New gaming/work rig (<$1000)

[kcbaltz]

I'd like your input on the build I'm about to make.

1. What YOUR PC will be used for?
Gaming (FPS mostly), multitasking, software development (compiling).

2. What YOUR budget is?
I'm hoping to come in well under $1,000.

3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from?
California, USA.

4. IF YOU have a brand preference?
No particular preference.

5. If YOU intend on using any of YOUR current parts, and if so, what those parts are?
My existing monitor is a 19" CRT, so 1208x1024 is probably the max I'd be gaming at. If it dies, an LCD upgrade could be in my future. I probably wouldn't go wide-screen with that or above 19", but I'd want to continue gaming. Also, reusing mouse, KB, etc.

6. IF YOU have searched and/or read similar threads?
I found a thread that seemed to match my needs and based my current build on it. (http://forums.anandtech.com/me...d=27&threadid=2266539). However, his needs weren't quite the same as mine.

7. IF YOU plan on overclocking or run the system at default speeds?
Default.

8. WHEN do you plan to build it?
If I can settle on a build I'm happy with, I'm ready to purchase now.


The build I've arrived at so far is thus:

Intel Core 2 Quad Q8200 2.33GHz
GIGABYTE GA-EP45-UD3P Motherboard
CORSAIR 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400)
ASUS EAH4850 TOP/HTDI/512M Radeon HD 4850 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP
2x Western Digital Caviar Black WD5001AALS 500GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA
COOLER MASTER Centurion 534 RC-534-KKN2-GP Black Aluminum & Mesh bezel
PC Power & Cooling Silencer PPCS500 500W ATX12V / EPS12V
SAMSUNG Black 22X DVD+R
Vista Home Premium 64

The video card is where I'm looking for the most input. Newegg has the Asus 4850 for $139 after rebate. Would I be able to buy another of these at some point for a CrossFireX config? Is that likely to help in the future or does it just get you more resolution (i.e. bigger monitor, but no better fps in future games)? I'd like this system to last me for several years, so I'm willing to make investments towards that end.

I picked the Quad over a Duo because of my desire to multitask. Also, I've heard it helps GTAIV and I'm looking forward to playing that. As I said above, I don't plan to overclock. Reliability, longevity, and not having to spend a lot of time tweaking is important. I'll be using the stock cooling.

The motherboard seems well recommended and it has RAID and CrossFireX support. I'll run my main drive in RAID 1 for safety.

The case seems to fit all my needs. The PSU was recommended somewhere and seems to have enough watts for the right price.

Vista is a reluctant pick. I'm happy with XP, but I want 64-bit support and I'm told that isn't terribly good with XP 64.

Right now, this is pricing out at ~$800 with shipping ($835 with tax). Rebates take it down to $702 ($758 with tax and shipping).

Thanks for taking the time to read this. Any changes, warnings, suggestions, especially about the video card or incompatibilities with the parts would be most appreciated.

 

[ther00kie16]

How about a beefier CPU? q9550 should be ~$270.
Just get a single 1TB drive (~$100 for some) such as Samsung's
XP 64 is actually pretty good but Vista's much improved now so might as well go with newer stuff
If you are shopping online, shipping's a lot for the case so I'd recommend looking for one with free shipping (Lian Li aluminum PC-7B for $90 right now on newegg)
The PSU is good but won't have enough for a quad and 4850 CF most likely. But you should really only go with 1 gpu anyway because mutli-gpu setups don't always scale well. So in the future, just replace the 4850 (there's actually 3 $130 after rebate 4850s on newegg and there's really no difference between brands nowadays except for warranty). If you are considering a $140 4850, it's a better buy to get the asus 9800gtx+ for $145 after rebate.

