heres my
rig:
Windows 7 64-bit
Processor - Intel i5 2500k quad core 3.3GHz
GFX - EVGA GTX 560 (Fermi)
Mobo - ASRock B75m-GL
RAM - Kingston HyperX Blu (2x 4gb DDR3 1600)
HDD - Seagate Barracuda 1tb 7200rpm
PSU - Coolmax CUL 750w
Case - Antec 300 illusion
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Monitor - Quantam View 32" 1920x1080 (1080p HDMI)
Audio - Logitech speakers (2 spkrs + subwoofer) and Logitegh wireless gaming headset
KB + M - Standard $10 kb and $6 mouse, but I love them... ;_;
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The computer cost me about $1050 and the screen cost me $180 (sale!) but this is a pretty butt kicking rig. If you want to spend a bit more bump the gfx card to a 680, and though not that much of a difference - an i7 core. And ofc splurge on a good set of speakers/headphones and a decent kb & mouse.
Shoot me up with any questions you may have - I built it myself. Add me on steam for any questions that need answering
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anyone who has been around computers since they started knows to steer away from amd. they may be better now, but fatal overheating problems, lockups, and texture scrambling/tearing due to video memory failure, all have left a sour taste in my mouth...
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Your sample size of 1 is great isn't it? Let's make that a sample size of 2: everything I have that's ATI/AMD has worked perfectly.
Both companies put out junk at times but saying that everybody knows to avoid AMD is just wrong. They've been pretty evenly matched for the last few years with AMD having a slight lead in price/perf under $500. The only real criticism you can make at this point is their mobile drivers need work.
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wrong on the count of quantity: I have owned 3 processors and 2 gfx cards. All crapped out in less than a year. The processors locked up on me almost daily from overheating. And if you reread my original comment you will see the parts "they may be better now" and "have left a sour taste in my mouth...". I know full well they are comparable now, but intel/nvidia has my support.
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I've had an Athlon XP running for 11 years, a Radeon 9600 for 9 years, and a x1950 pro for ~6 years. Again neither yours nor my own experiences mean anything overall.
And tbh if you're getting daily lockups from overheating, either the product was defective or it was user error. Also the graphics side has been comparable ever since the 9700 pro came out which is more than a few years ago.
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I have to say quite the contrary, I've had 2 nVidia cards, and both have fried themselves, the first after a year, and the second after a mere 3 months
I now have 2 AMD cards, and I've never had any problem whatsoever from them (other than them not being able to do what I wish they could xD)
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Less biased answer: AMD's processors have been significantly worse (objectively) than Intel's ever since Intel released their first dual-core processor, for all purposes that don't involve hyperthreading (which gaming generally doesn't use).
AMD's graphics cards used to be ATI's, and those have, allegedly, been more likely to have issues than Nvidia's cards, and don't support PhysX nearly as well.
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Forgetting the Athlon X2? Their CPUs don't perform as well in general, I agree, and have much worse IPC but depending on your workload and budget, it can make sense to go with an AMD CPU.
The "issues" people talk about stem from poor drivers ATI had 7+ years ago which people can't seem to let go. The hardware itself has always been fine and the desktop drivers are decent now. PhysX is dependent on what the user wants
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Actually the first Intel dual core processors were Pentium D, and they were crap. But Core 2 made Intel worth buying again. In recent years AMD has been relegated to the value part of the market. It can still worth buying for a low budget rig, but I agree that for a $1500 one Intel is the way to go.
ATI/AMD vs. NVIDIA has had its ups and downs. There were times were ATI/AMD was clearly the best choice (such as when NVIDIA released the awful 5000 FX family) and at other times NVIDIA was better. I feel that the choice is a matter of personal bias and a combination of things like perceived value for money, performance per watt, than any real superiority of one over the other.
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With that budget you should be able to buy the highest end GPU and probably some overclockable i5 (39xx K models, I think)
You should probably go for something like GTX 680 for the GPU, if you don't want 690, which is basically an SLI of GTX 680.
Does 1500$ include OS and monitor, by the way?
