43 replies to this topic

[Fogel]

• Still say i5
• The 7950 is best price/performance card out right now so that's an easy pick, but if I was going to spend $400 I would buy a GTX 670
• Since I recommended that PSU I of course think it is a quality PSU
• Older model Intel SSD but supposedly Intel drives are great though I would still go with a more current drive (any brand)
• EVGA specializes in NVidia graphics cards, I wouldn't trust any of their boards for CrossFire even if they advertised they supported it though I doubt this board does

[Spazmanien]

Whats some good ram? Im looking for 12 to 16GB

[vandreadstriker]

I'll also say stick with the i5. But then again if you can buy one and still have alot more to spare, go ahead.

I wouldn't get a 670 since the 7950 performs (at least) almost as good but for $100 less.

I still think you won't need an 80+ Gold or higher PSU but it isn't a big deal anyway.

I'd still get the Vertex4, especially for the price. Minimises all the SandForce shenanigans that you may or may not get, and also higher overall performance.

For motherboard:
- I'd get the ASRock Z77 Extreme4 for an entry-mid level board
- The Gigabyte Z77X-UD5H for a mid-high level, all-rounder board.

For RAM, any 16GB (2x8GB) 1600MHz kit you can find (preferably C9 latency)

[IVIYTH0S]

The sweet spot would be an 8Gb kit (2x4GB) running 1600mhz with CL9 or lower. Just get the cheapest ones and be happy, memory is memory.

Also agree with what has been said, either pickup a pretty cheap used 2500K or get a 3570K

7950 for video card

Look into a PC Power and Cooling 750W Silencer power supply, it's all you'll ever need , has an amazing warranty, IS amazing and has great connections.

[wevsspot]

- The Gigabyte Z77X-UD5H for a mid-high level, all-rounder board.
For RAM, any 16GB (2x8GB) 1600MHz kit you can find (preferably C9 latency)

The Gigabyte board is a sleeper (in a good way) great great board and great recommendation. Personally I'd go with an i7 CPU for any machine I do actual "work' on. Hyper-threading does have it's benefits for apps that can use the technology.

So if I were putting together this rig for myself I'd be using the Gigabyte UD5H and either an i7 2600k/2700k or i7 3770k

I think the HD7950 is a solid recommendation on the video card & if it were me I'd definitely do my best to sneak a SSD into the build equation for sure.

[Fogel]

So if I were putting together this rig for myself I'd be using the Gigabyte UD5H and either an i7 2600k/2700k or i7 3770k

Recommended that board in someone else's System Build topic.


OP:
This $10 deal is only good today, but regardless I would look for RAM with these specs:
Corsair Vengeance - 16GB (2x8GB) - $75 ... 1600 CL9 - 9-9-9-24

If you are only going to be gaming on this machine or just general use 8GB is more than enough. I would only go more than 8GB if you use Photoshop, CAD, 3D Rendering, etc.. Extra RAM doesn't speed things up, it just sits there doing nothing. If you know you need 12-16GB than that is the kit I would buy today. There are some Cas Latency 10 kits but I would try for CL9 if the budget allows. You probably wouldn't notice the difference between 1333 and 1600 so you can get a kit as cheap as $65 going with the slower RAM, but I would spend the extra 10 bucks and get the kit above if it was me.

[Shurman292]

I agree with everything recommended previously except for the video card choices. Before you even think about Crossfire or AMD video cards, check out which brand your graphics design software will support. A $300 video card will not help at all if your software does not support it. From personal experience, I know Adobe software plays nicely with Nvidia cards and not AMD. Just an fyi.

And please, please, please add an SSD!!!!

[Spazmanien]

Haha LOL!!! so many choices!! I've taken all recommendations into account and have watched a load YouTube reviews on the different items. I found that most of the stuff i've been looking at is cheaper or the same price on amazon.com. So here is my current list if items all of which except for the CPU cooler i found on amazon. Now before you look any further take the following into account.

1. I hate to say it but i am big into aesthetics. But will be dropped if price requires it.

2. I like quality and don't like how much upgrades can cost.

3. Because i cant build this at this point in time (for right now this is all dreaming) some of the the items will probably change with your different recommendations..

With that said here are the items and their links.



Corsair Memory Vengeance 16 Dual Channel Kit DDR3 1600 MHz 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM CMZ16GX3M4A1600?C9
by Corsair
$78.99
http://www.amazon.co... vengeance 16gb

OCZ Technology 128GB Vertex 4 Series SATA 6.0 GB/s 2.5-Inch Solid State Drive (SSD) With Industry's Highest 120K IOPS And 5-Year Warranty - VTX4-25SAT3-128?G
by OCZ
$89.99
http://www.amazon.co...ywords=vertex 4

Kingston Hyperx Cooling Fan Accessory - Black
by Kingston
$19.75
http://www.amazon.co...erx coloing fan

Creative Sound Blaster Recon3D THX PCIE Fatal1ty Champion Sound Card SB1354
by Creative
$130.24
http://www.amazon.co...s=sound blaster


Corsair Cooling Hydro Series H100I CPU Cooler System LGA1155 1156 1366 2011 AM2 AM3 FM1 & FM2
http://us.ncix.com/p...facture=Corsair


Intel Core i7-3770K Quad-Core Processor 3.5 GHz 8 MB Cache LGA 1155 - BX80637I73770K
by Intel
$319.99
http://www.amazon.co...s=intel core i7

ASUS SABERTOOTH Z77 LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
by Asus
$224.98
http://www.amazon.co...=sabnertoth z77

I chose to stick with this PSU cause i supports ivy bridge CPUs, while the power and cooling 750w PSU only supports sandy bridge.

