$1500 PC design challenge

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

No you don't win $1500. My friend is interested in building a PC for about $1500. It'll be general purpose but with gaming in mind. Not clear if he actually needs a monitor to go with it but I'd assume he does. He's not particularly computer-savvy so I guess I'd take reliable over cutting edge.

Also, the graphics card will need TV out. I'll post some preliminary stuff after I've done more newegg research (lol).

CPU: Intel i7 920 - $288
Mobo: ASRock X58 Extreme LGA 1366 Intel X58 - $170
GPU:
Soundcard (I may try to talk him out of this depending on the mobo's onboard):
RAM: 6GB Corsair Dominator 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 - $230
HDD's:
Monitor:
PSU:
Case:

[pevergreen]

CPU: Intel i7 860

The rest can go around that. The 860 is cheaper and more powerful.

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

Marginally cheaper while sacrificing (some) of the potential upgradability. Or that's the word on the street, that the more power i9's or something will use the LGA 1366 that the 920 uses instead of the 860's 1566. The mobo is frankly the hardest choice in terms of finding reliable and recent reviews of what's where, since most of the reviews I find are from when the new wave of CPU's were released and that doesn't really reflect the state of mobos as they are between new chipset launches.

[pevergreen]

Yet will i9 be the next desktop range. I heard that they are the expensive end of the range, since i5 are the normal desktop, i7 high end.

Should the mobo have USB 3 on it? Thats a major thing as well.

[TinCow]

I'll post something, but I want to know just how much needs to be done. Are we talking just box and monitor here, or does he need peripherals (mouse, keyboard, speakers, etc.) as well?

[CBR]

If he is not computer savvy then he is not going to do much upgrading is he? The 860 is a very good cpu and the 1156 mobos are generally cheaper than the 1366. So if money is an issue he can save a bit there I think.

[TinCow]

We upgraded Scienter's machine recently, and her new bits fit well into this budget.

CPU: i5-750 - $200
Mobo: ASRock P55 Extreme LGA 1156 - $140
RAM: G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 - $100
HDD: WD Caviar Blue 500gb - $56

Total: $496

The Mobo can take an i7, which leaves room for a future upgrade on the same board. I'll tell you though, that i5 is blazing fast. I don't know what you'd need the i7 performance for, unless you just like to brag about it to your friends. Games aren't challenging hardware the way they used to. I'd rather save the money on the CPU and spend it on better peripherals and a monitor.

For the rest...

GPU: EVGA 896-P3-1255-AR GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 896MB - $215, one of the reasons to cut back on a CPU is to spend a bit more cash on something like this.
DVD/CD Burner: SAMSUNG Black 22X - $31
Case - Hard to give advice on this without knowing the person. Does he care about it being flashy? About accessibility? Will he be upgrading? The answers make a lot of difference here. In general though, I highly recommend something by Lian Li - $100 to $300 depending on preferences.
Monitor: Hanns·G HH-281HPB Black 28" - $320, this is where your CPU savings are going. A good monitor is a lot more value for money, IMO.
PSU: CORSAIR CMPSU-750TX 750W ATX12V - $120

Total: $1282 to $1482 depending on case. A cheaper case ($100) can be used to beef up the CPU if you really want to, or to add good peripherals such as this, or speakers. Swapping out all case fans for silent fans is a good use of cash as well, IMHO.

[Lemur]

I'm still milking along my Core2Duo, which has a good bit of life left in it. I'll go quad-core when the Core2 just isn't cutting it anymore.

That said, if I were building from scratch right now, I'd go with the i5 chip. Maximum bang for the buck, and you still get 4 physical cores and 8 virtual cores. Plenty enough for CPU-heavy tasks such as re-encoding video, etc.

The 1156 mobos are the way to go.

[Beskar]

I am waiting for the 35nm line of chips before I consider upgrading, and after they been out for a while, so they get over the flaws/etc and improve and steady the design.

[Lemur]

Well, at least the videocard should be a no-brainer, either a 5850 or 5870. There's nothing to compete with those two right now, and the 5850 is a real steal.

[Roman_Man#3]

Core i5 750 - Pick it up from a MicroCenter if you can, they usually go for super cheap at those places.

Gigabyte GA-P55A-UD3 - For the Sata and USB 3 support. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128412

G.Skill 4gb DDR3 1600 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-193-_-Product

WD Black 640Gb - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...%20black%20640 If he needs 640gb. Could cut down to the 500gb if need be.

Sapphire 5850 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-857-_-Product

Might consider waiting for the Fermi cards to be released in the next couple of months. Not only will you have bigger selection of cards to pick from, the price of the ATI cards should drop.

Coolermaster 690 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-137-_-Product

Consider waiting again for Newegg to get the 690 advanced II in stock, its overall a better case than the original.

Corsair 650tx - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...9005&Tpk=650tx

[Lemur]

Might consider waiting for the Fermi cards to be released in the next couple of months. Not only will you have bigger selection of cards to pick from, the price of the ATI cards should drop.

That might be a real wait. According to the latest news, the Fermi cards won't ship until mid-March at the earliest, in "low quantities," and they're gonna be hot, hot, hot.

[Tellos Athenaios]

Do not forget the PSU; I imagine that the friend is upgrading from fairly generic components.

EDIT: Actually as far as ‘upgrade’ goes it is probably better to simply check what components can be reasonably carried over from a previous PC (if any) first.

[Roman_Man#3]

That might be a real wait. According to the latest news, the Fermi cards won't ship until mid-March at the earliest, in "low quantities," and they're gonna be hot, hot, hot.

Your first link says that the 5800 series from ATI is getting 4% yields, which is untrue. If they were only getting 4% yields, there would be even less in stock than there are now. It's closer to 40-60%, and Fermi is getting better yields than that site sayss as well: http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/17205/1/

Concerning heat, that same article says:

we were told that while running one Fermi card alone or two single-GPU cards is fine, going any higher may introduce thermal issues.

