So, what's a good gaming rig these days?

[Kalmah]

I'm currently using a GTX460 with a 3ghz Core2Duo. I had a stick of ram die a while back and ever since then my motherboard seems to have gone flaky.

To my question, what's a good high-end gaming pc? What's a decent mid-high gaming pc? I'm not considering extreme edition components or any of that. Just some examples of some solid builds.

I'm having a difficult time finding some good comparison charts for cpus and gpus and have been out of the market for some time. I'm considering an incremental upgrade by keeping my video card for now and just replacing mobo, ram and cpu.

I appreciate it.

 

[BrightCandle]

Probably best asked in general, they do build recommendations there and give you some questions to answer to guide the process.

 

[monkeydelmagico]

Solid mid range build here: http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2192841

 

[Kalmah]

Ok. Thanks guys!

 

[tweakboy]

I'm currently using a GTX460 with a 3ghz Core2Duo. I had a stick of ram die a while back and ever since then my motherboard seems to have gone flaky.

To my question, what's a good high-end gaming pc? What's a decent mid-high gaming pc? I'm not considering extreme edition components or any of that. Just some examples of some solid builds.

I'm having a difficult time finding some good comparison charts for cpus and gpus and have been out of the market for some time. I'm considering an incremental upgrade by keeping my video card for now and just replacing mobo, ram and cpu.

I appreciate it.

Its not worth it. If you upgrade the GPU you wont get the FPS cuz you have a 7 year old technology CPU Core 2 ,, dual @ 3Ghz is slower then the turtle race I held at my backyard last saturday.

Its not worth spending any more money. You need a quad core and theres lots to choose from we can help you with that. A 2500k and a bit of OC and you can use a 780 GTX if you wish. If there is a bottleneck its a minor one.

Also RAM prices have sky rocketed. I recommend at least 8GB ram and also get a SSD , 128GB ,,, for OS and APPS , then your world will change.

 

[Concillian]

Mid-high is Intel 4C / 4T CPU (3560/4560k) with slight OC. High end is 4C / 8T.

Budget builds depend on the games played. Older games that don't multithread well prefer an i3 (Many MMOs, Starcraft). Games that multithread better will do alright on an AMD.

The CPU performance difference between the "other options" and quad "K" chip is rather large, so many move up to the K chips.

AMD seems to have a fire sale on it's current gen GPUs as they get ready for their new ones, you have to be extremely loyal to nVidia (or shopping the top tier of cards, where nVidia is clearly faster) at this pass up current pricing, IMO. 7870 is quite adequate for 1080p at high details, won't hit 4xAA in every game, but will perform admirably and is on the order of $150 now. 7950 is even better and OCs like mad and are around $200. If you're used to a 460, a 7870 will be a significant upgrade. 7850 is almost as fast when OCed, but the prices are pretty close on 7850 and 7870 right now.

On any kind of budget, stay cheap on RAM and spend on the other components, as witnessed by the recent Haswell memory scaling article on AT.

 

[Headfoot]

First, Kalmah is a totally awesome band so props there.

Second, check out the fire sale prices on the Radeon HD 7950 3GB these days. I just got one for $180 AR which is a ridiculously good price.

Third, if you are comfortable buying new it might be worth picking up a whole 2500k/2600k + RAM + Mobo (Z68 or Z77 chipset) combo as you see those frequently enough these days. Very good bang for the buck buying that combo used

 

[Arkaign]

First, Kalmah is a totally awesome band so props there.

Second, check out the fire sale prices on the Radeon HD 7950 3GB these days. I just got one for $180 AR which is a ridiculously good price.

Third, if you are comfortable buying new it might be worth picking up a whole 2500k/2600k + RAM + Mobo (Z68 or Z77 chipset) combo as you see those frequently enough these days. Very good bang for the buck buying that combo used

Yep huge value. Just picked up a used 2600K + Z77 Pro for $75, was stock never OC (knew the lady who owned it, as I helped buy it for her when it was new, she replaced with 3930K!). Grabbed a 212+ Evo for $25, and upgraded a buddy from an FX 8150 to 2600K @ 4.6Ghz. He says it's like total night and day, even his USB and SSD run faster.

2600K @ 4.6Ghz is still handily faster than 4700 non-K, and about equal in gaming to a 4.2-4.3Ghz 4770K in most titles.

