Upgrade Advice

[seductive_words]

Okay so i got a computer for free, some of it is good, some of it is shit. I was in the market for a new computer any way so I figured I would take some of the parts out of this free one to create the type of rig I'm looking for and save some money in the process. I know I will need a new video card because this one sucks, as such I will need a new tower and power supply to support the new video card. You can see the specifications of the free computer I got below. This is what I was thinking of getting. I'm looking for advice on what you would change or add (SSD? Different RAM? etc..) to the replacement parts I have picked out.

Here are the parts I have picked out so far-
New Case: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119160
New Video Card: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130768
New Power Supply: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817171049

Here are the specs to the computer I received-

Desktop Specifications
Operating Systems	Windows 7 Home Premium 64-Bit
Platform	PC

Memory Module Specifications
Memory Type	DDR3
Memory Speed MHz	1600MHz
Total Memory Size	16GB
Memory Slots (Total)	4

Media Ports
USB Ports (Total)	6 - USB 2.0
 	4 - USB 3.0
Audio Out Jacks	1 - Headphone
Microphone Jacks	1
VGA Ports	1
DVI Video	DVI-D
HDMI Ports	1 - HDMI-Out Port

Processor Specifications
Processor Brand	Intel
Processor Class	Core i7
Processor Number	i7-3770
Processor Speed	3.40GHz

Hard Disk Drive Specifications
Capacity	2TB
Hard Drive Types	Hard Disk Drive
Speed	5,400RPM

Optical Drive Specifications
Optical Drive Type	Blu-ray Player / DVD±RW
Supplemental Drive
Supplemental Media Type	Media Reader
Capacity	16-in-1

Media Types	
        Compact Flash (CF)
 	Secure Digital (SD)
 	Memory Stick Duo
 	Mini Secure Digital (Mini SD)
 	Micro SD
 	Reduced size MultiMediaCard (RS-MMC)
 	 MultiMediaCard (MMC)
 	Secure Digital High Capacity (SDHC)
 	Memory Stick (MS)
 	Mini MMC
 	Memory Stick Micro (M2)
 	Micro Drive (MD)

Audio Specifications
Audio Chipset	High Definition Audio
 	ALC892 CODEC
Channels	8-Channel High Definition Audio

Graphics Specifications
GPU/VPU	NVIDIA GeForce GT620
Video Memory	2GB

WiFi & Wireless Specifications
WiFi Description	Wireless 802.11 b/g/n
Network Adapter Specifications
LAN Data Transfer Rate	10/100/1000Mbps
LAN Description	Gigabit Ethernet
LAN Interface Type	RJ-45
LAN Ports	1

Dimensions
Height	20.1"
Width	9.5"
Depth	21.7"

 

[JimJohnson]

I have gone through more then a few cases over the years I think for awhile I tried a new case every 45 days. Anyways I find the 150$ cases to be mostly fluff and not worth it. Unless you want it for the lights and shit.

 

[hawthorne]

You don't give any information about what you are planning to do with the rig. Is it just for EQ? If so, a 680 is MASSIVELY overkill. Is it for the latest and greatest games? Do you want to be able to play PS2 with ultra detail and no video/hdd lag? A little info would help here.

Besides that, I agree with JJ. 150 cases are not worth 3x the standard case cost in terms of what you get for it. Easy place to save a little cash. And 1000W PS? Maybe the 680 is more of a power hog than I thought but that seems a bit much as well. 750-800W should be sufficient for what you have listed above.

That HDD though.. It would be fine for a data disc that you dump things on, but you want something faster for gaming. 7200RPM or SSD.

 

[seductive_words]

You don't give any information about what you are planning to do with the rig. Is it just for EQ? If so, a 680 is MASSIVELY overkill. Is it for the latest and greatest games? Do you want to be able to play PS2 with ultra detail and no video/hdd lag? A little info would help here.

