First time build, opinion on this 950$ build

[elysio]

Approximate Purchase Date: next winter

Budget Range: 950 before tax

System Usage from Most to Least Important: gaming. only purpose.( playing Lol, RTS games , minecraft, etc)
Parts Not Required: none(completly new build from scratch)

Preferred Website(s) for Parts: newegg.ca

Country of Origin: Canada

Parts Preferences: by brand or type AMD graphics and intel CPU

Overclocking: Maybe

SLI or Crossfire:Maybe

Monitor Resolution: 1920x1080

Additional Comments: Is the power supply overkill?

List of parts and links:

CPU: intel i5 2500 http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115073
display: HANNspree HF225DPB 21,5"1080p http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824262011
GPU: XFX HD-685X-ZNDC radeon HD 6850 1gb http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150516
motherboard: BIOSTAR H61MU3 http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813138311
RAM: Patriot 4GB 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820220544
HDD: Seagate Barracuda ST3500413AS 500GB http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148701
DVD:ASUS 24x OEM http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827135204
case: Thermaltake V3 Black edition http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811133094
PSU: Antec EarthWatts EA650 650W http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Produc....ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16823233002
mouse: GIGABYTE GM-M5050 http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826146011
wireless adapter: Edimax EW-7811Un http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833315091


price includes individual shipping

Price : 888$

Please tell is you know of any compatibility issues with this build.

 

[Outlander_04]

Pay a little extra for the 2500K which can overclock

Save a little money by installing 4 gig of RAM, which is more than enough for gaming , but make it better quality 1600MHz CL8 1.5 volt

The Samsung F3 500 gig hard drive is a little faster

 

[elysio]

Pay a little extra for the 2500K which can overclock

Save a little money by installing 4 gig of RAM, which is more than enough for gaming , but make it better quality 1600MHz CL8 1.5 volt

The Samsung F3 500 gig hard drive is a little faster

I don't need to overclock, I read somewhere that the difference between 1333 and 1600 mhz ram is like, one per cent.

But thanks for the opinion on the ram

 

[qamrul]

Don't forget about the cost of the OS. A copy of Win 7 goes about 100 bucks. Also, if you don't plan on overclocking, you don't need a P67 board. You can save some money by getting an H67 or H61 board instead.

 

[elysio]

Don't forget about the cost of the OS. A copy of Win 7 goes about 100 bucks. Also, if you don't plan on overclocking, you don't need a P67 board. You can save some money by getting an H67 or H61 board instead.

I already have the OS. Just to make sure I don't need to overclock, can this system play the following games:

Mount & blade: warband
minecraft
age of empires 3
rise of nations
civ. 5
sims 3, maybe..
league of legends
napoleon total war
shogun 2 total war (and future total war games)
other RTS games

 

[Onus]

Multiple thoughts...
Planning a build for next winter is a very dicey proposition. A lot can change in six months, from the price and availability of individual parts and the effects of new hardware (e.g. Bulldozer; regardless of performance, it will certainly affect the going prices of other parts) to possible effects of the global economic situation on prices and availability in general.
Assuming you instead were deciding to build within the month:
Your selected parts will build a decent rig; I'm sure one that can handle all of those games, BUT...take a look at specific benchmarks. For example, Civ. V dramatically favors nVidia cards, so much so that in Anandtech's benchmarks, a 768GB GTX460 beats the HD6970: http://www.anandtech.com/bench/GPU11/203 by a visible amount. Do you want to base your GPU purchase on an outlier like that? Almost certainly not, but it is definitely the kind of thing you should consider. Do you care about PhysX? That's another vote for nVidia; but are you going to start bitcoin farming? HardOCP found that ATi cards blow nVidia cards out of the water: http://www.hardocp.com/article/2011/07/13/bitcoin_mining_gpu_performance_comparison/2
"Future-proof" is a myth; "future-resistant" is more realistic, and a 650W PSU for a single GPU certainly qualifies, as it offers enough extra capacity to allow for any number of possible upgrades. If, however, you'd rather lower up-front cost, a 550W PSU (of similar quality) would be sufficient, and the price difference would let you get the stronger HD6870 GPU.
The Patriot memory you've selected has two problems. First, it's a single stick. You want a 2-stick kit so you can run in dual-channel mode. Second, it wants 1.7V, which is higher than the 1.65V maximum Intel specification. Try to run it at 1.7V, especially on a cheaper mobo, and you may stress something a little too much. Back it down to 1.65V (or 1.5V), and you'll probably have to loosen the timings. In your place, I'd look for a 2x2GB (or 2x4GB) kit that runs on 1.5V or even less.
For gaming, you may find a cheap keyboard inadequate, such as possibly having problems registering multiple keystrokes or similar rollover issues. I'm not saying you need to spend $150 on a keyboard, but $50-$60 may be more realistic for something nicer. Same with the mouse. Real cheap ones are fine for office and general use, but for gaming I'll bet you'd be a lot happier with something like a Logitech M500: http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826104328 I find the tilt wheel particularly nice in games, and the laser tracking will be a lot more accurate and less prone to jumpiness.

