New PC Upgrade

[krayde]

Hello! First off, let me just say thank you for the awesome support and feedback i got last year when i went here, helped me big time. I really amazed that i was gonna get so much help from a forum.
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Alright! So im gonna make an upgrade in early September (FINALLY). What i have now is an old Stock Comp. 3-4years old.
This is my curren specc:

System Manufacturer: Packard bell

System Model: IMEDIA A6500 NCD

OS: Win 7 Ultimate 64

Processor: AMD Phenom(tm) 9500 Quad-Core Processor (4 CPUs), ~2.2GHz

Memory: 4096MB RAM - DDR2 (I got no clue what label and such the actual RAM is)

GPU: NVIDIA GeForce 9500 GS

Power Supply: Fractal Design Newton R2, 650W - REPLACED - http://www.inet.se/artikel/6900260/fractal-design-newton-r2-650w-modular

Case: Cooler Master Storm Scout - REPLACED - ]
Monitor: Samsung SyncMaster BX2335

Keyboard: Saitek Cyborg

Mouse: SteelSeries Ikari Optical Mouse

Motherboard: It is a motherboard from Packard Bell themselfs, some stock sh#t that came with the model of the computer
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The only things that i've replaced with my computer is Case and Power Supply.
Now, what i was hoping for you to help me with is, to find the best suitable PC for me with a budget of $1 570.


Approximate Purchase Date: Somewere in September

Budget Range: $1 570 with rebates, shipment and all that stuff excluded.

System Usage from Most to Least Important: Gaming, Genral use, surfing, folding up my movies and series and such, And then some more Gaming and General use. I use my computer several hours a day, everyday. Pro gamer

Parts Not Required: Mouse, Keyboard, Monitor. I would love if you could keep my PSU and Case if you are able too And oh, one quick question, what other use does an SSD have other then loading up windows in a flash? I Would really like to know, perhaps it could be of use to me

Preferred Website(s) for Parts: The best and cheapest Website availble for me. Any sites are preferable, aslong as they have normal price for shipping etc etc. For example, i never bought stuff from etc. Newegg or Amazon, but i take it will cost me extra since i live in Sweden, yes, no?

Country of Origin: Sorry what does this mean? Were im from? Im from Gothenburg Sweden

Parts Preferences: by brand or type (e.g.: I would like to use an AMD CPU & Biostar mobo with a 24" LCD and full tower case)

Overclocking: Maybe, i dont know how to do it.

SLI or Crossfire: Only one GPU.

Monitor Resolution: My Monitor is 1920*1080

Additional Comments: It needs to be qiet, but not too quiet either. As long as it dosnt sound like a Jet Engine im cool.


Sorry if i have forgotten anything. please let me know if i did. I tried to find more URL's for my specc but i couldnt find anything on it, guess its outdated lol. Any questions you have please ask them.

Thanks!!

 

[rvilkman]

I assume that is $1570 for parts ~ 10800 Sek so rounding it to 11000 kr.

Generally what you want is this:

CPU: i5 2500k 1795 kr
HSF(best): Noctua NH-D14 728 kr or
HSF(value): Coolmaster Hyper 212+ 239kr
Mobo: Asus P8Z68 Pro 1477 kr
Mem: Corsair Vengeace LP 2x4GB 1.5V CAS9 1600Mhz 778kr
GPU(highest): Gigabyte GTX580 4261 kr or
GPU(high): Gigabyte GTX570 3107 kr
HDD: Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB : 488kr
SSD: Intel 510 120GB 2274 kr
DVD: Samsung 24x DVD+/-RW 199kr

12000 kr with the more expensive Heatsink and GTX580
~10500 with the Expensive Heatsink and GTX570

Hopefully this helps.

The SSD is big enough to install the OS, the usual SW and a couple of the games you do play a lot.

 

[jerreddredd]

I'm confused.... do you want to re-use you Power supply and Case? how about the monitor? Samsung SyncMaster BX2335 is a nice monitor upgrading to a 24" isn't going to be a big deal

 

[krayde]

I'm confused.... do you want to re-use you Power supply and Case? how about the monitor? Samsung SyncMaster BX2335 is a nice monitor upgrading to a 24" isn't going to be a big deal

Sorry if i was a bit confusing. The thought was indeed to re-use the Power Supply and Case (maybe case, im not sure yet. I dont quite like the looks of it and i have been thinking of the: SilverStone Precision PS06). If the Power Supply is to weak for the build i want, then i will ofc get another one.
For the Monitor, Keyboard and Mouse im not looking to upgrade anytime soon.

 

[krayde]

I assume that is $1570 for parts ~ 10800 Sek so rounding it to 11000 kr.