Corsair Professional Series HX 750 Watt ATX/EPS Modular 80 PLUS Gold (HX750)
by Corsair
$144.99
http://www.amazon.co...keywords=HX 750

Western Digital Blue 1 TB Desktop Hard Drive: 3.5 Inch, 7200 RPM, SATA III, 64 MB Cache
$76.71
http://www.amazon.co...rn didiatl blue

Gigabyte AMD Radeon HD 7950 3GB GDDR5 DVI-I/HDMI/2x Mini-Displaypor?t PCI-Express Graphic Card GV-R795WF3-3GD
by Gigabyte
$299.99
http://www.amazon.co...eywords=hd 7950

Asus 24xDVD-RW Serial ATA Internal OEM Drive DRW-24B1ST (Black)
by Asus
$22.79
http://www.amazon.co...=Asus 24xDVD-RW

AZZA Full Tower Computer Case with 4xEasy Swap HD Trays and 2x2.5-Inch SSD Trays HURRICAN 2000R (Black/Red)
by AZZA
$152.97
http://www.amazon.co... hurrican 2000r

Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64bit (Full) System Builder DVD 1 Pack
by Microsoft Software
$91.99
http://www.amazon.co...s-Premium-64bit

All this is for a total of $2055.46 way under my original budget.

Now for my questions that i need answers to.

1. Do i need a network - wifi - lan card?

2. will all these components work together?

3. Overall what do you think?

I will still take into consideration future suggestions. I thank you all for all the help. Before this forum i was pretty clueless as to building this machine.

[Shurman292]

I chose to stick with this PSU cause i supports ivy bridge CPUs, while the power and cooling 750w PSU only supports sandy bridge.

Corsair Professional Series HX 750 Watt ATX/EPS Modular 80 PLUS Gold (HX750)
by Corsair
$144.99
http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Professional-Watt-Modular-HX750/dp/B0090I9VZI/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1352855589&sr=1-1&keywords=HX+750

Either of those PSUs will "support" Ivy Bridge CPUs. Even five year old PSUs (or older for that matter) will support Ivy Bridge. It's all about the connections to the motherboard (8pin cpu power and 24pin motherboard power). CMIIW but those connections haven't changed in ages.

If you want to connect to a wifi network, yes you will need a wifi card. You can grab a decent one for no more than $25 online. The motherboard will have an ethernet port for LAN connections.

Everything will work together well, and overall your system looks good. I suggest re-calculating your total cost though, because I am getting around $1850 for your total.

Good choice on the CPU cooler, I just ordered one

[Spazmanien]

haha!!! wow!!! what a blonde moment!! Ok... so i will look into a few other cheaper psus....or however you spell the plural of PSU ahah!!.

And to add to to that list for the Grand total correction is that im getting two 7950s. not one. two. for crossfire.

[wevsspot]

haha!!! wow!!! what a blonde moment!! Ok... so i will look into a few other cheaper psus....or however you spell the plural of PSU ahah!!.

I would call that a blonde moment
But on a serious note and concerning power supplies, it's ok to get a "less expensive" unit, but don't go for a "cheaper" unit. What I mean by that.................. the power supply is just as critical as any other component you choose to build with - and it's the one part that people always seem to want to skimp on. Corsair builds very good power supplies, but then again so does PC Power & Cooling (not as good as before they were bought by OCZ) but still very good power supplies. With power supplies, the quality and stability of the power provided is just as important as the claimed output of the unit. In general, a modular power supply will be more expensive than a non-modular supply. For your build anything 750W or higher from a well respected brand name will work fine. I personally like a single 12V rail, but I'm sure others may disagree with me.

For personal builds I always choose Corsair. With that being said, once I find a reliable brand I tend to stick with it (for whatever that's worth). If I were buying for myself here is a list of power supplies I would choose (in order from top to bottom) within the rated power range you're looking for;

Corsair AX750
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16817139016

Corsair HX750
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16817139010

Silverstone Strider SST-ST75F
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16817256079

XFX Pro750W
http://www.newegg.co...#scrollFullInfo

Rosewill Lighting 800
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16817182238

On that note, if you shop carefully you can probably pull off a good deal on a 850W unit for almost the same price as a 750W unit. Some good examples (again in order from top to bottom IMHO)

Corsair HX850
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16817182238

Seasonic X-850
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16817151102

XFX Pro850W
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16817207017

Seasonic M12II 850
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16817151108

Thermaltake SP-850M
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16817153158

Two units that I've left off my list but are getting kudos from users and external review sites alike;

Cougar SX850
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16817553006 (this looks to be a great value buy)

Lepa G900-MA
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16817194083 (also looks to be a great value buy)

[Spazmanien]

Great Thanks!! I think i liek that cougar 850w PSU. For one its cheaper than the 750w PSU I have picked out now, and it would go good with the red and black theme of the Azza 2000r.

SO now my new grand total is $2033.68

Edited by Spazmanien, 14 November 2012 - 09:58 AM.