Benching Team Member needs build advice...

Hey guys...

I'm used to doing builds that are more on the high end of the spectrum... So I'm a little lost when it comes to the more budget minded stuff.

What I need is a machine for in the garage / benching lair that will run quickly while doing the following... Usually all of these occuring at the same time.

1) Running Procaster for Livestreams.
2) Running AIM
3) Running ROG Connect
4) Browsing HWBot and other forums and such for information needed while benching. (4 or 5 browser tabs open at once usually...)
5) Downloading and transfering files from the internet and accross my network.
6) Running Excel
7) Running MS Word.
8) MSE running in background.

Some hardware requirements are that it must have Firewire... and must support at least 2 monitors.

I can throw a 3570K machine together with 60GB SSD and all for around $650... And that would EASILY handle all of this... But... I'm being told thats extreme overkill.

I'm looking for a huge amount of "bang for the buck" here... So any help would be appreciated!

Thanks!

You could use something like this:

- ASRock E350M1 - $94
- Vantec PCIe Firewire 400 card - $19.49
- 8GB Samsung DDR3 sticks - $44.99
- APEX MI-008 250W case - $48.99
- HDD / SSD of your choice - around $75 (m4 64GB)

That would do everything you need that computer to do paying less than $300.

If you want a little bit more of juice, I could list components for the FM1 platform. Or a Sandy Bridge Pentium/Celeron.

EDIT: I am not 100% sure if the E350M1 will be able to post with the 1600MHz Samsung sticks. I chose those because they are cheap and are known for the overclockability, maybe you get a good pair of sticks that might give the team some boints. The E350 seems to support up to 1066MHz, I am not sure if the motherboard will automatically downclock the sticks or not.

txus.palacios said:

You could use something like this:

- ASRock E350M1 - $94
- Vantec PCIe Firewire 400 card - $19.49
- 8GB Samsung DDR3 sticks - $44.99
- APEX MI-008 250W case - $48.99
- HDD / SSD of your choice - around $75 (m4 64GB)

That would do everything you need that computer to do paying less than $300.

If you want a little bit more of juice, I could list components for the FM1 platform. Or a Sandy Bridge Pentium/Celeron.

EDIT: I am not 100% sure if the E350M1 will be able to post with the 1600MHz Samsung sticks. I chose those because they are cheap and are known for the overclockability, maybe you get a good pair of sticks that might give the team some boints. The E350 seems to support up to 1066MHz, I am not sure if the motherboard will automatically downclock the sticks or not.

Click to expand...

Thanks for throwing that list together...

Let me throw in one more caveat though...

I'm one of these guys who will literally start throwing stuff if there is much lag between when I click something on the screen... and it actually happens.

I'm definitely looking for something on the "peppy" side...

I've been attempting to do all of this now on a laptop with an i3 330m CPU... And it's annoyingly slow if that helps give you an idea of what I'm after.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.1051827

AMD 2.4GHZ 3 core based on the Stars architecture. The included IGPU is even capable of light gaming. Add an SSD + any DDR3 4GB or higher and your done. As far as peppy goes SSD is the key!