New Gaming Rig for Jim's place

July 18, 2012

Some great suggestions so far! Thanks guys. Keep them coming if you have them

July 18, 2012

Jim, why are you selecting a PCI sound card for a motherboard with no PCI slots? ;-)

I've had great results with the Asus Xonar boards and they are not expensive.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100006519%20600011982&IsNodeId=1&Description=xonar&bop=And&Order=PRICE&PageSize=20

Or just go with the onboard audio to save money.

July 18, 2012

Alright my take on this. Especially since I just rebuilt my gaming rig.

Case

While this is mostly a totally subjective and personal taste thing. Why a full tower? It's a game rig not a server/workstation. Unless you plan on cramming a couple of custom Water loops in there or just need something to replace the end table, go with a mid tower. I'm not a big fan of chunky plastic cases. So I realize these are my personal faves in your budget range. Corsair 55D(i just bought one), C70 is tough guy cool, or the 500r stormtrooper?. Fractal Design Arc Midi is a great case. LIANLI a long time favorite the PC-9F, the A55B is a bit more compact and of course my V1000 which is still up for grabs.

Motherboard

While I can understand the cool drool factor of the sabertooth. But the pricing is absurd. I would lean more towards boards that have that meet the basic requirements.you need. If you want to go with Asus the MVG is a better board for the money The on board sound also eliminates the need for the sound card. The Gigabyte boards worth a crap are the UD5H and the G1.Sniper M. I personally just bought the ASRock Extreme4 I love it and it was cheap!

CPU

I sort of agree go IB just because you don't already have a SB. Where deviate is I would say the 3570K. Unless he's doing something regulalrly that needs the HT I don't see the $100+ advantage, do you?. I would normally point out that an i3 is all that is needed for all but a few games. But I'll assume he'll use the true quad for something. plus it nice to have and the i3 IB aren't out yet.

Cooling

H100 is overkill for such low TDP chips. I cool my overclocked 3570K with an H60 in SoCal summer temps easily. Get an H60. Just trying to reallocate cash for what I'm about to suggest further down.

RAM

No real comment here other than I prefer the Ares series. Oh and get 16GB its cheap and useful. If you prefer the same speed as the snipers

SSD / HDD

Not sure what all the crying is about with the M4. I have a pair of 256GB and they are plenty fast. It's a gaming rig how much writing are you realistically doing? For Doc to nuke 3 of them he's clearly doing something wrong. IMO Either way, here's where I drive the bus off the bridge for most folks. Put in a 512GB M4 seriously. If the scare tactics work....the absolute best of the best 256GB Sammy 830.

For HDD storage Either WD5000HHTZ for speed or the WD Black you already have for capacity. With all the $$$ saved off the other overkill parts, you can afford a less embarrassing SSD than a 64GB. With the added benefit of being able to not have to mess with data management. Programs = SSD (including games) HDD = Media only (music, video, etc)

PSU

1000w? Pick any decent 500-600w PSU and you're fine. Might I suggest the Corsair CX500 or if you want modular cables the cooler master SP M600

GPU

If you are looking to run a 1080 panel at high settings you would do better to go with AMD. While nVidia is impressive on the top end. They offer nothing worth buying below that. I love MSI GPU's so the MSI R7950 is my first pick the XFX Dbl D is a close second due to the awesome warranty. The Gigabyte would be my bronze medal.

Sound

if you're not using headphones, stick with onboard for now....

positional effects are all done in software now a days. the sound card wont make a difference. where sound cards help is in

1) analog output stage

2) virtualized surround for headphones

3) headphone amps.

if you decide to not use headphones you'll be better off with a receiver and a passive 2.1/5.1 set. LPCM negates the need for analog multichannel. If you go receiver you want HDMI out of your GPU.

But given that the benchmark in gaming sound is still the XF-i Titanium HD but the Xonar DX is quite popular as well.

Other thoughts

skip the crap monitors. Just go get an ultrasharp off dell outlet. Or consider one of the korean 27" panels (that would likely require that GTX670)

Spend a few bucks on a decent headset for gaming, especially if you are going to use a sound card. i recommend the corsair 1500

If you want to take advantage of the microcenter combo deals. Like the infamous $180 3570k + $50 off any motherboard. LMK

Its a gaming rig it should be like a sports car. Just what you need and nothing else. And whatever you need should be fast. Oh and don't forget fun!

July 18, 2012

Martis...thanks for the long write up. EXACTLY what I was hoping for and very helpful. Going to rework the parts list this weekend with Tim (btw, he is reading this as well) and we will post a new parts list soon. If you have more suggestions, please keep posting them. Thanks guys

July 18, 2012

(btw, he is reading this as well)

That's it Jim; get 'em indoctrinated into HSS while they're young

July 22, 2012

Ok...so here is what we have to date. Spent about 2 hours with Tim today talking him through it. He took some suggestions and not others. Here is what we purchased:

Dell Ultra Sharp U2412M 24inch Monitor - http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/popupproductdetail.aspx?sku=320-2676&?

COOLER MASTER HAF 932 Advanced RC-932-KKN5-GP Steel ATX Full Tower Computer Case with USB 3.0, Black Interior and Four Fans-1x ...

COOLER MASTER Silent Pro M600 RS-600-AMBA-D3 600W ATX12V V2.3 SLI Certified CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS Bronze Certified Modular

Seagate Barracuda ST1000DM003 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

Corsair Force Series 3 CSSD-F60GB3A-BK 2.5" 60GB SATA III Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

Here is what will get purchased next check: (unless we get talked out of it)

GIGABYTE GV-N670OC-2GD GeForce GTX 670 2GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card

G.SKILL Sniper Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1866 (PC3 14900) Desktop Memory Model F3-14900CL9D-8GBSR

ASUS SABERTOOTH Z77 LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard

Intel Core i7-3770K Ivy Bridge 3.5GHz (3.9GHz Turbo) LGA 1155 77W Quad-Core Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 4000 BX80637I73770K

CORSAIR CWCH60 Hydro Series H60 High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler

He also ordered some case fans from Performance-pcs to brighten the case up a bit.