$1500 Gaming Build

[kicl]

I am not new to computers but I am new to building my own pc. I am trying to build a pc for mainly gaming.

I have done some research and have concluded to this build: (changes may be made)

CPU: i5-2500k (may opt for the i7-2600k)
Board: ASrock FATALITY P67
Video card: GTX 570 (may swap choice for radeon 6950)
CPU cooling: Corsair H70
Power Supply: OCZ FATALITY series 750W
Memory: not exactly sure on what RAM yet but I've been looking at the corsair dominator or vengeance series
Storage: Western Digital Black 750gb
Boot Drive: not sure what SSD to get yet (help is much needed here)
Case: Corsair 650D

This build is semi-rough so changes will most likely be made. Any suggestions are welcome and very much appreciated.

 

[jerreddredd]

For gaming the i5 is fine, if you the spare $100 and want the status symbol the get the i7 its not a wrong choice.
I am partial to nVidia because of their better driver support. so stay with the GTX 570

I'm a firm believer in quality PSU's and I am not a fan of OCZ PSU's I would suggest a Corsair HX 750 though a 650 would be fine if you are not going add a second GPU. Antec, Silverstone and Seasonic also are good solid choices for PSU's

For the SSD get one with a Sandforce controller. get at least 120GB because you will get spoiled by how fast they are and wand to put more and more on it.

Recommend:
Mushkin
Corsair Force series (34nm NAND)
G.Skill
Patriot inferno

stay away from OCZ Vertex 2's until they fix them.

The OCZ Vertex 3 just started appearing, if you have the $ you jump on the new tech wave.

Ram: i like the G.skill Ripjaw X series, I think the best value is the 1600Mhz CL8's. for gaming 4 GB is good. I run 8GB to help reduce swap file usage on my SSD (in theory anyway) .

 

[boiler1990]

^+1

 

[IntelEnthusiast]

Looks good, as far as the SSD, take a look at the Intel® SSD 320 80GB. You pick up the reliability and performance that is the hallmark of Intel SSDs. I have the older Intel SSD X25-M 80GB and I am getting boot times around 20 second from it.

Christian Wood
Intel Enthusiast Team