Gaming PC upgrade

[AlanJohn]

I'm deciding to get a full PC upgrade so I can play the 2012 games like a boss.
My specs:

Spoiler

I need your help GBAtemp, to fully-upgrade it, so I can play BF3 on ultra.
Also, whats a good widescreen monitor I can buy?

BUDGET: 500$

 

[Originality]

First question: do you have a budget? I'll list two builds, one for the gods (with at least some sense of value in mind) and the other for us more humble of men.

Extreme Ultra PC: (£2480)

Spoiler

Case: SilverStone Temjin TJ07B-W (£216)
Motherboard: Asus Maximus IV Extreme (£264)
CPU: Intel Core i7-2600K (£239)
RAM: 8GB Corsair Dominator GT CMGTX7 (£329)
Graphics: Asus GeForce GTX 590 3GB (£630)
: HIS Radeon HD 6970 IceQ Turbo 2GB (£300)
Power Supply: Antec High Current Pro HCP-750 (£141)
SSD: 256GB Samsung SSD 830 (£340)
HDD: 2TB Western Digital Caviar Green (£125)
Sound Card: Creative X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Pro (£100)
OS: Windows 7 Home Premium x64 (£105)

Notes:
- The price of HDDs have at least doubled due to flooding where they are made.
- I've not mentioned a Sandy Bridge E or AMD Bulldozer system because, in terms of value, they suck. Hard.
- This list does not include CPU cooling because it assumes you'd want to grab some water cooling such as Corsair C80 or C100.
- Prices are in GBP because that's the market I know, and because I'm copying this out of the latest CPC magazine which happens to be full of reviews on Sandy Bridge E.
- New AMD and nVidia graphics cards are coming out in the next month, so the recommendation for them will most likely change in the next issue of CPC.
- It also does not include monitor, keyboard, mouse or DVD.

Performance PC: (£1248)

Spoiler

Case: SilverStone Fortress FT02B-W USB3.0 (£216)
Motherboard: Asus Maximus IV Gene-Z (£135)
CPU: Intel Core i5-2500K (£160)
RAM: (8GB G.Skill RipjawX F3-12800CL9D-8GBXL (£36)
CPU Cooler: Be Quiet! Dark Rock Advanced (£40)
Graphics: HIS Radeon HD 6970 IceQ Turbo 2GB (£300)
PSU: Corsair Professional Series HX 650 (£90)
HDD: Samsung SpinPoint F3 1TB (£58 - not seeing it at £30 makes me cry inside)
Sound Card: Asus Xonar DX (£58)
DVD: LiteOn IHAS123-19 (£13)
OS: Windows 7 Home Premium x64 (£105)

For a monitor, they recommend Viewsonic VP2365wb (£205) if you want 23", and Dell U2711 (£594) if you want 27". For triple monitor display, the stand the recommend is XFX Triple Display Monitor Stand (£318).

Second question: Is it just BF3 you want to play on ultra or do you want to future-proof your PC (for the next 3 years at least, although more likely 5-7 years)?

Any questions and I'll get back to you... at some point in the future ;p

EDIT: Ok, this post can be mostly disregarded, because the budget does not extend to the best parts (or even a complete overhaul for that matter). Someone in America can find you the best deals on Newegg for a motherboard, CPU and RAM upgrade kit, but forget about playing BF3 on ultra.

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

Budget?

 

[AlanJohn]

Do I have to buy a new motherboard or case?
I mean, I just need it for the sake of playing games on ultra.

 

[Originality]

Psuedo-realistic games like MW3 and BF3 put a lot of strain on the CPU and graphics for their physics, particle dust and post-processing effects (e.g. the blurring after a flash grenade goes off in your face). For that, you ideally want a CPU that can handle much more IPS (instructions per second, or instructions per clock) which AMD is famously bad at. This basically means a Core i5-2500K and a LGA1155 motherboard to go with it, one that uses DDR3 RAM because of the performance increase over DDR2 (this is debatable, but the difference does show in pseudo-realistic games).

You also want a modern graphics card, which means minimum HD 6870 or GTX 560.

After all this, you also need to check your PSU to make sure you can handle the upgraded graphics. You shouldn't have a problem here though.