FIRST GAMING PC BUILD

[Seffer72]

WOOOO!! WOOOOOO!!!! WOOOOOOOOO!!!!

Ok- flow of excitement energy is over...

First off i wanna say i'm VERY excited to be a member of this forum! Looks like a fantastical opportunity to learn a TON of pc knowledge i have ignorantly waited too long to learn.

So i am building my first gaming pc (FINALLY) after realising that our household pc is rubbish for play. Now i know for a fact this is VERY new to me and my general knowledge of doing this is based off only... let's say 3-2 weeks of extensive research. I really never thought i'd see the day i would be interested in this sort of thing but i am seriously ADDICTED. I'm pretty confident to an extent that i may have rounded up the appropriate components i will need to run a good gaming pc- particularly capable to run FINAL FANTASY XIV smoothly. I'd really want it to run almost anything i throw at it gaming-wise.

Here are the specific components i had in mind. (Sorry if i don't describe them very well- ill include a link to each just to clarify)



Case: ATX Full Tower http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811108190

Mother Board: GIGABYTE GA-880GMA-UD2H AMD AM3 2PCI-E 2.0 x16 interface Crossfire ready http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128445

CPU: AMD Phenom II X6 1055T Thuban 2.8GHz AM3 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103851

Hard Drive: SEAGATE BARRACUDA 2TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148506

VID Card (x2): SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 5770 1GB PCI Express 2.0 x16 Crossfire Support http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102858

RAM: Ripjaws 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231311

PSU: CORSAIR 850W http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139011



Aaaaand... that's what i have thus far. I know i'm missing an optical drive- haven't gone around looking for that just yet.



So with these components and the features they provide is around what i'm looking for. Total thus far i'm looking to spend about $1240 but i anticipate to spend more if need be. I want my machine to run exceptionally well- i'm aware that'll cost me This also being my first build, I can't say i'm concerned if it will be able to OC so i'll dismiss the thought... For now



The RAM im not too sure about... particularly the brand but i do know i want 8 GB DDR3 and to run on WINDOWS 7 HOME PREMIUM 64-bit. I also want to know if the crossfire of the Radeon 5770 with PCI-E 2.0 x16 interface wil be sufficient enough for most games.



So... yeah! That's what i was able to come up with so far and i'm pretty excited about it! Any changes i should make? Will these components be compatible with each other?? Anything i'm missing??? As i said, i'm flexible with making changes even along with my budget (but not too much... lol) I'd say about ~$1500 maybe'ish. ANY feedback is greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

 

[JonSimonzi]

You did really well for a first build, but there is some fine tuning that could be done. You did get most of the basics in the right direction

For a gaming build, you really don't need more than 4gb. 8gb is nice, but it's really wasted unless you have something that you specifically need it for. You won't notice a difference between 4gb and 8gb of ram with gaming. The g.skill Ripjaws are a good series of ram, but you might want to get the 1600mhz variety, it'll help in the long run when you get into overclocking the system (more on that later )

For an extra $40 - $50, a single 5870 would give you better performance than 5770 crossfire. Plus, you wouldn't need to worry about crossfire scaling in games.

If you're building a gaming rig with nice parts, overclocking that rig is just a hop, skip, and a jump away. You may say "I don't plan on overclocking", but hang around here long enough, and the bug will bite you For that, you'll need a cooler for the CPU, the stock one would nowhere near be good enough. The Xigmatek S1283 is a very good cooler for the price. Not the absolute best, but can do a very good job just getting into OCing.

For the build you have listed, that motherboard would not work. This part is just personal preference, but you have a really big case (full tower ATX) chosen, and a really small motherboard (micro ATX). Personally, I think it would look a little silly, but that's just me

For why it wouldn't' work, you chose 2x 5770s, which are dual slot cards, meaning they take up 2 slots on the back of a case\on the motherboard. That motherboard has the 2 PCIE slots right next to each other, meaning 2x 5770s would not fit. This Gigabyte motherboard would be a much better choice. I'm not really an AMD person, so someone else can chime in if there's a better choice for the price.

The PSU is WAY more wattage than you need, even if you went with 5770 Crossfire. You could easily drop down to a 650w or 750w and handle that system perfectly fine. You can see a build here here where one of our members built a high power gaming rig with a GTX480, one of the most power hungry cards on the planet, with just a 450w PSU. You definitely did right with Corsair though, they the most recommended brand.

If you do have that extra bit of wiggle room in your budget, +$50 for a single 5870, +$40 for a different motherboard, and +$40 for a heatsink would step up you're build quite a bit. If you don't have the extra money, drop down to 4gb of ram, and a 650w Corsair to absorb the extra cost of the other 3 parts.

Hope that helped a bit

 

[Seffer72]

Wow! Thanks a ton! very contradicting to friends telling me the components I had would work just fine... NOT. I'll look into different parts and see what i can find more that'll be more sufficient. The MB u linked looks pretty sick as is Be back soon!

