Lynnfield i5-750 Needs Mobo, GPU, + PSU

My friend is building a new system for about ~$1K, possibly more, so I'm helping out a bit.

There seem to be about 5000 socket 1156 motherboards, so any help choosing one would be appreciated.

Oh, and he'll probably be going 64-bit.

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APPROXIMATE PURCHASE DATE: Two weeks from now.

BUDGET RANGE: ~$1K, possibly more, especially if there's good reason.

SYSTEM USAGE FROM MOST TO LEAST IMPORTANT: Gaming, Media, Internet, Coding

PARTS NOT REQUIRED: Keyboard/Mouse, Monitor

PREFERRED WEBSITE(S) FOR PARTS: Anywhere, but Newegg/Fry's is preferable.

COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: No preference.

PARTS PREFERENCES: None.

OVERCLOCKING: No

SLI OR CROSSFIRE: No

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Here's the rough of the parts we'd like to use.

CPU: Intel Core i5-750 Lynnfield 2.66GHz 8MB L3 Cache LGA 1156 95W Quad-Core
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] =core%20i5
$199.99

Motherboard [NEEDED]: Need a compatible motherboard for the core i5, 4GBs of DDR3 RAM, etc.

GPU [NEEDED]: ATI or NVIDIA, it doesn't matter, so long as it's decently beefy.

PSU [NEEDED]: Needs to be powerful enough to power all the components and fit into an ATX Midtower (probably the Antec 300).

RAM: 6GBs of DDR3. Any suggestions

HDD: Probably a low-storage Western Digital Caviar Black or the like. He'll most likely use a 1TB external for his media. Suggestions?

Case: Probably an Antec 300 or the like.

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Any suggestions would be great.

The p55 is dual channel. Why do you want 6 gigs of ram. You'll want 4 or 8.

This is a nice microATX board.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813131599

Otherwise I like this new Sabertooth series board by ASUS
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813131601

Right now Ram only comes in 1, 2, and 4 gig sticks.

If you put 3 sticks in, one channel will have 4 gigs and the othe channel will have 2 gigs, thus defeating the purpose of dual channel ram. Your computer will run slower with uneven ram. the 3X2gig sets are for the X58 boards which have triple channel ram.

If you live near a Microcenter the i5 750 is $160 and i7 860 is $230

I just got these drives in, they are fast http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/Prod [...] e=10011016 Put 2 in raid-0 and you got your self one fast machine.

If you're not a Samsung fan, which most people aren't. Then the WD Blacks will be great. I have 5 of the WD Blacks 640 GB and they have been working great. But I gotta say, those Samsung SpinPoint F3 made me think twice about buying hard drives by WD.

You don't need those overpriced boards suggested above since you aren't looking for Crossfire/SLI. This board comes with an updated socket to avoid the problems of the first round of Foxconn socket problems. It also has USB 3 and SATA 3.

GIGABYTE GA-P55A-UD3 LGA 1156 Intel P55 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail $134.99

What resolution is he going to be gaming at? That is a huge deciding factor when picking a GPU. The new 5850's are very nice, but good luck finding one in stock. The 5770 will work well for lower resolutions.

SAPPHIRE 100283-2L Radeon HD 5770 1GB 128-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card - Retail $164.99

I agree with getting the Samsung F3 drive from ZipZoomFly, but I wouldn't mess with RAID if you're not comfortable with it. The drives are plenty fast without being in RAID.

Really? That sounds pretty nice, as I've always figured RAID was ridiculously tricky. Good to see Win 7 make it easier.