 

[krnmastersgt]

Actually only 1 of those 4850 has free shipping from what I remember, so there is a $10 or so difference

As for the video cards, thing about Crossfire and SLI is that they aren't the "add a card later" type of set-up, due to the bandwidth limitations faced by each generation of cards. If you find yourself down the line saying, this 1 4850 isn't enough to power my games at this res and think about adding another one, you'd be much better off selling your current 4850 and getting 1 more powerful card. Memory bus/type/total bandwidth will be drastically increased on a single performance card as opposed to 2 mid-level cards from a previous generation.

I agree with ther00kie about the CPU upgrade, the difference between a Q8200 and a Q9550 is quite impressive, although albeit, not linearly scaling with the extra $100 you put in, but the Q9550 will last you a longer time thanks to it's much larger cache/clocks.

 

[ther00kie16]

Originally posted by: krnmastersgt
Actually only 1 of those 4850 has free shipping from what I remember, so there is a $10 or so difference

As for the video cards, thing about Crossfire and SLI is that they aren't the "add a card later" type of set-up, due to the bandwidth limitations faced by each generation of cards. If you find yourself down the line saying, this 1 4850 isn't enough to power my games at this res and think about adding another one, you'd be much better off selling your current 4850 and getting 1 more powerful card. Memory bus/type/total bandwidth will be drastically increased on a single performance card as opposed to 2 mid-level cards from a previous generation.

I agree with ther00kie about the CPU upgrade, the difference between a Q8200 and a Q9550 is quite impressive, although albeit, not linearly scaling with the extra $100 you put in, but the Q9550 will last you a longer time thanks to it's much larger cache/clocks.

Good explanation.
And for the 4850s, you are right. The 1 with free shipping is stock cooling so it's not worth it. The better deal would be the 9800gtx+ (looks like the Dark Knight model) for $145 after rebate.
If q9550's cost is a problem, you could check fry's for deals. Back in november, there was a $230 q9550 + cheap ecs mb deal. Otherwise, perhaps think about Phenom II.

 

[zerocool84]

Get this mobo. You're not overclocking. Ditch Xfire. Not worth it for "future proofing".

GIGABYTE GA-EP45-DS3L

 

[kcbaltz]

Thanks for the great advice. The CrossFire / SLI explanation confirms a suspicion I had that it wouldn't be a valid upgrade path in the future.

I'll look into the Q9550. A 50% jump in price is quite a bit, so I want to see what kind of performance I'll be getting for that money.

The pair of drives is for RAID 1 btw, not for double capacity. My current system is only 80GB, so even 500GB is going to feel huge. The 32MB cache on the WDs looked like a winner. However, if 1TBs are only 25 more, that might make sense.

 

[heyheybooboo]

An e8400 with 4x2Gb RAMs

2 x WD 640Gb - 32Mb cache

 

[videogames101]

Originally posted by: kcbaltz
Thanks for the great advice. The CrossFire / SLI explanation confirms a suspicion I had that it wouldn't be a valid upgrade path in the future.

I'll look into the Q9550. A 50% jump in price is quite a bit, so I want to see what kind of performance I'll be getting for that money.

The pair of drives is for RAID 1 btw, not for double capacity. My current system is only 80GB, so even 500GB is going to feel huge. The 32MB cache on the WDs looked like a winner. However, if 1TBs are only 25 more, that might make sense.

Make sure you get a RAID card, because built-in motherboard RAID makes it hard to transfer your RAID setup to a new PC.

 

[kcbaltz]

When you refer to transferring my RAID setup, you mean just unhooking the drives from one mobo and attaching them to another? I can see where that might be problematic, but I've always planned to reinstall software and copy the data to new drives. It seems unlikely I'd replace the mobo without upgrading the HD capacity. But thanks for the warning; that's not something I would have thought about.

@heyheybooboo - Thanks for pointing out that the 640GBs have a 32MB cache flavor as well.

 

[batuchka]

Hmm what about a $768 before any rebates Phenom 2 build?
Part 1
Part 2 with total cost
Actually i have clients happy with a HD4670 for 1280 x 1024 resolution gaming hehe