I plan on building a computer in appx. nine or ten months from now so keep in mind that things will most probably be cheaper so I'm not looking for part recommendations. I just want to know from someone who has experience buying parts and building computers if I am dividing my money up properly or if there or parts I should be spending more on.
Case 130 8gb Ram 50 120GB SSD 135 2TB HD 100 CPU 300 Mobo 130 Video Card 290 Power Supply 100 Fans 60 Sound Card 24 DVD Drive 20 Network 20 Speakers 30 Monitor 150 Keyboard and Mouse 40
Total: 1579
I'm not sure if I should be buying more fans for in the case or if cases usually come with enough fans, and I'm not decided on water cooling yet. I'm hoping I'll be able to get a better video card for cheaper in a year from no also.
I think most of those prices are pretty spot on, but I bet when the time comes you can probably shave off about 50-100$ on the CPU depending on what you get, and the graphics card you can get great ones for around 150ish. Other than that it seems about right. It's always better to overbudget imo, that way when you have money left after you can be even happier.
Well, I think you should change your budget to about $7k. Then you can get a 48-core powerhouse running bulldozer chips.
Just kidding. Your budget looks spot on, and actually a little high, considering you could probably find the parts (regardless of when you get them cheaper) if you mix and match websites and keep your eyes open for deals. I personally like going back and forth between newegg.com and tigerdirect.com. Occasionally find a steal or two on Amazon, but mostly those two sites. So you might be able to come in under budget, though why do you want both a HD and SSD that is only 5% of its size?
Also -- do you have any of these parts you can cannibalize from a previous computer? I never really upgrade speakers, but I'm not a big-time PC gamer, I'm a power-computing guy, and my desktop is just a way to connect to clusters. Do you need a new keyboard/mouse/etc? Or can you get by with existing ones, or hitting a garage sale?
I have a laptop and that's it, I actually have speakers so I could use those but they're really cheap, but no mouse or keyboard etc.. I'm getting a small SSD for installing the operating system on, this will help for booting up and running speeds. I won't be using it for much else though, the hard drive is for my hundreds of games I'm going to install onto it xD
Fair enough -- I'd recommend possibly looking at Craigslist or some of the peripherals. Although they're pretty cheap these days, you could probably get them used for close to free...
I probably need to upgrade my rig at some point, but I just don't game anymore... and I'm waiting for D3 for Xbox, rather than upgrade my PC to play it...
You can easily knock the price of the case down to $50 or under. And you would usually want to either replace or add fans to the case. You can get good 40mm fans for like $10 each. You can spend a bit less on the processor and be fine. You also really don't need a sound card nowadays.
As for the video card, it all really depends on what settings you really want and on what size monitor. For a non 1080p monitor, you can spend less than $175 and max out most games, but when you are higher a good card could upwards of $350. But since you are saying that you are waiting, prices for those card will have probably come down by then.
If the SSD is really only for the OS, go with something smaller and you can spend around $60 on one.
I have a decent vid card, the issue is my slow-ass computer is about 6 years old now... and generally just slow. I really should upgrade, I just don't really feel like it... I used to replace my desktop every four years, lately just haven't bothered...
I want to get a case like the nzxt phantom, you know, something cool to look at, I've saved up enough money so I'm killing myself over saving every dollar, even though that's not a bad idea. I really want to be able to play every game flawlessly, I really like just watching how a game looks and I'm very taken in by graphics. I want to get an HD monitor probably around 23 24 inches also.
I'd suggest going with a GTX 670. That will run you about $400 for a EVGA FTW edition. There are more options if you don't mind using an AMD card though. Either way, you will most likely be spending over $300 for a card for something like that.
I have read about problems with AMD being slow on the driver updates for newer games though, Skyrim being one of them. Where I think Nvidia is a little bit more on the ball. I have an AMD though at the moment, and it is serving me just fine. But when I upgrade to multiple monitors I am going to buy a couple Nvidia cards instead, and just hold on to the AMD for a second PC.
