peshewah Posted October 19, 2011 Posted October 19, 2011 Helping a buddy build a computer. Gaming mostly. Want to run any game out there and run it well. We have a i5 2500K on the way. Not to sure about the mobo. More than likely will not overclock but would like to be able to if he wants to. Confused on the ram and video card as well. Will run one video card. I have read threads till I'm blue in the face. I see people reccomend a certain brand like MSI, Asus, and so on, but rarely says which one specificly. Would like to keep cost down. But then again not so cheap that its not future proof, atleast for a few years. In other words I don't see any since in spending $300 on a mobo. I'm getting old and get confused easily but still know my way around a computer. You guys are good to help people and good at what you do so thats why I come here. I need help crossing the road. Thanks for your time. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Black64 Posted October 19, 2011 Posted October 19, 2011 (edited) Well most motherboards are very similar and there is not one that is "the winner". I am sure some here can recommend a good one for that CPU and when we know more of your PC needs. For ram Corsair makes excellent ram. IMO I like G-skill because it is cheap and works great For a video card, depending on your budget you can get a 560Ti/6950 for mid range gaming or a 6970/580GTX for high end. If you really want to run anything you can get a 590GTX/6990 for the ultra high end. Also "future proof" is something of a debate most of the time. I think no PC is can/will be future proof unless you upgrade it every 2 years. The high today will be the mid end tomorrow. Anything else just ask. EDIT:grammer Edited October 19, 2011 by Black6464 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fogel Posted October 19, 2011 Posted October 19, 2011 (edited) Give us a budget range to work with Some things to chew on while you get that in gear, here is what I would suggest: - Nvidia in single card solutions ...EVGA is my #1 pick, followed by MSI / ASUS - ATI in multi-card solutions ...MSI / Sapphire would be my choice here That said, there is a chance you can unlock 6950 to a 6970. Not all of them will unlock and I don't have a list of which do, so find someone in the know or take a gamble. $220 - $280 Price Range - MSI 6950 2GB Twin Frozr II - MSI 560ti Twin Frozr II ...there is a 2GB version for $270 but out of stock currently $300 - $350 Price Range - EVGA GTX 570 (Reference for standard performance, decent cooling ... HD for shorter card but worse on cooling ...Classified for OC goodness) - Sapphire 6970 2GB If you really want to spend some money, you start talking GTX 580 (mid $400s), GTX 580 3GB (mid $500s), GTX 590 (mid $700s) and 6990 ($700ish). The best bang for buck is probably the 6950 if you can find one that unlocks or if you don't like the idea of taking a chance I would say a GTX 570. Other cards are good choices but I believe those 2 are the best performance per dollar you can find. Keep in mind though, you cannot max out every game with either card. People running two GTX 580s in SLI still take a performance hit running in just High Settings on BF3 (Battlefield 3). Though the GTX 570 can handle most games on really good settings. May not run Metro 2033 at max but it still looks great! Edited October 19, 2011 by Fogel Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
peshewah Posted October 19, 2011 Posted October 19, 2011 Thank you guys for the fast response. Now I have a good idea on the video cards. I'm really stumped on the mobo. I read that Asrock make good mobo but I also read that the cpu socket is close to the ram slots. If i get Gskill for ram, it looks like they have a tall heat sink. Gskill look like good performance and good price. If I get a after market heat sink for the cpu I'm afraid something won't fit. If you might have a good mobo in mind, lets say around $200, and a heat sink for a cpu, and 8gb of ram, DDR3 1600, that would help even more. I'm I asking too much? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stonerboy779 Posted October 20, 2011 Posted October 20, 2011 Corsair low profile vengeance 1600mHz for ram and a 212+ there will be plenty of clearance. Also the sapphire flex 6950 has a very good chance of having a pre loaded 6970 bios based of a guy on here getting 4 6970s sold as 6950s plus the air cooling on them is amazing. My two cents Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tjj226_Angel Posted October 20, 2011 Posted October 20, 2011 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130610 Nice looking, 5 year warranty which beats out Asus, PCI 3.0 and ready for the intel ivybridge processors coming out next year. I don't know if you know this or not so please forgive me if I am repeating old info, but with the Z68 platform you can get a 60GB or less SSD and use it a cache for the mechanical hard drive. This boosts the speed of the hard drive up to 5 times faster (closer to 8 in my tests). But that way you are future proofed. This Mobo should last 2-3 years is my guess. The success of the motherboard is truly dependent upon the success of the processor, and just be prepared for the ivy bridges when they come out. As for a video card. I would not go with anything AMD based. Yes its a great bang for the buck, but I have been seeing more and more driver issues since AMD bought out ATI. Just a thought. