Sub $750 Gaming Rig?

[kojiK]

Hi All,

I'm trying to build a gaming box on a pretty tight budget. Basically I'm trying to find a good balance between performance, reliability (I'd rather pay a little bit more for brand-name parts that have good reviews rather that budget parts), and cost, and I've come up with the following list of parts (I have an old box, keyboard, monitor, etc):

BFG Tech GeForce 9800 GTX+ (119.99)
AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition Callisto (102)
GIGABYTE GA-MA790X-UD4P (109.99)
Windows 7 Home Premium OEM (106.99)
G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR2 1066 (94.99)
CORSAIR 750W PSU (109.99)


SubTotal: 643.95

My main concerns are:

-Would this system be able to handle games like Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2, Bioshock 2, Dawn of War II, etc, at at least medium settings?

-Are there any easily-eliminated hardware bottlenecks with this setup?

-Is it worth spending more money to go for a quad-core? I know games are heading in that direction, but I'm assuming a fast dual-core should be future-proof for at least a few more years...

-Is there anything I'm overlooking to get equal performance but for cheaper?

-I was going to go with 32bit Windows 7 - but is there any reason to consider the 64bit version (my main uses are gaming and general MS Office type stuff)?

If anyone has any comments or tips to share on any of the above points, I'd be very grateful to benefit from the experiences of others. Many thanks for any advice!

-koji K.

 

[WonderingSoul]

No need for a 750w PSU.

Can get by with a 550 easy.

 

[jamesman32]

Yep, bump down the PSU to something around 500w, maybe switch the CPU to a Propus 620 quad core for the same price, and bump that 9800GTX to a 5770.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103706 - 620
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161306 - 5770
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182160 - PSU*

*Rosewill PSUs used to be pretty bad. These newer models are proving to be pretty good, so I will recommend it. Usually, stick to name brands like Corsair, Enermax, Antec, etc

A fast dual core will not be future proofing. Quad cores are where its at, and 6 cores are where it's going very soon.

Your bottleneck will go away by switching to the 5770 and the 620. Other than that it looks good, but I would switch to Win7 64. No reason to go with 32 anymore. Driver compatibility issues are almost totally gone.

 

[kojiK]

Great tips both - If I go for the 550W PSU it knocks the price down about $50 and I didn't even realize you could get a quad core CPU for $99, so that's a huge plus. May go with a cheaper graphics card for now than the 5770 though, with the intention to upgrade later as needed.

Thanks again.

 

[Leviathan41]

-I was going to go with 32bit Windows 7 - but is there any reason to consider the 64bit version (my main uses are gaming and general MS Office type stuff)?

You will need 64-bit to take advantage of your full 4GB of RAM. I would recommend the 64-bit version.

 

[Marshmallow64]

I would stick with the 550 over the popus because of L3 cache is is more benificial for games than the extra cores.