$1400 attempt at biggest bang for buck

[KDrew]

1. SSD- OCZ Vertex Series OCZSSD2-1VTX120G 2.5" 120GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) -249.99

2. RAM- G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL9D-4GBRL -49.99

3. Case- NZXT LEXA S LEXS - 001BK Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case -79.99

4. Motherboard- ASUS Sabertooth X58 LGA 1366 Intel X58 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard -194.00

5. GPU- SAPPHIRE 100312SR Radeon HD 6950 2GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.1 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card with Eyefinity -274.99

6. Power Supply- PC Power & Cooling Silencer PPCS910 910W ATX12V 2.2 / EPS12V 2.91 SLI Certified CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS SILVER Certified Active PFC Power Supply Compatible with Core i7 -179.99

7. CPU- Intel Core i7-950 Bloomfield 3.06GHz LGA 1366 130W Quad-Core Processor BX80601950 -279.99

8. HDD- Western Digital Caviar Black WD5002AALX 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive -59.99

9. CD/DVD- ASUS DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS Black SATA 24X DVD Burner - Bulk - OEM

10. Sound Card- ASUS Xonar DX PCI Express Sound Card -80.80

TOTAL- $1415

Guess I'll add another 4gb of ram too. So what are peoples' expert opinions on this? I plan to add another video card down the road and keep this processor the whole time. After it gets too old to game, I hope it's good for a regular pc for more than a decade. I got 120 gb SSD because any less just seemed like too little to work with. So are there any major bottlenecks that I overlooked or is this setup well balanced all around? thx

 

[IntelEnthusiast]

IF you want the best performance value then you should be looking at the Intel® Core™ I5 2500K and match that up with a P67 chipset based motherboard like the Intel Desktop Board DP67BGB3. This will give you a processor that is overclockable and great for gaming.

Also if you stay with the Intel Core I7 950 you are going to want to get a third stick of memory as the X58 chipset is a triple channel based board. The P67 based boards are dual channel so that you can stay with the 2 sticks of memory that you have picked out right now.

One last thing I think you can save a little money by going to with the Intel Solid-State Drive 320 120GB.

Christian Wood
Intel Enthusiast Team

 

[johnnyb_27]

I would change the processor to a sandy bridge. The i5 2500k actually does better in some games than the i7 2600k. Also i would change the graphic card to 560 ti factory overclocked or 570.

 

[johnnyb_27]

IF you want the best performance value then you should be looking at the Intel® Core™ I5 2500K and match that up with a P67 chipset based motherboard like the Intel Desktop Board DP67BGB3. This will give you a processor that is overclockable and great for gaming.

Also if you stay with the Intel Core I7 950 you are going to want to get a third stick of memory as the X58 chipset is a triple channel based board. The P67 based boards are dual channel so that you can stay with the 2 sticks of memory that you have picked out right now.

One last thing I think you can save a little money by going to with the Intel Solid-State Drive 320 120GB.

Christian Wood
Intel Enthusiast Team

Wow sorry didn't mean to repeat what you said. There was no answer up yet when i replied.

 

[KDrew]

Oh nice. I changed the processor and MOBO like you advised. idk if I care to pay that much for the SSD now that I think about it, not sure if it's worth it... the 5950 and GTX 560 are pretty much at a tie valuewise but I guess the 560 is a fair bit smaller and somewhat quieter so I probably will go for it.