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[Hazaro]

*Please note that the guide is slightly dated (AM3 upgradability is a no-no)
Other than that, parts are solid.

*Reposting*
1)Basic Desktop Questions
Budget: Price Range + Country
Main Use: Gaming, Video editing, or just general usage
Monitor Resolution: What resolution will you be playing your games at? Are you going to upgrade later?
List SPECIFIC games that you MUST be able to play: Self Explanatory

2)General Guide on what to buy (Summer)
Hazaro's buying guide (July, 2010)
De facto internet standard. Accept no substitutes
Tech Report Builders Guide!
A very good basic guide that has been updated for FALL. Has alternative options and many price points.

3) 15 minute video how-to
http://vimeo.com/5685229
40 minute how-to
http://www.tested.com/news/video-how-to-build-the-best-1500-gaming-pc-step-by-step/152/

4) Prospective laptop buyers please fill this out and ask their forum as well.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/wha...ould-i-buy-form-must-read-before-posting.html

http://i.imgur.com/Ypmgw.png

 

[Jin34]

Hey fellow Gaffers, I recently arrived back from my 4 year stint in the Navy, and it would seem i'm clueless about where hardware technology has progressed to, and i've noticed there are several newer unknown brands to me. I'm looking to build a gaming rig but also to use it for school, music, and various other things. I'd just like some advice or a friendly point in the direction i need to learn more or advice on parts. Thanks guys... oh and price really isn't an issue

Well if you want the fastest cpu you go with Intel (core i5 quads or core i7) if you want value you go with AMD. Note that new Intel cpus are coming early next year. In gfx card land you have the GTX 470 & 480 as the fastest cards but they are really power hungry and get hotter than the fires of hell. The GTX 460 is the current price/performance king and it has good power and thermals. Thing about video cards is that AMD (ATi name is being phased out) has new cards coming in less than 2 months so it's probably a good idea to wait there.

What are some of the brands you've never heard of?

 

[Hazaro]

Probably G.Skill and some of the new GPU vendors, maybe Foxconn as well.

 

[Jin34]

What's the benefit? And in order to send the signal and perform graphics processing, the motherboard would be communicating with the processor?

The benfits are lower costs since there are less parts and everything is more streamlined, this helps laptops more than anything, also since there is a slow but steady movement towards general purpose computing where programs use the graphics processor to accelerate their performance. Cpus and graphics processors are sort of threading in each others territory in a way.

Keep in mind that these igps, and specially AMD's Fusion, are far more powerful than what we generally associate with igps. Most of us are still going to use dedicated cards, those aren't going anywhere, just that the entry level cards are probably going to disappear.

As for the communication process well you are getting a little too technical there for me.

 

[Buggy Loop]

QUestion about the HDD and SSD.

I have a CM 690 II case, Where should i install them for the best heat & airflow? I was thinking the SSD at bottom or does it need a good airflow (does that thing heat up?) and the HDD in the middle of the fan?

 

[cartoon_soldier]

New Build:

Planning to get another set of the same 4GB RAM in the future to make it 8GB total.

I am willing to spend a few more dollars, if justified, so if someone seems something I can go for and it would be helpful, please say so.

Also, the RAM has a -25$ mail in rebate, so the actual cost is 81.xx

Thanks!!

Bump for new page.

Thanks

 

[Nabs]

that is quite the build.

 

[//B1G]

Use rivatuner or ATi's drivers to back down your core clock 50-100Mhz or so, and maybe 100-150Mhz on the memory.

No artifacts were found when you ran ATiTool?

There's a more aggressive Turbo, but yeah...

If you want to overclock (e.g. raise the multiplier) you'll need to buy a "K" branded unlocked processor. Up to Intel to set the price gouging :/

Man, sorry to be a little leach, but I don't feel like messing with this shit too intensely as to not fuck up my computer. Could you be a little less ambiguous? I'm sure for someone who knows what they're doing that's a definite enough instruction, but not for me.

