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A PC for a mate down under

MasterChuck

MasterChuck

Member
This will be my second PC build, first one was for me and this one is for a mate.

It will be a predominately gaming rig that he does some school work on. His budget is $1500 he can go a little bit over but, of course, lower is better. He'll be buying parts from PCCASEGEAR in Australia:http://pccasegear.com/. He doesn't care which brands (he wouldn't know the difference). He won't be using any parts from his current PC. He doesn't plan on overclocking, I would like to give him some overclocking potential however. He will be playing on a 1920X1080p panel. He plans on building within the month.

This is the build I have so far:
CPU: Intel i5-4690K ($275)
CPU Cooler: CoolerMaster Hyper 212 EVO ($40)
Motherboard: ASRock Z97 Extreme4 ($200)
GPU: Sapphire R9 280X Dual-X OC ($330)
SSD: Samsung 840 EVO 120GB ($100)
HDD: Western Digital Blue 1TB ($70)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224DB ($22)
PSU: Corsair CS650M ($140)
Case: NZXT Phantom 410 ($125)
OS: Windows 8.1 ($115)
Total: $1422
The only changes I can think of are in the storage department. The sandisk SSDnow v300 256gb is $140 and a 2tb drive at $100. The GPU is on sale now down to $330 from $380.

Thanks

Edit: it would also be great if he could grab a decentish 23-24" monitor because his current one is quite dated. He could probably go to $1550 to $1575 if a monitor was included.
 
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That motherboard seems a little more expensive than necessary. Not too bad, though, compared to the other ones on that site. And yeah, get 256GB on the SSD.
 
That configuration seems pretty good overall (given Australian pricing 🙁). However, I'd recommend a few changes:

- Mobo: The GA-Z97-D3H saves you about $31 and has the moderate overclocking capabilities that your friend is likely to want.
- SSD : I would recommend a ~250GB SSD as well, but I would avoid the V300 when the much faster Crucial MX100 256GB is $149.

The Phantom 410 is a good case, but make sure your friend is down with the styling.
 
Thanks for everyones input my friend is going to go with this build:
CPU: Intel i5-4690K ($275)
CPU Cooler: CoolerMaster Hyper 212 EVO ($40)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z97-D3H ($170)
GPU: Sapphire R9 280X Dual-X OC ($330)
SSD: Crucial MX100 256GB ($150)
HDD: Western Digital Blue 1TB ($70)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224DB ($22)
PSU: Corsair CS650M ($140)
Case: NZXT Phantom 410 ($125)
OS: Windows 8.1 ($115)
Total: $1442

Thanks to mfenn for finding a better deal on the mobo. you guys are legends. Still trying to convince him he needs a new monitor though. (his is from around '08)

Thanks
 
MasterChuck said:
Thanks for everyones input my friend is going to go with this build:
CPU: Intel i5-4690K ($275)
CPU Cooler: CoolerMaster Hyper 212 EVO ($40)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z97-D3H ($170)
GPU: Sapphire R9 280X Dual-X OC ($330)
SSD: Crucial MX100 256GB ($150)
HDD: Western Digital Blue 1TB ($70)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224DB ($22)
PSU: Corsair CS650M ($140)
Case: NZXT Phantom 410 ($125)
OS: Windows 8.1 ($115)
Total: $1442

Thanks to mfenn for finding a better deal on the mobo. you guys are legends. Still trying to convince him he needs a new monitor though. (his is from around '08)

Thanks
Click to expand...

Looks good. Another thing is that you can get a less expensive PSU like this Antec HCG-620 for $99. It's based on the Seasonic S12II platform, so quality is top notch.
 
Excuse me for being not too great in the details, but did I some how miss seeing the details about any memory for this computer build?
 
Thanks for that catch guys, nearly made a terrible mistake. 🙁
Is that good RAM: Kingston ValueRAM KVR16N11/8 ($95) (8gb 1600mhz)?
 
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