gaming build guidelines

[muddywarrior]

Hi guys, just a general query, I'm not building anything at the moment.

My question is, should I allocate more money to the graphics card and keep the other components cheap? How much will it affect my fps? For a $1500 purely gaming build, is it not better to buy a $1000 graphics card and keep $500 for the rest of the system instead of trying to make a more 'balanced' pc? (haven't done the numbers, just approximating)

If I can replace an
ssd,
overclockable i5,
2400MHz ram and a
z97 mobo

with an
hdd,
i3,
1333MHz ram and an
h81 mobo,

I lose a few fps and suffer longer loading times, but I save enough to upgrade from a gtx 970 to a gtx 980ti / fury x. (+20 fps). I realize I would give up the ability to Xfire/ SLI, but that would save me even more moneys on a lower wattage PSU.

Would that not give me better performance? I only use the computer for gaming, internet surfing and streaming movies to the tv.
Discussions welcome.
Cheers

 

[Ryarwood99]

I think an i3 will bottleneck a 980ti and 1600 is the standard/minimum for RAM. I would lower the RAM speed first, then get rid of the the SSD, then change CPU and MoBo, as long as its 1150. That's if I had to choose the order but if you have $1500 you'll have plenty of room for all of that

 

[Gam3r01]

Prioritizing graphics cards is usually best for gaming, however that would be taking it too far.
There comes a point when your hardware wont be able to keep up with the rest of the system, creating a bottleneck.

1500 bucks is an easy budget to work with however, you shouldnt need to cut corners.