$1,600 - $2,000 Gaming PC

[whimseh]

Hello! I've never built a computer before and this place looks like it's got lots of people who know what they are doing.
My budget seems to be pretty high compared to others.. just looking for a great machine that can run games on the highest settings with no trouble. GeForce 9400m isn't doing me any good at all... (Playing Starcraft 2 on low settings with lag is killing me!) Looking for a machine that will not be outdated in a few months and one that's easily upgradeable (I'm sure most homebuilt ones ARE easily upgradeable but you catch my drift)... And I'll probably be buying this sometime early next year so I might come back and seek more advice then due to product upgrades and such...

Approx. Purchase Date: Early 2012. (So quite a bit could change!)

Budget Range: $1,600 - $2,000 +tax etc..

Usage: HEAVY video game use, no video/photo editing, just video games and general use.

Parts Not Required: Pretty much everything is required! Building it from the ground up.

Preferred Website(s) for Parts: newegg.com, trusted legitimate sellers

Country of Origin: United States, Texas

Parts Preferences: Intel CPU(s) Preferably quad core+ (Core i7+ unlocked); (Preferably 2 GeForce GTX 580 graphics cards) SSD if it fits into the budget, regular if it's not. 500GB+ hard drive.. or I could figure that out depending on what the case could handle. Good case that can support multiple hard drives and graphics cards it the budget is willing. 8 GB+ of RAM. Good HD screen with HD speakers 20+ inches.

Overclocking: Have no experience with this! If I can do it without screwing up then yes! (Unlocked processor)

SLI or Crossfire: Yes, if it helps! Preferably.

Monitor Resolution: 1920x1080 HD

Additional Comments: Budget is a tad flexible. Adding new info here and there! No multiple monitor or 3D crap, also!




Is this asking too much? It's just that I've never done this before so I want to be concrete solid with my decision! So I'm not sure if my post is missing anything or not.. If you need any other information, I'll be glad to supply it!

 

[chesteracorgi]

Use this form to help us help you:

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/261222-31-build-advice

 

[whimseh]

Thanks! Will do immediately!

 

[whimseh]

Anyone out there?

 

[g-unit1111]

You don't really need the i7-2600K, the i5-2500K is $100 cheaper and will handle anything you can throw at it. Dual 580s is extreme overkill, and it would seriously break anyone's budget (cards are $490 a piece!). If you cant afford the $1,000 price tag that runs you with dual 580s, go with a single Radeon 6970 for $350, a 2 GB card is plenty powerful and it will handle games for years to come. Most games now are just barely catching up with X58 and P55 hardware, they still have a ways to go before they'll barely scratch the surface of what Z68 and P67 can do! So this is a quick build I was playing around with if that suits you:

Case: Corsair Carbide 400R - $99.99
PSU: Corsair Enthusiast Series TX 750 V2 - $109.99
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z68XP-UD3P - $179.99
CPU: Intel Core i5-2500K - $219.99
Cooling: Cooler Master Hyper 212 - $29.99
RAM: 16GB Kingston Hyper X Grey DDR3 1600MHz - $104.99
SSD: 64GB Crucial M4 - $114.99
HD: Seagate Barracuda XT 3GB - $179.99
Optical: LG Blu-Ray Burner - $79.99
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 560 - $249.99
OS: Windows 7 Home Premium - $99.99
Monitor: Asus VE247H Black Edition - $179.99

Total: $1680.86

 

[benikens]

Personally if I was going to building an awesome rig, I'd start with a 80+ gold PSU and a high end mobo, my current build using corsair ax850w psu and gigabyte z68x-ud7 mobo. i5-2500k is currently the go-to gaming cpu for sure, however by early 2012 could very well be one of the new AMD chips or the cheaper SB-E model, have to wait and see. If your planning this far in advance i'd look at the things that wont change much first. So like find yourself a case you like, and a monitor that's the right size/resolution. An awesome PSU now is probably still going to be awesome in 6 months, audio system you can probably check out now to, same with like if you want a gaming mouse etc. Everything probably just sit on your hands and wait because over the course of a few months essentially there's bound to be changes in like SSD's and GPU's etc

Also a strictly gaming PC does not need 16gb RAM, most people will have 8gb and even that is probably never maxed out.

 

[g-unit1111]

Personally if I was going to building an awesome rig, I'd start with a 80+ gold PSU and a high end mobo, my current build using corsair ax850w psu and gigabyte z68x-ud7 mobo. i5-2500k is currently the go-to gaming cpu for sure, however by early 2012 could very well be one of the new AMD chips or the cheaper SB-E model, have to wait and see. If your planning this far in advance i'd look at the things that wont change much first. So like find yourself a case you like, and a monitor that's the right size/resolution. An awesome PSU now is probably still going to be awesome in 6 months, audio system you can probably check out now to, same with like if you want a gaming mouse etc. Everything probably just sit on your hands and wait because over the course of a few months essentially there's bound to be changes in like SSD's and GPU's etc

Also a strictly gaming PC does not need 16gb RAM, most people will have 8gb and even that is probably never maxed out.

True - but the price per stick of RAM is so cheap right now, why not max it out? Just sayin'!

And yeah I'd do the same thing you're talking about - I'd get at least the PSU and case for now, those things certainly aren't going to change much - maybe add built-in USB 3.0 but that's about it. If you wanted to get a seriously unique and new case, definitely check out the new Corsair Carbide series, and Cooler Master's new Cosmos II, you can see a prototype of what it's going to look like here:

http://www.maximumpc.com/article/features/dream_machine_2011_how_we_created_best_pc_ever

 

[RedJaron]

Everything probably just sit on your hands and wait because over the course of a few months essentially there's bound to be changes in like SSD's and GPU's etc

Also a strictly gaming PC does not need 16gb RAM, most people will have 8gb and even that is probably never maxed out.

Totally agree. 16GB RAM is past overkill right now, unless you really want the bragging rights. SSDs and GPU wil indeed change the most in price. And if you've got $1400+ to spend now, you can easily fit an SSD in the build. With that much money, go with a 128GB drive minimum. In six months prices might even drop enough to budget a 256GB SSD. By that time, AMD and Intel may have even released their new stuff, who knows?

G-Unit's list is a solid one. As I said, I'd halve the RAM and put that money toward an M4 128GB. And unless you REALLY need the storage, save some money on the HDD with a smaller capacity, 2TB or less. If you don't need Blu-ray, you can save another $50. With those savings you can get an even better mboard ( a Gigabyte Z68XP-UD4 or ASRock Z68 Extreme series. )