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I'm clueless....Mini-ITX Build

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March 25, 2013 7:58:50 PM

Hi guys and gals,

Let me preface by saying that I haven't built a PC in over five years; so I am a little out of date with what tech is good and what components play well with each other. With that said, I am looking to build a mini-ITX (small form factor, in general, I guess) PC. I tried doing a search and reading some other posts, but I couldn't find specifics I was looking for, and to be quite honest, a lot of it reads like gibberish, as I haven't kept up with a lot of the new tech terminology.

I will try to be as specific as possible in what I am looking for (I for some reason can't find the sticky that lays out the format when asking for this)...so here we go:

Build: Mini-ITX PC
Budget: Would like to be at $800 or under, but I am flexible
Purpose of build: Everyday computer use (e.g. surfing the web, editing office documents, e-mail, etc). However, I do a lot of music recording and editing, and I would like to have a PC that is more than capable of handling that task. Also, I do occasional gaming (such as starcraft 2, CS, l4d, etc.)...nothing crazy like Crysis, but I would like to have decent GPU, discrete or not, and the ability to run at least two monitors for music editing purposes.

Case: As of now, the smaller the better. Is something along these lines good?
IN WIN BP655.300TB3L Black Steel / Plastic Mini-ITX Tower Computer Case
http://

Ram: I would like at minimum 8gb, but 16 would not be bad to have.

As far as the other components...I have no clue. Will an i5 or i7 be good enough? I definitely need to run a 64bit system, and I most likely will be using Windows 7, not 8 (I just don't want to have to deal with potential compatibility issues). USB 3.0 would be a plus, and a potential slot for a firewire or soundcard would be nice.


I hope that is specific enough, but let me know if you guys need more info. Thanks in advance for any help, and sorry for any "newbie" questions or info I gave.

More about : clueless mini itx build

March 26, 2013 12:58:56 PM

amuffin said:
A core i3 would be a good choice!

Here's a pretty decent board to start you off:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

You could get yourself a radeon 7770 that would do everything you request.

I like this case:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...


Thanks for the suggestions! However, that case you mentioned is a bit too tall for what I'm looking for. Ideally, I would love to get a Mac Mini...but I'm not an apple fan (don't even own an iPod), and they are somewhat overpriced for the lack of video capabilities/ expansion options.

In order to run a say, i7, 8-16 gb of ram, and a discrete video card (or possibly sound card/firewire card), what would my PSU need to be? Would a 300 watt cut it? I guess I could part it out and come back with the full options to see if it would all run together...that might be more helpful for you guys.
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