Building a new game rig and need suggestions.

[SlasnerSb]

I'm building a rig strictly for gaming and I have around $1100 to work with. Please suggest the best build for my money.

I want a system that will be easily upgraded when the next gen of gaming hits. Is this a realistic goal with the budget I'm working with?

 

[dmoney1980]

yes, please answer the questions below:

PLEASE when you POST threads asking for input on system builds tell us...

1. What YOUR PC will be used for. That means what types of tasks you'll be performing.

2. What YOUR budget is. A price range is acceptable as long as it's not more than a 20% spread

3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from.

4. IF YOU have a brand preference. That means, are you an Intel-Fanboy, AMD-Fanboy, ATI-Fanboy, nVidia-Fanboy, Seagate-Fanboy, WD-Fanboy, etc.

5. If YOU intend on using any of YOUR current parts, and if so, what those parts are.

*

7. IF YOU plan on overclocking or run the system at default speeds.

8. What resolution will you be using?

9. WHEN do you plan to build it?
Note that it is usually not cost or time effective to choose your build more than a month before you actually plan to be using it.

*

X. Do you need to purchase any software to go with the system, such as Windows or Blu Ray playback software?


At the end of the day it's your money. There's only so much we can do.

 

[SlasnerSb]

Used for Gaming
Price range would be 1000-1100
Buying parts in Canada
No brand preference
I will be buying all parts with the exception of a monitor
Default speeds
2048x1152
Plan an buying it in the next couple of days
I'll need to purchase windows 7

 

[rickon66]

You might be better off posting this in General Hardware since this is more a Video Card area. There are also many, many threads there basically asking the same question.

 

[Gryz]

First: we are on the AnandTech website.
Check out Anand's awesome buyer's guides.
They made a new guide just last week:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/6229/midrange-system-buyers-guide/2


My advice:
Best gaming CPU for your money: i5-3570K.

Best motherboard: Z77 chipset. Pick one of the major brands: Asus, Gigabyte, MSI or ASRock. I like ASRock, because they are still a bit cheaper, while the quality is on the same level as the other brands (aka not overpriced).

Best videocard: I only know the nVidia cards. I'd say a gtx660ti is the best bang for the buck. If you have a little more cash, get a gtx670. If you have enough cash, maybe even a gtx680. After all, putting money in the videocard will get you the most frames/sec per dollar.
AMD has similar cards. In the 7000 series. Others might be able to tell you which ones fit with what budget. I prefer nVidia myself (it seems they work a bit closer with game companies, and thus nVidia runs a bit smoother at launch. AMD usually catches up within 1-2 months after launch).

8 GB of RAM is enough. 4 GB is probably enough for today's games. But RAM is so cheap, it's not worth it to get only 4 GB. Don't get a noname brand, but for the rest it hardly matters what you get. Just get DDR-1600/PC3-12800 (or something faster, if the price is the same).

If you can afford it, get a SSD. For your OS, plus maybe a few games. 60GB can be enough, but if you switch games often, you'll have to copy/move data around a lot. 128GB is maybe the sweetspot these days.

PSU, case, HDD, all matter less for a gaming machine.
Get decent stuff, but if you have any money left, better invest it in a nice monitor. (I'd go for a 2ms 1920x1080 27", if I were you and the budget would allow it).
Hope this helps.

 

[DominionSeraph]

>canada
ugh
switching between newegg and ncix FTL.

Give me a minute.

 

[SlasnerSb]

@Dmoney and Rickon sorry about that I'm pretty new to this.

@Gryz thanks for the info man! I'm glad you said GTX 660 as thats the card I've been looking at.

Can someone explain to me how exactly I should be selecting a mobo? Gryz says Z77 but theres so many different ones at such a wide range of prices.

I could get this for $170.00

Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD5H Socket 1155 Intel Z77 Chipset Dual Channel DDR3 1600/1333/1066 MHz 3x PCI-Express x16 GigaLAN 7.1-CH HD Audio 5x SATA 6Gb/s 2.4 x SATA 3Gb/s 6x USB 2.0 10x USB 3.0 VGA/DVI/HDMI/D

VS. this for $95

Gigabyte GA-Z77M-D3H Socket 1155 Intel Z77 Chipset Dual Channel DDR3 1600/1333/1066 MHz 2x PCI-E x16 GBL 7.1-CH HD Audio 2x SATA 6Gb/s 4 x SATA 3Gb/s 3. 10x USB 2.0 4x USB 3.0 VGA/DVI/HDMI

Am I alright with the latter or is it really worth doubling the price for the first one?

