PC gamers, can i have your opinion on a build?

[ColdBlooded]

This is my first attempt at choosing the parts i need for a gaming PC from scratch, i've been meaning to get into it for a while. (I have the money available)

Case: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811146087

GPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127696

Power Supply: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151121

RAM: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820104339

Motherboard: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130653

CPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116504

SSD: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116504 (because i've heard SSD's give better loading times and performance than hard drives)

So what do you think? better recommendations, something not compatible, too expensive?

 

[BloatedGuppy]

It's fine. Obviously you realize it's fine. It'll be more than sufficient for all today's games and likely last you several years at least.

SSD's are a bit expensive to use for games themselves. You might be able to stick a few on there but load times shouldn't really be an issue with a normal drive. I'd use your SSD as your boot drive and stick your games on a secondary drive. Boot times with an SSD are just lovely. It'd be hard to go back now.

 

[ResonanceSD]

This is my first attempt at choosing the parts i need for a gaming PC from scratch, i've been meaning to get into it for a while. (I have the money available)

Case: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811146087

GPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127696

Power Supply: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151121

RAM: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820104339

Motherboard: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130653

CPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116504

SSD: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116504 (because i've heard SSD's give better loading times and performance than hard drives)

So what do you think? better recommendations, something not compatible, too expensive?

Use Steam Mover to transfer games from your main steam library to your SSD when you're playing them, and back to your regular HD which you should add to that build when you're not.

If you don't buy a regular hard drive as well as your SSD, then there's simply no hope for that build.

 

[Christopher Fisher]

I would get a white PSU, just to match the case; such as: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817703036

And white Corsair Vengeance LP: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820233199


As you can tell, I like all white builds

Everything you have looks fine though, and you can stick with it if you want. Your link to your SSD just takes me to your CPU. If you're not planning on getting a HD with your SSD, you should definitely rethink that. SSDs really aren't a storage solution; they're meant mainly to be boot drives, with the HD as a slave drive. If you can only buy one or the other, just get a good 7200RPM 64Mb cache HD like a WD Caviar Black or a Seagate Barracuda.

The motherboard is a very good choice btw; I used it when I built a friend's comp for him, and it's much more reliable than my own ASUS board. Just be careful not to plug anything in to the USB 3.0 port when you're setting it up. For some reason, his comp didn't want to boot when we had something plugged into the 3.0 port; it just stayed on a screen saying B2 or something like that. They've probably fixed it, but just a warning.

Oh, last thing I promise. You probably want to get a second-hand CPU cooler. I really hate the stock coolers that come with the CPUs, not so much because of they perform poorly, but because they're so hard to remove after a few years. Just go with a $30 cooler master hyper 212.

 

[Hawkeye 131]

Overall I think it's a good build however, I think (as others have mentioned), that you really should buy a regular HD. Although SSD's are nice they shouldn't really be used to store everything. Even if you can find a cheap Seagate or Western Digital "Green" 1TB or 500 GB HD would do. They won't be the fastest or best drives but for basic storage they'll do the job just fine and it would be worth the extra money. Lastly unless you plan on OC'ing that processor I would just go with a regular i3 series CPU (just one without the "K" marking).

All in all it should be a nice build.

-Hawk

 

[Christopher Fisher]

Overall I think it's a good build however, I think (as others have mentioned), that you really should buy a regular HD. Although SSD's are nice they shouldn't really be used to store everything. Even if you can find a cheap Seagate or Western Digital "Green" 1TB or 500 GB HD would do. They won't be the fastest or best drives but for basic storage they'll do the job just fine and it would be worth the extra money. Lastly unless you plan on OC'ing that processor I would just go with a regular i3 series CPU (just one without the "K" marking).

All in all it should be a nice build.

-Hawk

Don't use Green drives for anything other than media storage. They're not designed to be used as a primary HD, and especially not a primary HD that is going to be running games off of. A WD blue drive is what you'd want if you wanted a cheaper alternative to the black.

 

[Fluffythepoo]

660 Tis are only 260 on amazon and they come from more reputable manufacturers. but honestly Ti is only a minor performance improvement (like 15%) over the 660, but it costs 50% more. id just get a 660

cpu is about right price.

i got a 1000W at futureshop (bestbuy) for 120 so if ur spending that much at least get something bigger

msi mobos are cheap, itll work, but youll get more for the same price from other brands

and case is fine, but usually youll find cooler (often custom) cases at a local computer store (like mom and pop type of thing) and theyre usually cheaper.. check local yellowpages


so thatll work, but youre paying more than you should

 

[Quala]

Definitely have to agree with everyone else: get a regular hard drive to go with your SSD. Put your OS and maybe some other stuff you'd like to load faster onto the SSD and then maybe a couple games that you're playing currently. Although the link to your SSD is actually to your CPU, any SSD that's big enough to really be practical enough to use by itself would be ridiculously expensive.