Also, I only ran ATiTool for like 5 minutes, and no, it didn't come up with anything.

 

[dragonlife]

http://i36.tinypic.com/33ubz2q.jpg[IMG]
[/QUOTE]How good is this first build, Hazaro? My friend wants to get a gaming PC but doesn't have a lot of money...at this price it seems like maybe he'd bite. He and I would most definitely be playing L4D/Valve games. What other games could it run at decent settings? Would [url=http://store.steampowered.com/app/23310/]The Last Remnant[/url] be one?

 

[//B1G]

edit> got it now man, appreciate it.
brought everything down as much as you said to, and now even inside the bus of dirt 2 is running smoothly where as before it was slow as fuck (which i didn't get, because my framerate in actual gameplay was really good.)

 

[EatChildren]

Simple and possibly very stupid question; I have an AMD64 X2 3800+, but more importantly only 2GB of DDR (none of this DDR2,3,9000 crap). I'm still running Windows XP. Is upgrading to Windows 7 worthwhile, or will the older specs of my PC (GPU is an 8800GT) ultimately hold back OS performance?

Essentially I dont want to upgrade to 7 only to find my games run worse due to the OS hogging more memory than normal or some crap.

Forgive me if this is a stupid question.

 

[moojito]

I currently have an amd x2 4200 overclocked to 2.4ghz, 2gb ddr2 800 and a radeon 1650. Would upgrading the 1650 to a 4650 give me a fair boost of fps in TF2 and WoW?

I don't want to spend a lot as I'm currently putting money away for a decent upgrade, but that may take some time. The 4650 can be gotten pretty cheap - about £30 for the 512 and £50 for the 1gb.

Also, do you folks think at my fairly low system level it would be worth getting the 1gb over the 512 if the card is worth getting at all?

Cheers in advance, etc.

 

[moojito]

Simple and possibly very stupid question; I have an AMD64 X2 3800+, but more importantly only 2GB of DDR (none of this DDR2,3,9000 crap). I'm still running Windows XP. Is upgrading to Windows 7 worthwhile, or will the older specs of my PC (GPU is an 8800GT) ultimately hold back OS performance?

Essentially I dont want to upgrade to 7 only to find my games run worse due to the OS hogging more memory than normal or some crap.

Forgive me if this is a stupid question.

My system isn't far away from yours (see above), and I recently upgraded to windows 7. It seems to run perfectly fine. It gives me a system score of 4.6.

 

[cartoon_soldier]

that is quite the build.

I guess I will order it tonight or over the weekend then.

Thanks

 

[msv]

Simple and possibly very stupid question; I have an AMD64 X2 3800+, but more importantly only 2GB of DDR (none of this DDR2,3,9000 crap). I'm still running Windows XP. Is upgrading to Windows 7 worthwhile, or will the older specs of my PC (GPU is an 8800GT) ultimately hold back OS performance?

Essentially I dont want to upgrade to 7 only to find my games run worse due to the OS hogging more memory than normal or some crap.

Forgive me if this is a stupid question.

I'm running on the same CPU, also 2GB, with an HD4770 (used to run on 7900GT), so comparable. And yes, you should upgrade to Win7, works like a charm. It's only marginally more demanding than WinXP.

 

[msv]

Also, do you folks think at my fairly low system level it would be worth getting the 1gb over the 512 if the card is worth getting at all?

Cheers in advance, etc.

Yes, the 1GB will matter in some cases. Makes all the difference in High/Ultra textures in SC2. I've got a 512mb GPU, and it's limiting me to the high(or was it medium, the 512 requirement one anways) texture setting :/.

 

[Big Baybee]

Ok, I think I've pretty much decided to go with two gtx 460's.

These are the 3 Mobo's I'm looking at:

GIGABYTE GA-X58A-UD3R

ASUS P7P55D-E Pro

ASUS Sabertooth

Thoughts? Suggestions?

