System Builder Marathon, March 2011: $1000 Enthusiast PC

Video Card, Power Supply, And Case

Video Card: Gigabyte Radeon HD 6950 2 GB

The Radeon HD 6950 brings Radeon HD 5870-class performance down to $275 with 1408 stream processors and 1250 MHz GDDR5 memory.

Read Customer Reviews of Gigabyte Radeon HD 6950 2 GB

This is reason enough to justify our choice, but there’s more: the Radeon HD 6950 uses the same Cayman GPU that’s in the Radeon HD 6970, and these cards have an extremely high success rate of enabling the full 1536 streaming processors with a simple BIOS mod.

Almost as if to help us out, AMD was kind enough to include a BIOS backup switch on the Radeon HD 6900-series cards, a feature that makes it nearly impossible to brick the card with a bad BIOS flash. We’re itching to see if we can squeeze Radeon HD 6970-class performance out of it.

Power Supply: Corsair CMPSU-650TX

Read Customer Reviews of Corsair's CMPSU-650TX

With a 52 A +12 V rail and an excellent reputation, Corsair's 650TX continues to dominate the sub-$100 power supply market.

At $89, we simply can’t find a significantly better option to choose.

PC Case: In-Win Android

Read Customer Reviews of In-Win's Android

We like to use our System Builder Marathon series as an excuse to try out different PC cases. And, this month we had enough space in the budget to throw $69.99 at In-Win's Android.

The case offers a large amount of space and unique aesthetics (the front reminds us of the hero's helmet in Dead Space), but what draws us to it is the generous complement of fans: three 120 mm units in the front, rear, and top; as well as a 220 mm beast on the side of the case. We’ll see if all that airflow helps us squeeze higher clocks out of our components.

  • americanherosandwich
    That is one funky looking case. Great $1k system!
    Reply
  • toxxel
    That case is a behemoth.
    Reply
  • dirtmountain
    After seeing that case i was afraid for Princess Leia.
    Reply
  • cangelini
    dirtmountainAfter seeing that case i was afraid for Princess Leia.
    LOL
    Reply
  • Darkerson
    Crazy looking case, but nice system overall!
    Reply
  • _Pez_
    for 1k usd seems to be a cheap system.. hmm nice review, is good to see that new processors are really efficient even when overclocked ..to bad about the 22cm cooler of the side panel of that funny case. My Armor+ has exactly the same issue with a V6gt cooler and I decided to go back to my hyper212+ :D.
    Reply
  • ava__
    you forgot to add the cost of your beloved Windows
    Reply
  • Crashman
    cangeliniLOLHuh?
    Reply
  • Mark Heath
    9511317 said:
    Huh?
    Good to see the Tom's team is on the same page XD
    Reply
  • AkIRA_22
    that has to be the ugliest case I've ever seen in my life. At the end of the day the case is 100% taste, to 'recommend' a case is futile.
    Reply