$800 Gaming PC?

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shnish

Honorable
Dec 25, 2012
21
0
10,510
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i5-3570K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor ($169.99 @ Microcenter)
Motherboard: MSI Z77A-G41 ATX LGA1155 Motherboard ($79.98 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-2133 Memory ($39.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($69.99 @ NCIX US)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 660 Ti 2GB Video Card ($279.99 @ Microcenter)
Case: NZXT Guardian 921 RB ATX Mid Tower Case ($74.74 @ Mwave)
Optical Drive: Lite-On iHAS124-04 DVD/CD Writer ($16.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $731.67
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-01-05 14:49 EST-0500)

This is my current build for a gaming PC I plan on building by the end of January. I've already bought a $60 power supply and the $40 ram listed here (It was on sale recently, so it was a steal), which puts my build at just around $800. The power supply was a corsair HX650, which I managed to get on ebay for $60. My current situation is whether or not I should shell out an extra $40ish for a Caviar Black. I'm coming from a seagate 750 gb hard drive on my XPS 15, and one of the things about me is that anything better than what I currently have is usually okay unless I'm trying to future proof. That being said, I'm not super impatient and could probably tolerate a barracuda no problem, but any recommendations would be helpful. I also really like the case that I chose (It's around $75 on amazon with tax), and I don't currently have an USB 3 devices, so I could tolerate putting them in the motherboard directly if I needed fast speeds. The desktop won't be inside of a desk or anything, so I should have easy access to the different sides of it. I don't plan on overclocking for awhile, but I'll likely buy a CM 212 down the line if I want to go to 4 ghz. For now if I overclocked at all, I'd probably only do it a few hundred megahertz (if that). I also am not totally set on the 660ti since I hear a lot of people saying that the 7950 is a much better card for the price. I would probably get the 7950 for $320 on newegg (Twin Frozr II) and since I have a 650w psu, I could probably overclock it up to a 7970, correct? I'm going Intel, but I've heard that the whole "better compatibility" thing of Intel and Nvidia mainly just applies to laptops that use Optimus. The 660ti seems to perform better in a lot of games, but if I could overclock the 7950 without any negative effects, I might consider that as well. My main thing with the graphics card is getting the best one for my money so I can future proof it and not have to buy a new one for at least three years. I run on a 1920 x 1080 monitor, but I'd be willing to lower the settings in games years from now as long as I can maintain 60 fps. Any suggestions for this build would be great, thanks!
 
Solution
TheBigTroll
-there is no such thing as futureproofing
-black drives are just regular blue drives with more warranty
-CPU is already at 3.8ghz. 4ghz is not considered a "overclock" if you ask me.
-to see any benefit from overclocking, you must be at least 4.2ghz or above
-run your memory at 1600mhz. running it faster isnt covered by intel
-what power supply did you buy. if its not a derivative of a seasonic or superflower unit, its probably not that good
-fyi, a 7950 performs better than a 660ti, just with a bit less stabilty. given a 660ti is cheaper than a 7950 right now, id get the 660ti

here is the revisions i made
http://pcpartpicker.com/p/w2N8

if you dont overclock, i can save you 50 or so bucks
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TheBigTroll

TheBigTroll

Illustrious
Apr 15, 2012
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-there is no such thing as futureproofing
-black drives are just regular blue drives with more warranty
-CPU is already at 3.8ghz. 4ghz is not considered a "overclock" if you ask me.
-to see any benefit from overclocking, you must be at least 4.2ghz or above
-run your memory at 1600mhz. running it faster isnt covered by intel
-what power supply did you buy. if its not a derivative of a seasonic or superflower unit, its probably not that good
-fyi, a 7950 performs better than a 660ti, just with a bit less stabilty. given a 660ti is cheaper than a 7950 right now, id get the 660ti

here is the revisions i made
http://pcpartpicker.com/p/w2N8

if you dont overclock, i can save you 50 or so bucks
 
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S

shnish

Honorable
Dec 25, 2012
21
0
10,510
Completely forgot about the whole intel stock overclocking thing. You're right about that. The ram I'll likely run at 1600mhz just because clockspeed over that doesn't matter much. I bought a corsair TX650, which I'm certain is a great power supply. Saving money isn't a big issue to me, more of just getting the most for my money. The "future proofing" is a temporary thing, of course. A core i5 will certainly last longer than a phenom II X4 in how long it can be used before it shows signs of bottlenecking. That's all I mean by future proofing. Do you think the black drives are actually worth it, or should I just stick with a $60-70 seagate?
 