 

[Corky]

well guys I got the parts now, going to go to sleep though its late.
So here is the plan and please warn me if something looks wrong in my process :


1) Put in the cpu and ram
2) apply thermal paste and hyper 212+ cpu cooler
3) Put the motherboard into the case
4) Connect the power and data-cables (HDD/dvd/psu are already in the case)
5) Connect the chassi cables
6) Put in the 460s and connect the SLI-bridge
7) See if the pc posts, if it posts go into BIOS and upgrade to the latest BIOS version
8) Make sure dram settings are correct, timings and voltages.
9) Put in windowscd and delete my current w7 , and then reinstall new clean w7
10) Get into windows, install latest motherboard/chipset drivers
11) install latest gpu-drivers

What say you GAF, am I missing anything? Anything I should be cautious about? Any last minute tips?

Love

 

[Vorador]

My desktop pc just froze up on me an hour ago. When i booted it up again it shows three blue lines on the left side of the screen, and when it's in text mode shows three vertical lines of text in a pretty curious fashion. I can pretty much already guess it's the graphic card that blew up on me. Well it had a good run, my XFX 8800GTS, too bad since it was still good for current games.

Now, should i get the GTX460 or the 470? Or even dual GTX460? My motherboard is SLI capable although probably only 8x lanes per card on SLI (i think it was a Asus Maximus Formula), and plenty of PSU juice to spare.

 

[Buggy Loop]

Do peoples generally put their GPU in the first PCI express 16x slot? I was thinking its close to the CPU but...

 

[Vorador]

After reading some benchmarks and stuff i decided to order a GTX470, since i found a good one for 280€.

 

[TouchMyBox]

Do peoples generally put their GPU in the first PCI express 16x slot? I was thinking its close to the CPU but...

Yes. The top slot always has the most bandwidth (if not equal bandwidth).

 

[cartoon_soldier]

I might go to Ava Direct instead of NCIX.

35$ vs 90$ (+20$ insurance) for shipping

And 3 year warranty + lifetime tech support vs 1 year limited warranty from NCIX.

And the money is coming to around the same.

 

[LukeT]

So after finally getting my student finance sorted I'm ready to pull the trigger on this gaming build. Im getting Windows 7 with the student discount for £30 so it comes in at £788.82 with delivery so within my budget of £750 - £800.

Is everything O.K with the parts compatibility wise? Any improvements? Looking to game at 1080p.

i5 760
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Intel-i5-760-S1156-Lynnfield-Quad-Core-28-GHz-8MB-Cache-Core-Ratio-21x-95W-Retail

Asus P7P55D-PRO
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Asus-P7P55D-PRO-Intel-P55-Motherboard-LGA1156

Coolermaster Hyper 212 cooler
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Cool...4-Heat-Pipes-LGA775-1156-1366-AM2-AM2plus-AM3

Gigabyte 460 1GB
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/1GB-...z-Shader-Clock-1430MHz-336-Cores-DL-DVI-mHDMI

4GB Corsair ram
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/4GB-...600)-Non-ECC-Unbuffered-CAS-9-9-9-24-DHX-165v

500GB Samsung F3
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/500G...HD502HJ-SATA-3Gb-s-7200rpm-16Mb-Cache-8ms-OEM

650W Corsair power supply
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/650W...-Modular-PSU-with-80PLUS-Bronze-Certification

Cooler Master CM690 case
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Coolermaster-CM-690-II-Advanced-Black-Mid-Tower-Case-w-o-PSU

DVD drive
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Sams...DR-12x-DVDR-DVDplusRW-x8-RW-x6-SATA-Black-OEM

 

[Mr_Brit]

So after finally getting my student finance sorted I'm ready to pull the trigger on this gaming build. Im getting Windows 7 with the student discount for £30 so it comes in at £788.82 with delivery so within my budget of £750 - £800.

