Gaming Building a new PC- Intel Quad i5

[granville]

I've been rather unhappy with my Dell computer lately. Specs are rather basic-
System- Dell Inspiron 456MT (desktop)
CPU- AMD Athlon II x2 250 @3ghz
Memory- 2GB DDR2
Video Card- Radeon 4350 512MB

I've learned that it's not sufficient for what i need. I want something more powerful and i want something i can disassemble and reassemble with a fair amount of ease, reusing old parts if i can. I had to buy my Dell due to receiving a specific gift from that company and not having much room to spend decent money on it. Now my financial issues are gone and i can branch out a bit (to a degree). I've decided to start from scratch and this time build my own PC. I've allowed myself about $950 to spend on a computer. I already have accessories and a monitor, so i'm just going for the PC.

I've decided to god for a quad core, something i can overclock rather high too. I intend to do some rather high resolution gaming (720p or above). I hope to be able to play some of the latest games at decent framerates using fairly high graphical settings. I'd consider 25fps or above good enough for normal games. I'm also into emulation, and apparently both PCSX2 and Dolphin can up the internal resolution to play their games in true HD. I also intend to do some video encoding and rendering, so a quad core would be very agile at that. Suffice to say, i have uses for the quad, so i'm going with it.

Now for the parts themselves. I'm pretty set on what i've picked out, i've put in a good amount of thought about what parts i want. Here's what i have for my build-

CPU- Intel Core i5-750 Lynnfield 2.66GHz (WILL overclock this as high as possible)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16819115215
Motherboard- MSI P55-GD65 LGA 1156 Intel P55 ATX
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16813130239
Memory- G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16820231277
GPU- XFX Radeon HD 5770 1GB 128-bit GDDR5
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16814150447
PSU- CORSAIR HX Series 650W ATX12V Modular-
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16817139012
Heatsink/CPU Cooler- COOLER MASTER Hyper 212 Plus
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16835103065
Case- Rosewill CHALLENGER Black ATX mid tower
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16811147153
Optical Drive- OEM Lite-On DVD burner combo drive
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16827106289
Hard Drive- SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16822152185

I've also added some Arctic Silver thermal compound to the cart, as well as a DVI-to-VGA adapter since the GPU doesn't support VGA monitors (i'm using an older monitor for the moment, i'll probably hook it up to a HDTV eventually).

Anyways, i splurged on the PSU (don't laugh antoligy) and the heatsink. I intend to overclock my components, especially the CPU. I've heard Core i5's are excellent overclockers and you can easily get up to 4ghz on just air cooling stable. The GPU is not the strongest, but i'm not going to kill my budget for a fancier one. I intend on overclocking it if possible as well.

So thoughts, advice, suggestions, whatever are welcome. I've got a baseline budget to keep with though. I'm hoping to stay inside it. I might make a $10-$30 allowance though if i absolutely NEED something else or i have to upgrade to a better part... Thanks in advance.

 

[Madridi]

Well, it looks like you have done your research. The parts in general look good.

However, I would recommend considering these:

Cooler: The V6 is apparently good, but not good enough for that price. Instead, go with the hyper 212+. It's a great budget cooler with impressive results. Dont get it from newegg though as they have it for $50.
http://www.amazon.com/Cooler-Master-RR-B10...1182&sr=8-1

Case: The case is most likely your personal preference, but since you want to overclock your CPU, you would want to get a high airflow case such as the HAF 922 case .. It will cost you about $90 though .. then again its your choice

Motherboard: I think this is good, but for that price I'll look around for something better and get back to you

Good luck with everything

 

[granville]

Thanks! I had chosen the case because it seems very well ventilated and has three fans. I thought that would be enough. $90 is not something i want to spend on just a case though. As for the cooler, i had previously had the Hyper 212+ on my list of parts, but was told by someone at an emulator forum that i should get the V6 instead. I was told it was barely any better than the stock heatsink that comes with the CPU and that using it to overclock would not be sufficient.

I'd love to spend less on it, but i do intend to overclock and don't want to overheat anything. Is this the right one? http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16835103065

If you're sure i could potentially push the i5 up to 4ghz on that air cooler, i'd go for it.

 

[Madridi]

Here are a few suggestions for the motherboard:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16813128425
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16813131620
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16813131621
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...82E16813131620R
plus the one you already picked

Oh and for the ram, for some reason I missed the link you posted. You are way better off with this RAM:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16820226103
Higher speed, better cas latency, all for $10 more

 

[Minox]

I'm just gonna comment on the PSU.

While the Corsair CMPSU-650TX may be cheaper it will also bring along one hell of a cable mess. A cable mess that you somehow have to fit into the chassi. I've fiddled around with said PSU myself and it's far from ideal unless you really really have to stick to a certain price class.

Instead I'd recommend getting the modular variant of it despite it being $30 more than the other variant. In the short run it may not seem like there's going to be a difference but if you have to mess around inside the chassi ever so often it will soon prove to be a good purchase since you only have to plug in the cables you actually need to have plugged in instead of having unused cables lying around. Less cables = better air flow = cooler components. Not to mention that it looks a lot better with less cables hanging around.

