New PC rig help.

[jebara]

I'm thinking about getting my first gaming PC, and as usual I thought it would be best to ask people who know what their doing first.
Got tired of consoles and want something new,heard that PC gaming is it, took a look and found a ton of interesting games, Planetside 2,Chivalry,Day Z, Witcher(don't play on Xbox much) and now I want to get in.

So what are the recommended specs for a good rig these days?
So I heard somewhere Ram cannot be changed,is this true? if so should I get more for future purposes.

Videocards,I remember that I need a good one,your recommendations?
Feel free to give any tips you think a new comer has to know, thanks guys.

 

[Crises^]

Hello Jebara

What is your budget as we can build a system around that, also what country do you live in so we can use a supplier that delivers to you.

 

[jebara]

Hello Jebara

What is your budget as we can build a system around that, also what country do you live in so we can use a supplier that delivers to you.

Hey XTC, I live in the UAE, don't have a specific budget but as I lurk new egg I'm seeing stuff
like video cards at 800$ to 1000$ and I'm kinda not wanting to spend that kinda money on just one part.
I remember lurking around New Egg some time ago and finding some decent at 300-400$,and since video cards are a a huge focus when it comes to gaming I guess I can spend a bit more.
Other parts I'll have to see, recommend me parts and I'll see if I ever have to cut corners.
And tell me, are those 800-1000$ cards really that important? if so, maybe I have to get em?
Thanks!

 

[Doom972]

Recommended specs:

A quad-core CPU - The higher the clock rate, the longer your PC would be able to run the newest games.

RAM - 8 GB is more than enough for the moment, and you can replace it or add to it (depends on how many RAM slots the motherboard has).

Graphics card - I recommend the best card of the previous series. For example, if you go for nVidia, you'll want one the Geforce 500 series (the newest is 600). Of that series, you should pick one of the three best (not less than that), depending on what you can afford. In this example that would be GeForce GTX 590, 580, and 570.

Another important decision is the motherboard: make sure that it supports your CPU type and clock rate, as well as your RAM type and clock frequency.

I hope that this helps.

 

[jebara]

Recommended specs:

A quad-core CPU - The higher the clock rate, the longer your PC would be able to run the newest games.

RAM - 8 GB is more than enough for the moment, and you can replace it or add to it (depends on how many RAM slots the motherboard has).

Graphics card - I recommend the best card of the previous series. For example, if you go for nVidia, you'll want one the Geforce 500 series (the newest is 600). Of that series, you should pick one of the three best (not less than that), depending on what you can afford. In this example that would be GeForce GTX 590, 580, and 570.

Another important decision is the motherboard: make sure that it supports your CPU type and clock rate, as well as your RAM type and clock frequency.

I hope that this helps.

Looking at New Egg, and I can see the Radeon 7950 at 330$, is that a good card cause I think I can get something at that price, if the rest of the rig goes well, if not the 660 TI seems kinda cheap, and I heard that I can double it later, however I'm currently thinking of the 7950.
As for the CPUs,I see I7's and I5's, I'm hearing some where to go for I5 but I hear something about bottle necks.
As for mother boards, can you recommend me anything?
Also, power source, 600W-500W is good? if not what is?
I like a fast computer and I remember something about changing Ram in some computer course I took not too long ago, can you tell me more about it cause I can't remember what was said.
I'll look for a case and I'm assuming I need a minimum of a Terabyte of a hard drive, if not more.
Did I miss anything?

 

[Crises^]

I'll do a quick build on new egg for you, give me a few minutes.

 

[Protrek305T]

Here look as these videos they explain is really well.

1300$
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8Ga_26h1MU

1850$
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmQN1SFAgu0

There are more videos with different builds so look at their channel for more videos.

 

[Crises^]

Here is a quick build before using this if you are not going to do any overclocking in the future you can save around $200 by getting a h77 motherboard instead of this z77 and using the stock cooling instead of the corsair h80 I listed here. Also I left out the dvd drive/keyboard/mouse/monitor as that's all personal taste.

