New to desktop building

wjess · Feb 5, 2014

Hi all, I'm totally new to the desktop building world. Pardon my fundamental qns.

I'm looking to buy either xps 8700 or an Alienware x51. But now, I'm interested to build one of similar performance myself.

I'm looking at the i7 intel 4770 processor, but I've no idea which motherboard to pair it with. I prefer m atx due to size preference.

Please help. Cheers!

ferwindjacks · Feb 5, 2014

Since you're asking specifically for the motherboard, that's all I'll give you. However, if you'd like suggestions for a build, list your price and I'll send you a pcpartpicker link and see what you think.
I have an i7 4770k Processor paired with an Asus Maximus VI Hero mobo. I love it. I love the way it looks, its features, and for the price, its simply fantastic. Since you're into the mATX size, I recommend the Maximus VI Gene. Same thing as the Hero, but smaller (for the most part, haha).
ROG line aside, the Gryphon is also a good contender.

I'm glad you're taking building a computer into your own hands, its a great experience, you'll learn a lot, save money, and not be paying for big names like Alienware!

Regards.

wjess · Feb 5, 2014

Hi thanks for the fast reply.
im from Singapore. My budget is 1600-1800

I posted this link as this place is really assessable and probably where I will get my parts. This desktop will be mainly for gaming and photoshop and illustrator. Games will include BF4, WOW and FPS games.

It will be great if you can suggest a graphic card from the link below that is on par or better than the Geforce 660 that alienware uses.

Thanks!

ferwindjacks · Feb 5, 2014

Pro tip-don't link others websites that automatically download things. I'm lucky my browser add ons and anti-virus caught that.
I personally use a EVGA GTX 770 SC. Set me back about 350 dollars, and was the priciest part of my build.
I don't know how much your build currently is, but the 700 series equivalent is the GTX 760 which is also pretty good.
Best GPU on the market right now is the GTX 780Ti, which will set you back a cool, 7-800 dollars.

Regards.

wjess · Feb 5, 2014

My bad. I've removed the link.

GPU: I'm guessing the bigger the number the better?

Ram & hard drive: does brand matters? For the hard drive, why do ppl have a smaller ssd and a bigger sata? My understanding is the ssd is for the os and it improves performance?

Motherboard: other than compatibility to the processor, the Matx size, I'm looking for sli ones so I can add another GPU maybe sometime next year

Anything I missed or mistakes?

ferwindjacks · Feb 6, 2014

For the Nvidia line of GPUs, you're pretty much right-higher number the better. 780Ti being the best GPU on the market in terms of speed.

Brand always matters, I personally use Corsair RAM but Crucial/Kingston is good as well, along with a couple others. In terms of SSD's, Intel, Samsung and Kingston are the only ones I'd use. SSD will give you better performance all day, but costs more (around 1 dollar per gig) and have smaller storage sizes. For HDDs/HHDDs I'd only use Seagate, but Western Digital is alright as well. I've just had bad experiences with WD, so I usually dont recommend them. People usually use SSDs to store their OS for faster boot times and performance.

For mATX, the Asus Maximus VI GENE has the ability to SLI.

Any other questions or something I missed, I will be happy to answer them.

Regards.

wjess · Feb 6, 2014

ferwindjacks :

For the Nvidia line of GPUs, you're pretty much right-higher number the better. 780Ti being the best GPU on the market in terms of speed.

Brand always matters, I personally use Corsair RAM but Crucial/Kingston is good as well, along with a couple others. In terms of SSD's, Intel, Samsung and Kingston are the only ones I'd use. SSD will give you better performance all day, but costs more (around 1 dollar per gig) and have smaller storage sizes. For HDDs/HHDDs I'd only use Seagate, but Western Digital is alright as well. I've just had bad experiences with WD, so I usually dont recommend them. People usually use SSDs to store their OS for faster boot times and performance.

For mATX, the Asus Maximus VI GENE has the ability to SLI.

Any other questions or something I missed, I will be happy to answer them.

Regards.

Thanks! Cheers!

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