SgtJoo

What would you put into a computer you built yourself with the aforementioned budget? It's what I'm looking into, I'd appreciate some feedback.

Clock

A while ago TigerDirect made a computer for under $500 USD that could run Crysis reasonably well, I bet if you expanded upon that you could get a pretty decent machine for about that much, maybe even a little less.

I know, premade computers aren't very promising but TD advertised it to be able to run Very High Crysis, it probably does like Medium settings.

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abc

[b]You REALLY need to say what it's for, how often you will upgrade it, whether you need a monitor/mouse/keyboard etc, whether you have an OS or need one, whether you can save a DVD RW from current PC etc, whether you want gaming grade mouse, media grade speakers etc or just functional.

Since peripherials can realistically add up to $400~ whether you need them or not will really define the sort of performance you can afford.


$1250 in US land is the "no mans land" of custom builds. Problem is you really want 4 things from a custom cumputer:

upgradability
SSD boot drive
5850 level of performance
Core I5 platform

$1250 will get you 2 of those, with economising on the rest (e.g. small or no SSD, 5770 not 5850, or no upgradability - but to omit upgradability you'd have to be stupid.)

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Schosch

Taken from computerbase.de:
(that would actually be three of your four abc )

850€ (roughly 1200$)

AMD:

Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition (125W)
Alternative: Phenom II X4 945 (95W)
Gigabyte GA-MA770T-UD3P
Alternative: Gigabyte GA-770TA-UD3 oder MSI 770-C45 oder ASUS M4A79XTD EVO

Intel:

Core i5-750 Boxed
MSI P55-CD53
Alternative: ASUS P7P55D oder Gigabyte GA-P55-UD3


Remaining components:

4GB G.Skill 1333MHz CL7
Alternative: 4GB GeIL 1333MHz CL7
HD 5870
Alternative: HD 5850
Cooler Master Silent Pro 500W (KM)
Alternative: Cougar CM 550W (KM) oder Enermax PRO82+ 525W oder be quiet Pure Power 530W
Western Digital Caviar Blue 640GB
Alternative: Samsung F3 500GB
LG GH22
Alternative: Samsung SH-S223F oder Sony AD-7240S
Cooler Master CM 690
Alternative: Xigmatek Midgard

Edit: On a sidenote, the Phenom II X4 955 and the Core i5-750 are pretty much the same performance-wise.

abc

Ah but EU prices almost always exclude tax. Also there must be another catch or w/e somewhere. The 5870 alone retails for OVER half the 850 Euro asking price.

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SgtJoo

Including peripherals (Basically just mouse, keyboard, monitor)
For playing MW2 and anything else I feel like
I might be able to get the OS for free
Don't really care about the quality of the mouse, and actually since I already have a headset I don't care about speakers...
And all new parts

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indokyne

are you carrying over or re-using any parts?

or does this build have to be completely from scratch - including monitor, keyboard, speakers etc etc?

SgtJoo

Completely from scratch.

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abc

Antec 300 - best budget case. fantastic airflow. fantastic quality. mature looks.
2x120mm blue intakes - probably makes cooling slightly WORSE but looks good and is the same price as the case but with no fans, so may as well have free fans
Corsair TX650 - great mid range PSU from the best mainstream brand. Outstanding power (a cheap 650w will only give 450w max before blowing up. But an expensive 650w will give 650w at very good efficiency (i.e. cheaper electricity bills) and if you're very stupid it'll give you 800 watts of power and still not blow up) not to mention being expensive, the fan will be nice and quiet.
Samsung DVD+-RW - it's a black DVD drive. nevertheless my cheap DVD is noisy but my samsung drive is nice and quiet.
Intel Core I5 750 - Outruns the I7's in gaming. Will outrun just about anything except an I7 in stuff like animation and video editting.
G.Skill Ripjaw 1600MHz 2x2GB - Fantastic memory from one of the best brands. Very good overclockability.
Asus P7P55 LX - Not the best BUT it's a good brand, has good memory support, does crossfire (2x video cards) and will OC ok.
PowerColor HD5770 - Nothing wrong with that brand. Decently fast card. Will easily max MW2 at full HD.
Logitech MX518 - Brilliant gaming mouse at a very cheap price.
cheap USB keyboard - it works.
Hanns G 24" Full HD monitor - great brand, fantastic contrast ratio, good response time, HDMI & DVI inputs
WD Caviar Black 500GB - second fastest 500GB HDD currently on market (excluding the $500 SSDs, naturally) Get a Samsung Spinpoint F3 instead if they're in stock.
Belkin Power Surge Protector (free w/ something, maybe CPU?) - pointless since a good feature of expensive PSU is built in power surge protectors and all sorts of weird & clever ways of stopping your PC being melted if hit by lightening etc (may have been an exaggeration.)