Is everything O.K with the parts compatibility wise? Any improvements? Looking to game at 1080p.

i5 760
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Intel-i5-760-S1156-Lynnfield-Quad-Core-28-GHz-8MB-Cache-Core-Ratio-21x-95W-Retail

Asus P7P55D-PRO
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Asus-P7P55D-PRO-Intel-P55-Motherboard-LGA1156

Coolermaster Hyper 212 cooler
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Cool...4-Heat-Pipes-LGA775-1156-1366-AM2-AM2plus-AM3

Gigabyte 460 1GB
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/1GB-...z-Shader-Clock-1430MHz-336-Cores-DL-DVI-mHDMI

4GB Corsair ram
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/4GB-...600)-Non-ECC-Unbuffered-CAS-9-9-9-24-DHX-165v

500GB Samsung F3
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/500G...HD502HJ-SATA-3Gb-s-7200rpm-16Mb-Cache-8ms-OEM

650W Corsair power supply
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/650W...-Modular-PSU-with-80PLUS-Bronze-Certification

Cooler Master CM690 case
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Coolermaster-CM-690-II-Advanced-Black-Mid-Tower-Case-w-o-PSU

DVD drive
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Sams...DR-12x-DVDR-DVDplusRW-x8-RW-x6-SATA-Black-OEM

Everything is good. Although if you want you can drop down to a 768mb card instead and save £50.

 

[cartoon_soldier]

Sorry, got new build at Ava Direct, pretty similar to previous NCIX build, but eVGA gfx card is the main difference and got Samsung F3 instead of WD Caviar Black

COOLER MASTER Centurion 590 Black Mid-Tower Computer Case, ATX, No PSU, SECC
OCZ ModXStream Pro Power Supply w/ Modular Cables, 700W, 80 PLUS®, 24-pin ATX EPS12V, One 6-pin + One 8-pin PCIe, SLI Ready
ASUS P7P55D-E PRO, LGA1156, Intel® P55, DDR3-2220 (O.C.) 16GB /4, PCIe x16 SLI CF /2, SATA 3 Gb/s RAID 5 /7, 6 Gb/s /2, USB 3.0 /2, HDA, GbLAN, FW /2, ATX, Retail
INTEL Core™ i5-760 Quad-Core 2.8GHz, LGA1156, 2.5 GT/s, 8MB L3 Cache, 45nm, 95W, EM64T EIST VT XD, Retail
COOLER MASTER Hyper 212 Plus CPU Cooler, Socket 1366/1156/775/AM3/AM2, Copper/Aluminum, Retail
OCZ 4GB (2 x 2GB) Gold Low Voltage PC3-12800 DDR3 1600MHz CL8 (8-8-8-24) 1.65V SDRAM DIMM, Non-ECC
EVGA GeForce® GTX 460 EE (AR) 763MHz, 1GB GDDR5 3800MHz, PCIe x16 SLI, DVI /2, mini-HDMI, Retail
SAMSUNG 1TB SpinPoint F3, SATA 3 Gb/s, 7200-RPM, 32MB Cache, Retail
RAID No RAID, Independent HDD Drives
LITE-ON iHAS124 Black 24x DVD±RW Dual-Layer Burner, SATA, OEM
NONE No Operating System (Choose OS or subject to Limited Support)
WARRANTY Silver Warranty Package (3 Year Limited Parts, 3 Year Labor Warranty)

$1104.58. Still looking good?

 

[RadicalRad]

Quick question for you all. I'm putting the finishing touches on my new PC but I seem to have overlooked one important thing. A wireless network card. (whoops) Anyhow, I was just gonna ask what you'all would suggest. What have you had good luck with?

I'm getting this mother board

On a slightly unrelated note there's a special going on new egg for 10% off all LG monitors just got a new one for the new PC. Was convenient as I was already looking at an LG for the new rig.

Promo code: EMCYXZV24

Expires on Sunday.

 

[Big Papa Husker]

I am thinking about upgrading my 2 year old C2D E8600 with a i7 processor.