 

[WhoBeDaPlaya]

WTF? I need to meet more old ladies like that, and I thought I made out like a bandit with a $9.99 MSI P67A-G43 and $50 i5 2450P

 

[Arkaign]

WTF? I need to meet more old ladies like that, and I thought I made out like a bandit with a $9.99 MSI P67A-G43 and $50 i5 2450P

She's pretty cool. She was going to just give it to me, but I insisted on giving her the cash I had on hand at least. She does TONS of video blogging/etc for her interior design business. She's in her 30s I think, so she's an old lady to some people, but then again, some would find her pretty hot lol. The 3930 is a solid upgrade for her uses. She almost always has Photoshop, Premiere Pro, and a couple dozen or more browser windows open. So we took her from 8GB/2600K to 32GB/3930. Why no 49xx? Had an old 3930 I got from the Intel Retail Edge program for about $200 IIRC. It needed a good home.

 

[escrow4]

FX 6300 + 7870 would be a very cheap and cheerful (especially now) mid range box. You can easily crack 50+FPS in any game with a mix of high/medium settings for the gruntier titles. Rest High/Very High. Yes AA will need to be reduced or disabled. I paid $364 for this combo, in the US now it would be around $280.

 

[Dave3000]

If you were to buy a new PC right now, a good high-end gaming PC would be at least:

i5-4670k
GTX 770 or Radeon 7970
8GB DDR3-1600


a good mid-range gaming PC:
i5-4570
GTX 760 or Radeon 7950
8GB DDR3-1600

 

[Roland00Address]

The Graphic Cards have been said before
7950 or GTX 760 are the best bang for your buck

One thing to consider if you want to go cheap and simple, is just go for a dell outlet xps and just upgrade the video card (and/or psu)

For example this system a refurbished dell xps 8500 is $494.25+Tax when you use the coupon code N70JT11FW87M2N (Go to slickdeals and search for dell outlet for coupon codes such as this, The price before coupon code is $659.00

Processor Processor: Intel Core 3rd Gen i7-3770 Processor (3.40 GHz with Turbo Boost 2.0 up to 3.90 GHz)
Operating System Windows 8
Hard Disk Drive 1TB Hard Drive, 3.5 Inch, 7200rpm, SATA
Memory 8GB Dual Channel DDR3 at 1600Mhz
Media Bay 16X DVD +/- RW Drive
Video NVIDIA GeForce GT 640 1GB GDDR5
Base Dell Outlet XPS 8500 Desktop
System Color Black Chassis w/19:1 media card reader
Network Interface Card Dell Wireless 1703 802.11a/b/g/n, Bluetooth v4.0
Keyboard English Keyboard
Mouse Dell USB 6-Button Laser Mouse
Hardware Upgrade 120V Power Cord
Heatsink
Screw
Office Software Microsoft Office 365 - 1 Month Trial (Internet access required to install & activate)
Software Upgrade Windows 64 Bit

The power supply is 460w with 32 amps on the 12v rail

 

[tential]

This type of question is so subjective and depends on what your gaming style is that I dunno if you'd ever get a really decent answer.
Like said, General is the best place to ask, and people need to know your goals. For my goal of 1080p only gaming, my rig works perfectly for me. I can always OC to hit my goal of 60 FPS. For other people who game at a 30 inch monitor though, 1080p might be a joke.

 

[Arkaign]

This type of question is so subjective and depends on what your gaming style is that I dunno if you'd ever get a really decent answer.
Like said, General is the best place to ask, and people need to know your goals. For my goal of 1080p only gaming, my rig works perfectly for me. I can always OC to hit my goal of 60 FPS. For other people who game at a 30 inch monitor though, 1080p might be a joke.

True. Even single 30" gets laughed at by the people with builds like :

Quad Raid 1TB SSDs + 8x4TB Internal Storage
4960X @ 5+Ghz
48GB DDR3-2400
Quad Titan OC 6GB
Full Custom Cooling
Dual 1500W PSUs
4x4K SXRD Projector Setup for true borderless 200" 8192x4096 Display
128TB SAN for External Storage
McIntosh Reference HT System
etc.

A setup like that, the home theatre components alone are $300k+. And there are a few people out there that actually go to that extreme.

 

[FalseChristian]

Let's get serious. If you want an affordable system here you go:

Athlon FX-9590 (8 core, can be overclocked to 5.4GHz)
16GB Kingston ValuRam 1333MHz (will do 1648Mhz without a sweat)
2 4GB GTX 760 SLI or 2 Radeon 7950 3GB XFire.
CoolerMaster GXII 750w PS
CoolerMaster +212 EVO CPU cooler
Flea Market mouse and keyboard
OEM version of Windows 7 HP 64-bit
2 TB WD Caviar Green (5900 rpms)
2 TB USB 3.0 Seagate Desktop Hard-drive for storage.