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127565 I would recommend this card because its quiet, cool, its in a decent enough price range where if in the future you need more power for games it won't be too expensive to get another card, and it allows for some overclocking which is always nice : ). When you are looking for any graphics card make sure it has a nice heat sink on it and more than one fan on a card means greater OCing potential. Other than that I would say anything above a 560 is overkill with an i5 and to just make sure it has a good brand name. The reason you were confused is because so many cards have the same specs. For instance asus gigabyte and MSI all have similar cards, the real meat is what level of GTX is it and in this case its 560. In fact as long as its a 560 you can pretty much covered your eyes and point to one on the screen and you will still have a great card. Heat sink I will always and forever recommend the noctua NH-D14. It ranges from 80 to 90 dollars and it is one of, if not the best and quietest heat sink on the market. The only other two that keep up with it is the corsair h100 which is loud and its meant for all cases, and the silver arrow by thermalight. Noctua is still your best bet because as long as you don't have any crazy eat sinks on your ram you can pretty much fit it in any case mid atx form factor and up. Ram, if you are seriously talking about playing any game coming out I would recommend http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145313 this. You might think I am insane. However, if you want to play any game with in two to three years this is the best solution because you can get very good results with overclocking the ram. So for instance let say Crysis 2 needs 1600mhz to play at max settings, I don't really know but lets pretend. However next year or when ever when crysis three comes out it might need 1866mhz ram. You could overclock this ram and have a much more stable overclock than other models of ram and boost the ram to the required settings. However the flip side is, for the price you could buy a set now, then when you do need better ram, buy it then and the two sets together wil be about the same. As for a simple solution I would recommend http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820226219 this. It's simply, powerful, looks cool, and its what I have in my pc and it works great. I hope this answerers a lot of your questions, and lastly no ASRock its still a bad company, just with a new face. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
peshewah Posted October 20, 2011 Posted October 20, 2011 Thanks again guys for your time and suggestions. Stonerboy, I have read about the Sapphire. Pretty sweet deal. I already have the monitor. Its a Asus VH236H. Max resolutions is 1920x 1080 so from what I've read is that anything alittle bit above the 6950 or 560ti isn't going to do me much good. Angel, thats really good info on the Z68 board and the 60gb SSD. If 60gb will hold the operating system than thats the way I will go. And "No" I didn't know 90% of what you telling me. I'm grateful. The Mushkin ram is the way I will go for sure. I'm still up in the air on the mobo. I would like get it first before I get a video card to make sure there is no issues with the two. I've been reading alot (too much) about motherboards and everything is starting to run together. Some years back it seemed like there was always that "one special mobo" everyone wanted to buy. Everyone was talking about. But its not that way anymore. There are more choices and I hate to say it, but less interest. Hope I'm wrong. but anyway , Thanks again guys. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wevsspot Posted October 20, 2011 Posted October 20, 2011 When you are looking for any graphics card make sure it has a nice heat sink on it and more than one fan on a card means greater OCing potential. Clarification - dual fan gpu coolers may improve cooling performance thereby improving overclocking results, but there isn't any proof or guarantee that dual fans mean greater OCing potential. However in many circumstances they can help run your card cooler and be quieter than single fan solutions. So for instance let say Crysis 2 needs 1600mhz to play at max settings, I don't really know but lets pretend. However next year or when ever when crysis three comes out it might need 1866mhz ram. Clarification - RAM speed has a minimal impact on gaming performance. Anything DDR3 1333Mhz or above will work just fine, however most folks settle in at DDR3 1600Mhz. A larger impact on gaming performance (and overall system performance) is the amount of RAM installed, not the speed of the RAM installed. .......................and lastly no ASRock its still a bad company, just with a new face. Everyone is entitled to their opinion so I'll offer mine. ASRock isn't a "bad" company. In the marketplace they may seem like relative newcomers, however they were founded in 2002, and according to business review they are now the 3rd largest maker of motherboards in the world. I've had multiple ASRock boards and for the most part they have been excellent boards considering the feature set and price point. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stonerboy779 Posted October 20, 2011 Posted October 20, 2011 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130610 Nice looking, 5 year warranty which beats out Asus, PCI 3.0 and ready for the intel ivybridge processors coming out next year. I don't know if you know this or not so please forgive me if I am repeating old info, but with the Z68 platform you can get a 60GB or less SSD and use it a cache for the mechanical hard drive. This boosts the speed of the hard drive up to 5 times faster (closer to 8 in my tests). But that way you are future proofed. This Mobo should last 2-3 years is my guess. The success of the motherboard is truly dependent upon the success of the processor, and just be prepared for the ivy bridges when they come out. I agree with this mobo suggestion (only reason I don't have it myself is that it wasn't yet listed in stock when I built my last pc). Would however suggest getting a larger SSD than 60gb if you want to load os onto it. I don't see the point because I can deal with a 10 second longer boot if it means better overall performance in everything vs only a few things. As for a video card. I would not go with anything AMD based. Yes its a great bang for the buck, but I have been seeing more and more driver issues since AMD bought out ATI. Just a thought. Nothing wrong with amd they even more quickly released a working beta driver update to get rage working than nividia did. