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My gaming rig for college

D

dornick

Senior member
Ok, after long weeks/months of research, I've come up with a fairly definitive list of parts for my college computer. I'd really appreciate it if you guys could look over it and tell me what you think. All prices are directly off newegg. I will be overclocking.

Edit: here's the wish list

#2: Changed the mouse and sound card, per suggestions.

#3: Okay, I've done some updating with a case change, keyboard, and $7 speakers. Something else interesting I've noticed: In the week or so, I've had the wishlist, I've noticed the total prices drops a couple of dollars every day. Should be quite significant by July 😀

Case: Antec SLK-3000B - 45.00
CPU: Athlon 64 3200 s939 - 182.99
MB: DFI LanParty NForce 4 Ultra - 130
GPU: Chaintech 6600gt PCIe - 176.00
RAM: OCZ Value Series 1gb pc 3200 - 118.31
HD: Hitachi 160gb 7200rpm SATA - 90.00
DVD-R: NEC ND-3520A - 49.99
CD-R: Sony 52x32x52x IDE - 29.99
Sound: Creative Audigy 2 Value (7.1) - 49.00
PSU: OCZ ModStream 450W - 80.00

Monitor: Sceptre x9g 19" 12ms - 349.00
Headphones: Sennheiser pc150 w/ mic - 55.00
Speakers: Crap 2.0 - 6.75
Mouse: Logitech MX510 - 27.00
Keyboard: Logitech UltraX PS/2 - 19.00
Cooling: Thermalright XP-90 - 44.99

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Total Price: - 1453.02


This comes right around my budget of $1500. If you haven't guessed yet, this will be used fairly intensely for gaming. I picked all thic out now in the hopes that the prices will drop somewhat by July. Anyway, thanks alot for any comments or suggestions/changes!

Some notes:
1) I'll probably catch some flak for picking a cheap case, but I don't see any need to pay $100 or more for the box that holds the parts.

2) I only plan on keeping the 6600 for a year at the most, when I'll upgrade to a next-gen card.

3) I heard the Sceptre was decent at gaming and it has everything I want (DVI, 8-bit) so I said what the heck for the price.
 
Get the cheap speakers, I have nice headphones but they hurt my ears after two hours. Besides you might want to listen to music while you're on your bed.
 
I would replace the OCZ value ram with Corsair Value Select. It can often be found for $90. Also, the sound card you have isn't great for gaming, sad as it is Creative still makes the best sound cards for gaming. You don't necessarily need a sound card though, I'm using the onboard sound on my DFI Ultra-d and its fine. You don't need to get an XP-90 IMO. I have stock cooling on my A64, and I have been able to push it to its limits with it (a measly 2412 mhz 🙁 )

If its a gaming rig, you should trying to upgrade the graphics card to a better one. My suggestion would be to get the retail athlon 3000 (which comes with a HSF), don't get the xp-90, only the NEC DVD drive, the Corsair Value Select ram, and no sound card. With the money you'd save from that you could upgrade to an x800xl and the overall cost of the computer shouldn't go up at all.

The mouse is probably overkill too. I have the mx510 and its very nice, and probably $20 cheaper than the mx518. I also have the sennheiser pc150s, and they are very nice. It takes a while to condition your ears to them, but now I can wear them for about 6 hours before my ears start to hurt. I don't think you would need speakers along with them, they should be fine by themselves.

Edit: I can't access your wishlist. It brings me to a page asking me to log in.
 
I would recommend a Leadtek 6600gt...it's not much more (if any) and is the best quality out of the 6600gt...other 6600gt's are known to have many HSF issues (mostly, they Heatsinks fall off)
 
"My gaming rig for college"

get a dell 600m that you can't play games on. grades > games.

trust me and you can thank me later.
 
You could get an Antec Sonata or something that comes with a good 380w PSU. That PSU would handle the system fine and it would be cheaper then buying that case and the OCZ PSU.
 
The problem with the Sonata is it comes with a 20pin power supply, DFI strongly recomends a 24 pin one for their nF4 boards.
 