ZALMAN Z11 Black Steel / Plastic ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
$69.99


Western Digital Caviar Green WD15EZRX 1.50 TB 3.5" Internal Hard Drive
$89.99


ASUS GTX660 TI-DC2O-2GD5 GeForce GTX 660 Ti 2GB 192-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card
$309.99
NVIDIA Coupon Metro: Last Light - THIS IS FREE WITH THE GPU
Item #: N82E16800995159
Return Policy: VGA Standard Return Policy
-$59.99 Saving
$59.99
$0.00


CORSAIR HX series HX650 650W ATX12V v2.2 / EPS12V 2.91 SLI Ready 80 PLUS GOLD Certified Modular Active PFC Power Supply
$119.99


Arctic Silver 5 High-Density Polysynthetic Silver Thermal Compound AS5-3.5G - OEM
$7.99


Rosewill RTK-002 Anti-Static Wrist Strap
$3.99


G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1866 (PC3 14900) Desktop Memory Model F3-14900CL9D-8GBXL
$66.99


ASUS P8Z77-V PRO LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
$199.99


Intel Core i5-3570K Ivy Bridge 3.4GHz (3.8GHz Turbo) LGA 1155 77W Quad-Core Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 4000 BX80637I53570K
$219.99
1

Intel Gift - iRacing Subscription 3 Month - THIS IS FREE WITH THE CPU
Item #: N82E16800995160
Return Policy: Standard Return Policy
-$30.00 Saving
$30.00
$0.00


CORSAIR Hydro Series H80i Water Cooler
$88.99


Corsair Neutron Series CSSD-N256GB3-BK 2.5" 256GB SATA III Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
$199.99
Subtotal: $1,377.89

 

[Headdrivehardscrew]

Hey OP.

'Recommended rig' is more difficult than the weather forecast, guessing your favourite colour and cooking you a meal while sitting on your lap.

It's easiest if you state

a) where you live (UAE)
b) how much money you're willing to spend
c) state what parts you already have and intend to keep on using, if any

The 'RAM cannot be changed' bit is either

I) TRUE, if you buy an Apple unit that comes with the RAM soldered onto the motherboard / Logic Board in Apple speak
II) FALSE, if you go for a normal, pre-assembled PC or parts you want to assemble yourself
III) SOMEWHAT TRUE, if you hold off buying the max amount of RAM now and wait until it becomes rare and hard to get...

These days, I'd really recommend you either go for 8GB of RAM and be done with it, OR go right for the max amount of RAM your motherboard of choice allows.

As for the GFX card - if you intend to buy virginal new, $200 is the absolute lowest you want to consider for gaming. Right now, I would say the sweet spot for acceptable to decent gaming is in the range of $200 - $300. I just set up a rig with a Gigabyte GTX 660 for a friend who plays PS3/360/PC on his huge TV, so 1080p is the max resolution no matter what, and the thing zips through everything we throw at it. it cost just $200, so any more money spent would have been wasted.

I recommend giving this site an ogle for a quick brain upgrade (and reference):

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/GPU12/372

Subtotal: $1,377.89

Good build!

 

[Crises^]

Recommended specs:

A quad-core CPU - The higher the clock rate, the longer your PC would be able to run the newest games.

RAM - 8 GB is more than enough for the moment, and you can replace it or add to it (depends on how many RAM slots the motherboard has).

Graphics card - I recommend the best card of the previous series. For example, if you go for nVidia, you'll want one the Geforce 500 series (the newest is 600). Of that series, you should pick one of the three best (not less than that), depending on what you can afford. In this example that would be GeForce GTX 590, 580, and 570.

Another important decision is the motherboard: make sure that it supports your CPU type and clock rate, as well as your RAM type and clock frequency.

I hope that this helps.

Looking at New Egg, and I can see the Radeon 7950 at 330$, is that a good card cause I think I can get something at that price, if the rest of the rig goes well, if not the 660 TI seems kinda cheap, and I heard that I can double it later, however I'm currently thinking of the 7950.
As for the CPUs,I see I7's and I5's, I'm hearing some where to go for I5 but I hear something about bottle necks.
As for mother boards, can you recommend me anything?
Also, power source, 600W-500W is good? if not what is?
I like a fast computer and I remember something about changing Ram in some computer course I took not too long ago, can you tell me more about it cause I can't remember what was said.
I'll look for a case and I'm assuming I need a minimum of a Terabyte of a hard drive, if not more.
Did I miss anything?

Also I wouldn't waste my money on a ?1000 euro card unless your planing on doing like a 4 screen set up.
The build I posted just above should suit you, also are you planing on overclocking if not I'll change the motherboard and cooling system for you and either leave it at a cheaper price or put that money into a better card like a 670gtx up to you.

 

[SnowyGamester]

Honestly you'd have probably been better off posting this in the advice forum. You might not get as many responses but they're generally more consistent and well-informed. As for what you need, I'll address some of your questions and make a few recommendations.

So I heard somewhere Ram cannot be changed,is this true? if so should I get more for future purposes.