Right now this is what I have:
Motherboard: Gigabyte x48-DS5
CPU: Intel E8600 3.33Ghz
Memory: 2x2GB OCZ Platinum 1066mhz

I am planning up upgrading those 3 pieces and using my existing case (Antec P182), graphics card (4870x2) and sound card (SB X-Fi Gamer).

I am thinking about the following:

I am between that memory and Corsair's Gamer series. Is there any big difference? What is the best bang for my buck?

Thanks for the help!

 

[Outdoor Miner]

I am thinking about upgrading my 2 year old C2D E8600 with a i7 processor.

Right now this is what I have:
Motherboard: Gigabyte x48-DS5
CPU: Intel E8600 3.33Ghz
Memory: 2x2GB OCZ Platinum 1066mhz

I am planning up upgrading those 3 pieces and using my existing case (Antec P182), graphics card (4870x2) and sound card (SB X-Fi Gamer).

I am thinking about the following:

I am between that memory and Corsair's Gamer series. Is there any big difference? What is the best bang for my buck?

Thanks for the help!

The i7-950 is literally half the price of the 960. Just get that and overclock it. If you have a Micro Center near you go there where it has a very delicious price of $249.99.

 

[zbarron]

I have a i7 920 PC with an Asus P6T motherboard. It was working fine until tonight when I bought a CM Storm Sniper case for it. Once I hooked it up when I hit the power button it turns on for a fraction of a second and then goes back off. I don't know what's wrong. Has anyone had this problem with a new case?

 

[Wallach]

I have a i7 920 PC with an Asus P6T motherboard. It was working fine until tonight when I bought a CM Storm Sniper case for it. Once I hooked it up when I hit the power button it turns on for a fraction of a second and then goes back off. I don't know what's wrong. Has anyone had this problem with a new case?

The only way it's got something to do with the case is really if you're shorting it (which I doubt).

Check your connections. Particularly your CPU power line.

 

[zbarron]

The only way it's got something to do with the case is really if you're shorting it (which I doubt).

Check your connections. Particularly your CPU power line.

I tried disconnecting everything. Once I took it out of the case it worked. I think when I screwed in the power supply I put the screw in a hole I wasn't supposed to that touched something and was shorting it. Oops. Thanks though.

 

[Buggy Loop]

Alright! installed everything today, cable management gave me headaches, CM 690 II is one tight case, or its antec's fat cables that made it worst i dont know, but i managed to put all the cables behind the right side panel (looking from the front). Took a few plugging and unplugging before i was set with the way i wanted it to be, tie-wrap'd it and voila.

Sadly, i dont have win7, i've got a 32bit oem version someone gave me but that wont be cutting it for an AMD X6 1090T. I started the PC to see if everything was working and the fans were spinning, all OK. i booted Ubuntu from USB drive and did a few tests, everything's good so far but this isnt much of a stress on the machine like a game benchmark would.

Q: I have a laptop that has a burnt GPU, maybe someday i'll buy a card on ebay but its not for a while now with this desktop. I have an XP key under it even though dell never sent me a CD, i know that key can work with a copy of XP. Could that key work for win7 professional upgrade? Even if XP isnt installed on the HDD? I heard win7 formated the drive for XP anyway so it would be a full clean install just as if i had the retail one? Its 39.99 for students in canada, i hope the above would work.

 

[Hazaro]

How good is this first build, Hazaro? My friend wants to get a gaming PC but doesn't have a lot of money...at this price it seems like maybe he'd bite. He and I would most definitely be playing L4D/Valve games. What other games could it run at decent settings? Would The Last Remnant be one?

http://www.pcgameshardware.de/screenshots/original/2008/11/L4D_GPUs_1920_181108.PNG
Good enough?

It's a very solid computer. 3Ghz Quad + a 4870 which is as fast as a 5770.
TLR is UE3 so that will run at 60fps too.

edit> got it now man, appreciate it.
brought everything down as much as you said to, and now even inside the bus of dirt 2 is running smoothly where as before it was slow as fuck (which i didn't get, because my framerate in actual gameplay was really good.)

Awesome.