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shnish

Honorable
Dec 25, 2012
21
0
10,510

Oh. Well it's a 2.5" laptop hard drive in my XPS and I wouldn't have a hard drive in it otherwise. My plan is definitely to get a new hard drive, not to use the laptop one.
 
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shnish

Honorable
Dec 25, 2012
21
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10,510

Yup. I've got one not too far away from me that's $183 after tax. Much better than the $170 8320 I originally thought to buy on Amazon. What benefits does the extreme 4 serve? Isn't it at least $20 more expensive? I do believe that quality motherboards are important, I guess I just don't really know why I think that other than just the fact that it's a common belief.
 
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TheBigTroll

TheBigTroll

Illustrious
Apr 15, 2012
14,099
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you can wipe your old drive and use it in the new rig. now we just have to get the go-ahead and select a SSD for your usage

and id defintely get a seagate over a WD black in terms of pricing.


id also suggest a better motherboard if you are not buying a new hard drive. it needs quite a bit of improvement
 
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shnish

Honorable
Dec 25, 2012
21
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10,510

I'm not going to get an ssd for now, I don't think. I'd want a 128 gig so I could put some games on it as well, and it doesn't seem like there are any priced that well. I need to keep the hard drive in the laptop because I may be selling it or I just want it to remain there in case I ever need to use it. I'd like to completely rule out using that laptop's hard drive, though.
 
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shnish

Honorable
Dec 25, 2012
21
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10,510

Definitely buying a new hard drive. Probably going to go for the Seagate drive. Do you know of any good, cheap, 128 gb SSDs? I want to be able to have windows and some large games (like BF3) on it if I do decide to get one.
 
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boulbox

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Apr 5, 2012
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Its price is a steal, it can overclock just as well as a lot of other $150+ boards and has pretty much everything you would need on it for a gamer like that extra PCIe slot for SLI/CFX

even though the MSI board would be the cheaper choice, the ASrock would be a more solid choice in my opinion
 
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shnish

Honorable
Dec 25, 2012
21
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10,510

My main problem with it is that it's about $40 more than I'd like to spend on a motherboard, plus shipping. I likely won't go SLI/CFX down the line, I'd only do that if i got a lower end card. I don't use a lot of usb ports and use a wireless usb headset, so I don't actually need extra pci ports for a soundcard or anything. Do you have any boards that you can recommend in the $90 range that are better than the one I chose?
 
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shnish

Honorable
Dec 25, 2012
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10,510

Any examples? The boards that I've been looking at are pretty expensive, except for the micro atx ones. I'm going atx, though.
 
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shnish

Honorable
Dec 25, 2012
21
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10,510

I didn't know MC was still having that deal. Extremely good to hear! Thanks so much for telling me about it. I'll be picking up the mobo/proc next week.
 
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shnish

Honorable
Dec 25, 2012
21
0
10,510

Well, because of the whole $50 off thing at micro center, I'll just pick up the motherboard for around $90 with tax. It's possible that I'd throw in a second video card down the line, but I wouldn't buy a motherboard specifically for that feature.
 
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shnish

Honorable
Dec 25, 2012
21
0
10,510

Probably not, because by the time I chose to upgrade, crossfire/sli just wouldn't be worth it. Are there other boards that are even cheaper with that $50 micro center deal? At this point I just want a good motherboard that's under $100. The extreme 4 might be a bit overkill, though. If there's any other board that's cheaper at MC, I'd be willing to go for that, too.
 
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