Not true. RAM is replaceable in anything but the latest Macs (and maybe a few laptops) which have it soldered on because why the fuck not. You can easily get away with around 8gb at the moment so that's something to shoot for, but you should definitely consider a motherboard that can have more added in the future (I personally went for one that maxes at 32gb which leaves plenty of room for improvement when it becomes necessary). There are also different types of RAM so you should make sure that the RAM you choose is a compatible speed/type for your board.

And tell me, are those 800-1000$ cards really that important? if so, maybe I have to get em?

Yeah I wouldn't do that. As nice as it would be to have a $1000-something GTX Titan that would be completely overkill...there's a point at which you're paying for power you aren't going to use anytime soon, plus the more you pay the worse the price/performance ratio is going to be. You have to find the sweet spot where you're getting a decent card but aren't breaking the bank. If I had to buy one at the moment (which I don't since my GTX 560 suffices for now) I'd go for a GTX 660Ti (or the 7950, though I'm not partial to ATI). Anything better than that and the price shoots up very quickly.

The 660 TI seems kinda cheap, and I heard that I can double it later

This can be true if you have a motherboard that supports nVidia SLI. Honestly I've not looked too much into it but I think you'd probably be just as well off replacing it with something better in a few year rather than getting a second one when the card is old and out-dated anyway.

I'm hearing some where to go for I5 but I hear something about bottle necks.

Get an i5, don't bother with i7. The only advantage an i7 offers is hyperthreading which doesn't do shit for games. Probably go for a 3570 (current top-tier i5) or 3570K (if you care about overclocking) rather than getting something less powerful and upgrading later since then you're buying two CPUs.

Also, power source, 600W-500W is good? if not what is?

Depends entirely on your overall build. 650-700W should be enough for even the most power hungry builds unless you've got multiple graphics cards. Also don't get shit-tier ones since they often fail and overheat more easily than good branded ones of the same power rating. Get something at least bronze certified.

As for mother boards, can you recommend me anything?

I went for one of these [http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=138_1183&products_id=20084] myself. Supports my CPU of choice (i5 3570), has a whopping 32gb maximum RAM (though limited to DDR3 1600 so no overclocking the RAM), plenty of USB slots, a few PCI slots and a bunch of other shit I didn't read or care about. There are better ones but it's really good value for money.

xTc212 posted an alright looking build though I'd definitely take notice of where he said you can cut a few costs (because that motherboard is expensive as shit and water cooling is completely unnecessary). Personally I'd also cut out the SSD since all it does is improve load times (which is nice but probably not worth $200).

 

[spartandude]

Im pretty much playing all the games the OP mentioned on full (or pretty much full save a couple of options such of Uber Sampling for Witcher 2)

heres what i have

I5 3570k 3.4GHz quad core cpu
GTX 660TI GPU (2gb)
8gb of RAM 1600MHz
Windows 7
8OO Watt PSU

cost me about £650

again im playing Witcher 2 on full graphics (not Ubersampling which tanks the frame rate for only a small visual upgrade) and its running at a steady 60fps occasionally dropping down to about 40fps.
PlanetSide 2 is on mid-high settings (its poorly optimised) and depending on my internet connection im again getting a steady 60fps
Chivalry is Maxed out and apart from when my internet slowly died it had no slow down what so ever

 

[jebara]

Hey OP.

'Recommended rig' is more difficult than the weather forecast, guessing your favourite colour and cooking you a meal while sitting on your lap.

It's easiest if you state

a) where you live (UAE)
b) how much money you're willing to spend
c) state what parts you already have and intend to keep on using, if any

Okay, A)Abu Dhabi.
B)1300$ sounds like a decent amount I'm willing to spend, considering spending another 500$ and go for the earlier mentioned 1,800 model.
C)I don't really have any PC experience to know the true worth of each part, that's why I came here, I've been a console guy up to this point and its my first time getting into PC gaming.
Again, I want to thank everyone here.

 

[PoolCleaningRobot]

I hope you don't set your expectations too high. I preordered Blood Dragon on Steam and after I downloaded it, it was still good hour before I got to play thanks to bullshit like signing up for Uplay and installing crap

Sorry, bitterness aside, remember that the gpu is the most important in gameplay, not processor. That doesn't mean you can skimp on the processor but rather you don't need the most expensive or most powerful. you also might like to download game booster, it closes a bunch of processes so your games can run a little better. Another optimization tip that might work is play a game on an HD TV at a lower resolution like 1280x720 rather than full 1080p. Depending on your TV, you games can look largely the same on both resolutions.