Ok, I think I've pretty much decided to go with two gtx 460's.

ASUS P7P55D-E Pro

That one. Has the extra chip for USB/SATA bandwidth

Sorry, got new build at Ava Direct, pretty similar to previous NCIX build, but eVGA gfx card is the main difference and got Samsung F3 instead of WD Caviar Black

$1104.58. Still looking good?

If you want the warranty, go for it.

I am thinking about upgrading my 2 year old C2D E8600 with a i7 processor.

Right now this is what I have:
Motherboard: Gigabyte x48-DS5
CPU: Intel E8600 3.33Ghz
Memory: 2x2GB OCZ Platinum 1066mhz

I am planning up upgrading those 3 pieces and using my existing case (Antec P182), graphics card (4870x2) and sound card (SB X-Fi Gamer).

I am thinking about the following:

What is the best bang for my buck?

Well that is certainly not value oriented.

If you plan on running 2 cards, the mobo listed above in this post (the Pro) along with an i5-750/760 is the best value. i7 provides marginal increases and unless you want to shell out hundreds for an old 6 core later you might as well get the i5.

Also 12GB of RAM is overkill unless you do TONS of media work.

Fill out the top post for what you are looking for
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=23390154&postcount=14952

 

[RadicalRad]

Would a USB wireless adapter work out for gaming? Or are they not as fast as internal cards?

 

[Hazaro]

Would a USB wireless adapter work out for gaming? Or are they not as fast as internal cards?

Some of them work fine, but I'd personally get a PCI for a desktop.

 

[Big Papa Husker]

I just made a few tweaks to my wish list...

I think its a little more reasonable now.

 

[Mr_Brit]

I just made a few tweaks to my wish list...

I think its a little more reasonable now.

Since you're obviously willing to spend a little more to get better performance then upgrade that CPU fan to something better like an H50 or H70.

 

[Clevinger]

Since you're obviously willing to spend a little more to get better performance then upgrade that CPU fan to something better like an H50 or H70.

If he wants water cooling. Get a noctua nh-d14 if you want air cooling (though make sure you have enough space in your case for it).

 

[Corky]

well guys I got the parts now, going to go to sleep though its late.
So here is the plan and please warn me if something looks wrong in my process :


1) Put in the cpu and ram
2) apply thermal paste and hyper 212+ cpu cooler
3) Put the motherboard into the case
4) Connect the power and data-cables (HDD/dvd/psu are already in the case)
5) Connect the chassi cables
6) Put in the 460s and connect the SLI-bridge
7) See if the pc posts, if it posts go into BIOS and upgrade to the latest BIOS version
8) Make sure dram settings are correct, timings and voltages.
9) Put in windowscd and delete my current w7 , and then reinstall new clean w7
10) Get into windows, install latest motherboard/chipset drivers
11) install latest gpu-drivers

What say you GAF, am I missing anything? Anything I should be cautious about? Any last minute tips?

Love

Ah godmooooooorning gaf. Since nobody has had any objections to my step by step plan, that's what I'm going with now. Gonna take my sweet time so I'll cya in a couple of hours.

question : What's the best way to test that a sli-setup is giving you the "correct" preformance? Unigine Heaven?

 

[Mr_Brit]

Ah godmooooooorning gaf. Since nobody has had any objections to my step by step plan, that's what I'm going with now. Gonna take my sweet time so I'll cya in a couple of hours.

question : What's the best way to test that a sli-setup is giving you the "correct" preformance? Unigine Heaven?

That all looks good. Good luck mate.

 

[PjotrStroganov]

If you want to use all available screws for the mobo, it could be a good plan to put in the heatasink after you've placed the mobo. It depends on the mobo though and whether the case has enough space to do it.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Construction complete! Now I need to find a guide on how to OC a Core i7.

 

[LukeT]

Does the Coolermaster Hyper 212 come with thermal paste applied like the stock coolers or do i need to buy some?