Also agree to get a processor without the K at the end unless you plan on overclocking; the K just means it's unlocked for easier OCing and therefore costs a bit extra. A site called pcpartpicker lets you enter all your parts and will tell you how much power they'll all consume and try to detect problems with your build, so I reccomend checking them out. A previous poster also mentioned looking around locally for better prices/parts-do that if you can.

Finally, although these forums have plenty of computer-savvy folk, a computer centric site like Tom's Hardware can sometimes give you advice on more specific issues more quickly.

Also, if this is your first build; Newegg has some pretty good tutorials on YouTube if you need them, and consider grabbing an anti-static wrist strap for $5 if you haven't got one around already.

 

[Nooners]

Don't use Green drives for anything other than media storage. They're not designed to be used as a primary HD, and especially not a primary HD that is going to be running games off of. A WD blue drive is what you'd want if you wanted a cheaper alternative to the black.

What's the difference between Green, Blue, and Black drives? I've been using Greens on my video editing PC for 2 1/2 years now, and I admit this is the first I've heard of any difference...

 

[Th37thTrump3t]

First off, your link for the SSD is the same as the link for your CPU, so I can't really say if it's worth it or not. Though I have to agree with everyone else here. If you're gonna go for an SSD, get a smaller one and use it for your OS only and get a 500GB-1TB HDD for everything else (Depending on how much crap you plan on having on there. I'm currently using more than half of my 1TB drive but I have a lot of shit.). I also noticed that you didn't list an OS. I would recommend going with Windows 7 Home Premium x64. I wouldn't recommend anything over Home Premium unless you plan on joining a domain. I also wouldn't recommend going with Windows 8 at the moment since it is a new OS and is on the shit end of the Microsoft Windows release cycle. I'd give it a year or two while they at least work out the kinks and let game devs work out the compatibility issues that are all too common when upgrading your OS. Other than those things it seems like you spec'd out a pretty decent rig that should last you a few years.

 

[Terrible Opinions]

Your RAM is 1.65V. Try to get 1.5V. Not a big deal, but it's an easy mistake to correct.

You absolutely do not need a power powerful PSU.

It seems like you want to overclock your CPU, but you didn't include an aftermarket heatsink in that list. I recommend a Coolermaster Hyper 212.

Your SSD choice just links to your processor.

 

[bishbosh]

i got a 1000W at futureshop (bestbuy) for 120 so if ur spending that much at least get something bigger

why does OP need a 1000w powersupply? the PSU op has selected is probably one of the best PSUs on the market and it has more than enough wattage for his setup. He could run 2 gfx cards off that PSU comfortably.

OP your SSD link is actually a link to a processor. I just recently purchased an SSD and have researched them pretty thouroughly. At the moment the best SSD buys are the intel 520, samsung 830, samsung 840 pro, OCZ vertex 4. I would probably go with whatever you can find cheap but also take into consideration that intel and OCZ offer 5 yr warranty while samsung offer a 3yr warranty. Although OCZ offers a 5 year warranty they are not really well known for their reliability and RMAs/reformatting/firmware-updates are annoying.

personal opinion: that case is fugly. I would go with something a bit more low profile and mature but thats the beauty of BYO PCs, you choose the parts you like.

you probably want to pick up a CPU cooler if you are overclocking or live in a hot area unless you dont mind fan noise. ~$30 can get you a coolermaster hyper 212 evo or you can shell out ~$90 for a higher end noctua d14, thermalright silver arrow, thermalright archon or w/e is the king of high end air cooling atm. this all depends on how much you want to OC, the differences in temps are about 5 and the coolermaster runs louder but you can remedy that by changing the fans.

 

[bishbosh]

Overall I think it's a good build however, I think (as others have mentioned), that you really should buy a regular HD. Although SSD's are nice they shouldn't really be used to store everything. Even if you can find a cheap Seagate or Western Digital "Green" 1TB or 500 GB HD would do. They won't be the fastest or best drives but for basic storage they'll do the job just fine and it would be worth the extra money. Lastly unless you plan on OC'ing that processor I would just go with a regular i3 series CPU (just one without the "K" marking).

All in all it should be a nice build.

-Hawk

Don't use Green drives for anything other than media storage. They're not designed to be used as a primary HD, and especially not a primary HD that is going to be running games off of. A WD blue drive is what you'd want if you wanted a cheaper alternative to the black.

erm green drives are perfectly fine as a main drive. you will hardly notice the performance difference between green and black esp since OP is using SSD. For hardrive I would pick something reliable with good warranty and a reputable manufacturer that has good RMA/ customer service tbh.

black: high performance, dual processor, large cache, 5 yr warranty
green: low power consumption and noise, 3 yr warranty
blue: seem really not have a theme or anything- just regular hardrive, 3 yr warranty

 

[TheHmm]

Add a regular HDD aswell, also thats the wrong Case, you need this one:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811146082

 

[Quesa]

So what do you think? better recommendations, something not compatible, too expensive?

