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Need help on mobo, cpu, and ram.

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I just got a case, graphics card, and power supply for christmas and now I want to upgrade the rest. But before I do, I want to know if there's anything new coming out that won't cost a fortune and is worth waiting a couple months for. But if there's not then I need help picking out the motherboard, cpu, and ram.


Budget Range: $800 max.

System Usage: Mostly gaming and normal computer use.

Parts Not Required: Monitor, Keyboard, Mouse, Speakers, Case (Thermaltake Level 10 GT), PSU (Corsair AX850), Graphics Card (EVGA GTX 460), Optical Drive, Hard Drive

Preferred Websites for Parts: Anything. Would prefer to order everything from one website, but it doesn't really matter.

Country: US

Parts Preferences: Pretty sure about the i7 2600k, it's not set in stone. Corsair H80.

Overclocking: Maybe

SLI or Crossfire: Maybe in the future.

Monitor Resolution: 1680x1050, will probably upgrade in the future.

Additional Comments: Would like to watercool the CPU, will probably get the Corsair H80. Please factor that into the budget.

More about : mobo cpu ram

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What games do you play?

Unless you do tasks that benefit from hyperthreading, swap it for the i5-2500k. Use the $ saved to get an SSD.

For RAM, any that doesn't have tall heatspreaders such as the G.Skill Sniper Series 2x 4GB @ $50 will work.

For the Motherboard, a cheap yet reliable option is the ASRock Extreme3 Gen3 for $122.

The GPU you have may not be enough if you plan on playing recent games.

Best solution

Graphics card Master

The only new thing coming out is the Ivy Bridge processor from Intel and we don't know what will be released first and when and how much. So there are plenty of good choices that you can get now. For a mostly gaming computer you will be wasting about $100 with the 2600k since the only difference between it and the 2500k is the hyperthreading which is not utilized in gaming.

Intel Core i5-2500K Sandy Bridge 3.3GHz (3.7GHz Turbo Boost) LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 3000 BX80623I52500K
$229.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

CORSAIR Vengeance 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9R
$49.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

ASRock Z68 Extreme3 Gen3 LGA 1155 Intel Z68 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
$121.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

CORSAIR H70 Core High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler
$79.99 and a $10 rebate makes it $69.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

EVGA 01G-P3-1370-KR GeForce GTX 460 (Fermi) 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card
$169.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

The total for this is $641.95 and I included another 460 because you got one for Christmas and I would have piched a 560ti or 570 for this build but with two 460's in SLI you should have good performance.

Right now I think I'm going to go with this.

ASUS P8Z68 DELUXE/GEN3
Intel Core i5-2500K
CORSAIR Vengeance 16GB (4 x 4GB)
Corsair H80

I chose not to get another graphics card because I plan to upgrade that in the future, which is part of the reason I chose that motherboard. It has pci-e 3.0 slots so I will be able to use newer cards using this while still being able to use my current card for the time being. And since I forgot I'll need a new copy of windows I have to add on $100 for that, so I'll get an SSD some other time, and hopefully the prices will have gone down more by then so I can store more games on it. That brings my total to around $770 and I still have to check what discounts I can get. Please tell me if you see any potential problems with this that I may have overlooked.
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