 

[PjotrStroganov]

Does the Coolermaster Hyper 212 come with thermal paste applied like the stock coolers or do i need to buy some?

Most if not all come with their own paste. You'll probably have to apply it yourself though.

 

[Dina]

If you want to use all available screws for the mobo, it could be a good plan to put in the heatasink after you've placed the mobo. It depends on the mobo though and whether the case has enough space to do it.

Why would a heatsink limit the amount of screws? If it has a backplate, I would always install the heatsink first. If it doesn't (screw-on), it doesn't really matter, but would still do it.

 

[LukeT]

So after finally getting my student finance sorted I'm ready to pull the trigger on this gaming build. Im getting Windows 7 with the student discount for £30 so it comes in at £788.82 with delivery so within my budget of £750 - £800.

Is everything O.K with the parts compatibility wise? Any improvements? Looking to game at 1080p.

i5 760
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Intel-i5-760-S1156-Lynnfield-Quad-Core-28-GHz-8MB-Cache-Core-Ratio-21x-95W-Retail

Asus P7P55D-PRO
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Asus-P7P55D-PRO-Intel-P55-Motherboard-LGA1156

Coolermaster Hyper 212 cooler
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Cool...4-Heat-Pipes-LGA775-1156-1366-AM2-AM2plus-AM3

Gigabyte 460 1GB
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/1GB-...z-Shader-Clock-1430MHz-336-Cores-DL-DVI-mHDMI

4GB Corsair ram
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/4GB-...600)-Non-ECC-Unbuffered-CAS-9-9-9-24-DHX-165v

500GB Samsung F3
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/500G...HD502HJ-SATA-3Gb-s-7200rpm-16Mb-Cache-8ms-OEM

650W Corsair power supply
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/650W...-Modular-PSU-with-80PLUS-Bronze-Certification

Cooler Master CM690 case
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Coolermaster-CM-690-II-Advanced-Black-Mid-Tower-Case-w-o-PSU

DVD drive
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Sams...DR-12x-DVDR-DVDplusRW-x8-RW-x6-SATA-Black-OEM

So I pulled the trigger and ordered but changed the motherboard to the
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/Asus...-(x16)-DDR3-2200(OC)-SATA-6Gb-s-SATA-RAID-ATX
It's slightly cheaper and doesn't do SLI but it has SATA 6Gb/s and usb3. Ill more than likely buy an SSD before putting in a 2nd graphics card.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

I really like the price/performance of Gigabyte compared to Asus these days but it all depends on your local availability. I'm also still angry about how my Asus P5B Deluxe fried a few years back, apparently having a Northbridge voltage of 1.65v available in the P5B Deluxe's BIOS doesn't actually mean Asus wants anyone to ever use it. Sigh. Ever since then I've used Gigabyte boards and haven't looked back.

 

[Corky]

Well here she is at the moment, not the best cablejob but what can you do with a non-modular psu..

I'm pretty sure I haven't missed anything.

gonna see if it posts

fakeedit : AHHH it posts!

gonna update bios :

fakeedit : no disk found?!
fakeedit : phew, changed usb-drive, disk found

Bios-update complete!!

YEEEEES it has memoryprofiles for my ram, 8 8 8 24, 1.65 ! Das is korrekt fraulein

Installing windows..

expanding windows files (0%)... dang this is taking a long time.


Left to do :
install chipset drivers
install gpu drivers

 

[kagete]

Well here she is at the moment, not the best cablejob but what can you do with a non-modular psu..


I'm pretty sure I haven't missed anything.

gonna see if it posts

fakeedit : AHHH it posts!

gonna update bios :

fakeedit : no disk found?!
fakeedit : phew, changed usb-drive, disk found

Bios-update complete!!

YEEEEES it has memoryprofiles for my ram, 8 8 8 24, 1.65 ! Das is korrekt fraulein

Installing windows..

expanding windows files (0%)... dang this is taking a long time.


Left to do :
install chipset drivers
install gpu drivers

You'll be fine Corky! I'm rooting for you!