$1000 Gaming Computer

Hello everyone im putting this list together for a friend.
Hes looking for a new gaming comp and has about $1000 to spend.
I put together a list for him (rather then him buying from dell or something).
Could you guys take a look and make sure i picked out the best possible computer. He wont be overclocking this.

Case
not sure.

PSU
550W sparkle $89.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817103517

Hard drive
Western Digital Caviar SE 160 GB $57.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822144415

Gpu
Sapphire 100168L x1900xt
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814102025R

Cpu
AMD Opteron 1210 $171.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819105015

Mobo
DFI Infinity NF570-M2/G $113.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813136019

Ram
Not really sure.

Sound Card
Creative Sound Blaster Audigy2 ZS $74.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16829102178

thanks for the help

Looks pretty solid, don't forget about the OS (I'd try to find a used copy of XP or 2000). I'm not up on DDR2 so I'll leacve that to someone else.

Only considerations I'd say are the HDD and sound card. For the sound card I would get the X-fi version which pretty much the same price after MIR and is a better card. Unless the ZS has extra ports which you need....if that's the case the ZS platinum is just a couple bucks more (after a huge 100 MIR so be cautious, but you get the 5.25 bay with it).

For the HDD I'd get the seagate 7200.10 version (only comes in a larger drive though), which is about 20 bucks more. The Seagate is a better performer (not by anything large or very noticeable, but I feel safer with seagate over WD but that's a personal opinion).

If you stick with what you got though I think you'll be happy, the changes for me would just be gravy. For RAM I would get value/inexpensive RAM as spending a lot of cash on RAM unless all your other components are top knotch is stupid IMO because better RAM rarely delivers noticeable gains.

ok if this was posted in the AMD section I would not post this for fear of persecution from amd fanatics.

I am PERFORMANCE PC fanatic and i am telling you for a couple bux more a e6300 and DS3 would rape what your going with. $180 for the cpu and $150 for the mobo.

Good advice on the perpendicular drive from ajrettke

Is this the hard drive?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822148143

And the cpu//mobo combo by Rattle is this im assuming:
Intel Core 2 Duo E6300
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819115005

GIGABYTE GA-965P-DS3 Socket T (LGA 775) Intel P965 Express ATX Intel Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813128012

About that mobo their are 2 diffrent kinds of them listed on newegg:
the p965 version and the g965 version, whats the diffrence?

Ive been out of the loop for a bit.

p965 is the one you want, if its within your budget get the Asus P5b deluxe its even better than the ds3.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822148144
this is the HDD you want the one you linked to is IDE.

are you looking for 1gb or 2gb of memory ?

Thanks alot for the very speedy reply Rattle.

How much of a performance increase are we looking at with the e6300?

I would say roughly a stock 1.86ghz e6300 performs like a 2.4ghz AM2 or AMd 939 dually with 1mbx2 l2 cache

and look what they do ! not done yet either !

Nice, he can afford that and really its not very big amount of a diffrence.

Any suggestions for the RAM for the e3600?

does he want to OC ?

That PSU is decent for the price, if you poke around you may be able to find a better one for similar cost with MIRs or sales and you can try using froogle to pricesearch for other reputable vendors (use resellerratings.com to check them out before buying) Newegg often doesn't have the best prices. Or for a little more money, ~$20, you can get the excellent Silverstone ST56ZF PSU at places other than Newegg.

If you want to go C2D and get a P965 chipset board that's cheap but good there is the Gigabyte S3, the non-solid capacitor version of the DS3. Do NOT get a G965, it has integrated graphics in the chipset and hinders overclocking.

Another consideration is the graphics card. There is an x1950xt 256MB, new not open box, from Sapphire and Powercolor for roughly the same price. Look in the graphics cards forum for a thread titled 'x900, 7950GT...' or sometihng like that. It's not necessarily better or worse just another similar-priced option.

I see many of the things you're looking at are open box prices. There's not necessarily anything wrong with open box just realize it may or may not have all the extras and will have less warranty coverage. Personally I would avoid an open box HD though.

My friend does not want to OC at all, hes new to it and still has the "doesnt it screw up your parts?" sterotype.

Thanks for the suggestions guys.