Generally what you want is this:

CPU: i5 2500k 1795 kr
HSF(best): Noctua NH-D14 728 kr or
HSF(value): Coolmaster Hyper 212+ 239kr
Mobo: Asus P8Z68 Pro 1477 kr
Mem: Corsair Vengeace LP 2x4GB 1.5V CAS9 1600Mhz 778kr
GPU(highest): Gigabyte GTX580 4261 kr or
GPU(high): Gigabyte GTX570 3107 kr
HDD: Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB : 488kr
SSD: Intel 510 120GB 2274 kr
DVD: Samsung 24x DVD+/-RW 199kr

12000 kr with the more expensive Heatsink and GTX580
~10500 with the Expensive Heatsink and GTX570

Hopefully this helps.

The SSD is big enough to install the OS, the usual SW and a couple of the games you do play a lot.

I have a few questions here, trying not to get off-topic too much.
Could someone explain to what an SSD id good for other then having a fast boot up? What other uses does it have?

If you take a look here: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/charts/2011-gaming-graphics-charts/Enthusiast-Index,2674.html should i just get the best GPU on that chart within the budget i have, or?

And lastly, What kind of options is there for you HDD's? there is RAID0 and such, but im not quite sure how it works. I pretty sure i heard that you can put two HDD's together and make them faster but you only get half of the memory, something like that...

The 580 GPU is a bit pricey for me i think. I would be willing to pay about $471- 550 for a Graphics Card.
How good is the i5 2600k? Would i notice any big difference between that one and the i7 2600k? Would the i5 2600k be enough? (I think it defiantly would be enough but im just in case).

Thank you very much!

 

[rvilkman]

Since you overclock and you are all about games, the i7 2600k's hyper threading really doesn't help you. As games don't generally use more than 4 cores.
Thus it's not worth it.

SSD's give fast bootup and generally when you install applications on them they also give very fast level loading times for example.
Since they have read speeds up to about 550MB/s. Which is a lot more than a HDD. Thus why I listed that you should install the games you play most on the SSD.

As for the graphics card yeah that is pretty much the way you can do it.
However the GTX570 or Radeon 6970 is the best GPU on the budget you have. Possibly GTX480 if you can find one for cheap (= less than GTX570).
I recommended the Nvidia GPU's since you had one of those before. But the AMD's are just as good. GTX560Ti and Radeon 6950 are good choices as well.
But have less kick than the ones listed above.

You can of course have multiple HDD's and put them on raid 0, but if your most played games are on the SSD they will be really fast to load anyway.

Raid 0 = striping, which basically means that you need minimum of 2 HDD's and every other block will be written to one and the next one to the other.
So when you read from the raid it's twice as fast. You don't lose any space, but if one HDD dies you lose all the data.
Raid 1 = mirroring. The same data is mirrored on both disks. Reading is faster, but writing is the same as the same data is written on both disks.
For this you lose half the data capacity.

 

[krayde]

Since you overclock and you are all about games, the i7 2600k's hyper threading really doesn't help you. As games don't generally use more than 4 cores.
Thus it's not worth it.

SSD's give fast bootup and generally when you install applications on them they also give very fast level loading times for example.
Since they have read speeds up to about 550MB/s. Which is a lot more than a HDD. Thus why I listed that you should install the games you play most on the SSD.

As for the graphics card yeah that is pretty much the way you can do it.
However the GTX570 or Radeon 6970 is the best GPU on the budget you have. Possibly GTX480 if you can find one for cheap (= less than GTX570).
I recommended the Nvidia GPU's since you had one of those before. But the AMD's are just as good. GTX560Ti and Radeon 6950 are good choices as well.
But have less kick than the ones listed above.

You can of course have multiple HDD's and put them on raid 0, but if your most played games are on the SSD they will be really fast to load anyway.

Raid 0 = striping, which basically means that you need minimum of 2 HDD's and every other block will be written to one and the next one to the other.
So when you read from the raid it's twice as fast. You don't lose any space, but if one HDD dies you lose all the data.
Raid 1 = mirroring. The same data is mirrored on both disks. Reading is faster, but writing is the same as the same data is written on both disks.
For this you lose half the data capacity.

Thank you! That clarified a few things for me.
Though, i have a few questions about your build here. What made you choose the Mobo, SSD and HDD? My knowledge about about those three things are very small. What is that make them good and worthy in your build?

I am thinking of an build something like what you said, but with the Gigabyte GTX570 and the Noctua NH-D14. Would it be better to have x2 SSD's and x2 HDD's in RAID 0 on both the SSD and HDD, or just going RAID on either one of them? And I don't need a DVD, i would want a Blue Ray instead.

 

[rvilkman]

SSD choice was reliability and speed. Intel has that side covered and warranty to match.
Other options would be OCZ Agility 3, OCZ Vertex 3 and Corsair Force 3.

HDD It's just generally the most recommended HDD here on the forums and I have a couple of them as well, because of it's reliability, speed and price.