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Don't go for the highest end graphics card, effectiveness drops off sharply after the $300 mark ($200 if you're extra picky). Buying a $1k card is throwing away your money.
Similarly, if this is a gaming PC you don't need hyperthreading, so get an i5 instead of an i7, and don't buy more than 4 cores.
If you want to overclock, take a CPU with a "K" on the end. If not, the "K" is extra price for no benefit and you shouldn't get it. The "P" suffix indicates that the processor has no onboard graphics, which for gaming purposes means you're going to run cooler without any drawbacks (other than not having the "K" suffix, if you're an overclocker).
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The only difference between i5 and i7 is that i7 has hyperthreading. Hyperthreading and >4 cores have virtually no benefit for gaming; almost nothing takes advantage of them. The only reason he should go for those is if he's intending to use the system for game development tasks like rendering and compiling.
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Just because someone HAS the money, doesnt mean they NEED to spend it. You would be a horrible person in charge of acquisitions, unless you worked for the government sector...
Might as well tell them to put their money in a pile and burn it for what you want them to get.
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I never recommended getting a $1k graphics card. The GTX 680 is around $500, and at least it's future proof. If he was on a lower budget I'd say something like the GTX 660 Ti would be good enough, but if the guy can afford blowing $1500, IMO 680 is the way to go.
I wouldn't say the effectiveness drops though. I know more about AMD cards, so I'll compare using them. HD 7970 is much more powerful than HD 7770, while GTX 660 is approximately as powerful as the HD 7770 and GTX 680, as powerful as 7970. It's worth the extra money, unless you think it's better getting something lower and then making it SLI when starting to see performance drops in next-gen games.
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Late-numbered video cards of each generation have been very powerful, yes. The 5xxx models are beasty even today.
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Well, for CPU ya can't beat an i7, but for GPU... you can't just say "no AMD because no AMD". In the GPU market AMD and nVidia actually compete nowdays. AMD's tend to have slightly better cost-benefit, whereas nVidia tends to have the übber-top at any time (at übber-top prices, of course).
Also, when comparing same-level AMD vs nVidia cards; you really have to look at the games that you play. My AMD card outbests my brothers more expensive, more modern) nVidia card (rest is all the same machine) with almost every game; but there are exceptions... most notably Borderlands 1 (haven't tried 2); it actually lags on my machine with less details than it does on my brothers with everything maxed out; I'm guessing it's something to do with the shaders they use to give that cartoonish looks; they are probably just more efficient on the more modern gpu.
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The i7 is overkill for gaming. The only difference between i5 and i7 is that i7 has hyperthreading. Gaming almost never uses hyperthreading, so you're throwing away $100+ for virtually no benefit.
If you do a lot of compiling, on the other hand, then the i7 is a good idea.
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Barely, especially if he overclocks the i5.
Its really not worth the extra cash, he is better off using that on more HDD space or a nicer monitor/mouse/keyboard/speakers/soundcard.
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Honestly I prefer space over performance a lot of the time, I have a lot of files, I use a higher speed hard drive for programs and games but media is sort of a big deal nowadays and file sizes are going up, my music folder is 200gb and my Shows folders tally up to 2+tb.
But yeah for games/programs/os a faster drive is better for them, but having a couple slower storage drives isn't a bad idea nowadays.
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My game drive is a Seagate green drive. I notice no performance problems for gaming. Though its entirely separate from the OS and is dedicated to strictly gaming storage, so that is a factor.
I too have 2TB+/- of media. Music is only 20gb though :P
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http://pcpartpicker.com/p/L89l
I am picking some more expensive parts for quality and reliability as that is worth more than the short term saving. The PSU can easily be used for the next build. Probably the next two. Also leaves room for a second 670.
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Here's something to get you started:
CPU: Intel i7-3820
RAM: 32GB (4 X 8GB) Quad Channel DDR3
GPU: AMD Radeon™ HD 7950 OR, since you don't want AMD: 2x NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660 on SLI OR 1x GeForce GTX 680
HD: 2 (or more!) x <pick you size> hybrid HD's on RAID 0 (for performance; windows + games) + 1 (or more) 2TB HD's as secondary (for low-performance storage (MP3's, movies, porn and crap))
EDIT: Optical drive: NONE! Screw disks, they should be outlawed!