 

[Knufire]

+1 to all of that.
Here's the PSU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139005&Tpk=650tx
RAM: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231303

You really should also go with a 5850, 5870, or a GTX470 for your graphics card.

SATA III on a normal spinning hard drive is a waste. I would go with a WD Caviar Black: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136456&Tpk=wd caviar black 2tb

Also, with a single graphic card, you really don't need a full tower. I would go with a Cooler Master, Antec, or Thermaltake case, personally. The HAF series from CM are pretty amazing cases.

 

[Seffer72]

Thanks Jon and Knufire for your feedback; AWESOME information and feedback. Really appreciate it.

Welp I quickly skimmed through to find new components to replace the ones suggested except the PSU (for possible future OC purposes once the bug bites me... unless it REALLY isn't necessary and my knowledge of OC is... well next to nothing lol)

I'll post what i found very soon.

 

[Seffer72]

Anyone else have any suggestions?

 

[lsaddict]

I would look into adding an ssd for your main programs and os. I'm still new at this but I think triple channel ram would be better.

 

[Knufire]

I would look into adding an ssd for your main programs and os. I'm still new at this but I think triple channel ram would be better.

Triple channel is only supported on the X58 platform, meaning you need a i7 930, 950, 960, 975, or 980. All AMD and all other Intel CPU's only support dual-channel.

 

[Wathnix]

You should stay away from the seagate brand drives for anything 1tb and over. They have had quality issues and have not, in my opinion addressed them properly. Look for a Hitachi or Western Digital brand drives if you decide to go with mechanical drives. I personally have both these manufacturers in the TB range. All drive manufacturers eventually put out some duds and seagate is currently holding the bag on that score, eventually they will turn around.

don't worry too much about the optical drives, they are all pretty much the same these days. Don't waste your time with blu-ray, you will be disappointed., simply buy something around the $30 mark that gets good reviews, be sure it is the color you need.

if you plan to go windows 7 check to see if you qualify for the microsoft student discount, you can get win 7 home premium for $30. check the microsoft website.

remember to buy heatsink grease (arctic silver 5) and tie downs to keep your cables neat.

 

[A-Dub]

if you plan to go windows 7 check to see if you qualify for the microsoft student discount, you can get win 7 home premium for $30. check the microsoft website.

You can get Win7 Home Premium or Pro for $30 with the student deal. They are upgrade licenses though. You will have to do the double install trick to get them to activate.

Do you really need a 2TB hard drive? You can save a bit of money by going with this combo deal:

Corsair 650 watt + Western Digital 1TB for $160, use the money saved to upgrade video card/cooling/motherboard as suggested above. If you manage to fill up the 1TB drive its pretty easy to add a second down the road, by then it will be even cheaper and you'll have spent less than going with a 2TB drive from the start.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.514406

 

[Seffer72]

That is a pretty sweet deal- thanks for your suggestion.

Well I do plan to run several games along with Photoshop for some graphic rendering which does take up an uber amount of space. Along with MP3's of course but you are definitely right about upgrading to add another HD later if need be. Think I got the right replacement components that were suggested- will post them later today.

Thanks again!

 

[Wathnix]

You can get Win7 Home Premium or Pro for $30 with the student deal. They are upgrade licenses though. You will have to do the double install trick to get them to activate.

Do you really need a 2TB hard drive? You can save a bit of money by going with this combo deal:

Corsair 650 watt + Western Digital 1TB for $160, use the money saved to upgrade video card/cooling/motherboard as suggested above. If you manage to fill up the 1TB drive its pretty easy to add a second down the road, by then it will be even cheaper and you'll have spent less than going with a 2TB drive from the start.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.514406

You can do a clean install on a blank drive with the upgrade simply by selecting the option when you are installing, it's what I did

 

[Seffer72]

I checked out the project MIAHALLEN was working on http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=654048

Now THAT'S impressive! Very useful information to boot

Happy to say my tower case is on it's way! Wasn't anticipating on having it so soon but my better half had sneaked into my newegg.com wishlist and purchased it for me to get started. VERY excited now that the structure's in stone. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811108190

 

[1stratos1]

well i ll suggest u to take the cm haf case as i got it and its really good,as for cpu cooler as i heard that the stock cooler isnt that good, so u can buy an cpu air cooler and i think its worthy. As for 2x5770 when i was searching for what to buy i found that x5770 got better perfomance than 5870, but not sure if i remember well, i suggest u to search for benches between the graphic cards and see which is better (i mean 5770x2 in cf or 5870), ofc dont look just one benchmark but try to find 2-3 sources to be 100% sure .
As for HDD Western Digital is a really good brand and especially the series black caviar is faster than green caviar or blue.
Something last is that for sure u ll need a good screen with HQ and big enough like 23".

