Advice (2) Builds - Deals - Recommendations

[mvanlone]

Hi, I have experience building systems. However, I have not kept up with technology lately. Anyways, I need to build (2) GAMING pc(s) for my 2 step children for a Christmas Present. They never had this kind of technology before. I am looking for configs for gaming computers. Suggested parts and combinations. I plan on buying these parts during next week. So I need help on what direction I should go. The budget for each pc is $600 - $800. This price does NOT include monitor, operating system, or mouse or keyboard. I am just wanting to get (case, memory, cpu, video card, motherboard, PSU, Hard drive, DVD-Drive,) I will be buying the same parts for each system.

Thoughts? If you had your choices what products and why? This does not have to be SLI (one video card only). Thinking AMD route. Suggestions? Any discounts or good sales?

Thanks for any responses.

 

[boiler1990]

AMD is definitely the way to go with that budget range; you can get the X4 955 for about $150, + 4GB DDR3 RAM for ~$80, and a good 890 chipset motherboard for ~$100. You'll be getting the best performance for your money; the X4 955 holds up well against the i5-750 in terms of gaming, and you'll have enough RAM.

The only component that will limit the gaming is the GPU. I would recommend a GTX 460 or 470 if you want to go Nvidia, but I'm not familiar with ATI/AMD's cards. My GTX 470 plays Just Cause 2 and Call of Duty: Black Ops at Full Settings (1920x1080) at probably 35 FPS (Black Ops is higher; JC2 has so many textures it runs a little slower).

 

[kkiddu]

For the graphics, check out TomsHardware's recommended cards for November 2010. Pretty good guide.