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127565 I would recommend this card because its quiet, cool, its in a decent enough price range where if in the future you need more power for games it won't be too expensive to get another card, and it allows for some overclocking which is always nice : ). When you are looking for any graphics card make sure it has a nice heat sink on it and more than one fan on a card means greater OCing potential. More than one fan is not always better nor always quieter. Eg sapphire flex 6950/70 their new vapor-x cooling cools on par with asus dc-II and msi twin-frozor III more quietly. It is also only a single fan. While I agree better cooling is needed it is not always found my having more fans, I am with wev. Other than that I would say anything above a 560 is overkill with an i5 and to just make sure it has a good brand name. Depends on your definition of overkill I have two 560s in sli running with 1ghz core clocks and find that even on my single 1080p monitor they are not overkill. To me something is only overkill when its min frame rate never drops below your max refresh rate. So while I am still dipping to 35-40fps on witcher 2 or playing at 30fps on a heavily modded Morrowind or getting 50fps in stalker (with some shadows turned down), not overkill to me. I think the op would still do well with sli 560TIs or better again with cf 6950s The reason you were confused is because so many cards have the same specs. For instance asus gigabyte and MSI all have similar cards, the real meat is what level of GTX is it and in this case its 560. In fact as long as its a 560 you can pretty much covered your eyes and point to one on the screen and you will still have a great card. Heat sink I will always and forever recommend the noctua NH-D14. It ranges from 80 to 90 dollars and it is one of, if not the best and quietest heat sink on the market. The only other two that keep up with it is the corsair h100 which is loud and its meant for all cases, and the silver arrow by thermalight. Noctua is still your best bet because as long as you don't have any crazy eat sinks on your ram you can pretty much fit it in any case mid atx form factor and up. Great cooler however op could save lots and get the $25 212+ which I run with a single stock fan at 60% on my 2500k for temps no higher than 35C in normal use or 40C with a 4.8GHz oc. Ram, if you are seriously talking about playing any game coming out I would recommend http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145313 this. You might think I am insane. However, if you want to play any game with in two to three years this is the best solution because you can get very good results with overclocking the ram. So for instance let say Crysis 2 needs 1600mhz to play at max settings, I don't really know but lets pretend. However next year or when ever when crysis three comes out it might need 1866mhz ram. You could overclock this ram and have a much more stable overclock than other models of ram and boost the ram to the required settings. However the flip side is, for the price you could buy a set now, then when you do need better ram, buy it then and the two sets together wil be about the same. The op shouldn't get that ram at all he should get the virtually same speced low profile vengeance ram at 50% the price and at the correct voltage for sandy bridge. Intel recommends 1.5v memory not 1.65 which was used by the older socket. Also all that stuff about games and RAM not sure what you are trying to say. I hope this answerers a lot of your questions, and lastly no ASRock its still a bad company, just with a new face. Again with wev nothing wrong with asrock not like there was in their early days. They are actually a cheap and quality company now. Also op when you decide on graphics card/s we will help you find a psu Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
peshewah Posted October 21, 2011 Posted October 21, 2011 I got this for a heatsink http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103065 I got this for RAM http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820233186 I got this for a hard drive http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822145533 What do ya think? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stonerboy779 Posted October 21, 2011 Posted October 21, 2011 I think pretty solid choices but personally wouldnt have gotten a Hitachi hdd. Thats me tho Any idea what sort of price you want to spend on mobo? Whether you will want support for cf or sli in the future. I will stick with a recommendation of a 6950 flex or two from sapphire if you want max settings with dips in the 50s for min rates or single if you want decent frame rates constantly with some settings like shadows, which eat fps to produce usually not too much, turned down. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
peshewah Posted October 21, 2011 Posted October 21, 2011 (edited) Looks like my buddy will have to spend some money, he'll have to sell some blood. What do you think about EVGA like this one http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188098 Maybe 2 GPU in the future, but only one for now Or this one http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=13-157-263&SortField=0&SummaryType=0&Pagesize=10&PurchaseMark=&SelectedRating=-1&VideoOnlyMark=False&VendorMark=&IsFeedbackTab=true&Page=3 Edited October 21, 2011 by peshewah Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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