 

[elysio]

Multiple thoughts...
Planning a build for next winter is a very dicey proposition. A lot can change in six months, from the price and availability of individual parts and the effects of new hardware (e.g. Bulldozer; regardless of performance, it will certainly affect the going prices of other parts) to possible effects of the global economic situation on prices and availability in general.
Assuming you instead were deciding to build within the month:
Your selected parts will build a decent rig; I'm sure one that can handle all of those games, BUT...take a look at specific benchmarks. For example, Civ. V dramatically favors nVidia cards, so much so that in Anandtech's benchmarks, a 768GB GTX460 beats the HD6970: http://www.anandtech.com/bench/GPU11/203 by a visible amount. Do you want to base your GPU purchase on an outlier like that? Almost certainly not, but it is definitely the kind of thing you should consider. Do you care about PhysX? That's another vote for nVidia; but are you going to start bitcoin farming? HardOCP found that ATi cards blow nVidia cards out of the water: http://www.hardocp.com/article/2011/07/13/bitcoin_mining_gpu_performance_comparison/2
"Future-proof" is a myth; "future-resistant" is more realistic, and a 650W PSU for a single GPU certainly qualifies, as it offers enough extra capacity to allow for any number of possible upgrades. If, however, you'd rather lower up-front cost, a 550W PSU (of similar quality) would be sufficient, and the price difference would let you get the stronger HD6870 GPU.
The Patriot memory you've selected has two problems. First, it's a single stick. You want a 2-stick kit so you can run in dual-channel mode. Second, it wants 1.7V, which is higher than the 1.65V maximum Intel specification. Try to run it at 1.7V, especially on a cheaper mobo, and you may stress something a little too much. Back it down to 1.65V (or 1.5V), and you'll probably have to loosen the timings. In your place, I'd look for a 2x2GB (or 2x4GB) kit that runs on 1.5V or even less.
For gaming, you may find a cheap keyboard inadequate, such as possibly having problems registering multiple keystrokes or similar rollover issues. I'm not saying you need to spend $150 on a keyboard, but $50-$60 may be more realistic for something nicer. Same with the mouse. Real cheap ones are fine for office and general use, but for gaming I'll bet you'd be a lot happier with something like a Logitech M500: http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826104328 I find the tilt wheel particularly nice in games, and the laser tracking will be a lot more accurate and less prone to jumpiness.

Thanks for all your advice. However, I have no idea what PhysX is...care to explain please? Also, I won't play Civ. 5 that much, maybe a few times a week, no more so I'll stick with AMD si the performance isn't that bad.

 

[Onus]

PhysX is a nVidia-proprietary method for processing particle effects and other physics phenomena on the GPU instead of the CPU. Very few games use it, but it does add some nice effects. Even though I like it (e.g. in Sacred 2, one of my games), it is certainly not a dealbreaker. There are some initiatives out there to create open-source tools for doing this on anyojne's GPU, but none of them have gained any traction yet with developers.