Corsair CMPSU-650HX

 

[Madridi]

@granville
I dont really know anything about this case, but it seems to me that you already researched it so go for it

The hyper 212+ barely has any difference over the stock heatsink? Well that person does not know what he's talking about really. In fact, the only reason the price is so high at newegg is because they demand for it is very high. Yes it can potentially overclock to 4GHz (depends on the chip you have though, some chips clock better than the others), but most likely your temps will be around 70 degrees (which is fine). Getting the V6 will get you better temps, but not that much better, and for that price you are better off with a high end cooler such as the megahalems. You can find the megahalems for about $65, and its probably the 3rd best cooler in the market right now.
The V6 just looks cool nothing more, its still better then their previous cooler the V8 (which I got, and I'm stuck with), but again, for that price .. just no..

@Minox_IX
I'm with you on the whole modular vs non modular, but it will cost signifantly more. So I'm not sure he'll go for it just because of the cable mess as a main reason


Edit: yes granville that's the right one. But very overpriced at newegg .. get it from amazon. Or even better, if you have a microcenter near where you are at, get it from there ($20 .. but that was about a month ago, I'm not sure if its still the same price there)

 

[Madridi]

After looking more carefully at those motherboard, the one you picked seems to be the best. So I guess go for it.

If possible, change the RAM and cooler .. The case and PSU is up to you

I personally have the corsair 850TX, yeah its a lot of cables, but luckily my case has a space in the back for all extra wires so I tucked everything back there. going for the HX series (modular) will give you better efficiency, less messiness and therefore, better ventilation, but its up to you whether you can afford spending more on that or not..

Edit: I keep missing stuff. For some reason I thought the MSI board you picked has USB3. It does not, so I suggest you reconsider and maybe check that last two links in my suggestions ..
Edit2: People over at overclock.net say this is the best board for your budget
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...-261R-_-Product
Its open box though, people say open boxes are fine and comes with 30 day newegg guarantee just in case ..

 

[granville]

If you're talking about USB 3.0, that's definitely not something that's going to sell me on a motherboard. I'm considering the PSU though. It's a bit pricey for me though...

As for memory, i found this instead, so how is it- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16820231277

 

[Madridi]

I just editted my previous post so you might want to check it out.
If you dont want USB 3.0 then there definetly are better boards (gigabyte ones most likely)
As for the memory: It's good, better than the ones you originally picked, but the case latency is higher than the ones I linked (lower is better)

 

[granville]

I got the ripjaws series recommendation a while back from a member here called seedvt. He's a PC guru and builds them for a living (or did).

I downgraded the HD to 500GB and upped the PSU to the one Minox suggested. I'm getting pretty over budget now. I also downgraded to that Cooler Master Hyper 212+ since it was apparently overkill to have the other one. Fancy lighting does not interest me. I'm sticking with the case i found. From the pictures, it seems extremely well ventilated and it comes with 3 case fans.

 

[Madridi]

ripjaws have good reputation, but so does the munchkin blackline series .. but anyways its still good so do whatever makes you comfortable

I would keep the 1tb hdd (its about $7 cheaper on amazon btw) .. good choice on upping the psu.

So what cooler did you decide on?

 

[granville]

Like i said, if the Cooler Master Hyper 212+ really IS a lot better than stock and can handle frequencies nearing 4ghz, i'm going with it since it's like $20 cheaper at least (more elsewhere, newegg has gotten expensive lately).

 

[murkurie]

I recommend a 460 gpu, this article will explain why.

 

[Diablo1123]

I've also added some Arctic Silver thermal compound to the cart, as well as a DVI-to-VGA adapter since the GPU doesn't support VGA monitors (i'm using an older monitor for the moment, i'll probably hook it up to a HDTV eventually).

Are you sure the video card doesn't come with one? I've purchased 3 HD5770s for me, my cousin, and my sister and if I remember correctly, they each came with one. Enough for me to have extras laying around at least.

And my HD5770s play Starcraft II at 1920x1080 at max settings with no lag at all.
I can even play Left 4 Dead 2, splitscreen with at least 60 fps.

And pretty Crossfire will work in the future.

 

[granville]

Yeah, the images seem to suggest the 5770 comes with a vga adapter, and seedvt thinks so as well. I think the only game i might have trouble with would be Crysis lol!

 

[Diablo1123]

Yeah, the images seem to suggest the 5770 comes with a vga adapter, and seedvt thinks so as well. I think the only game i might have trouble with would be Crysis lol!

According to the product info page of the card on Newegg, it comes with one.
I can't run the heaven benchmark on max setting, but I will try Crysis

 

[TheWingless]

Crysis should run fairly well without AA still with the 5770... Or at least that's what it looks like here.
I'd say Metro 2033 is much more demanding... And a few other games.

Unless you mean Crysis 2.

 

[Minox]

I recommend a 460 gpu, this article will explain why.

SLI is out of question in this case which nullifies your point. If he has to go with a single GPU then ATI gives more performance for the cash.

 

[Madridi]

I have the XFX 5770, and yes I can confirm that it has the dvi to vga adapter.. Sorry I missed that

Good luck on your build!

 

[granville]

Crysis should run fairly well without AA still with the 5770... Or at least that's what it looks like here.
I'd say Metro 2033 is much more demanding... And a few other games.

Unless you mean Crysis 2.

Actually, i heard Crysis 2 was LESS demanding or something. Like they optimized the code better. So Crysis 2 may very well end up getting better performance. But i did indeed mean Crysis 1. To me, 30fps is totally playable.