Hello all! I'm newly registered, although I've been reading the forums for awhile now.
I've decided that it's time to build my first computer. In the past, I've bought Dells. Yes, I know -- I'm a bad person.
I'm pretty computer savvy when it comes to software and so forth (in fact, I write software for a living) but kind of a dummy when it comes to hardware.
This computer will be used for gaming, and to a lesser extent, utility. (I tend to 'retire' my old computer when I buy a new one into my fileserver, email, web-surfing box to keep my nicest box clutter free). The types of games that I gravitate to vary quite a bit, but include MMOs, RPGs like Oblivion, first person shooters, RTS games, and strategy games -- (currently, I'm pumped for Spore to come out next week).
I'm confident that I am pretty capable of physically putting the computer together correctly, but buying the parts is a little scary to me because of compatibility issues, performance bottlenecks, cooling, power, and all the other little considerations. Frankly, I don't even know where to begin.
As said in the subject, I'd like to spend between $2000 and $2500 for the whole rig, which should include the monitor and a 64-bit copy of Vista or XP. If a few extra dollars could yield me something stupendous, I'd be willing to go higher too -- that's just ballpark.
Lastly, a few thoughts:
I'd like to stick with an Intel chipset. Another question I have is whether waiting for the Nehalem architecture would be wise at this time. My current understanding is that the chips they are releasing this year will be the -extremely- high end chips, probably costing an arm and a leg. If not, I suppose it makes sense to go with a quad core?
I've always been more of a fan of NVidia than ATI, but I see a lot of people recommending the 4780x2 card in other threads. I know that NVidia just had their NVision or whatever conference where they debuted some new stuff. Anyway, I'm flexible here. I just want the best performance.
Fast hard drive(s), I don't particularly want RAID. Are those velociraptor drives worth getting?
Overclocking, again, I don't know that much about it -- but if it were -easy- to do and not stressing my components, I'd be interested in that as well.
So anyway, I'd just like some advice or "fantasy builds" that would get the job done here. I'm in the US, so Newegg is my likely purchase avenue.
Thanks for reading!
I've decided that it's time to build my first computer. In the past, I've bought Dells. Yes, I know -- I'm a bad person.
I'm pretty computer savvy when it comes to software and so forth (in fact, I write software for a living) but kind of a dummy when it comes to hardware.
This computer will be used for gaming, and to a lesser extent, utility. (I tend to 'retire' my old computer when I buy a new one into my fileserver, email, web-surfing box to keep my nicest box clutter free). The types of games that I gravitate to vary quite a bit, but include MMOs, RPGs like Oblivion, first person shooters, RTS games, and strategy games -- (currently, I'm pumped for Spore to come out next week).
I'm confident that I am pretty capable of physically putting the computer together correctly, but buying the parts is a little scary to me because of compatibility issues, performance bottlenecks, cooling, power, and all the other little considerations. Frankly, I don't even know where to begin.
As said in the subject, I'd like to spend between $2000 and $2500 for the whole rig, which should include the monitor and a 64-bit copy of Vista or XP. If a few extra dollars could yield me something stupendous, I'd be willing to go higher too -- that's just ballpark.
Lastly, a few thoughts:
I'd like to stick with an Intel chipset. Another question I have is whether waiting for the Nehalem architecture would be wise at this time. My current understanding is that the chips they are releasing this year will be the -extremely- high end chips, probably costing an arm and a leg. If not, I suppose it makes sense to go with a quad core?
I've always been more of a fan of NVidia than ATI, but I see a lot of people recommending the 4780x2 card in other threads. I know that NVidia just had their NVision or whatever conference where they debuted some new stuff. Anyway, I'm flexible here. I just want the best performance.
Fast hard drive(s), I don't particularly want RAID. Are those velociraptor drives worth getting?
Overclocking, again, I don't know that much about it -- but if it were -easy- to do and not stressing my components, I'd be interested in that as well.
So anyway, I'd just like some advice or "fantasy builds" that would get the job done here. I'm in the US, so Newegg is my likely purchase avenue.
Thanks for reading!
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