Originally posted by: dornick
Ok, after long weeks/months of research, I've come up with a fairly definitive list of parts for my college computer. I'd really appreciate it if you guys could look over it and tell me what you think. All prices are directly off newegg.

Edit: here's the wish list

And forgot to mention, I'll be doing massive OC'ing 😀

Case: Evercase 4252 - 35.50
CPU: Athlon 64 3200 s939 - 182.99
MB: DFI LanParty NForce 4 Ultra - 130
GPU: Chaintech 6600gt PCIe - 169.99
RAM: OCZ Value Series 1gb pc 3200 - 128.31
HD: Hitachi 160gb 7200rpm SATA - 91.50
DVD-R: NEC ND-3520A - 49.99
CD-R: Sony 52x32x52x IDE - 31.99
Sound: Turtle Beach Santa Cruz 6 (5.1) - 47.99
PSU: OCZ ModStream 450W - 80.00

Monitor: Sceptre x9g 19" 12ms - 335.00
Headphones: Sennheiser pc150 w/ mic - 55.00
Mouse: Logitech MX518 - 49.00
Cooling: Thermalright XP-90 - 44.99

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Total Price: - 1432.25


This comes right around my budget of $1500. If you haven't guessed yet, this will be used fairly intensely for gaming. I picked all thic out now in the hopes that the prices will drop somewhat by July. Anyway, thanks alot for any comments or suggestions/changes!

Some notes:
1) I'll probably catch some flak for picking a cheap case, but I don't see any need to pay $100 or more for the box that holds the parts.

2) I only plan on keeping the 6600 for a year at the most, when I'll upgrade to a next-gen card.

3) I heard the Sceptre was decent at gaming and it has everything I want (DVI, 8-bit) so I said what the heck for the price.

4) I could throw in some cheap speakers too, if anyone thinks they're necessary.
Click to expand...


If your not buying until july, the new graphics cards will be out by then and you will then be able to either buy the new stuff or less expensive current stuff.
 
Originally posted by: sniperruff
"My gaming rig for college"

get a dell 600m that you can't play games on. grades > games.

trust me and you can thank me later.
Click to expand...


Did you just recommend a 600m? I have one of those peices of crap for college. Trust me. I'm still playing games.

I got Star Wars Republic Commando cuz a floormate told me it was good. Now I'm back to America's Army. LoL.

Grades > Games?

My friends at UCLA, UC Davis, UCI, UCSD all have better grades than I do. Crap. Must shape up.
 
That case is one of my favorite cases for customer builds. Its not cheap by any means and built extremely well.
 
I would replace the OCZ value ram with Corsair Value Select. It can often be found for $90
Click to expand...

Bad advice there.

Corsair VS doesnt work well at all with the DFI NF4 motherboards...

 
Originally posted by: BouZouki
I would replace the OCZ value ram with Corsair Value Select. It can often be found for $90
Click to expand...

Bad advice there.

Corsair VS doesnt work well at all with the DFI NF4 motherboards...
Click to expand...

I'm running it on my DFI nF4 Ultra-d. It works fine with the 3/10 bios.
 
Originally posted by: sniperruff
"My gaming rig for college"

get a dell 600m that you can't play games on. grades > games.

trust me and you can thank me later.
Click to expand...

lol, I'll thank you now. 😀

don't worry though, I'm not an obsessive gamer. It's only a gaming rig because I like to play the latest stuff.
 
My response to everybody is in this post.

CheesePoofs - The reason I got a sound card was cuz I heard it helps with the load on the processor if the sound is off-board. And also because I wouldn't mind some extra quality. Also, I think you're right on the mouse. While I would like that one, I don't think I could justify the extra cost. I'll also consider either bumping the HSF down, or just getting the stock one. Read Cheesetogo's section about the video card.

hans030390 - "not much more" is $50 on newegg 😛

shoRunner - Yeah, it's the VX. It caught my eye in that AT value RAM roundup.

