Building a cheapish strictly for gaming PC

Discussion in 'Tech Talk' started by Deadend, Jul 31, 2011.

  1. Deadend
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    Well there is a price to pay for being able to go the doctor any time I need or get a necessary operation with out having to sell a kidney while I'm there to cover costs. Or to have a child and not be $5000-$30000 in the hole when its time to leave the hospital. You pay as you go we pay ahead everybody pays in the end though.
     
  2. Deadend
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  3. EniGmA1987
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    I have seen them and always wanted to try them, but I never have. IMO performance for Windows loading and an app or two would be higher, your most used stuff. But for everything else it would be just like any normal hard drive. I think it would make a good boot drive if you need more space for your OS and a couple things than just 64 GB. But if you only need 64GB for the OS and can do another drive for everything else then a SSD is the way to go as a 64GB SSD is right about the same price as that 500GB hybrid.

    http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=61050&vpn=AGT3-25SAT3-60G&manufacture=OCZ Technology
    http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=56783&vpn=SV100S2/64GZ&manufacture=Kingston
     
  4. Deadend
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    Ok bit of a rethink on this. I may go with a I3 2100 and then have an upgrade path to a 2500k in 6-8 months maybe but I need a motherboard in the $100 range cheaper is as always better but it should be able to handle some mild overclocking with a 2500k.
    Right now thinking

    $50ish case doesn't matter what it looks like to me just that it's cheap and has places to put extra fans as needed.
    6850 or 6870 (just going to call it a $200 card and go from there)
    60-80 dollar harddrive probably 750g caviar black.
    I3 2100
    $100ish MB
    window 7 64bit
    4g 1600 ram 8g if there is a good sale at the time of purchase
    500ish Wat power maybe 650 if there is a sale for one.
    $20 dvd drive.

    And an optional SSD if I happen to find a few extra bucks. But then I may just going strait for a 2500k instead if I find the money for an SSD.

    That 700-800 depending on sales/rebates at the time of purchase (end of November first week of Dec.).

    Other stuff has come up and I will not be getting a new screen for a while so I'm going to be on my 720p (1366x768) TV for the foreseeable future. So anything bigger then 6850/70 is just going to be overkill.
     
  5. EniGmA1987
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    definitely go with 8GB of RAM, its not much more expensive than 4GB, companies are basically giving them away.

    1TB hard drive is much better than a 750GB. 750 drives are very old and have low performance compared to 640GB and the new 1TB drives. Platter density on 750GB drives are 250GB per platter. 640GB drives use 320GB platter densities. And 1TB drives use 500GB platters now. And drives are just starting to come out that use single 1TB platters. Higher density = higher transfer rates = higher speed.

    If you can afford a cheap SSD then yes you should go straight for a 2500k. It would be better to save for a 128-256GB then try to make due with less space.
     
  6. Deadend
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    Got any recommendations for a Cheap but descent MB only needs to run a single card and I'm not too worried about USB 3 right now either but as I said maybe good for some light OC on a 2500k (I probably wouldn't change much more then the multiplier by a notch or two.). For some reason Intel MBs have always confused the hell out of me. also don't worry about sales and such right now I'm just looking for some specs and brands to aim for when the time comes.
     
  7. EniGmA1987
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  8. Deadend
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    Will ivy bridge work on any 1155 board or does it require and specific chipset?
    Also I need to go with a Nvidia card for a possible job opportunity GTX 460 is = to a 6850 and GTX 560 is = to a 6870 right?

    Thinking of a I3 2100 and a GTX 460 maybe a 560 if there happens to be a sale at the end of the month (Nov.) (which there usually is).
     
  9. Sogetsu
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    Ivy will be LGA2011 socket I believe. (Unless lower end chips follow older socket). Going to go no for now until I can confirm.
     
  10. Deadend
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    No I think the sandy bridge-e are using that socket. Ivy is supposed to be backward compatible with 1155.
     
  11. EniGmA1987
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    I havent followed the Ivy Bridge news much but I think I remember hearing that you could use it in Z68 boards. IDK about P67's. Also, Intel motherboards are not drop in replacements only 3rd party companies like ASUS and Gigabyte from what I remember.
     
  12. Deadend
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    From what I could find today the first bunch of Ivy SKUs are supposed to run on 1155 with a bios update then the second set of SKUs will use that new socket. But there has also not been anything said officially by Intel on Ivy's socket or chipset that I could find.
     
  13. Deadend
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    I've been looking at HDDs today for reasons that are in my other thread and was looking at some Seagates but I also see a lot of bad customer ratings for them anybody have any experience with their reliability?
     
  14. EniGmA1987
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    Seagate tends to have the lowest reliability of all major brands, but mostly people stopped trusting them after the giant fiasco with the .11 series drives. No one ever confirmed exactly what the issue was, but the best idea was a firmware problem. Why a simple firmware fix to new drives being shipped out wasnt an option IDK. But it took about 6 months before new .11 series drives came to the market that didnt have a problem. With their newest drives they run fine, but I have still had more failures among Seagate drives than other brands. Everyone likes Western Digital, and they do make the fastest drives. However the WD black drives also run quite hot which puts your other drives at higher failure risk if you have a bunch of drives like me. Western Digital green drives should be avoided due to firmware problems that make them use less power but greatly lower their lifetime and increase their failure rates.

    You should limit your HDD search to Seagate enterprise drives (kinda pricy), Western Digital black drives, or Samsung F3 drives.
     
  15. Deadend
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    Samsung drives are not sold in Canada any more, We mostly have Hitachi, Seagate and WD.
    This is the only affordable Hitachi I could find. http://www.ncix.com/products/?sku=57878&vpn=0F10381&manufacture=Hitachi

    I'm probably going to end having to pay a lot for a WD drive. Unless some other company decides to make a move in to Canada in the next month. :eek:ook:
     
  16. EniGmA1987
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  17. Deadend
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    Sorry I should have said Samsung are not sold in Canada by Canadian companies. Mostly because they seem to require Canadian RMAs to be sent to Korea or something with the shipping entirely the costumers cost. So I guess Canadian companies just said the hell with it.

    I might grab that Hitachi though if the price stays the same. (even though newegg.ca charges 2 or 3 bucks more for shipping then other domestic stores.)
     
  18. Deadend
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    Heh now I'm just hoping there are any hard drives left for me to order since seems like most of NCIX hard drives are in backorder now.
     
  19. Deadend
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    How much space does Windows 7 take on a HDD? Trying to figure out if I can go with a 120g SSD until HDD prices drop. But it's likely going to end up as a Sandforce drive since they are the only ones in my price range (with sale/rebates) so I'm still debating with myself and my just go with a 500g HDD. I'm going to need space for Skyrim(10-20g), BC2(10g?) and SWTOR (my as well call this 50g) I may also want to play through Dragon Age: Origin again on a comp that can run it properly.
     
    Last edited: Nov 2, 2011
  20. EniGmA1987
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    I just did the math and yes you can fit all that on a 120GB SSD. But it will be close. And that is taking into account the crap that somehow accumulates on the drive within the first year and Windows growing. So just keep and eye on it. And probably grab a 1TB drive when they come back down in price in 6-8 months so you can move some of your stuff over to that instead to give yourself some breathing room.