 

[aigomorla]

good gaming rig is very subjective to what games you play.

for example... i think a lot of us wonder why we got such expensive videocards to play DX9 games which are all ported from consoles.. :T

Then a few of us are happy when we can get to rack the settings up really high so we can see things like Laura's Crofts gorgeous hair move around all wavy with high fps.

But yeah.... totally dependent on what type of games u play.

 

[Arkaign]

Let's get serious. If you want an affordable system here you go:

Athlon FX-9590 (8 core, can be overclocked to 5.4GHz)
16GB Kingston ValuRam 1333MHz (will do 1648Mhz without a sweat)
2 4GB GTX 760 SLI or 2 Radeon 7950 3GB XFire.
CoolerMaster GXII 750w PS
CoolerMaster +212 EVO CPU cooler
Flea Market mouse and keyboard
OEM version of Windows 7 HP 64-bit
2 TB WD Caviar Green (5900 rpms)
2 TB USB 3.0 Seagate Desktop Hard-drive for storage.

That's a stunningly terrible use of money with that CPU. And the 9590 will melt a 212 even at 5Ghz.

http://www.amazon.com/AMD-FD9590FHHK...ywords=fx+9590

You can get a hand picked 3770K with IHS pulled for direct-die that does 4.8Ghz for that price. And clock for clock it will go beyond annihilating even a theoretical 6Ghz 9590.

 

[tweakboy]

4770k + 760 Ti .

What resolution will you be playing at ? gl

 

[Blue_Max]

Any i5 (1155 or 1150, NOT the old 1156!) you can get a deal on, 8GB of DDR3, and either a new video card or a second 460 to match yours and a motherboard that supports SLI. (I'd go cheaper board and newer card...)

Heck, the 460 is still pretty decent...

 

[Jacky60]

An overclocked (4.2-4.6Ghz) 2600K/3770K/4770K and a pair of 7950's with an SSD for OS and room for a couple of games or more with a 27" monitor would be good enough for 95% of gaming scenarios. I'd go with a cpu that has HT or more than 4 physical cores as with next gen consoles multithreading/using more than 4 cores will soon be much more widespread. If you're still rocking your current build you'll wanna keep next rig for a while. Don't get an FX 9590. The 460 is still pretty decent but a pair of 7950's will piss all over it singly or in SLI.

 

[Kalmah]

I know I'm a little late for replying but thanks guys.

I'm currently playing Borderlands 2 with mid-high settings and my cpu is capping out at 100%. (it's the e8400 c2duo) It's making my audio stutter which is getting annoying.

I know somebody that is willing to sell me a core2quad for about $60 that will work in my motherboard. The problem is that my mobo might be having some issues. Even after a fresh os install my system keeps hanging at random for 2-20 seconds at a time. (ever since a stick of ram died, I removed the stick of ram and replaced it with a non-matched stick. (one is 1066mhz the other is 800mhz, I have them both running at 800mhz) One stick is 2gb the other is 1gb also. No dual channel for me at the moment. DDR2 is so damned overpriced right now I hate to spend the $80 for a 2x2gb pair. So I'm just sitting here with a mucked up machine.

My other problem is that I want to pick up a SSD but my mobo is only sata2 which it seems every ssd requires sata3.

He's also willing to sell me a 560gtx for about $100.

So I could get a core2quad and a 560gtx for about $200 total. The core2quad will work in my mobo but then I'm out the SSD which can't be used and I'll still have to spend about $80 for ram. All while running the risk that my mobo is going bad.

I'm not sure what the core2quad is, I imagine it's probably one of the higher clocked variants.

I guess I really just dont have any money right now therefor this is driving me nuts. I could probably squeeze the $280 out for those parts but I know if I wait and save the money I could get something much better come tax return season.

For some reason this motherboard will not overclock even by 1mhz. It resets itself after boot. After doing a lot of looking into it it appears that others with the same mobo have had the same problem. I would just overclock it, grab some ram and that 560gtx for now if I could. The mobo is a Gigabit ga-p31-es3g

 

[frozentundra123456]

I know I'm a little late for replying but thanks guys.

I'm currently playing Borderlands 2 with mid-high settings and my cpu is capping out at 100%. (it's the e8400 c2duo) It's making my audio stutter which is getting annoying.

