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HaGGardSmurf

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A friend of mine wants to build an intel PC, or rather wants to build a very powerful PC for under $1500 he doesnt know if he should go intel or AMD, basically whichever will be the better more powerful build.

Which I expect to be the Intel build. Now I know what to look for in terms of an AMD build, amd CPU's are pretty straight forward. Now once you have the CPU, you can narrow your motherboard results down pretty good. Most DDR3 RAM now a days seems like its very good quality (the mainstream brands anyways) and I know intel's benefit more so from higher frequency's as opposed to tight timings.

I know what HDD, and SSD's to look for, PSU is pretty straight forward, modular, verify the connections and that it will be able to power everything and look for 80+ silver or better.

Graphics card is kind of up in the air right now, again I am an AMD fanboy I guess so I know MUCH more about the ATI cards than I do nVidia. So I'd probably have him go 6970 or 6950 (or 6970) depending on how much money is left in the budget. What are the comparable nVidia cards to that? The gtx 570? The 590 is a dual GPU card I think?

Thanks.

PS, I know this is kind of a long post, but basically I'd like to know what to pick as a intel CPU, and why. Sandy bridge, or not? i5 or i7? What to look for in terms of motherboard chipset's, and memory controllers? also what nVidia card would be comparable to the ATI ones listed.
 
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k1114


560=6870
560ti=6950

Sandy bridge is the latest and greatest and the forum is still flooded with many sb builds, idk how you missed that. The recall was fixed back in march, no old mobos with the issue are being sold. I'd recommend a i5-2500k and a p67 or z68 mobo. Probably a board with 8x/8x for sli/cf. 1600mhz ram is the best...
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Proximon

Proximon

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All you have actually said is that your friend wants a "powerful PC." That's not really enough information. We need to know what he will use it for.

If it's mostly gaming, the CPU is the second consideration after the GPU, not the other way around.
 
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HaGGardSmurf

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Gaming PC.

Looks like it'll be a 560 or 6950 as far as the GPU goes. Now what would you guys recommend for a CPU + motherboard?

The thing's i'm confused about is the sandy bridge is kind of a step backwards isnt it? I've seen lots of people building PC's and avoiding sandy bridge. Also, I remember there being some kind of huge issue with sandy bridge and certain chip sets? There was some kind of recall I believe?

For RAM I'll probably go for G.Skill 1600 mhz 1.5v lowest timings I can find.
HDD will be WD black
SSD will likely be OCZ Vertex 3
PSU will be decided after I can figure out what motherboard and cpu to get.
Case will be decided later after everything is picked out.

@dexter, I'm almost certain he wants it here and now (about a week from now we'll probably sit down and order everything.)
 
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dalmvern

dalmvern

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No, for now Sandy Bridge is top of the line. There are, however, two "generations" of the Sandy Bridge, 1156 socket (old generation i5-760) and 1155 socket (new generation i5-2500k.) Obviously the 1155 socket is faster, and newer tech.

If you see people holding off on building computers it is because the AMD Bulldozer should be out in the next month or two and Intel's new chipset, the Ivy Bridge is projected for Early 2012 if I remember correctly.
 
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k1114

k1114

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560=6870
560ti=6950

Sandy bridge is the latest and greatest and the forum is still flooded with many sb builds, idk how you missed that. The recall was fixed back in march, no old mobos with the issue are being sold. I'd recommend a i5-2500k and a p67 or z68 mobo. Probably a board with 8x/8x for sli/cf. 1600mhz ram is the best bang/buck.



There is only one generation of sandy bridge, 2 generations of cpus with the core i moniker (intel's naming has never made much sense). 1156 is nehalem, 1155 is SB, these refer to the architecture's codename while core i is a marketing brand name. (Like amd's llano is stars architecture.)
 
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k1114

k1114

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The difference is $10 from the 2500 to the 2500k. And imo is worth the extra $10 to extend the "effective" lifespan as OC is really easy on SB (or just use the auto OC that pretty much every mobo has). But if he's one of those people who just buys a complete new system every couple of years then it's ok I guess. It would help if I knew the rest of the parts, have you sat down with him yet? Telling us the parts before you buy is probably beneficial.
 
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HaGGardSmurf

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Nope havent really sat down.

Yea, your right, the difference is $10 I must have been looking at the 2600k vs the 2500 or something because I could have sworn the price was about $60 difference.

