Hi All,
I’m putting together a gaming pc for my dad. I was hoping you would comment on my component selection. Anecdotes about parts, possible problems, opinions on alternatives, that kind of thing.
Any particular reason you are going AMD? Intel currently has the performance lead. If it is purely price, then you are overspending on a $250 motherboard.
Also, check Asus web site to ensure the memory is compatible. Just had that issue with some GeIL memory and an EVGA mobo and I was quite unhappy.
Yeah, I’m doing more research now re: AMD vs Intel. When I first started looking around there were so many Intel things to research I just sort of slid into AMD…lazy. I’m putting together another Intel list that I’ll post soon.
I want to overspend on the motherboard for upgrading later. I know I’m not going to get the best processor now, but I’d like to get a board that supports the current best (at least) at a later time.
While I don’t know your financial profile for your build (I’m guessing it is fairly high), personally I would shave some $$ on the mobo and channel it into a sound card (unless you are transfering one from your current system) or to a second hard disk for RAID. I’ve seen this board recommended in some “Killer Rig” reviews, so I’m sure it is a great board.
Second, I was recently looking at reviews for the 640MB 8800GTS, and I couldn’t find any reviews giving it a great edge over the 320MB version. If I had the $$, I still opt for 640MB, as the vid card is usually the first component to become ‘outdated’.
Processor choice is more than fine - the next step up cost ~$100 more, and IMHO is not worth it. I know it $300 more, but did you consider Quad core?
Lastly, the notes I’ve read consider stock Intel cooling adequate to good, but noisy. Have you considered other cooling solutions?
Yeah, this box won’t be the cheapest. Like I said in OP, it’s for dad, so he’s paying. I don’t want to waste his money but I don’t think I’m doing that yet. My newegg cart with the setup above (cpu, mb, vcard, ram, hd, dvd, psu) is a little over $1100 with rebates. Add in case (cooler master centurion?), cpu cooler (thermalright ultra 120, definitely), display (??? no idea yet), and shipping will be another $400-$500 for an estimated total of $1500-$1600. I do want it semi-future-proofed so he doesn’t want another new box in 18 months. I am planning on upgrading it, though, and I think my choices of ‘Very nice but not ultra-top-of the line components’ allow for that.
It all starts with the motherboard. Like you said, that’s a nice board. It supports quad cores so when those get more mature we can slide one in there (although 45nm tech will probably be tempting). Easy to add 2 more 1gb ram sticks (or go 4x2gb). I’m going w/the 640mb video card because I can completely imagine new games in 2-3 years benefiting from more than 1gb video ram if I go SLI with 2x 8800GTS.
Oh, and my dad’s losing his hearing so the onboard sound should be fine… But that’s another easy upgrade.
1: The 8800 geforce card. Yes It’s uber powerful, but the main selling point is it’s DX10 compatability. This means getting Vista (is that figured in to your budget), which despite the big improvements still has some driver/compatability problems.
If your not going Vista then you could save money in the long run by getting a couple of 512 SLI cards now and upgrading in 18 months time.
2: Monitor? Are you going to use one already owned and if so what size are we talking about? Again your graphics card might be overkill if you’re using anything less than 23" (from what I’ve read the 8800’s only really come into their own around the 28-30" mark.
3:Cooling. If you’re scratch building it’s definitely worthwile spending a few quid extra on improved fans and heatsinks. My main rigs starting to show it’s age with some of the latest games but £60 on heatsinks and a few hours of overclocking have just bumped by graphics card performance by 30%. CPU is next.
Bunny,
Interesting points in #1&2. Got links to any reviews regarding the monitor size and the 8800? Because while I’m not going to be installing vista initially, I’m planning on doing it in the future.
I’ve got the cooling covered. The CoolerMaster Centurion 534 has 120mm fans, a side intake, and I’m planning on getting a nice aftermarket cpu cooler.
That is the mobo I’ll be ordering in the next couple of days for my new box. I have a EVGA 8800 GTX GPU and love it. The idea of being able to chain two of them together with SLI is sweet.
Just a word of caution about the NVIDIA 680i boards: I bought a ASUS Striker Extreme and had a lot of problems with it. Checking ASUS’ fora I learned it’s kinda hit or miss, problem-wise, and some of the problems are related to the 680i chipset. I’d check EVGA fora to see if people are having any problems there.
But that’s another easy upgrade.