2 Grand Budget: Want a Killer Gaming Rig

[DeathTouchWilly]

A buddy is asking me to help him construct a system that can last (roughly) 4 years, or as long as possible if 4 years is a little too unrealistic. He's a gamer (M2TW, FEAR, BF2142, etc) His budget is (also roughly) $2000 US. He'll go above or below depending on what exactly he gets for the increase in spending

This system will not be overclocked. No monitor, keyboard, or related peripherals needed. I'd much prefer suggestions for AMD CPUs and not Intel.

On your mark, get set......... GO!

(Oh and thanks for any help in advance.)

[AruisDante]

Well.... is there any reason why you HAVE to have AMD? Since, much as those it pains us all to hear it, C2D is far superior.

So, assuming you can be open minded....

E6600
eVGA 680i
eVGA 8800GTX
Corsair Dominator DDR2-800
OCZ GameXstream

if you need HDD's, those will still probably fit in the budget. This rig will play for.... a very long wile.

[DaftAMDUser]

Originally Posted by AruisDante

Well.... is there any reason why you HAVE to have AMD? Since, much as those it pains us all to hear it, C2D is far superior.

So, assuming you can be open minded....

E6600
eVGA 680i
eVGA 8800GTX
Corsair Dominator DDR2-800
OCZ GameXstream

if you need HDD's, those will still probably fit in the budget. This rig will play for.... a very long wile.

I second those products and the C2D over AMD.

[trismegistus]

I also second those products.If he can wait,wait for new amd procs.If not fx-60 will do the job.

[DeathTouchWilly]

Nah scratch that AMD line. If Intel is really the way to go these days then I want my buddy to get the best rig for his money. Thanks so much for the suggestions I'll look into them.

[Zardokk]

I've always been an AMD fan, too, but it's true...Intel has the lead now. Definately go with a C2D rig. Aruis's suggestions are pretty **** good, the E6600, eVGA 680i, 8800GTX, and that RAM are all definately the way to go. Beyond that, it really comes down to budgeting for which parts are most important to you. I'd get a good PSU like a PC P&C Silencer 750 and a nice case, although I really haven't budgeted all that stuff out, so I dunno what it would cost you. I may post back a little later with some detailed suggestions.

[daedalus]

I heard that ram doesnt have the micron chips anymore?... Can someone update me on that?

[chronDiggity]

Well I don't know what everyone else thinks about this but I recommend one fast hard drive and one massive storage hard drive for best gaming performance. Leave the pagefile and operating system on the fast hard drive and install your large games on the bigger hard drive (like 250gb+) and you should notice an improvement over a single hard drive.

I recently did this with an 80GB hd and a new 320gb hd. The 80gb isn't any faster in RPMs, but the fact that theres only about 15GB on there now makes the operating system run faster, which I think has helped my performance in games alot.

[DaftAMDUser]

RAID w/an extra storage drive blows that out of the water Chron. This is a $2000 budget we are dealing with, so he has hte headroom.

[Taichan]

don't waste money on raptors, the preformence gain is crap compared to the cost to raid 2 of them together.

[Groo]

why the expensive memory if no OC?

I second the Raid Idea.

If you can hold out till sAM2+, that might be worth looking at, but if not, get a C2D at that budget. I don't think the 4x4 is worth the expense, but you might want to research it further

[mcfly]

why has no one suggested the qx6700???

[AruisDante]

Originally Posted by mcfly

why has no one suggested the qx6700???

cuz.... that would use half of the budget?

If you got a QX6700 and a 8800GTX, you'd have less then $400 for the rest of the system. Where as an E6600+8800GTX leaves you with ~$1200 for the rest of the system.

[DeathTouchWilly]

why the expensive memory if no OC?

Yeah good point, this ram has massive heatsinks on it. This guy won't be OCing this machine (which I know is blasphemy for a forum that has a URL of EXTREMEoverclocking ) so I don't see the need for such exorbitant RAM. Can anyone suggest a 2 gig set that won't be able to cool the RAM even if magma gets on it by accident.

Leave the pagefile and operating system on the fast hard drive and install your large games on the bigger hard drive (like 250gb+) and you should notice an improvement over a single hard drive.

I recently did this with an 80GB hd and a new 320gb hd. The 80gb isn't any faster in RPMs, but the fact that theres only about 15GB on there now makes the operating system run faster, which I think has helped my performance in games alot.

That's actually a pretty cool suggestion and it make sense. I'll look into that. Thanks.

As far as RAID goes, I could ask him to set one of those up but he has no idea what RAID is. He's not even putting the machine together himself so the more advanced configurations I ask him to throw on cost that much more money for him to set up. And it also makes it much harder for him to troubleshoot problems when things go wrong if he has no idea his system runs a RAID - or what that means for that matter. Guess who he's gonna call at 3AM when his system won't boot..... that's right - me!

[chronDiggity]

I don't think raid is all that hard. I've got built in raid controllers on my asus p5w dh deluxe. I think you just plug em in rite and set it up in bios and vavavoom there you go...

Perhaps he should look into a motherboard with this sort of feature?

[trismegistus]

Why don't you put his rig together?

[AruisDante]

Yep, RAID is just a "you plug in the drives, tell them you want it RAID'd, hit a few keys and you're good to go" deal, at least on the 680i. Anyone that has the manual could figure it out in 5 minutes tops.

As for the RAM, the fact that he's not OC'ing is the very reason to get high end RAM. The point of OC'ing is to get more performance out of cheaper stuff. Since he's not doing that, he's gotta do it the old fasion way, which is to buy the good stuff. Of course the Dominators happen to OC really well, but they're also the best performing RAM on the market at stock as well.

Plus, if he's ever bit by the OC'ing bug (we all are eventually), he'll have something very good to work with.

[chronDiggity]

Originally Posted by AruisDante

Plus, if he's ever bit by the OC'ing bug (we all are eventually), he'll have something very good to work with.

Yea I think that might happen within a week. lol. You'd have to be crazy NOT to OC a C2D setup.

[DeathTouchWilly]

Originally Posted by trismegistus

Why don't you put his rig together?

I'd love to, but unfortunately he lives several states away so traveling all the way out there is not nearly expedient (nor cost effective) enough. We've been corresponding mostly by email as of late. And boy is it a pain to explain the computer basics to someone via email...

[Groo]

Originally Posted by DeathTouchWilly

I'd love to, but unfortunately he lives several states away so traveling all the way out there is not nearly expedient (nor cost effective) enough. We've been corresponding mostly by email as of late. And boy is it a pain to explain the computer basics to someone via email...

get all the part mailorder anyway, but send them to your place. I assume your going DX10, so you'll need a new OS reguarless (Vista)

install and test everything, then put it back in the case box and mail it to him insured. it'll tack on $20 tops (assuming you dont live in CA, and therefor have to pay sale tax for most of the online retailers). Thats just 1% of the budget.

ps. I bet setting up a raid is easier than explaining how to relocate the paging file to a seperate drive