I just redid my system, as per my Nov 2007 policy I got the best CPU I could without getting an Extreme one, this time an i7 3770K for a little over a hundred more than you're getting your i5 3570K. I don't think there's a noticeable difference, but I was very happy having that top end Quad CPU all these years, so I paid my extra cash there. You really won't go wrong with an i5, though.

I stuck with a 3 generations old GPU for now (just didn't have $400 more to throw around), but I think yours is a wise choice between price and performance. If you were more concerned about your budget you could get something perfectly capable of running everything for half that, it really depends on your game of choice. World of Tanks, for example, used to be a pig on my Core 2 Quad because it's a single threaded game and CPU intensive, so on various maps I would drop to nearly stuttering single digit FPS. Now it screams even though the GPU's the same. Most games are going to be GPU intensive though, obviously.

I could not justify a SSD. I know a number of people who swear by them, but until my eyes are opened, that's $100~300 I'm saving for 5x the storage. The rest looks just dandy.

What's the difference between Green, Blue, and Black drives? I've been using Greens on my video editing PC for 2 1/2 years now, and I admit this is the first I've heard of any difference...

I looked that up for a friend recently, I wasn't sure; the difference between WD's black and blue HDs is supposed to be in seek and write times. Green drives there's a understood focus on consuming less energy, so I imagine everything is throttled a bit more.

 

[flying_whimsy]

I'd agree with what the other folks have to say about SSD: get a normal hard drive as well. One caveat I would add, however, is to watch out for advanced format drives. It's still fairly new and I've only seen it available on the newest Western Digital drives; it uses larger sectors for storage and seems to have a higher rate of not working out of the box than normal (especially laptop models). Hybrid drives (usually a standard HDD with a tiny SSD built into it) are kind of iffy for long term use, too; especially if you get a smaller one that would go in a laptop.

For the ram, if you are going to buy multiple kits be aware that sometimes they may not be compatible due to different production runs/facilities even if they are the same make and model; it's a rare issue but I've seen it come up on more than one occasion. Look for bundles that have the required memory as they are typically tested to function as a group. Also, latency is just as important as speed for memory performance; although how noticeable it is really depends on the build and what it's used for.

Finally (I know this is a lot, but this is something I don't see thrown around a lot for new system builders and by the sound of it this is your first true scratch build), be ready for something to not work. Make sure you are checking compatibility for everything you order (manufacturer websites typically have lists for different models and such when it comes to memory; plus google and newegg reviews are great resources for that); taking the time to type in a few google searches can save you hours of frustration and additional shipping costs. Also, given the nature of mass production for computer parts and the perils of shipping, things can be dead on arrival; be sure to test your memory and your hard drive for errors as soon as possible (Western Digital and Seagate have some great HDD diagnostic tools and there are a ton of memory checkers including one you can download from microsoft).

Hope that helps and good luck.

 

[bishbosh]

I would use an SSD for the main operating system and the most frequently played games. For the rest a convential platter-based drive will do just fine. The graphics is going to last to at least 2020 for running games on maximum everything, however I would recommend this [http://ark.intel.com/products/63697/Intel-Core-i7-3930K-Processor-12M-Cache-up-to-3_80-GHz] over that i5 for better long-term perfomance as everything becomes more CPU intensive (6 cores are better than 4)

the thing is it would probably be around the same price to upgrade CPU 3-5 years down the line and you would get better performance. buying PC parts in an attempt to future proof your pc is generally not very cost effective due to the nature of the industry.

tbh OP u could probably drop down to a gtx 660 or a hd 7870 and save $100 while still being able to play games at max fps with slughtly lower settings for ultra demanding gfx games such as BF3.
GPU/CPU best-value-for-money occurs at around ~$200. I really dont think it is necessary to spend more than this if you just want a powerful computer that can play all the games in HD resolution at ~60 fps with fairly high settings.

 

[direkiller]

SSD: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116504 (because i've heard SSD's give better loading times and performance than hard drives)

it sorta worrying your trying to use a I5 for a SSD (you linked the wrong thing)

The only thing is if you plan on getting an aftermarket heatsink for your CPU make sure it fits in the case(as you have a mid case this might be an issue for some 120mm and anything above that is a no go)


also
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2373004&CatId=1969
shop around a bit

 

[Frezzato]

Snip

Primarily console lurker here. Forgive my ignorance but you didn't mention your OS or optical drive/burner. That's at least $100 in costs right there. Or is the OS not an issue? Just wondering.