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PC build for visual studio, vid streaming, and gaming

merk

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

That's pretty much covered in the subject 🙂 Currently i'm not building anything big in visual studio although that might be changing. For video - i'd like to be able to stream an HD recording in real time to my PS3. My current PC hiccups on 1080 recordings unless i pre-convert them which takes 7-8 hours. Using handbreak to convert, and playon or azure for live streaming. As for gaming - not into FPS's much. and I'll be keeping my current vid card since i just recently updated that. Mostly into MMO's/strategy


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

I'd prefer not to spend more then $450 or so. That's for the cpu, mobo and ram. Going to keep the HD's i have, the vid card and hopefully the PSU If i need a bigger PSU, i'll spend the extra for that.

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

USA

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.

I'd lean towards INTEL for the cpu and ASUS for the mobo just because I've had good experiences with both, but I'm open to other suggestions.

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

hard drives, graphics card (GTX 460 se), case, PSU (antec 650w)

6. IF YOU have searched and/or read similar threads.

slightly - main thing i'm not sure on is if i'd be better off with a faster dual core cpu or a slower quad core cpu. Not sure what what the best chipset would be.

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

I dont plan on doing any overclocking.

8. What resolution YOU plan on gaming with.

1280x1024 - although in the not too distant future i'll probably break down and buy a wide screen monitor instead of square.

9. WHEN do you plan to build it?

Within the next couple of weeks - i might hold out for a little while to see if newegg runs any deals on parts i could use. I'm not in a uber-rush to build this so if i knew some good sale was coming up in a couple of weeks i could (probably) wait.

I would like for the mobo to support USB3, UEFI and hw virtualization.

Thanks in advance for any advice
 
heh - that's pretty much exactly what i was looking at myself. The only thing different is i already ordered some ram since newegg had a shell shocker deal 8gb of 16000 ram for the same price as the 10666
 
I might be wrong, but VS can be a resource hog, I feel it can use the HT of an i7 2600 and 12 or 16 GB of RAM
 
With the price jump between the i5 and the i7 i would go for the i5. As for needing 12 or 16gb ram. My advice would be stick with the 8gb you got and see how it goes. adding another stick or 2 is something that can be done if and when required.
 
I might be wrong, but VS can be a resource hog, I feel it can use the HT of an i7 2600 and 12 or 16 GB of RAM

I've done some work in VS with an i5 M520 and 4GB of RAM. It might use a fair amount, but 16GB is really over the top, IMO.
 
I've got 8gb in my current machine and i think that's been working ok for me. and a few other developers i know, many of whom work on bigger projects then i do, use 8gb. so for now I'm going to stick with 8gb.

I am however considering a different mobo:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128495

Its cheaper and still has all the features i want, plus in looking at the reviews of the asus, there seem to be some issues with DOA and quality control.

I am also considering adding in a 64gb ssd drive. I'm just wondering if i should spend the extra money for a SATA III ssd or get a SATA II instead.
 
GIGABYTE and ASUS are comparable brands, you should be OK with either and GIGABYTE IS cheaper! I myself am working on building a gaming machine with i5 2500k but I am looking at ASUS P8Z68-V LE.

As you are getting a Z68 mobo you might as well get a SSD, I am sure if you use it in SSD caching mode, it should be helpful while using Visual Studios.
 
The below should be all you need, and well below your $450 mark:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231424 - 8GB DDR3 - $50

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131773 - Asus Z68 - $130

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115073 - i5 2500 - 210 - 15 = 195

:thumbsup: Though the Gigabyte the OP linked later is fine as well.

As for Visual Studio, it's a dog no matter what hardware you have. More threads on the CPU won't really help. As the OP has already surmised, an SSD would be the biggest boon to VS performance. I consider the Samsung 470 to be a solid (reliable) and reasonably priced drive.
 
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