The parts I am pretty certain about are:
CPU: 2500k
Motherboard: ? (Havent picked one out yet, now that I know the CPU, I'll be looking around)
Video Card: GTX 560ti or HD 6950
Ram: G.Skill DDR3 1600 mhz (probably 8GB anything more is overkill for him, hes no video editor or anything that requires lots of ram)
HDD: WD black 1 TB (Or possibly a 2 500gb WD black raid 0 array. See what he thinks. The SSD may be more than enough for what he needs.) The only other possibility is seagate barracuda's I'll look at the prices right now.
SSD: OCZ Vertex 3
PSU: ? (I'll pick one after the mobo, looking for compatibility with mobo, high efficiency 80+ silver or higher, good warranty, decent power output, and modular.)
Case: Not sure, thats up to him since its mostly about looks. I'll make sure he picks one with good airflow and room for upgrades.
Optical Drives: Probably a blu ray combo drive, but we will see what money is left in the budget.
CPU Cooler: Stock for now, but possibly a hyper 212+ depending on money left over. I am a huge fan of keeping things cool, but I'll leave this one up to him, and the budget. Since he wont be OC'ing and if he wants to he can buy a cooler when the time comes. (However if he is set on a case that doesnt have the best airflow I may pressure him into an aftermarket cooler to help keep things cool.)
 
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madchemist83

madchemist83

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Any RAM with same specs will do. make u sure u take in account height of RAM modules as they interfere with cooler u planning on dropping in later(also I think it would be better to get it right away and mount it on the mobo, and don't disassemble ur PC in couple week just to put cooler in)

There is another option for HDD -Samsung F3

Why OCZ .. they just picked up the pace .. imo u should go with either crusial m4 or intel 320

For PSU I would suggest look into brands like FSP, Seasonic. Also other brands producing pretty good PSU lately, might wanna check reviews( and not newegg ones) before buying one.

Case - Antec 300 or HAF series ... best cooling for the money

 
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HaGGardSmurf

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What would you suggest for a motherboard? I'd prefer to go with Asus over any other brand. I know Asus is one of the best brands as far as AMD, I think gigabyte is one of the best as far as intel, but I'm not certain...

Anyhow the biggest thing at this point is the motherboard. I dont know what to look for.

Everything else is basically just the spec I am looking for. So when the time comes I will be shopping around looking for components with close spec's or better for as cheap as I can find. The main thing's are the CPU (figured that out) and the motherboard.

Also, for a hard drive, what is the difference between

Seagate 1TB Barracuda 7200.12 32MB Cache
and
Western Digital 1TB Caviar Black 64MB Cache

The cache is the only thing I can tell, and how much of a difference will that make? Is it worth an extra $30? I'm thinking of going with 2 500 GB Seagate Barracuda's in raid 0 which is the same price as the Western Digital drive, but should be about double the speed (But again dont know about the Cache size, the 500GB versions are 16MB cache, does that add to 32 or does it even matter with the 'double speed'?). I could even go with 2 of the 1TB Barracuda's for $24 more than the Western Digital.
 
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k1114

k1114

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Well mobo and psu would depend on if you want to sli/cf later or not. But the asrock z68 extreme3 gen 3 is pretty cheap and has a decent amount of features. Asrock is part of asustek. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157271 750w psu if you want to sli/cf, compatibility isn't really an issue. 80+ silver and modular are luxuries/not necessary, although searching came up with only a $30 difference just looking at good quality psus of course. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817207016 This XFX is made by seasonic so is good. Review: http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/XFX-PRO-750-W-Power-Supply-Review/1182

For ram, just get the cheapest 2x4gb 1600 1.5v you can find. For gpu I would suggest a dual fan card, cooler is better. Antec 300 and haf 912 are good low price cases. The 300 illusion usually goes on sale for $55 every so often. HDD cache doesn't make much difference. What size ssd were you going to get? 60gb is enough for a boot drive and to save some money til the price comes down for a larger capacity.
 
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HaGGardSmurf

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SSD size is going to be 60GB mainly for a boot drive, and a few large app's that clearly show a benefit from a SSD, like photoshop etc..

GFX card will likely be the ASUS Direct CU II version of the 6950 or the 560ti one of the two.

RAM, will be selected the day we buy everything depending on prices. Basically just like what you said.

As for PSU, I'll need to see what he think's for the output. See if he wants to SLI or Xfire later. I'll probably try to get him to go for a 750 watt or higher just so he has options for upgrading down the road.
 
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