New build questions

[ssraid]

I've been planning on building a new pc for a while now and was looking for some good advice. I wanna go with a sandy bridge build since they seems to be the fastest cpus out with reasonable price. So since it will be easier to read I'll do my questions as such:

1) cpu: Sandy bridge, I5-2500k or i7-2600k? All I really do is game and watch tv.

2) Psu: I was thinkin' of a 550w but not sure how much power would be good.

3) video card: Was leaning towards something like a 560ti. something with in 200 or so dollars.

4) Ram: Was just gonna get 16gigs Newegg is having some nice deals.

5) Motherboard: I have no clue what is good and what isnt. XD

6) Monitor: There's are really confusing me. I've been lookin em up for a while now. I was thinking of spending about 200$ on one, but not sure what is good. I see some with like 50k:1 contrast with LED blacklight that arent HD and some that are only 10k:1 with HD. XD i dont know whats what.

Any help at would be very appreciated. Thanks in advance for your help

 

[Outlander_04]

a 2500k will do all you want

a 550 watt is fine for a 560 ti and 2500k

theres no gaming improvement when you upgrade from 4 to 8 gigs of RAM so 16 gigs is a complete waste of money . RAM must be 1.5 volt or less

Mb's with a Z68 chipset

Contrast figures for monitors are bogus . They're a number dreamed up by the marketing department . LED's are nicer to use IMO and use less power . Bigger the better for gaming . 24 = 27 inch

 

[ssraid]

So for a monitor out of these ones what would be the best? http://www.newegg.com/Product/Productcompare.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007617&IsNodeId=1&page=2&bop=And&ActiveSearchResult=True&CompareItemList=20|24-236-117^24-236-117-TS%2C24-236-052^24-236-052-TS%2C24-236-102^24-236-102-02%23%2C24-236-111^24-236-111-TS%2C24-236-112^24-236-112-TS

Thank you for the reply. The less ram will save me a lil and same with CPU.

 

[PoplicoMan]

actually
a lot

 

[PoplicoMan]

anyway instead of a Z68
go for a P67
you never said you wanted to do video encoding
which only H67 and Z68 accelerate
The Z68 is usually 20$ more than P67
but the Z68 is a better chipset
is you can find a Z68 board with some decent spec and reviews go for it

 

[Outlander_04]

I dont have direct experience of any of those monitors but the first and last are LED , and the last one is bigger
so if money was no option ..number 3

Also notice the response times . Lower is better so the 1 and 3 are probably newer technology and better for gaming

 

[madchemist83]

don't forget to get a cooler for ur CPU

 

[Outlander_04]

Z68 chipset has a couple of other tricks beside video encoding . It can allow you to use hard drive caching using a very small SSD which is likely to be the most important one for a gamer .That would let you get most of the performance of an SSD for a fraction of the cost
Prices are about the same as a P67 board so you might as well .
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157279 $115

2500K's run well ,and even overclock well, using the stock cooler . If you are on a budget you dont need one other than the one in the box

 

[PoplicoMan]

and LUCID VIRTU

 

[PoplicoMan]

so you dont heat up the room playing pinball
just a metphor

 

[Outlander_04]

Lucid Virtu is a driver that switches the cpu's graphics on when you are not gaming , and the graphics card on when you are .
The advantage is that the cpu will perform much better at encoding tasks when its using its own graphics because a feature called Quick Sync gets turned on .

Handy to have , but not essential for a gamer