Buying Computer, Need Advise Please

[lations]

hey guys, i'm a total newb and i cannot build computer (skill or time wise). i plan on buying the following system and would love to hear any suggestions or criticism on what im doing here and its price. i plan on using it mainly to game, encode/decode/compress video, and pretty much everything that doesnt include video editing and really extreme tasks.

CoolerMaster ATCS 840 Black Pearl Full Tower Case
CoolerMaster 850 watts real power pro
i7-920 2.66 ghz
CoolerMaster V10 Gaming CPU Cooling Fan w/ Hybrid Tec Cooling
Asus P6T intel X58
12 GB 1600 MHz Memory
2x Geforce GTX295
256 GB (128GBx2) Ritek RiDATA MLC Solid State Disk
3 TB (1.5x2) data hard drive
Pioneer 8x blu ray disk rewriter
LG 20X double layer dvd super allright
creative X-FI XtremeGamer 24-BIT Sound Card

Price: 3800

* some of these components are really the only option cyberpower has (like the cooling is best it has i think)
is it worth it to go for i7-940 for $300 more? (i dont think i will/can overclock)

 

[Kraynor]

An SSD? Really? Come on no standard desktop user, not even a hardcore gamer, NEEDS an SSD, they're a massive moneysink. Want the reduced loading times? Turn on your computer, go make a coffee, it'll be fully loaded by the time you get back.

Also, I'm pretty sure you can get blu-ray rewriters that are also DL-DVD reader so I don't really see the need for 2 drives unless you want to do direct disc-to-disc copying. Also, do you need a BR-rewriter? Seems like needless expense that you could easily do without (HDMI cable to a TV? Any BR player is going to be hooked to a HDTV, which more than likely has a HDMI port, or a DVI port, just buy a long cable from your PC). If you need the storage space, just get an external hard drive. At least that's more reliable than optical media.

I could rip holes in more parts of your system but it's late and I'm tired so I'll summarise...

Nice case
PSU maybe a touch on the low side with everything you've listed (read quad-GPU setup)
Fine CPU
V10's not that amazing, and much too large (it might be resting on your RAM) which would cause vibrations and nasty fitting, get a Xigmatek S1283 or see http://www.frostytech.com for more recommendations (and don't forget the good thermal paste!)
Motherboard seems ok, I prefer Gigabyte myself but that's just personal preference, not that familiar with the P6T
RAM, 12gb looks like a lot but I've got 8gb so you get a tip of the hat for overkill, always fun. Give us a brand though, some is better than others.
Graphics... wow, you're not video editing or doing other really extreme tasks (which, I'm assuming, include high-definition 3d rendering), but you need a quad-GPU setup? There's not even that many games that'll take full advantage of that much power...
SSDs, I've covered them already
HDDs, 3TB? I see why, lots of space is always good, but I personally prefer more smaller drives than few big ones, if one fails you lose less (hell, with lotsa little drives you can have multiple RAID 1s going on for lots of redundancy). What drives are they?
BR-RW, up top.
DVD-RW, up top... kinda... I like LGs drives, have one myself, bit noisy though (well, mine is, don't think it's a DL-DVD reader though...
Sound card, to be honest I've never been a fan of the really high end Creative cards. They're very good, but unless you're an audiophile you'd be fine and happy with one of their cheaper options, like the X-Fi PCI-E XtremeAudio.

Price: Way too much for my liking, even with all those over the top parts.


End note: OHHHHH I see what you did! I went over to CyberPower's site and looked at their configuration page, and you just went in there and picked basically the most expensive part for pretty much every single option because, of course, the most expensive is the best! (Here's a hint, it isn't always the way)

 

[lations]

yeah you pretty much pegged what i did man. my thing is that the setups i did for like 5-6 hundred less looked much weaker, so if i spend 3K for something looking worse, why not just throw the last 6 hundred at it and get top of the line?
i really appreciate the advice, so you would go more for:
2 GPU setup (like one gtx 295)
a velociraptor and 1TB drive space (with external hard drives as needed)
cheaper sound card, and drop the BR drive
that seem more reasonable??
one quick side question: what exactly is high def. 3d rendering?

 

[gkay09]

Well check this config...

CPU+ CASE combo
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.165528

RAM - 6GB is really enuf...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231247

MOBO- P6t Deluxe
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131365

WD BLack 2X1TB in RAID 0 (will perform as comparable to a single Velociraptor and gives 2TB disk space)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136284

GTX295 X 2
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130449

PSU
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139007

CPU cooling
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835702007

Grand Total comes to $2492
And this will be as powerful as the one u have listed...
(Mayb except for the SSD though )

 

[gkay09]

And u can ask any gud Technician to assemble those for u and u will be saving a lot of money...

 

[gkay09]

But if u are completely new to building PC then u can get it from the Cyber power itself and take advantage of their warranty and customer support...

 

[lations]

i like that quite a bit...where would i go about finding a good technician? are there people you can hire for this cheaply?
also, you say 2 1TB drives in raid 0 will go as fast as velociraptor...would that be true of any 7200 hard drive, or does brand matter?
Thanks guys

 

[gkay09]

Well yes the newer HDD (especially the WD black ones) perform very well...

It was not the case with the old HDD and the old raptor...the raptor had a significant performance advantage...

But the newer HDD are bigger and are becoming more efficient and powerful...
So the current HDD lineups are catching up...

So for example u will only notice difference in the game/level load times...say about 5 to 8 seconds difference...between the velocirator and the RAID 0 WD BLack...

But looking at ur requirements and ur experience with the computer assembling, I would suggest u go with the Cyber power...but don waste money on SSD for now...
So take my computer parts suggestions as reference and choose the components there in the system configurator...
The extra money u pay will cover for the customer support and the warranty...

 

[lations]

awsome, you guys are gonna save me over a grand for sure...cannt thank you enough for all the help

 

[IzzyCraft]

1tb raid 0 set up isn't that asking for data loss?

 

[Kraynor]

Here's what ya do, 4 1TB drives, RAID 5. Not the best performance but at least you've got some reduncancy.

 

[tobensg]

Nice to have that much free cash to spend on a new rig. Or maybe chains are being pulled?? I'll just make do with my old rig build by Cray Inc.

 

[lations]

no, chains arent being pulled but i dont want to just throw the money away. so what are the odds of a drive going down...i'm a bit of a gambler and i am willing to go with raid 0 if the odds are like 15%. also cyberpower only has the option of up to 2 drives in raid and then 2 separate hard drives (up to 1.5 TB apiece)...if it were up to me i'd just get a bunch of hard drives and do raid 10 or something