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CPU:i5 3570 with a nice Heatsink/Fan.
GPU:GTX680(Going rate is 450, still leaves you a lot for other stuff, if you want to spend less a 580/660ti is also fine just not as good obviously.)
Ram:8-16gb, anymore is kinda useless, even 16 is overkill atm.
HDD: Honestly with that much money, spread it across a couple 1-2tb drives and maybe an SSD if you want to keep the OS/Certain programs/games on it. I like WD myself but Seagate is alright. I never had issues with those brands.
Sound Card: If you plan on buying decent speakers which honestly I suggest, sound is a part of the gaming experience, it always confuses me when people but 1k plus builds and have shoddy 20 dollar speakers. The Xonar line is nice for sound cards, A Xonar DG would be enough for most speakers/headphones under 300.
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I didn't know that Hillary Clinton knows anything about computers.
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I suppose, he said 1500 budget and he wanted something rather expensive, but yeah its probably not worth it Price - Performance wise. The 670 you have in that build up there is a nice choice. All I would add to that build is a soundcard honestly, but I guess thats only if he plans on getting nice speakers/headphones.
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I agree with HC here. 3570k+ something like the EVO.
660TI,670,680, 7970 if you are willing to accept AMD in your case.
8-16GB of DDR3-16/1800
1 HDD, 1 SSD etc.
Personally, I had a lower budget so I ended up with a MSI 670, 3570k, 8GB ram. No soundcard upgrade or anything flashy.
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16GB of ram will easily fit into your budget. It really improves the ability to switch tasks quickly, and the rest of this PC is going to last long enough to see 16GB become the norm. It really isn't going to cost more than 100 USD total for 16GB unless you get high performance RAM which doesn't help much at all for gaming. Maybe 2 FPS difference between average 'low-rent' ADATA RAM and the top-end Dominators, Snipers, or Mushkin Redlines. Worry less about CAS latency on your RAM and instead go for a faster GPU.
The GTX 680 is going to give around 25% higher performance than a 660 Ti, so get it if you can afford it. The price difference is 150-200 USD, but for a high budget build, I highly recommend it. You want to get your money's worth displayed on the screen, not stored on your hard drive. You're paying 35% more money for 25% more performance, which is really close to a 1:1 ratio, making the improvement worth it in my eyes. Completely ignore tha GTX Titan, priced at 1000-1200 USD. While it has faster texture transfers and much more VRAM, its actual gaming performance is slower than the GTX 690 priced costs 150-225 USD less. Only get a Titan if you want a single card solution for a lot of monitors, since that 6GB VRAM won't help at all if it isn't being used.
Keep in mind that AMD's heat and voltage issues today match Intel's CPUs and Nvidia's GPUs. The difference today is just price and PhysX. Just for PhysX, I recommend Nvidia if you can afford it. For CPUs, Intel is always more expensive for less performance per dollar compared with AMD. Intel has easier RAM setup due to XMP, so go with Intel when you can afford it. Just realize that it isn't cost effective to do so.
After picking out a 7.1 surround soundcard with a high sample rate, along with high quality speakers and/or a great headset, drop the rest of the budget on as many 1TB drives as you want for storage, all Western Digital. Avoid Seagate like herpes. 120GB SSD boot drive, plus another if you play games with long load times between scenes, such as MMORPGs or some of today's FPS games.
A spare SSD and extra RAM would let you run a 24-hour dedicated game server with no impact on performance when playing games on the same system, if you're into that.
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I would go for 16GB as well. Big reason: ram cache. SUPER useful.
Pick up a 670. Solid cards. Cheap for the performance. 680 barely gives you more but costs another 30% (roughly).
Onboard sound is perfectly fine in 99% of all cases. Hitachi drives are also good. SSD must be Intel.
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6 core Intel Core i7-3930k and nVIDIA GeForce GTX 690
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Looking to budget upwards of $1500.
Of course, I want a rather expensive GPU.
I don't want any AMD stuff.
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