Hi guys,
My Dell 4550 just died, motherboard is done with and so is the HDD. I now and two choices, either buy a PC or build it. Honestly it's not worth buying a new one because you pay for things that you dont need plus it isnt really the way you want it so I have decided to build one.

I'm not a total newb to building PC's BUT I havent done it in 4 years so I suck at it now Sad

I'm a gamer however not a hardcore as some. I want to do a gamer PC though. Also I do a lot of storage though, games, programs, movies, music.

So it looks like I need:
- Mobo - OC capable, dual core, either Intel orAMD whichever is better to OC and easier
- CPU - No prefference in AMD or Intel, whichever is easier to OC and is faster.
- RAM
- Video Card - dual capable, kinda of leaning towards NV since I've always had problems with ATI
- Power supply - 500W

Wanna spend about 1 grand

Anything I'm missing?

I dont need, HDD or monitor or any keyboard or mice. I just need a mobo, power supply, video card and ram

Here are a few of the stuff that I like but I'm not sure if they are good.
Case -
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6811144151 - this is something I was leaning towards. It has nice looking case plus lots of fans for cooling.

I really appriciate it everyone!

Thanks
Reggie

A few quick requests/advice:

-You need to give a budget. Everything comes down to the budget....that determines what you get and what you don't.
-How "futureproof-ish" do you want this? Do you plan on running Windows Vista when it comes out?
-Games. You state you don't need cutting edge power and don't play much things very intensive......well, Quake 4 really isn't that demanding compared to other games out there now. So.........that means you don't need 2 graphics cards, it's a waste of time and money.
-I highly doubt you'd need water cooling. 99.9% sure you won't need it.
-What size monitor you gonna use?


A few quick comments:

-The Cruiser case is good
-Get a 500 watt power supply for sure. Depending on some answers to the above requests, you may even need more. Don't get a cheap PSU. Get something that's more than $70.
-AMD or Intel? Pepsi or Coke? Rum or rye? Such is the dilemma. Both have their strong points. Since you're not looking at cutting edge, you can either go with a cheaper dual core AMD for a smaller budget, or spend a bit more and get an Intel Core2Duo. That's probably your best bet.
-RAM depends on your budget, system requirements, and expectations
-Doubt you need RAID.
-Stock cooling will probably work for you.......CPU and GPU.


To recap:

Post your budget. Go from there. There are TONS of suggestions floating in these forums for any budget. Once you have that set, anyone here can copy/paste a recent system build or critique. And then you're off to the races

woops, sorry that's my fault. The minimum that I wanna spend is 1 grand. Max 2 grand but I want to avoid that, expensive!
With 1 grand I should be able to at least get a decent system with good specs.

ok to answers the questions:
I would like it to be future proof, when vista comes out, I'll be upgrading to it and so on so yes, that's a big factor.

on the power supply, check! absolutely understand that more power will be needed.

for the video cards, well I do racing like NFS games which require a good card. plus I want to in the future dual it, right now is not required but later on I want to make it dual, so a video card and motherboard that lets me do dual would be great.

as for monitor, for temp use i'm using my lcd 37" tv, i'll get an actual lcd later on, prob 21 or bigger, but that's later on.

ok hope that was cool

Thanks

That does help a lot - and yes you should get a pretty awesome system in your budget range.

A good starting place is a suggested build list from someplace like Midrange Buyer's Guide - September 2006 from http://anandtech.com/guides/
Look at the upgraded AMD and Intel systems for ideas starting out.
There is also a Budget and High End buyers guides there as well.

Case options are pretty much a matter of personal taste more than any other part.
Mild - COOLER MASTER Centurion 5 CAC-T05-WW Black/Silver $40
Cool and Quiet - Antec Performance I P180 $125
Wild - GIGABYTE GZ-FA1CA-ASS Silver $150

Check out these links.....they follow along with what WR2 suggested.......they should give you a good indication of what you can get, what to avoid, etc:

http://forumz.tomshardware.com/har [...] 03559.html

http://forumz.tomshardware.com/har [...] 06094.html

Cases, there's all kinds of cases. Coolermaster makes some great cases. Lots of folk here own the Thermaltake Armor tower. Unless you get a super-cheapo you should do okay - just google the case you're interested in and read the reviews.

I liked the X-Cruiser, and these as well:

Aerocool ExtremEngine 3T
NZXT Zero
Coolermaster Ammo (this is just a weird case, but interesting)
If you missed Tom's article: Gaming Case Showdown (a lot of folks are raving about the Silverstone featured)

That said, I myself finally got the Coolermaster Stacker 830

Note that almost NO case out there (there's a few exceptions) have a PSU you want, so buy one without if possible & get a quality PSU.

Here's a good link for PSU's: PSU 101.

Most here suggest a Antec, ThermalTake, OCZ. The above thread has a nice link to a page to calculate your system's needs, but in all likelihood a 500-600W (quality!) PSU will fit the bill, more if you want it to be more future-proof. I like modular cabling, and the "SLI-ready" ones with the extra outputs.

ok so we got cases and poser supply done
now only ram, video, mobo and cpu left

I checked the review site and it had some cool info.

can you guys post more info on what you might think is good. please if you can, post your setup too.

thanks guys.