TOTAL: $1012.90



Suggestions for $200 left:

Upgrade GFX card to a HD5850. This would make your PC seriously l33t. HD5850 are 50% faster than the 5770, e.g. faster than a GTX285, i.e. the fastest (single GPU) nVidia card from 2009

Upgrade MOBO. Maybe to a Gigabyte UD... board for better overclocking. Obviously spending $50 more on better quality copper and plastic is only sensible if you'll ever OC.

Upgrade case to a Xigmatek Midguard or Antec 900 - performance wise you gain nothing as the Antec 300 is fantastic but you get a bit more space, more features and more lights & windows etc

Upgrade to an SSD - SSD are like hard drives but uber uber fast. They make your PC turn on in 20 seconds, load photoshop CS4 in 7 seconds and make smaller programs (like word) appear instantly when you click em. Problem is you can "only" afford something like a 64GB one, so you'd put windows & favourite programs on the really fast SSD and put music etc (I don't know about you, but I don't see the point in loading music in 0.000001 seconds when I want one track to last the whole 3:30 seconds...) on the "slow" (but still very good) normal drive, i.e. a WD Caviar Black or Samsung F3.

Bigger monitor - lol? 28" anyone? these get rapidly pricey.


If I were building this and don't really like computery things (i.e. don't want to overclock or fiddle with stuff) I'd get a xigmatek midguard case and MAYBE an SSD with the extra cash, if possible.

That's a cracking setup for $1000 though.

The REAL STRENGTH of that setup is it's fantastic now (brand new, just released quad core that's faster than it's big brother in gaming. great GFX card, 24" screen and high quality case & mouse) yet you could drop a $600 GFX card in or go crossfire without needing to get a bigger power supply or a bigger case or diff mobo.


p.s. PSU = power supply.

__________________
"I don't like new Linkin Park, I don't like old Linkin Park... I JUST LIKE LINKIN PARK"

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This is getting repetitive.

Schosch

Western Caviar Blue or Black is a good choice (just like the MX518). I have two Caviar Blue 640GB in my PC and the transfer rate when copying some video footage from one drive to the other is about 70-80MB.

@SgtJoo: What OS are you going to get? Windows 7 hopefully (Home Premium is good enough).

SgtJoo

I <3 you. Nohomo ofc.

Oh and Windows 7 hopefully.

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abc

Really though the Samsung F3 outclasses the WD Caviar black if you can get hold of one, the F3 uses 500GB platters so can sustain a read/write of about 100~/80~ which just outclasses the older 320GB per platter WD Caviar & Spinpoint F1.

Incase you though that was a typo, the F3 IS better than the F1, but (just to confuse things) the F2 is slower than both because it's an energy saving eco drive.

Of course if you do a lot of read/writing large files (photoshop, video editting etc) then RAID 0 may be worth a look. This is putting two HDD together to make one twice as big drive. Read/writes will be doubled so you'll be looking at some pretty immense 200MB/s reads with burst speeds literally into GB/s. However the downsides are if one drive breaks you loose EVERYTHING and with two hard drives you are more likely to experience a problem sooner than if you just had one. The main "pointless" ness of RAID 0 is that access time, the time it takes to find a file in the first place without even loading it, is still relatively "ages" whereas the as mentioned SSD find things virtually instantly then loads it with a F3-matching-or-exceeding (depending on if you get a high/low end one) speed.