Cheesetogo - Based on the rumors going around, I'm seriously doubting the next-gen cards will be around in any sort of quantity (if at all) in July. My plan is just the sub-200 card that can handle today's games and come 06 (or sooner), I'll dump it for a new one

Edit: what do you guys think of the Sceptre LCD?
 
If you really want to offload some of the processing from the CPU, get an audigy2.

I agree with the waiting for when you're going to buy it before you make any decisions. In a couple months, everything we suggest is going to be out of date information.
 
I would reconsider the mx510. Since you are a gamer you will probably spend 20+ for a mouse anyway. If you play FPS games at all you will notice the difference. I personally can't play seriously without it, and the thumb buttons come in handy for other things, too. Maybe it isn't such a big deal if your just a casual player... I dunno. Another good fps/gaming choice is the Microsoft Intellimouse(?) 3.0, but NOT the mx500. It has negative acceleration problems in games.
 
Originally posted by: DLeRium
Originally posted by: sniperruff
"My gaming rig for college"

get a dell 600m that you can't play games on. grades > games.

trust me and you can thank me later.
Click to expand...


Did you just recommend a 600m? I have one of those peices of crap for college. Trust me. I'm still playing games.

I got Star Wars Republic Commando cuz a floormate told me it was good. Now I'm back to America's Army. LoL.

Grades > Games?

My friends at UCLA, UC Davis, UCI, UCSD all have better grades than I do. Crap. Must shape up.
Click to expand...

heh make that a 1100 with a 2.4 celeron then =)

as for suggestion i'd get one of those dell 1905FP's that they have for sale for $300 once in a while... and i'd definitely get a case that you REALLY like because you'd be staring at it for a while.

as for the CDRW i think you can skip it.
 



You said you are going to be doing some massive overclocking.. I know your not big on cases but for OC a case will make a differnce for temps which need to stay low.
I would suggest upgrading or getting a better fan system. Also I understand you are doing a lot of gaming and I would suggest you get the x800 XL, its not that much more and is a big differnce. Then again you are going to get a new gen card.


 
Originally posted by: bum
I would reconsider the mx510. Since you are a gamer you will probably spend 20+ for a mouse anyway. If you play FPS games at all you will notice the difference. I personally can't play seriously without it, and the thumb buttons come in handy for other things, too. Maybe it isn't such a big deal if your just a casual player... I dunno. Another good fps/gaming choice is the Microsoft Intellimouse(?) 3.0, but NOT the mx500. It has negative acceleration problems in games.
Click to expand...


I have used both personally I like the mx510 better, its all preference and the issues you named are fixed with the drivers, (I never had them)
 
Originally posted by: sniperruff
"My gaming rig for college"

get a dell 600m that you can't play games on. grades > games.

trust me and you can thank me later.
Click to expand...



I agree. I present my senior project tommorow, and the only thing I want to do is play doom 3. I know that I didn't do as well in a few classes because of games. Get a light laptop with a decent battery life.
 
hmm i play lots of games, still get good grades.

i commute an hour to school, find time to do homework and go to the gym. Yet, im doing good and i play my games a lot.

besides, what else is there to do between 11am-7pm on saturdays and sundays when everyone is just chilling getting over their hangover.
 
im going to get flamed but

OVERCLOCKING IS HORRIABLE ! lol your not gurented to get a good overclock and just adds stress to your system and ruins stabilty save money and get somehting like this !

Antec Black ATX Mid Tower "SLK3000-B" 45.00
ENERMAX Noisetaker Series 420W 76.00

AMD Athlon 64 3200+ 190.00
CHAINTECH NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra 84.00
Corsair Value Select 512MBx2 83.50
Seagate Barracuda SATA NCQ 80GB 68.00
NEC 16X Double Layer DVD±RW 48.99
Rosewell ATI x800xl 269.99

Total 865.48

you will playing games for the next 3 years without worrying about aything just fine ! and you can burn dvds etc etc
get a nice crt monitor i hate lcds for gaming and some good logitech speakers and you will be sitting pretty !
 
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