V da Mighty Taco said:
Yep, looking to build my first gaming rig hopefully within the next few months, within the $800 - $1000 range without monitors or peripherals. Decided to go to r/buildapc for some help on this, and wound up with this about a week an a half ago (the price of the whole thing seems to have gone up by about $90 since I originally did this): http://pcpartpicker.com/p/GWYZWZ
UPDATE #4: New Intel rig that runs a i5-4590, courtesy of [user]pokepuke[/user]. Still looking at the fx-8320 rig as well, but the i5-4590 does seem like a notably better processor. Unfortunately, the latter rig involves removing the SSD outright as well as dropping from a 600w PSU to a 500w one instead. Anyways, feel free to compare the rigs as well as giving me any more advice that you come up with. Thanks again, everyone!
AMD FX-8320 build: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/FfdXhM
Intel i5-4590 build: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/TrgwCJ
I built all of my PCs in the past and my four year old rig still runs strong with only some minor upgrades on my part. So I can't comment on the newest hardware but I can comment on some general issues you should look out for. The most important point being: know what you want your rig to be for.
If your rig is like mine an entertainment/workstation that I use for a variety of things you don't necessarily need the best performance in terms of games but also a decent smoothness when you work with your OS or simply enough storage space for all your stuff. Since I assume that you also work on your PC, do research, program or whatever I'd keep a diverse approach in mind and don't go for ultra gaming specific stuff.
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Mainboards: the heart and soul of your rig and you really should do research and pick quality products here. And that's not to say you should pick the best quality gamer mainboards out there but look for well received boards in the mid-price range. Read: for instance, if you know that you don't have the money for two graphics cards right away I'd not bother to pick SLI which usually entails pricier mobos that rarely mandate the initial investment. In terms of manifacturers I'd vouch for MSI or Asus, they usually make good-quality products.
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SSD/HDD: An SSD offers a lot of smoothness and fastness when you work with your OS and install it on your SSD. Me doing so has led to a performance gain that I can only compare to the advent of dual-core processors (i.e. your system not freezing each time a process decided to die on you and fully occupy the CPU in that case). So I definitely recommend it, however I would go for an, at least, 128Gb version if possible - with 64Gb I'd likely run into space problems with all the additional programs I, for instance, also put there to maximize on the performance gain. Games usually only benefit in terms of loading times so it won't be that useful for gaming alone afaik. Given your budget, I'd hence go for the 1Tb HDD but definitely upgrade with an SSD later. Trust me, you'll need the space of the 1Tb HDD. For reference, I'm currently running an 128Gb OCZ Agility3 and 2x Seagate 1Tb HDDs, all of which are about half-full with School/Uni Stuff, Movies, Mp3s, Savegames, Mods and about a hundred games from my Steam Library :3
Also keep in mind that whenever you have an SSD install the latest drivers from your manifacturer: SSDs requires special maintenance on the OSs part that Win7 has natively but a more hardware-specific version supplied by the manifacturer is desirable.
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Custom Coolers: it seems you are going for a boxed cooler which I'd not recommend. I've used boxed coolers twice, each time they led to overheating after a time (despite me cleaning them routinely) and were loud as hell. Don't buy a boxed CPU and go for a custom one instead whose cost may even lie within the order of the savings from buying an unboxed CPU or may only make for a small additional investment. For reference, I've made some really good experiences with custom coolers from Arctic Cooling.
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Tower: You may find cheaper ones with the same quality out there. I'm currently using this one [http://www.alternate.de/Sharkoon/Nightfall-USB3-Geh%C3%A4use/html/product/970199?] which looks gorgeous under my desk and costs about 75-80 $ if I gauged correctly. Keep in mind, though, that this is a medium-sized tower which offers enough space for my stuff but already gets kind of cramped with the stuff I have in there. Still, should be enough for your needs in terms of size, so don't necessarily go with a larger one. Be careful when looking for cheaper ones, though: you will want to find a good quality tower that offers easy installation/upgrading and some help with all of the cables inside. It's really a boon to have.
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PSU: I've worked with very expensive ones and I've worked with budget ones. In the end, the budget ones died on me far too quickly for instance due to a broken switch in my multiplug and may have damaged my hardware. Definitely look for bronze or better certified PSUs - they protect your hardware better and provide an overall more stable working environment. In terms of wattage I usually go for a higher power one to secure upgradeability and some more space for my system in terms of power.
Can't comment on your CPU or graphics card.
To sum up my thoughts on your builds: recheck the tower, add a custom cooler if you can spare the money, get rid of the SSD but add one later or spend more initially and add one for your OS directly.
Also a general thing to keep in mind when you finally have your rig: don't spare on maintenance! Both software- and hardwarewise. This may or may or may not include: dusting off your rig occasionally and reinstalling your OS occasionally to keep the thing running smoothly and get rid of all the stuff and unneeded software that routinely clogs up your system in time and you are too lazy to manually uninstall and clean out. It really helps to keep your system and performance like its supposed to be.