I know somebody that is willing to sell me a core2quad for about $60 that will work in my motherboard. The problem is that my mobo might be having some issues. Even after a fresh os install my system keeps hanging at random for 2-20 seconds at a time. (ever since a stick of ram died, I removed the stick of ram and replaced it with a non-matched stick. (one is 1066mhz the other is 800mhz, I have them both running at 800mhz) One stick is 2gb the other is 1gb also. No dual channel for me at the moment. DDR2 is so damned overpriced right now I hate to spend the $80 for a 2x2gb pair. So I'm just sitting here with a mucked up machine.

My other problem is that I want to pick up a SSD but my mobo is only sata2 which it seems every ssd requires sata3.

He's also willing to sell me a 560gtx for about $100.

So I could get a core2quad and a 560gtx for about $200 total. The core2quad will work in my mobo but then I'm out the SSD which can't be used and I'll still have to spend about $80 for ram. All while running the risk that my mobo is going bad.

I'm not sure what the core2quad is, I imagine it's probably one of the higher clocked variants.

I guess I really just dont have any money right now therefor this is driving me nuts. I could probably squeeze the $280 out for those parts but I know if I wait and save the money I could get something much better come tax return season.

For some reason this motherboard will not overclock even by 1mhz. It resets itself after boot. After doing a lot of looking into it it appears that others with the same mobo have had the same problem. I would just overclock it, grab some ram and that 560gtx for now if I could. The mobo is a Gigabit ga-p31-es3g

Well, the E8400 is over 3ghz if I recall correctly, although unfortunately dual core. Depending on what quad you get, if the clockspeed is considerably lower, I am not sure how much improvement you will see, especially if you have no overclocking headroom at all.

 

[DigDog]

my c2d is nearly dead, so i'm upgrading. G1610 (a i3 celeron), £20 mobo and a single stick of 8Gb ram. total £75. has twice the passmark score than my E6600 .. so ...

few years back it wasn't like this; some nice games, if you wanted to play them (like Oblivion), you HAD to have a top of the range setup; nowadays, you can play anything on just about any piece of rubbish, as optimization has come a long way, and "medium" video quality is still amazing.

 

[NTMBK]

I know I'm a little late for replying but thanks guys.

I'm currently playing Borderlands 2 with mid-high settings and my cpu is capping out at 100%. (it's the e8400 c2duo) It's making my audio stutter which is getting annoying.

I know somebody that is willing to sell me a core2quad for about $60 that will work in my motherboard. The problem is that my mobo might be having some issues. Even after a fresh os install my system keeps hanging at random for 2-20 seconds at a time. (ever since a stick of ram died, I removed the stick of ram and replaced it with a non-matched stick. (one is 1066mhz the other is 800mhz, I have them both running at 800mhz) One stick is 2gb the other is 1gb also. No dual channel for me at the moment. DDR2 is so damned overpriced right now I hate to spend the $80 for a 2x2gb pair. So I'm just sitting here with a mucked up machine.

My other problem is that I want to pick up a SSD but my mobo is only sata2 which it seems every ssd requires sata3.

He's also willing to sell me a 560gtx for about $100.

So I could get a core2quad and a 560gtx for about $200 total. The core2quad will work in my mobo but then I'm out the SSD which can't be used and I'll still have to spend about $80 for ram. All while running the risk that my mobo is going bad.

I'm not sure what the core2quad is, I imagine it's probably one of the higher clocked variants.

I guess I really just dont have any money right now therefor this is driving me nuts. I could probably squeeze the $280 out for those parts but I know if I wait and save the money I could get something much better come tax return season.

For some reason this motherboard will not overclock even by 1mhz. It resets itself after boot. After doing a lot of looking into it it appears that others with the same mobo have had the same problem. I would just overclock it, grab some ram and that 560gtx for now if I could. The mobo is a Gigabit ga-p31-es3g

Sounds like that motherboard is pretty screwed. Random hangs, refuses to overclock, dying sticks of memory? And your current memory setup is so very, very messed up! Don't sink any more money into that thing!

Don't get the CPU. Buy a GPU for now, and save up. Wait until you can afford to replace the motherboard, RAM, and CPU at once, and get that SSD too. Even an Ivy Bridge i3 will beat a Core 2 Quad these days: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ivy-bridge-wolfdale-yorkfield-comparison,3487-12.html Hang on until you can put the money together.

Is the card a Geforce 560 or 560ti? The difference is important- the ti version is a lot faster than the non-Ti version.

EDIT: I missed that you already had a 460. In that case definitely don't buy the 560! It's such a minor difference that it's really not worth it. Keep saving.