Gamer Black Friday Build $1000 Budget

[Flacco]

Purchased the PSU for $50, sitting at $935 now with just the ram left to purchase.

Saw these two on newegg:

G.SKILL Sniper Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1866 (PC3 14900) @ 29.99

or

G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) @ 24.99

Both are Iron Egg guarantees which is nice if I have any issues with them early on. I'll admit I don't really know what the differences are between the two. Obviously the sniper series is a bit faster. That worth the extra few bucks? Probably can't go wrong with either but wanted some insight before I purchased. Cheers and happy Thanksgiving.

[mfenn]

DDR3 1866 is faster than DDR3 1600 (obvious statement of the day!), but it doesn't really matter (1% difference). I'd save the $5 and get the DDR3 1600.

[Flacco]

Final Build:

Case: Thermaltake Armor A90 Gaming Mid-Tower Chassis $39.99AR*
Processer/Mobo: i5 3570K + Asrock Z77 Pro3 $224.98AP (Microcenter purchase)*
Graphics Card: GTX 670 - GIGABYTE GV-N670OC-2GD $329AR*
SSD : Samsung 840 74.99AP (Microcenter purchase)*
PSU: CORSAIR TX650 $50 AR
Ram: G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 $24.99
Monitor: Acer GD235HZbid Widescreen 23.6" 3D LCD Display $174.99 (w/$25 gift card)*
Heatsink: Hyper212+ $20*
Thermal Paste: 2.99*
Tax: 18.18 has been added to the total for Microcenter purchases. Gas not gonna worry about found out there was a second store in MD (Towson) just 15 minutes away from work.

Total = $960.11

+ Assassins Creed 3 and Borderlands 2 free with the graphics card.

Was able to come in under budget and very happy with what I got for my money. Once again tyvm mfenn for all your help with finalizing the build selections. Can't wait to get everything and put it together. Hoping to do it either Tue or Thurs provided the parts have arrived.

[mfenn]

Looks good, let us know how it goes.

[Flacco]

So everything finally arrived and I had time to put the PC together. Take my time make sure I'm doing everything correct and do a test boot before I put the motherboard in the case. Everything works fine.

Install the motherboard and start installing all my components. Everything is installed so I go to grab my DVDburner out of my old PC and hook it up to the new one. Ooooops apparently this drive is a LOT older than I thought. No sata option, IDE only. MB has no IDE, DVD drive has no sata.

I'll be picking up a new DVD drive from Best Buy tomorrow as I don't feel like waiting for one to ship from elsewhere. Live and learn I guess. Was really looking forward to being up and running tonight too.

Hopefully that will be the only problem I run into though. Looked like all my fans etc were spinning on the test boots though.

[riversend]

Flacco,
Do you have an 8GB USB key laying around somewhere? If so, you can do an Win7 install file off another version running on another computer. Go to Sevenforums and then tutorials, they have a guide there that should get you up and running. If doing 64bit you will need a 64 bit computer to build the files. No need to buy the new drive if that is all you want it for.

[Flacco]

Yea I know, thanks for the heads up though. Just convenient to have the cd/dvd drive for installs and if I ever do decide to actually burn something.

Up and running now. Loving the SSD, wish it was bigger though. Just playing CS:S atm but everything maxed getting like 300+fps. Adjustment to playing with fps configs def though.

[mfenn]

Glad you're liking it!