Replacing my previous ~6 year old build

b33k4y

Distinguished
Jul 20, 2009
2
0
18,510
Hello all!

So my first and last custom desktop build was in 2003. You may be wondering how I have survived this long. Short answer is I used a newer gaming laptop for awhile while I was off at school. Anyway, all you need to know about this beast is that the Radeon 9500 is holding on by a thread and it's running off an Asus A7V8X-X with a single stick of 512. The CPU is an AMD Athlon XP 2600+. I am hoping the end result of my new build is that bricks are promptly shat from the extreme jump in performance. I am excited. So here it goes:

APPROXIMATE PURCHASE DATE: About a month from now
BUDGET RANGE: under $1500

SYSTEM USAGE FROM MOST TO LEAST IMPORTANT: Gaming mostly
PARTS NOT REQUIRED: Keyboard, mouse, speakers, wireless card

PREFERRED WEBSITE FOR PARTS: <3 newegg
PARTS PREFERENCES: I am very open to suggestions but I am leaning towards Asus, Intel, and Nvidia

OVERCLOCKING: Maybe
SLI OR CROSSFIRE: Probably not

MONITOR RESOLUTION: I don't really know what is optimal here... looking to get a monitor anywhere from 20-24"
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: Meh. Just don't want a leaf blower on my desk.

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This is what I was thinking of getting:

Case
Antec Three Hundred Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Retail
I prefer clean, simple cases but wasn't sure how this fairly inexpensive one would do.

PSU
CORSAIR CMPSU-750TX 750W ATX12V / EPS12V SLI Ready CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS Certified Active PFC Compatible with Core i7 Power Supply - Retail
Overkill?

Motherboard
ASUS P6T SE LGA 1366 Intel X58 ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail
I like ASUS a lot and was curious as to whether or not the SE was a good purchase. Should I just get the regular P6T? The V2?

CPU
Intel Core i7 920 Nehalem 2.66GHz LGA 1366 130W Quad-Core Processor Model BX80601920 - Retail

Memory
Crucial 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1066 (PC3 8500) Triple Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model CT3KIT25664BA1067 - Retail
Depends on the motherboard I guess, but was reading up on articles pertaining to RAM speeds. I have never overclocked and realize it is a lot easier and safer to do so now. I'm sure I'll be very satisfied with the performance I get on this build but want to leave some room for OC'ing in the future. 1066? 1333? 1600? The price difference is about 50 bucks between the two extremes.

Video Card
EVGA 896-P3-1255-AR GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 896MB 448-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Retail

Hard Drive
Western Digital Caviar Black WD1001FALS 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drives - OEM

DVD/CD
I don't really know or care; will probably pick whatever is decent off of newegg. I rarely use CDs and DVDs on my computer.

Case Fans
APEVIA CF12SL-UBL 120mm Blue LED Case Fan - Retail
Because I want my case to look like: http://img120.imageshack.us/img120/1323/15tn4.jpg

Monitor
Not certain what size is right for me. I don't want it to be excessively big, and I think 24" might be pushing it in terms of gaming while sitting at my desk. Any suggestions? 1680 x 1050? 1920 x 1080? I was actually shocked at how low some of the prices were. Should I be scared of monitors in the 150 dollar range?

This leaves me with a bill of $1070 without the monitor. I'm obviously not shooting for $1500, but I have a bit of room to spare. I plan on getting Windows Vista with the free coupon for 7, too.

Sorry for the long and overly thorough post and thank you for your help. Suggestions? Criticisms?
 

tecmo34

Administrator
Moderator
ASUS P6T SE LGA 1366 Intel X58 ATX Intel Motherboard does not support SLI, just in case you wanted to know since you picked up a GTX260 Core 216 GPU. You will have to go with an ATI card if you want to Crossfire but I would just recommend waiting for the DX11 cards this fall before making a switch to ATI. Your GTX260 will work just fine and you can't really beat their prices now.

Your PSU is currently an overkill but I would stick with it myself. It will allow you with more of an upgrade path down the road if you decide to Crossfire.

Since you do have a little wiggle room on price, I would recommend getting this memory instead... OCZ Platinum 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1866 (PC3 15000) Triple Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model OCZ3P1866C9LV6GK - Retail

Here is a good monitor at 1920 x 1080... ASUS VH222H Black 21.5" 5ms HDMI Widescreen LCD Monitor - Retail... after MIR is cost $159.99
 

b33k4y

Distinguished
Jul 20, 2009
2
0
18,510
Thank you. I wasn't that interested in SLI or Crossfire just because I don't think I'd need it, but I might be wrong. It would be good to have the option open I suppose.