So many socket 1150 motherboards... where to start?

[crashtech]

There are quieter 80mm fans, but moving to a more modern setup with 120 and/or 140mm case fans would be much nicer, if one cares about noise levels. Also, I would think it best to change the power supply since it is getting pretty old. Capacitors degrade over time, most especially electrolytics, which are necessary to use in PSUs because of the large capacitance values required.

 

[Sophia]

There are quieter 80mm fans, but moving to a more modern setup with 120 and/or 140mm case fans would be much nicer, if one cares about noise levels. Also, I would think it best to change the power supply since it is getting pretty old. Capacitors degrade over time, most especially electrolytics, which are necessary to use in PSUs because of the large capacitance values required.

The psu that originally came with it died long ago, so no worries there.

 

[crashtech]

Have you settled on a brand and budget yet? I'd assume you'd want to stay with ASUS, but they do command a bit of a price premium. There are some H97 boards out that look interesting, but they don't have much of a track record yet.

 

[Sophia]

Have you settled on a brand and budget yet? I'd assume you'd want to stay with ASUS, but they do command a bit of a price premium. There are some H97 boards out that look interesting, but they don't have much of a track record yet.

I have been pondering the H97 boards. I've used Asus in the past, but I don't have a strong brand preference. I have $250 maybe $300 in mind (not including Windows). I need at minimum a cpu, motherboard, ram, and a power supply, so I was thinking along the lines of G3220-ish, 4gb ram, solid 450-550W (maybe along these lines).

(Before anyone asks, I am unfortunately nowhere near a Microcenter.)

 

[crashtech]

This is morphing into a build thread, but I'll throw my 2c in here anyway. I suggest for that money, a G3420, an ASRock H87M Pro4, Team 2x4GB DDR3-1600, and a SeaSonic S12G 550W:

http://pcpartpicker.com/user/crashtech/saved/YLc48d

$286

 

[you2]

Few changes to the above I would suggest; personal preference but I would go with gskill memory and for PSU 300watt is overkill for this build so I would go with this psu:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-033-_-Product
or
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-086-_-Product
(I generally prefer seasonic over antec so I would favor the second one @ 39)
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I would get the g3320 over the g3420 (it is 99% the same speed and $8 cheapers; but the g3420 does support faster ram
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for ram:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-311-_-Product ($74); if you go with the G3420 you might want 1600 ram (these are 1333)
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Anyways this should get you below $250.
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The board above is H87 - if you want H97 it will be price neutral if you go with MSI or asrock (no comment on which board you should use because I'm not sure of the feature set you want - the MSI H97 has ALC887 (sound) 1 pci slot, 6 sata ports, dvi/dsub/hdmi (no display port) 4 usb 3/4 usb 2
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the asrock is similar but has acl892 and has 6 usb 3.0 and usb 2.0.
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Sadly it also lacks display port (I tend to favor display port for 27 inch monitors).

 

[Ketchup]

This is morphing into a build thread, but I'll throw my 2c in here anyway. I suggest for that money, a G3420, an ASRock H87M Pro4, Team 2x4GB DDR3-1600, and a SeaSonic S12G 550W:

http://pcpartpicker.com/user/crashtech/saved/YLc48d

$286

Agreed. OP, why don't you open a thread over in GH with answers to the sticky. You'll probably get more responses (if you want them) and some of them are very good at spotting deals.

 

[coolpurplefan]

Looking at post #31, from the research I did, the Realtek hierarchy is something like: ALC 887, ALC 892 then the ALC 1150.

If I'm correct, the 892 and 1150 have Blu-ray audio support. The ALC 1150 is the one I picked when I bought an AsRock H87 Performance. (Although now the H97 Performance is out.) It's supposed to be good enough to replace a sound card. And I read Realtek audio is "more compatible" (same thing I read about the Intel LAN).

EDIT: I hesitate to say this but I did read that the ALC 887 is crap.

ANOTHER EDIT: Just noticed the post above where you say you want RAM. I just want to add that I read Haswell CPUs apparently work better at 1.5V. I ended up choosing 8GB Kingston RAM default at 1866MHz and 1.65V but can select 1600MHz and 1.5v. I mean you can choose in the BIOS. The reason I say this is because a lot of RAM I looked at was rated at 1600MHz and 1.65V. (I have no explanation for what seems like an oddity in the industry.)

Some prices for you...
AsRock Fatal1ty H97 Performance motherboard $100 at newegg.com
Intel i3-4360 $160 at newegg.com
G.Skill 2x2GB RAM (so I did find 1.5V 1600MHz RAM) model # F3-12800CL9D-4GBRL $48 at newegg.com
SeaSonic S12II 520 watt power supply $60 at newegg.com
I compared prices with Amazon.com and it's close to the same. So you're talking about $370 for that combo.
*Disclaimer: I did not try that mobo with that RAM and I haven't even tried my AsRock H87 Performance mobo yet.