Hardware Building first gaming PC, could use help

[injected11]

Anyone have any experience with this motherboard? It sounds pretty good, but again fewer reviews than I'd hope for. Hoping I can find a cyber monday deal on it somewhere.
www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131820

Also, in regard to hard drives, does Western Digital have better build quality than Seagate? I'm looking at this drive atm.
www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136772

If I can find it discounted, I'm looking at buying this optical drive. Looks pretty solid and does everything I'd want. If anyone has any experience with it, lemme know!
www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106381

It's all coming together now... I'm starting to get a nerd boner. You guys have been tons of help so far, and I really appreciate it.

 

[Sicklyboy]

That HDD and BD drive ought to be fine. Lite-On drives tend to be good drives (in my experience) (and they are the go-to drive, granted only very specific models and specific revisions, at that, for burning XGD3 backups for the 360).

I've had more ST drives fail on me than WD drives, (4 to 1, respectively) but two of the ST ones may very well be my fault. I have been using a ST portable drive quite heavily for Wii backups, however, and I do not have a single complaint about it. I think that WD you linked would be a fine choice (and it kills me to see these things getting so cheap for that capacity and not having the money to buy them yet (my server, and my desktop, are hungry for a few 2 or 3 TB drives))

Edit - as far as the mobo, I'm not going to comment on it. I don't follow motherboards or processors until I actually need to.

 

[Originality]

I used to believe that SeaGate (ever since they acquired Maxtor) had the worst build quality of all HDD MFRs. However in the last year, several trusted review sites now swear by them as the best for 2TB+ sizes. Even then, I still wouldn't discount WD drives since they've been pretty much the standard for what a HDD should be like for ages, and only Samsung were better in terms of value (performance against price).

That motherboard is good, although you're starting to get close to the price point of the ASUS Maximus V Gene, which is one of the best motherboards.

Getting a BD drive is a matter of personal need. I personally never use one since I've got my PS3 to play BD movies and enough drives to store data (including 1TB external) that BDs are unneccessary. What do you need to burn BDs for?

 

[Sicklyboy]

[...]What do you need to burn BDs for?

I'm sure many people said the same thing when DVDs were becoming main stream and CDs were the standard. Frankly, it's just to give yourself the option should you need to in the future. BD disks hold a lot of data, obviously not as much as some flash drives and it pales in comparison to an external hard drive, but when I get a BD drive for my PC it will be a burner as well. Just to give myself that option.

 

[Originality]

I'm sure many people said the same thing when DVDs were becoming main stream and CDs were the standard. Frankly, it's just to give yourself the option should you need to in the future. BD disks hold a lot of data, obviously not as much as some flash drives and it pales in comparison to an external hard drive, but when I get a BD drive for my PC it will be a burner as well. Just to give myself that option.

Fair enough. I personally will hold back from buying one until I need one. It'll be cheaper by then too.

 

[Sicklyboy]

[...]It'll be cheaper by then too.

Their cost is definitely a prohibitive factor when it comes to buying one. I've been looking at them for over a year now and the price hasn't budged a cent.

I don't have much of a need for a BD drive at all. I get my movies by various other means, most of which are non-disk based, but for those BD ones I do currently own, I do have my PS3. One thing I noticed though on my PS3, still sitting on FW 3.74, BD movies look unbelievably grainy. Not sure if that's an issue with the PS3 itself, its FW (fixed in a newer one?), but I am pretty sure it's not the movie because I've tried 6 or so movies and they all look the same.

 

[injected11]

Sounds good. I'll be sticking with Western Digital for HDD then. Now that you mention it, I doubt I'll ever need a blu-ray burner. Gonna scrap that and look for a blu-ray reader/dvd+cd burner since they looked around $20 cheaper, and I'm having a hard time remembering the last time I used an optical drive at all, and I have a 2TB external HDD already. Gonna start looking into that higher-end motherboard, but I found the linked one for about $30 cheaper elsewhere, so that's probably the final nail. Thank you both. Very helpful to see people who know what they're talking about talk these parts out.

 

[Originality]

Plasma, ever thought it might be your TV?

 

[Sicklyboy]

Not if videos played over hdmi from my pc, routed through the same stereo receiver look perfect on the same tv.

 

[Originality]

Not if videos played over hdmi from my pc, routed through the same stereo receiver look perfect on the same tv.

Strange then... my PS3 (slim) outputs perfectly on a 42" HDTV. It's only the laptop (using Intel GMA HD 4500) that gets grainy, using the same HDMI cable/port.

 

[Sicklyboy]

I've got a feeling it's the old firmware. I hear mixed reviews that point to it being a possibility.

 

[Originality]

Older than 3.55?

 

[Celice]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817116018

If you are still searching for a PSU deal, r/bapcsales seems to like this one. Well, for 10 comments to like it Reviews seem to be good for the unit too, especially at this price of $30 after rebate AND free two-day shipping.

 

[injected11]

So my dad offered up his old PC as a sacrifice so I can mess around inside a PC before I start building mine. I found old 1GB x 2 RAM sticks inside. I'm using 4GB x 2 sticks in my build, would it make any difference if I added the 1GB x 2 sticks to it, or is it pretty much negligible at this point?

 

[Rydian]

Anything beyond 8 isn't noticeable for the average user.

 

[DCG]

Their cost is definitely a prohibitive factor when it comes to buying one. I've been looking at them for over a year now and the price hasn't budged a cent.

I don't have much of a need for a BD drive at all. I get my movies by various other means, most of which are non-disk based, but for those BD ones I do currently own, I do have my PS3. One thing I noticed though on my PS3, still sitting on FW 3.74, BD movies look unbelievably grainy. Not sure if that's an issue with the PS3 itself, its FW (fixed in a newer one?), but I am pretty sure it's not the movie because I've tried 6 or so movies and they all look the same.

The grain is comming from the source, the movie itself....
I've asked it somewhere (I believe some movie tread on another tech site).
Because the movies have a high resolution grain is also passed trough a lot clearer... That's why I play animated movies (that I mostly rent for that cause), they should be without grain because they are 100% digital
(at least that's the theory).

Cables can also cause some problems.... I've had a 15,- euro one which failed after 4 months.
Replaced it with a 20,- euro one and haven't had any problem since :/

 

[Originality]

And I've been using £2 HDMI cables for years without any problems. No grain.

 

[Celice]

So my dad offered up his old PC as a sacrifice so I can mess around inside a PC before I start building mine. I found old 1GB x 2 RAM sticks inside. I'm using 4GB x 2 sticks in my build, would it make any difference if I added the 1GB x 2 sticks to it, or is it pretty much negligible at this point?

Aren't there different types of memory? I don't know or think DDR3 boards support DDR2 memory, so if these sticks aren't the same in that regard, they are kinda mum :/

 

[Originality]

Motherboards that support DDR2 and 3 do exist, however it's always either-or. You can't mix the two at the same time.

 

[injected11]

I'm finally about to assemble the computer. I was reading through the steps again, and came to the part regarding first boot, and it keeps referring to a monitor. I skipped buying a monitor to save some money and because I intended to use an HDMI cable to connect it to my television instead. Will a TV work properly and allow me to adjust the BIOS for the first boot? Or should I borrow my brother's monitor for a little bit?