Budget gamer, help needed

[Toro 45]

This might help to clear somethings up. Note the bold text.

I like the price on that board, can it take the 2500 to 4.0-4.5 range? I thought I read somewhere that the Z77 and the Z68 chipsets were best for OC on the 2500K.

Also What would be a better video card choice?it's for my son he is not a high res gamer, right now on an old Radeon 4850. Probably has it on 1024 0r 1280 medium to high settings. Even though the 550Ti is not great should be a big improvement over the Radeon?

I was thinking the same thing, thats why I asked about i3-2120 in my first post. He's coming from an E7300 core 2 duo with a mild OC. I did'nt know if the 2120 was going to be a big enough jump without overclocking it but sounds like it could be.

Lot's of good info here guys, I appreciate it!!

No worries on my other systems, my sons comp is the slowest of the bunch

As much as I appreciate the concern on my other systems, they're better/faster than his comp and I'm only concerned with his new build.

 

[lakedude]

Ok, sorry for getting sidetracked. It was possible that going to W7 was a big mistake if your systems were like 1.3 GHz single core machines with 128 MB of RDRAM or something. Now we know different so now we can put this issue to bed.

 

[Toro 45]

No problem lakedude

He said he wants to stay with the 2500k cpu and overclock it(4-4.5ghz). So this ASRock Z75 Pro3 that was suggested earlier looks good, I assume without the SSD caching it's going to take a performance hit later when he upgrades to an SSD drive? Any better choices in that price range?($85-$95)

The money he saves with buying the board will go towards one of better video cards mentioned in this thread.

No one has complained about the cpu cooler I listed, I take it the OC on these chips just doesn't require a beast of a cooler?

 

[lakedude]

Those 212 coolers are some of the most popular and best for the money. Got a couple of 212s myself...All copper Zalman coolers might be better but you can't beat the 212 series for value.

 

[mfenn]

What are you guys so worried about? Where did all of this fear of running 7 come from? Is this 2002 and someone brought 7 back from the future?

:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

 

[mfenn]

He said he wants to stay with the 2500k cpu and overclock it(4-4.5ghz). So this ASRock Z75 Pro3 that was suggested earlier looks good, I assume without the SSD caching it's going to take a performance hit later when he upgrades to an SSD drive? Any better choices in that price range?($85-$95)

As a father, you should prevent him from making such a grave error. Or at least stick around to tell you "I told ya so." :awe:

A 4850 with a overclocked i5 2500K is an extremely unbalanced gaming machine, almost to a ridiculous degree. It won't matter how much processing the i5 can theoretically do if the GPU can keep up with the processing. I'd recommend sticking with an i3 build similar to Durvelle's and sinking the extra money into the GPU.

 

[Toro 45]

I think you missed this part of my post

No problem lakedude

He said he wants to stay with the 2500k cpu and overclock it(4-4.5ghz). So this ASRock Z75 Pro3 that was suggested earlier looks good, I assume without the SSD caching it's going to take a performance hit later when he upgrades to an SSD drive? Any better choices in that price range?($85-$95)

The money he saves with buying the board will go towards one of better video cards mentioned in this thread.

No one has complained about the cpu cooler I listed, I take it the OC on these chips just doesn't require a beast of a cooler?

 

[mfenn]

I think you missed this part of my post

Nope, I saw that part completely. Saving $50 on the mobo is good, but that only gets you to a 6870. That's certainly a hell of a lot better than a 4850, but it's not gonna be great going forward.

The rule of thumb for a gaming machine is that the GPU should always cost more than the CPU. With a $220 CPU, there is still a lot of room to cut there and add to the GPU. For example, shaving off another $60 by going to the the i5 2310 and ASRock B75M gets you into 7850 territory.