Tek daydreams about building a new PC (again)

well i'm not going to get you a core i5 with the vid you want..and while the core i3 works fine for me i'm not sure you would accept that? the 7970 is overkill..and the amd isn't going to keep it fed properly...but if you head down to a 770 or a 7800 with the amd or an I3 you'd be set. ..:)
 
I'd still like to get an AMD Radeon 7850 card, preferably a HIS card (since they're a Christian company with an excellent reputation).

I guess I could get an i3 to start then maybe upgrade to an i5 or an i7 a few years down the line.

I'm also somewhat flexible on the budget. I'm just so very frugal (perhaps to a fault) that the thought of spending more than $500 on a PC when my machine already does nearly everything I want it to (with the notable exceptions of playing NS2 and GW2 at full frames) makes me twitch.
 
nopers..intel changes sockets too often..you buy what you get and then stick with it until the new mobo swap..amd is gearing towards the same thing. the performance delta between 7850 and 7770 isn't that high..not for the price delta. if you have your heart set on the 7870 it is really just a rebranded 6970. the two are equal in performance and the 6970 should be less expensive. I'm not a fan of AMD right now their cpus have a bad design that is never going to be on a performance par with Intel..ever. Until they dump this architecture they are not going to be competitive on the desktop.
 
Hescominsoon said:
nopers..intel changes sockets too often..you buy what you get and then stick with it until the new mobo swap..amd is gearing towards the same thing. the performance delta between 7850 and 7770 isn't that high..not for the price delta. if you have your heart set on the 7870 it is really just a rebranded 6970. the two are equal in performance and the 6970 should be less expensive. I'm not a fan of AMD right now their cpus have a bad design that is never going to be on a performance par with Intel..ever. Until they dump this architecture they are not going to be competitive on the desktop.
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Okay, then without further ado, let me ask you and anyone else interested in helping out (because, I'll be frank, I have come to loathe researching PC hardware and I would really, really appreciate help from the experts):

What build do you recommend for a mid-range system? Let's peg the budget at between $450 and $600 for now.
 
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That's a strong build. I am partial to Intel as well and think the 2500k is still rocking.
I would highly recommend the 2gb version of that video card however.
 
no need...with the i5 he isn't going to be able to run resolutions high enough to warrant that..plus the games he wants to run aren't texture heavy programs..:)
 
I don't plan on running resolutions higher than 1920x1080 at this time, but I suppose I should allow for the possibility if I end up getting a monitor that can support higher resolutions.

Also, the video card in the combo HCS linked only has 3/5 stars on reviews. :(

The i5-2500K looks solid compared to the FX-6300, though.

The RAM looks great, too, though I've seen it for less these last 2 weeks. This set of G.SKILL RAM is $12 cheaper: G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL9D-8GBXL - Any reason not to choose it over the $37 set?

EDIT: The CPU linked in the combo was $20 cheaper 11 days ago. :(
 
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Tek7@Work said:
Tiger Direct is selling an i7 3770k for $250.

Thoughts?
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Nevermind, it's sold out.

Just like almost every other Black Friday or Cyber Monday deal I've been interested in. -_-

EDIT: So what mainboard would you all recommend for an i5 or i7? I'd like to balance price and features. USB 3.0 is required (though nearly all boards support USB 3.0 based on what I've seen).

EDIT#2: Okay, here are a few options for mainboards:

EDIT#3: Here's another option: ASUS P8Z77-M LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Micro ATX Intel Motherboard - $130 shipped
 
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Okay, I'm just throwing this build together to see how much it would cost me:


Total: $528

Not cheap my any means, but still better than I had imagined for an i5 build.

Of course, I can probably expect to pay $20-$40 more since the HIS video card rebate offer ends tomorrow and it looks unlikely that the video card linked above will be back in stock tonight.

So I'm estimating a total of $550 for this build.
 
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What do you all think of me buying the mainboard, processor, and memory for now, using the GeForce GTS 450 I have a little longer, and watching for a sale on a solid Radeon 7850 card?
 
Tek7 said:
What do you all think of me buying the mainboard, processor, and memory for now, using the GeForce GTS 450 I have a little longer, and watching for a sale on a solid Radeon 7850 card?
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Your build is looking great. Holding back for a better price on the video card is probably fine, 450's still do pretty well.
 
Tek7 said:
What do you all think of me buying the mainboard, processor, and memory for now, using the GeForce GTS 450 I have a little longer, and watching for a sale on a solid Radeon 7850 card?
Click to expand...

That's what I did, just not with a GeForce card or with Intel guts.
 
I prayed before placing the order, asking God to place a roadblock in my way if it wasn't the right time to order.

I added the items to my cart on Newegg.

I clicked to checkout.

And the RAM had been removed from my cart, with the error "G.SKILL F3-12800CL9D-8GBXL has been removed from shopping cart due to quantity limitation/insufficient stock. Some combo items might be affected by this."

/sigh

Well, it's not the answer I wanted, but it is an answer. :)
 
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