The Bigger They Come…
System Builder Marathon, March 2010: The Articles
Here are links to each of the four articles in this month’s System Builder Marathon (we’ll update them as each story is published). And remember, these systems are all being given away at the end of the marathon.
To enter the giveaway, please check out this Google form, and be sure to read the complete rules before entering!
Day 1: The $3,000 Performance PC
Day 2: The $1,500 Enthusiast PC
Day 3: The $750 Gaming PC
Day 4: Performance And Value, Dissected
Introduction
It’s always been the goal of our System Builder Marathon (SBM) series to present three levels of enthusiast builds, beginning with budget-performance and ending with extreme-performance configurations. However, last year’s price increases took particularly hard hits on the low-cost system’s memory and high-end system’s cooling configuration. Moderate expectations and a wider selection of mainstream parts offer a little more flexibility in the middle. However, maintaining the same price structure meant increasing all three budgets by a similar level. Getting back to where we were at the beginning of last year pushed the occasionally-broken $2,500 budget to $3,000, the frequently-breached $1,250 budget to $1,500, and the completely-disregarded $625 budget to $750.
Each of the three builders approached the new budget limits with a different perspective. The $3,000 PC builder quit spending when he ran out of economically-feasible performance upgrades, coming $100 short of what he considered to be an actual limit and leaving plenty of room for several weeks of price changes. The $1,500 PC builder treated the budget as theoretical, maximizing scalability with an LGA 1366 platform that pushed the budget $23 beyond its limit before time-restricted discounts vanished. The $750 system builder focused on cramming in the highest possible gaming value at purchase time, with far less regard for what the future of prices (or upgrades) would bring.
| March 2010 System Builder Marathon Components | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Row 0 - Cell 0 | $750 PC | $1,500 PC | $3,000 PC |
| Motherboard | Gigabyte MA790GPT-UD3H Socket AM3, 790GX | ASRock X58 Extreme LGA 1366, X58 Express | Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD7 LGA 1366, X58 Express |
| Processor | AMD Athlon II X3 435 2.90 GHz Triple-Core | Intel Core i7-920 2.66 GHz Quad-Core | Intel Core i7-920 2.66 GHz Quad Core |
| Memory | G.Skill DDR3-1600 CAS 9 2 x 2GB (4GB Total) | Crucial DDR3-1333 CAS 9 3 x 2GB (6GB Total) | Crucial DDR3-1333 CAS 9 3 x 2GB (6GB Total) |
| Graphics | 2 x Sapphire HD 4850 512MB GDDR3-1986 625 MHz GPU | 2 x Visiontek HD 5850 1GB GDDR5-4000 725 MHz GPU | PowerColor HD 5970 2GB GDDR5-4200 Dual GPU at 750 MHz |
| System Hard Drives | WD WD6401AALS 640GB, 7200 RPM, 32MB | WD WD7501AALS 750GB, 7200 RPM, 32MB | 2x Crucial CT64M225 SSD 64GB x 2 (128GB Total) |
| HDD Accessory | None | None | SNT-SATA2221B 2x 2.5" Mobile Rack |
| Additional Hard Drive | None | None | WD WD1001FALS 1.0TB, 7,200 RPM, 32MB |
| Optical | LG GH22NS50 22x DVD±R | Samsung SH-S223C 22x DVD±R | Lite-On DH-4B1S-08 4x BD-R, 2x BD-RE |
| Case | Antec Three Hundred | Cooler Master CM 690 | Cooler Master Cosmos-S |
| Power | Antec EarthWatts EA650 650W | Corsair CMPSU-750TX 750W | SilverStone ST1000-P 1,000W Modular |
| CPU Cooler | Xigmatek HDT-SD964 92mm Tower | Rosewill FORT120 120mm Tower | Swiftech H20-220 Ultima XT Liquid Kit |
| Current Price | $789 | $1,582 | $2,926 |
The value goals of today’s comparison meant frivolous spending would be out of the question. Less than 10% of the $3,000 system’s total price was spent on added storage and Blu-ray capabilities. Similarly, less than 10% of the $1,500 system’s price was spent on upgrading to LGA 1366. The $750 PC builder was even thriftier, with less than 1% of the PC's price spent on an upgrade to 640GB.