So if one fermi card is fine, and 2 fermi cards are fine, that means you have to triple SLI to get thermal issues. And I don't think triple SLI for fermi is a matter of concern for the OP considering the budget.

[Lemur]

Your first link says that the 5800 series from ATI is getting 4% yields, which is untrue. If they were only getting 4% yields, there would be even less in stock than there are now. It's closer to 40-60%, and Fermi is getting better yields than that site sayss as well: http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/17205/1/

Fari enough, and I stand corrected. From your link, however, this is salient:

Those in the know are claiming that Fermi despite the yield and thermal issues is only about 20% faster than Cypress, while Hemlock smokes it. The combination of low yields, high thermals, and marginally better performance than Cypress could be conspiring to place Nvida in the position of having to release the card, but have to sell it at a loss till they are able to address the issues in the next spin according to sources. Because of the situation a mole we know is suggesting that Nvidia may limit the sales of Fermi to consumers and instead use the chips for the Tesla and Quadro products where prices and margins are much better.

Which just drives home my original point, that waiting for Fermi is an iffy idea, especially when the 58XX series from ATI is here, available, reasonably priced and does the job. You can always wait for the bigger, better, badder tech coming down the pike. But if you're building a gaming boxen, at some point you need to take a look at the landscape and see what makes sense now.

I do not believe Fermi is going to be available in quantity and at a competitive price any earlier than late spring/early summer. That's a hell of a wait for unproven tech.

[Tellos Athenaios]

And there will be the obvious first round of driver bugs etc. etc. to iron out.

[Roman_Man#3]

Well, I'm not really suggesting he wait so that he can buy an nVidia card, more so that the landscape smooths over a bit. ATI's cards are starting to come down in price thanks to yields improving, and as time progresses up to the Fermi release, they'll only get lower as ATI tries to undercut nVidia as much as they can. I'd suggest at least waiting a couple of weeks to see if ATI's pricing trend continues.

[Gregoshi]

I'm still milking along my Core2Duo, which has a good bit of life left in it. I'll go quad-core when the Core2 just isn't cutting it anymore.

At the risk of starting up a Four Yorkshiremen skit, I'd be happy with a Core2Duo. I have it tough. I'm running on a 7 year old P4...

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

Welp, my friend ended up going basically with TinCow's build, just a different case, slightly smaller monitor, different CD drive and some more ram (same type). He was kind of rushing it to have it built for the new semester so I didn't get to look at some of the suggestions here in time. Parts came late on Friday and we built it then. No issues except that the RAM needed to be put in a different order than the motherboard manual said but there's a handy little display thing on the mobo that gives you POST codes so you can figure out what's wrong. Total cost was about $1300 and it seems to be working beautifully. Thanks everyone!

[pevergreen]

Bleh. i5



Glad you managed to stick it together ok. Just remember, you shouldn't be able to see any glue if you did it right.

[TinCow]

Bleh. i5

Out of curiosity, what exactly are you running that an i5 can't handle?

[pevergreen]

More accurately is why doesnt my computer boot 100% of the time...

I just think the little increase in price to the new i7 860 is worth it, over an i5.

[TinCow]

I just think the little increase in price to the new i7 860 is worth it, over an i5.

If you're not on a budget, sure... but given a price constraint, I don't think $80 is worth it for an extra 140mhz and hyperthreading. I've been very surprised at how much the gaming industry has slowed down in its hardware demands. There was a period from about 1998 through 2006 when I was doing major upgrades ($500+) to my machine every year. I've only done a single upgrade on my box since 2006 (to dual core w/ GF 9800) and it's still running pretty much everything at max.

I think SLI is the perfect example of unnecessary upgrading. Any hardware discussion on a gaming forum will inevitably end up in a discussion about whether to use SLI, and which mobos to get for best SLI performance. Yet only 2.4% of all gaming computers have an SLI setup. I feel like a lot of the hardware junkies have continued on buying the $300+ CPUs and GPUs, without really acknowledging that stuff like that isn't needed anymore. The same is true with overclocking, which is totally unnecessary now unless you're on a stupendously small budget. It's perfectly fine if you enjoy building 'hot rod' rigs for performance alone, but that's a pretty small niche market.

[pevergreen]

I spent a fair bit on my 3 month old computer, but I moved from a Dell XPS m1530 laptop.

Dad went and got two "gaming" computer (long story) back in 06/07. They cannot run L4D2 or The Sims 3 properly.

I think my timeline is correct, but we got them before the nvidia 8000 series and dual cores...

I sit in the camp of "If you're going to build a computer, build it properly."

That being said be smart about it. I could have spent less, but as long as the person is happy with what they end up with, does it matter?

[Crandaeolon]

I've been very surprised at how much the gaming industry has slowed down in its hardware demands.

It probably has something to do with console generations. These days, most (all?) AAA titles are developed for the current console generation first; the PC might get somewhat better resolution textures or other small graphical upgrades, but console hardware limits are the primary consideration.

[Raz]

At the risk of starting up a Four Yorkshiremen skit, I'd be happy with a Core2Duo. I have it tough. I'm running on a 7 year old P4...

Haha, mine's a 9 year old P4 still running Win2000...
(Un)fortunately, it just died last week - the mobo now smells like chargrill.

[Gregoshi]

Haha, mine's a 9 year old P4 still running Win2000...

And we consider ourselves lucky!

[TinCow]

It probably has something to do with console generations. These days, most (all?) AAA titles are developed for the current console generation first; the PC might get somewhat better resolution textures or other small graphical upgrades, but console hardware limits are the primary consideration.

I never thought about that; you're almost certainly correct.