 

[DominionSeraph]

http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=59617&promoid=1267
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=70541&promoid=1267
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=70902&promoid=1267
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=45271&promoid=1267
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=55583&promoid=1267
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=67546&promoid=1267
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=64385&promoid=1267
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=70136
http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=65701&promoid=1267

 

[DominionSeraph]

Wait, why is that ram coming up as a different price? I thought it said $34.
Give me a second.

Edit: Oh, here it is:

HURRY! Limited Quantities at this price! This special price will be applied ONLY after you complete your order, and will be processed in the order that they were received. No rainchecks or price matches at this special pricing. In-store stock does not reflect number of units available at this price.

So it will take the $10 off when you complete your order.

But that's only good for today.

 

[SlasnerSb]

@Dominionseraph
So why take the $170 Mobo over the $95 one if they have nearly identical performance specs with the only noticeable difference being different input allocations?

 

[DominionSeraph]

That mobo has a $40 rebate.
Which $95 one were you looking at?
E: never mind, I see it. Let me look at it.

 

[DominionSeraph]

I can't find the VRM info on that Gigabyte motherboard, but it's probably a 4+1 phase which won't be as good for overclocking. The Extreme4 is 8+4

 

[dmoney1980]

the extreme 4 is a great mobo and it performs the same in gaming as more expensive motherboards. plus it has the fastest boot times!

 

[Gryz]

Different motherboards (with the same chipset) have hardly any difference in performance.

The difference is in the features. Expensive motherboards will allow you to put in 8 harddisks, in stead of only 4. Or have more USB-ports. Or they allow you to put in 2 videocards (for SLI/CF). Or they have more features in the BIOS to push the overclocking. Or more expensive electrical components in case you wanna push the overclock to the limit.

Basically, if you just want to play games, get the cheapest ASRock Z77 motherboard. The Z77 Pro3 or Pro4 costs 80 euros (in my country). The Extreme 4 (which I have, and dmoney recommends too) costs 125 euros. For normal performance, there is hardly any difference. I think you can overclock a bit with the Pro3/Pro4 as well. The main difference is that the Extreme4 supports SLI/CF while the Pro3/Pro4 do not. If you don't know why you would buy the more expensive boards, I'd go with the Pro3/4 if I were you. Put that $40 into a better videocard or monitor.

I recommend you to not worry too much about overclocking. You shouldn't bother at the start. Maybe later, when you are a bit more familiar with your new PC, you can experiment a bit. Keep it simple. I have overclocked my i5-3570K+Extreme4 from 3.4GHz to 4.0GHz. I didn't need to overvolt it (even undervolted it a little, so it wouldn't increase temperatures much). That's a 18% performance increase, without very little effort or risk. But to begin with the i5-3570K is so fast already, you don't need to worry about it much. Most motherboards will allow you to change overclock settings, so the cheapest Z77 motherboards are good enough, I think.

 

[Dark Shroud]

Maybe a bit over kill.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i7-3820 3.6GHz Quad-Core Processor ($299.99 @ Memory Express)
Motherboard: MSI X79A-GD45 (8D) ATX LGA2011 Motherboard ($179.99 @ Memory Express)
Memory: Patriot Gamer 2 Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($34.99 @ Canada Computers)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($69.99 @ Canada Computers)
Video Card: MSI Radeon HD 7950 3GB Video Card ($292.63 @ DirectCanada)
Case: Antec Six Hundred ATX Mid Tower Case ($39.88 @ Canada Computers)
Power Supply: PC Power & Cooling Silencer MK III 600W 80 PLUS Bronze Certified ATX12V Power Supply ($58.76 @ DirectCanada)
Optical Drive: LG GH24NS90 DVD/CD Writer ($15.99 @ Canada Computers)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (64-bit) ($95.99 @ Computer Valley)
Total: $1088.21
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2012-09-18 15:42 EDT-0400)