading Windows and you instantly realize the full performance benefit of the upgraded build.

You could install windows and all of your programs on the SSD and store Videos & Music ect on a secondary spinner drive.

An i3 is a wate of money, get an i5

I would look at getting a larger motherboard, such as an ATX. With the motherboard that you have chosen, you only have two RAM slots and three PCIe slots. This limits future expandability.

You have the large case, might as well use a full size motherboard.

Something like this might be a good choice:

ASUS Z97-E/USB3.1 LGA 1150 Intel Z97 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.1 USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard - Newegg.com

Others may have better ideas. I'm not an Intel guy so my knowledge is limited in that regard.

Yea the z97 is cheap mostly because nobody bought it
asus z87 sabertooth is pretty common and barely costs more looks like 20.us more for a popular mobo

That is a nice looking case :)

I don't believe I would anything less than 750w psu evga has some good prices :)
Yep i5 at minimum :)

ThrashZone said:

Yea the z97 is cheap mostly because nobody bought it
asus z87 sabertooth is pretty common and barely costs more looks like 20.us more for a popular mobo

I would have thought that the Z97 chipset would be more popular because it's newer and has the M.2 connectors for SSDs and other things. What is the main difference between the Z97 and the Z87 chipsets? I'm not clear on the differences other than that, though I agree that the Sabertooth board is better than the one I linked.

And I agree on the 750W PSU. :)

Z97 vs Z87: Which motherboard should I buy? - How-To - PC Advisor

Mellon Head said:

ThrashZone said:

Yea the z97 is cheap mostly because nobody bought it
asus z87 sabertooth is pretty common and barely costs more looks like 20.us more for a popular mobo

I would have thought that the Z97 chipset would be more popular because it's newer and has the M.2 connectors for SSDs and other things. What is the main difference between the Z97 and the Z87 chipsets? I'm not clear on the differences other than that, though I agree that the Sabertooth board is better than the one I linked.

And I agree on the 750W PSU. :)

M.2 ssd's are expensive now heck I have a board capable of them and I've pass on it and opted for conventional ssd's

AddRam pretty much sums it up since the op is looking at a i3 and z97 wouldn't be a good choice way more than needed not really sure it's compatible with i3 ?
The asus sabertooth z87 is good for upgrades to i7 4970k which AddRam and Boozad both are using now :)

@ AddRAM and ThrashZone:

Thanks for the explanation. :)