Edit:Never mind the pre-built stuff, I should have read further to see your budget
And 8 gigs of ram is all you technically need. Anyone with more ram than that uses it to run servers off their computers or edit videos. It could help to have more (I don't think ram is that expensive)

Oh yeah, it can also be important to have a faster hard drive. The hard drive is usually what bottle necks a computer's performance. Your budget wouldn't include a solid state drive, but a 10,000 rpm hard drive would be good (the lowest is 5,000)

 

[Headdrivehardscrew]

Hey OP.

'Recommended rig' is more difficult than the weather forecast, guessing your favourite colour and cooking you a meal while sitting on your lap.

It's easiest if you state

a) where you live (UAE)
b) how much money you're willing to spend
c) state what parts you already have and intend to keep on using, if any

Okay, A)Abu Dhabi.
B)1300$ sounds like a decent amount I'm willing to spend, considering spending another 500$ and go for the earlier mentioned 1,800 model.
C)I don't really have any PC experience to know the true worth of each part, that's why I came here, I've been a console guy up to this point and its my first time getting into PC gaming.
Again, I want to thank everyone here.

Hey there,

xTc212 has meanwhile updated his post (#8) and I absolutely agree to everything said there.

Nothing wrong with the $1800 build off Youtube either, but bear in mind that you absolutely need to get

1. Keyboard you're happy with
2. GOOD mouse you're happy with (your taste matters, as has been mentioned earlier)
3. display

You might not need a display/monitor if your gaming TV is nice, fast and big enough to make you happy for gaming. HDMI is absolutely recommended, DVI is good as well. HDMI is generally best and stupid good, depending on your setup. Do you intend to run the (surround) sound from gaming directly to the TV, or do you want it to go to/through your AV receiver, or do you intend/need to get surround speakers?

 

[Destal]

I would say for that if you have any interest in overclocking an ATI 7950 can overclock much better than the 660ti and honestly is more comparable in performance to the 670. As with some of the other posters mentioned an i5 is more than sufficient. Getting an SSD will also give an amazing performance increase, even if you just get a smaller one to only run the OS.

Don't let the idea of building your first computer scare, you it is really simple. Nearly all of the parts only fit in their specified place and the manuals tend to be more than detailed enough to show you where the rest goes. Also, there are tons of guides on youtube on how to put certain pieces in place. When researching GPU's they should give you a minimum required wattage and you can use that as your guide to getting a PSU, but keep in mind that a better PSU will help the rest of your components live longer because they supply electricity at a more consistent rate.

I've no clue what the conversion rate is, but I built my own computer less than 2 months ago for about $1,000 US and I got

i5-3570K
7970 ATI (I got this way on sale at the time) http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3242918
16GB 2133mhz ram http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231501
750W modular PSU http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817341041
Case http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=6531504 Really solid case, I got a 200mm fan up front and on top and they fit perfectly.
ASUS MOBO with crossfire/sli support http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2406888

 

[PoolCleaningRobot]

Subtotal: $1,377.89

Nice. I'm impressed you were able to get all that for less than $1500

 

[Crises^]

Subtotal: $1,377.89

Nice. I'm impressed you were able to get all that for less than $1500

Thanks also if the OP isn't overclocking he can cut the z77 motherboard for a h77 and cut the h80 for stock cooling and save another $200. I remember back in the day when parts cost a lot more, for the performance you get now PC gaming has really gotten a lot cheaper

 

[PoolCleaningRobot]

Subtotal: $1,377.89

Nice. I'm impressed you were able to get all that for less than $1500

Thanks also if the OP isn't overclocking he can cut the z77 motherboard for a h77 and cut the h80 for stock cooling and save another $200. I remember back in the day when parts cost a lot more, for the performance you get now PC gaming has really gotten a lot cheaper

Even pre-built computers are coming down somewhat. I've seen a decent gaming PC on new egg for $900. You can't replace building it yourself when you want particular things but hey, if just want a decent PC and no fluff it's not impossible to find anymore

 

[MrMrAwesom]

I'm more or less force plugging my favorite PC gaming site, but effort will be made nonetheless.
(they swear a lot & such so not for everyone)
http://www.kbmod.com/2013/04/pc-build-guide-april-2013/
They used pcpartpicker.com which only lets you chose parts compatible with the rest of the PC your building so it should be fine if you want to have a go at that, although it has reviews you'd still have to look up which parts perform best ect.

I have an old $1300 build that now equates to slightly better than the $500 & runs ultra everything just not really playable at ~19 Frames Per Second (high is fine.