Ah also the Samsung F3 are virtually identical price to a Caviar Black, making the caviar black - however great they are, redundant. An F3 is potentially my next upgrade if I don't want to fork out on an SSD.



Also, don't know why I highlighted the TX650 PSU for potential upgrade. I mean you could get a modular HX650 which would make building the thing slightly easier, but it's probably about $45 more. Of course you could get a TX750 or even a TX950, but unless you actually plan to spend $1200 on graphics cards one day, such a high end PSu is simply an unneccessary expense.

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"I don't like new Linkin Park, I don't like old Linkin Park... I JUST LIKE LINKIN PARK"

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SgtJoo

Hey abc can you link me the right RAM on newegg? I'm oblivious as to which one is the right one.

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abc

Yeah sure. Ripjaw is by no means the best memory ever HOWEVER it is amazing for three reasons:

The price: $95 for 4GB of 1600MHz is pretty damn good
OC'ing: No it's not the best, but G.Skill as a brand are one of the best so buying a "midrange" product from the "best" brand is always a safe bet.
I5: It just compliments the I5 perfectly. As I said it's not the best but exactly like the I5 it's damn good.

Newegg.com - G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL9D-4GBRL - Desktop Memory




If you OC then these will probably get 1 hundred or two MHz more because they have lower timings to begin with:

Newegg.com - G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL7D-4GBRM - Desktop Memory

If are buying this to OC (in which case get a better mobo and an aftermarket cooler) then these have even lower timings and still are not ridiculously priced at all:

Newegg.com - G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL7D-4GBRH - Desktop Memory

I suspect the first link is the only one relavent to you. Unless you OC em heavily you won't notice the difference at all.




Any thoughts on whether you're gonna keep the $200 or get a 5850 (or perhaps a 5830 would be a better buy on the 5th of feb?) or upgrade some other bits?

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SgtJoo

With the extra 200 I'd probably upgrade the video card. I have time on my side. I won't be getting this for at least a month, if not a couple. Any suggestions?

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abc

A month, if not a couple?

Ok, so you're gonna want an ATI HD6850 then...

If the 5800-refresh/6800 doesn't happen in time, the HD5830 definitely should (released 6th feb apparantly) be out by then. Well worth considering as most people just don't need the power the HD5850 offers.

I personally would consider extra money on a case upgrade. With this budget any "upgrade" is purely in terms or looks, it's pretty hard to get anything with better cooling or better build quality.

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"I don't like new Linkin Park, I don't like old Linkin Park... I JUST LIKE LINKIN PARK"

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This is getting repetitive.

SgtJoo

I'm assuming those cards aren't out yet?

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abc

no. As I said HD5830 is around the 6th of feb. The 5830 is IMO a good idea because the 5850 is although great value extremely powerful thus expensive. The 5770 however, the next best thing, is substantially slower. Sure the 5770 isn't a couch potatoe... but I'd personally want something a little faster for your rig. The HD5770 is £130. The HD5850 is a massive £230. There is absolutely nothing worth buying inbetween... and that's a shame because £160~ is often the pinnacle of high end performance without buying a card that is up there in the leagues of silly-fast-and-you-pay-for-it.

There is a rumoured 5800 refresh (i.e. take current GFX cards, sprinkle some fairy dust and they're about 10% or so faster) OR a complete redesign (substantially faster) in Q3ish 2010. Although actually Q3 is ages away, so forget about that. At least wait to see the price of a 5830.

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"I don't like new Linkin Park, I don't like old Linkin Park... I JUST LIKE LINKIN PARK"

COD owner - COD expansion pack owner - COD2 owner - COD2: BRO player - COD3 owner - COD4 owner - COD:WaW owner - COD: MW2 owner - COD: BO owner

This is getting repetitive.