Mobo now that is something also picked from highest end worth spending money on. There are other choices around that price point and within about $40 from it. But it will give you good OC results and with the Z68 chipset will give you all the features you might want from a LGA1155 motherboard. Will also enable SLI / Crossfire in case you want that in the future. A P67 based motherboard will probably do as well so the Asus P8P67 Pro is another option for example. Save a couple of bucks.

I actually had both GTX570 and GTX580 listed as options, so yeah 570 is a good choice.

You could get even more speed by adjusting the SSD and HDD setups. But generally the SSD is fast enough on it's own so you don't really need to Raid them.
If you want to raid the HDD I would say that going with Raid 1 would be more beneficial as it is your data drive, so it would give you some extra security in case of HDD failure.
But yes for the HDD if you want speed, going with 2 HDD's in Raid 0 will make that side faster.

Well obviously you can go with a bluray instead, normally it's not really worth it, but if you have use for it go for it.
Generally for bluray playback a regular player you hook up to an HDTV works better and is cheaper as you need a SW component a well to play bluray movies.
such as PowerDVD from Cyberlink.

 

[krayde]

SSD choice was reliability and speed. Intel has that side covered and warranty to match.
Other options would be OCZ Agility 3, OCZ Vertex 3 and Corsair Force 3.

HDD It's just generally the most recommended HDD here on the forums and I have a couple of them as well, because of it's reliability, speed and price.

Mobo now that is something also picked from highest end worth spending money on. There are other choices around that price point and within about $40 from it. But it will give you good OC results and with the Z68 chipset will give you all the features you might want from a LGA1155 motherboard. Will also enable SLI / Crossfire in case you want that in the future. A P67 based motherboard will probably do as well so the Asus P8P67 Pro is another option for example. Save a couple of bucks.

I actually had both GTX570 and GTX580 listed as options, so yeah 570 is a good choice.

You could get even more speed by adjusting the SSD and HDD setups. But generally the SSD is fast enough on it's own so you don't really need to Raid them.
If you want to raid the HDD I would say that going with Raid 1 would be more beneficial as it is your data drive, so it would give you some extra security in case of HDD failure.
But yes for the HDD if you want speed, going with 2 HDD's in Raid 0 will make that side faster.

Well obviously you can go with a bluray instead, normally it's not really worth it, but if you have use for it go for it.
Generally for bluray playback a regular player you hook up to an HDTV works better and is cheaper as you need a SW component a well to play bluray movies.
such as PowerDVD from Cyberlink.

I already have x2 HDD's ~590GB each. Those came with the computer when i bought it.
What do you mean with "SW", what does it mean? What is the chances that my HDD's would fail if i had them in RAID 0? In these 3years i've had my comp. my HDD's havn't failed yet Are the chances high that they will fail if i put them in RAID 0 or? Would it be possible to put like one of the HDD's i already have as backup if i were to get 2 new HDD's in RAID 0?
Let's ignore the DVD/Bluray for now.

I am looking at the cheaper variant of the GPU you've listed and it seems to be a good one, as i said im willing to pay about $550 for a GPU.
I am also willing to pay, let's say another 70-110$ for a mobo, if its even needed - as i said, my knowledge in motherboards arnt the best so i don't know how much cash youi need to put out in order to get a good Motherboard.

I am very intrested in getting x2 new HDD's and put them in RAID 0 for speed.

 

[rvilkman]

SW = software, and it means that if you have a bluray drive for your PC it doesn't mean you can play bluray movies. You also need a software program such as the powerdvd to play those movies.

Well I've used HDD's in Raid 0 at work for non sensitive data for the past 5 years or so I've seen maybe 5-6 HDD failures in the systems, so they do occur. But then i'm sure that with a well ventilated case that won't be as much of an issue than it is with business pc's. And yes obviously if you take regular backups the risks for serious issues with any system are mitigated by a great deal.

You really don't need to pay any more for the mobo, that asus i listed is pretty much top of the line, and for your use more than enough.
The deluxe version just adds some connectivity, but nothing more.

Generally it should be simple for you to get 2 HDD's and set up the raid 0 for them.

 

[krayde]

SW = software, and it means that if you have a bluray drive for your PC it doesn't mean you can play bluray movies. You also need a software program such as the powerdvd to play those movies.

Well I've used HDD's in Raid 0 at work for non sensitive data for the past 5 years or so I've seen maybe 5-6 HDD failures in the systems, so they do occur. But then i'm sure that with a well ventilated case that won't be as much of an issue than it is with business pc's. And yes obviously if you take regular backups the risks for serious issues with any system are mitigated by a great deal.

You really don't need to pay any more for the mobo, that asus i listed is pretty much top of the line, and for your use more than enough.
The deluxe version just adds some connectivity, but nothing more.

Generally it should be simple for you to get 2 HDD's and set up the raid 0 for them.

Alright. What HDD's would you prefer to use as a RAID 0 setup?

 

[rvilkman]

2 of the ones I listed (Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB) should work fine.

 

[krayde]

Thanks! This will help me a great deal when i will upgrade.