Need advice building my rig :)

[Oldwhpsian]

Hey guys

So I'm building a new gaming rig, and I want this rig to be a beast. I want it to thrash any game that gets thrown at it.

Firstly, I'll let you guys know how I'll be playing these games. I'll be playing on a single monitor, right now it's about 21" but I'll get a new one soon at about 26" or so. I'll play the games at as high a resolution as possible and I want to completely max out all the settings.

I've decided to wait for Haswell to land before I build my rig, just so that it can be relatively future proof and so I can drop in a Broadwell sometime in the future if need be. What are your guys ideas with regard to this?

With the motherboard, my general perception is that you PC is only as good as your motherboard, because that's what everything fits into and it ties everything together. Is this a correct idea? Or can you settle for a less impressive motherboard overall? And also, what are the things that you will be looking for in a good motherboard?

With RAM, I'll be honest and say that I'm tempted to got for 16GB of the stuff. Is this a good idea, or should I just settle for 8GB? And again, what type of ram should I be looking for?

And now onto the GPU. Like I've said, I want this computer to be powerful, and churn through top end games. Right now I'm looking at the GTX690. What I'm not sure about though is whether or not this card is excessive for my single monitor game-playing. Just how pretty will this card sit playing BF3 or Metro2033 on full graphics at a high resolution? And if its overkill, what level of card should I look at? Also, what clock speeds and how much VRAM am I looking for on the card itself? (I heard VRAM comes into play at higher resolutions?)

Tons of questions, I know, but I'd love to hear what any of you have to say and advice is always welcome

 

[gussrtk]

here is my take on a BEAST RIG


PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/D1yy
Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/D1yy/by_merchant/
Benchmarks: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/D1yy/benchmarks/

CPU: Intel Core i5-3570K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor ($189.99 @ Microcenter)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler ($29.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: ASRock Z77 Extreme6 ATX LGA1155 Motherboard ($159.98 @ Outlet PC)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($49.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($77.98 @ SuperBiiz)
Storage: Samsung 840 Series 120GB 2.5" Solid State Disk ($101.11 @ eCost)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 670 2GB Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($369.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 670 2GB Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($369.99 @ Newegg)
Case: NZXT Phantom (Black) ATX Full Tower Case ($99.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: Corsair Professional Gold 850W 80 PLUS Gold Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply ($144.49 @ Amazon)
Total: $1593.50
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-02-12 06:10 EST-0500)




its important to have a GOOD motherboard, which starts to generally range from 100$+ (doesnt mean that all 100$ boards are good you know), generally i like asus, but asrock seems to give more for the money, so thats why i put that in. the motherboard will be the one that will give stability to your system as well as depending on quality will allow higher overclocks cuz of that stability.
http://pcpartpicker.com/part/asus-motherboard-p8z77vpro alternative


8gb ram is really all you need for gaming, but if you wish to go crazy its always up to you or you could buy another set 2x4gb later on. you want 1600mhz ram, 1866mhz is good too, generally not worth going for the higher mhz ones than this. unless good price (corsair vengeance ), g.skill ram is very good too


for gpu a 670 will be plenty good for ultra graphics, but 2x670 is killer . really not worth going for 690... 670SLI is smarter
well you can get regular cards which are around 900mhz+ or you can get a little bit overclocked cards (factory) which are 940mhz or 1.01ghz which is way more expensive... but you can get 2x670 and take the more regular clock cards since there will be 2... you can see on pcpartspicker when choosing vid card, it will show clock speed. if you go with Gigabyte 7970Ghz edition the clock speed is like 1100mhz but the radeon dont put out as nice graphics as Nvidia... they have their own advantage.
single card 2gb vram is plenty dont want 1gb though.


thats about it?






you can make this build cheaper by going with asrock extreme 4 which is 130$ and a single 670nvidia (evga is the one to take)

 

[g-unit1111]

8gb ram is really all you need for gaming, but if you wish to go crazy its always up to you or you could buy another set 2x4gb later on. you want 1600mhz ram, 1866mhz is good too, generally not worth going for the higher mhz ones than this. unless good price (corsair vengeance ), g.skill ram is very good too

Not on Ivy Bridge - anything above 1600MHz and Intel voids your warranty. Voltage is also critical, you want 1.5V - no more and no less.

you can make this build cheaper by going with asrock extreme 4 which is 130$ and a single 670nvidia (evga is the one to take)

EVGA makes great cards and has excellent technical support, but their cards still continue to run reference coolers. The Gigabyte Windforce 3X has the best cooling solution on the market for an air cooled video card.

With the motherboard, my general perception is that you PC is only as good as your motherboard, because that's what everything fits into and it ties everything together. Is this a correct idea? Or can you settle for a less impressive motherboard overall? And also, what are the things that you will be looking for in a good motherboard?

That's kind of true but not really. All motherboards pretty much perform the same functions these days. You only need anything a basic Z77 motherboard if you're running multiple video cards and that depends on configuration.

I've decided to wait for Haswell to land before I build my rig, just so that it can be relatively future proof and so I can drop in a Broadwell sometime in the future if need be. What are your guys ideas with regard to this?

Future proofing is a moot point - no matter what CPU and GPU you go with there's always something better that's going to be coming along. We know the details of Haswell already - there's nothing new being brought to the table in terms of clock speeds. I don't know anything about Broadwell yet. That's a long way off.

Here is what I would suggest:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i5-3570K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor ($229.99 @ Newegg)
CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-U9B SE2 37.9 CFM CPU Cooler ($60.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UP4 TH ATX LGA1155 Motherboard ($192.86 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill Ares Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($84.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: OCZ Vector Series 128GB 2.5" Solid State Disk ($149.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 670 2GB Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($369.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 670 2GB Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($369.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Fractal Design Define R4 w/Window (Titanium Grey) ATX Mid Tower Case ($134.98 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: NZXT HALE 90 750W 80 PLUS Gold Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply ($149.99 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: Lite-On iHAS124-04 DVD/CD Writer ($22.98 @ Newegg)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (OEM) (64-bit) ($99.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $1918.73
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-02-12 13:18 EST-0500)

 

[J_E_D_70]

For reference on one card to two to start, a single 670 stock clocked gets >60fps on BF3 Ultra (using Antialiasing Post High instead of MSAA 4X is smoother and looks the same - to me anyway) at 1080p. I use adaptive vsync and it locks 60fps.

Definitely get a two or three fan 670 or 7970. The reference coolers are full of fail (hate mine).