Thats my opinion i hope i helped u. Good luck with ur research!

 

[Seffer72]

@1stratos1: Yeah that's what I was thinking at first- that 5770 crossfire would be a better way to go performance and quality wise but then it's suggested otherwise. I'm pretty sure I'm going to go with a single 5870... Which I could crossfire in the future. *drools* I'll check out the benchmarks as u suggested tho to see; wasn't even aware what a benchmark was.

 

[Seffer72]

Roit! So this is what i have thus far as to changes for my build that were suggested above. (Thanks a lot for your feedback everyone- greatly appreciated.)

Sorry again if i don't describe the components very well to appropriate terms- i'll provide links to each.


Case: ATX Full Tower (PSU on bottom) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...&AID=10446076&PID=3754110&SID=skim1132X509988

Mobo: GIGABYTE chipset 890G AMD AM3 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128435

CPU: AMD Phenom II X6 1055T 2.8 GHz http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103851

RAM: RIPJAWS 4GB (2x 2GB) 1600 DDR3 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...&AID=10446076&PID=3754110&SID=skim1132X509988

Vid Card (x1): SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 5870 ATI http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102883

Hard Drive: WD Caviar Black 2TB 7200 RPM http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136456

PSU: CORSAIR HX Series 850W http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139011

OS: Windows 7 Home Premium x64

And possibly a CPU cooler if the one provided really is regarded as not being the most reliable. The case is massive- was hoping this would be sufficient for good airflow.

Now i have some concerns...


Vid Card Size + Case: My partner bought me the case to help me get started seeing how excited i was with this project. As suggested, (thanks again!) i am now going to use an ATI 5870 HD video card which i saw are VERY LARGE and LONG cards. lol I didn't realize how massive they are (the one listed above in particular running around 10 inches long according to reviews). My worry is that since my cases has the PSU on the bottom- will there be room for the card to fit in place without being interrupted by the HD bays? I would- no, WILL crossfire another 5870 in the future once i can recover from this purchase but if one can fit- can two? I think it should fit fine seeing how massive the case is. I would just like reassurance

There was also the thought (thank you 1stratos1 ) would one 5870 run better than 5570 crossfired? but that's irrelevant since i plan on using another 5870 later... if i can

RAM: As suggested i am now going along using 4GB 1600 RAM from RIPJAWS (cool looking rams to boot too ). However i did want to go with using 8GB of RAM (2x 4GB) 1600 DDR3 (i found one set that ran the 1600 series). 4 GB should be enough RAM to run games fine as stated. However, since i am planning to use a more powerful video card along with crossfire (if i am able to), and since i would also like to get into OC once this build is successful, should i run with more ram?

I did find a medium of 6GB (3x 2GB) 1600 DDR3 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231247 but my concern with using three cards comes from reviews stating that sometimes the 3rd card is not recognized. Not from this particular set of RAM but from a variety that i browsed. I recall this was an issue regarding the fact they were running Windows 32 Bit and also that the motherboard just didn't support the amount of RAM they had. I don't think/hope i would have this issue.

Here is the 8 GB set i also found: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231314


Again THANKS a ton for all the feedback i'm getting- this rocks!

 

[1stratos1]

Well ur case looks great but the Dimensions(L x W x H)
23.66" x 8.86" x 21.65" are in cm? i guess no , anyway personaly i as i told u i got the haf that got the psu down and i got crossfired the 2 cards and its ok, if the case is about the same as haf or a bit smaller in dimensions then u really must be ok with the space.

As for ram u can buy now the 2x2 and after u can place 2x2 more or 2x4. Well now in case u want to hold the pc that much that u ll think that u need 2x4 and after to buy one more 2x4 then dunno. Well thats all i hope i m helping and not making u more confused xD.

 

[JonSimonzi]

The card will fit with more than enough room. No need to worry about that. Both will fit if you do go Crossfire in the future.

Using a more powerful card along with Crossfire, or getting into OCing once it's done, having 8gb of ram wouldn't be any benefit. Unless you're doing something where the extra ram is need, which is mostly graphic or video work where things need to render, you'll never notice the difference. 8gb of ram is moreso for the ability to say "I have 8gb of ram". Now, there is nothing at all wrong with 8gb of RAM. If you have the cash for that 2x4gb kit of the 1600mhz ram, by all means get it. Just that is one area where you could save the cash if you needed too.

A 6gb kit could be used in that setup, but it's mainly built for an Intel 1366 platform build. Intel's X58 chipset can run ram in tri-channel, if you look at most X58 motherboards they will have either 3x or 6x ram slots, vs. the 4x ram slots on the AMD board.

 

[Seffer72]

Alright! Sounds great! 4 GB it is thanks again for all your input everyone! Will post the steps of the build soon!