Magical Christmas build and all its low-budget glory!

Well hello there!!
This christmas i'm asking for something special for christmas, a new computer.
You see, the one i'm typing this on is a custom built computer, now you may be thinking it is only a few years old, well, you are wrong. It is around 7 years old and has a AMD Athlon XP 2500+ at its heart. She has lived a long life but no longer can keep up with the games i want to play. I asked my parents if i could get a new one for christmas and indeed as usual we have to bring up the fact that our computer now seems to work fine for AOL and Word. So basically my budget is around 500 bucks. I already have a monitor and a cd drive, YAY.

Basically my plan is to skimp on processor and videocard then upgrade during the summer when i have a job.

The plan is to overclock this baby.

Here is what i have so far:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819116072 - CPU

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813128345 - MOBO

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6811129021 - CASE or antec 300?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835186134 - COOLER

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820231209 - MEMORY - PURCHASED CORSIAR

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6822136074 - HDD

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6817341010 - PSU

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814102792 - GFX CARD

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835100007 - THERMAL PASTE

So what do you think, the total comes out to about $476 with rebates.

Will this thing overclock well? It is loosely based on the new $625 SBM article

Anyways I can save some moneys??

Any and all help and comments are GREATLY appreciated!!!

Thanks in advance!

- Zack

Hope you got the case...

change cpu to e7300 only $109

cange video card to http://www.newegg.com/Product
/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102770 $129

Change memory ram to: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820145184 only $19,99

Change hard drive to:http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822145215 only $54

Change cooler to: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835233003 only $21

Grand total=$515

Everything I did no mention leave the same I know it is $15 dollars over your budget, but it shouldn't be a problem to get $15 dollars more.

This will give you a much, much, much better computer for the money.

Hope this helps

I missed out on it. I was going to pick it up because it was a such a good deal, (had th money saved up for it and everything) but it took too long for my Dad to get to it, and it went out of stock. Oh well.

Glad to see you got the case though.

Sorry mate, misread your post. Guess were in the same spot then.

Yes the G.Skill is better, but you can't beat the price on the cosiar, which you can put into something else.

The PSU you picked should be fine and give you room to overclock as long as you use one video card. You need 750w psu for crossfire or sli at minimum.

If you mean E7200 over E8400 by, 7200 over the 5200 (or am I misunderstanding). Than yes the only advantage of the E7200 and E8400 is FSB and cache, but the E7200 outperforms the E8400 when the FSB is moved up to match the E8400 and the voltage is increased (overclocked), in every test except for unzipping files. So there is not a big difference between the E7200 and E8400 if you overclock.

Hope this helps

zomg the corsiar you posted are 15 bucks with EMCBBCJAJ promo code after rebate

out of stock

in other news, just ordered the corsair ram, what a deal

Rebates are fickle things though, you're either gonna get an amazing deal or get completely screwed over if you dont get you're rebate

EDIT: I also ordered the antec 900 literally hours before they ran out

since the retention bracket for the 120mm xigmatek fan is sold out is this an acceptable replacement?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835233014

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835233020

sweet acura_speed thanks for that i think there a microcenter a short drive from here

This MoBo is on sale today for only like 6 bucks more after MIR and its looks like its the same one that i picked except with the ICH10R chipset, so it has raid capabilities

it also looks like it comes with a few more free cables

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813128359


it should work right, yes?

anyone have any insight on the cooling fan problem:


since the retention bracket for the 120mm xigmatek fan is sold out is this an acceptable replacement?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835233014

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835233020