Besides that, I agree with JJ. 150 cases are not worth 3x the standard case cost in terms of what you get for it. Easy place to save a little cash. And 1000W PS? Maybe the 680 is more of a power hog than I thought but that seems a bit much as well. 750-800W should be sufficient for what you have listed above.

That HDD though.. It would be fine for a data disc that you dump things on, but you want something faster for gaming. 7200RPM or SSD.

This rig is for mostly new games like GW2, D3 and CS GO. I cange it up a lot, I haven't been dedicated to a game since EQ. Basically if it's new I'm gonna try it.

 

[hoppy96pgtbs]

I'm running 2 SSD's in Raid0, they both ate shit within the past month. 3 months ago the firmware bug got me, updated that, and now they are dying again.

I cant load 4 instances of EQ atm without BSoD.

Do your research before picking a SSD. They are amazingly fast, but seem like they are built to die. I did my research..... 700+ 5 egg rating on mine and they still failed. Working on RMA now.


That PS may be a bit overkill as already stated, but it's better to have too much than not enough imo.

I would go with the nine hundred case. It's nicely priced and sleek.

 

[Tewgn]

I would go with the nine hundred case. It's nicely priced and sleek.

i agree with him or if you want more room id go with the 1200 case.

Other than that id switch to a faster hard drive, and ive got a 580 Gtx Asus 3 slot and it run 4 instances of EQ fine. Just bottle necks the old Q6600 Quad i have.

D3 i have no problem running high graphics on everything. Just a rule of thumb...

1. Graphics cards for towers now a days are getting so beefy that buy the lesser ones are the way to go. or even run them SLI/Crossfire. i dropped 500$$ when the GTX 580 came out because my card was very out dated and i believe it will last me for a very long time!

 

[rob]

I'd recommend (especially at this price) http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151088 for a power supply.

For a case, I went with http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811822014 recently. I'm happy with it.

 

[dewey2461]

I did some research on power supply's and efficiency.

You really do not want to buy a 1000w PS and end up only drawing 250w. They work best in the 50-80% range.

I would highly recommend getting a nice modular power supply. They are very nice because you can use just the wiring you need and remove the extras. Makes for a very clean build.

Personally I would stay away from solid state drives unless you have a lot of extra money to spend. If you get the right one they are very fast on reads. Write speeds are about the same as hard drives. But they are a lot more expensive and tend to die with out warning. Take the extra $100-$200 and put it into faster graphics / cpu.

You should also look into overclocking. Replace the motherboard and cpu with overclocking friendly parts and its likely you can squeeze out an extra $100-$300 worth of cpu speed.

 

[JimJohnson]

I did some research on power supply's and efficiency.

You really do not want to buy a 1000w PS and end up only drawing 250w. They work best in the 50-80% range.

I would highly recommend getting a nice modular power supply. They are very nice because you can use just the wiring you need and remove the extras. Makes for a very clean build.

Personally I would stay away from solid state drives unless you have a lot of extra money to spend. If you get the right one they are very fast on reads. Write speeds are about the same as hard drives. But they are a lot more expensive and tend to die with out warning. Take the extra $100-$200 and put it into faster graphics / cpu.

You should also look into overclocking. Replace the motherboard and cpu with overclocking friendly parts and its likely you can squeeze out an extra $100-$300 worth of cpu speed.

For less then 1$ a gig SSDs are great for your OS HD+ games. You wouldnt use it to back stuff up.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227791

Performance
Sustained Sequential Read
Up to 560 MB/s
Sustained Sequential Write
Up to 430 MB/s
4KB Random Read
Up to 90,000 IOPS
4KB Random Write
Up to 120,000 IOPS
Seek Time
0.1 ms
MTBF
2,000,000 hours

Not sure what HD you are getting for 100$ that gives that kind of read/write that is not an SSD.

 

[rob]

You should also look into overclocking. Replace the motherboard and cpu with overclocking friendly parts and its likely you can squeeze out an extra $100-$300 worth of cpu speed.

I wouldn't do this. There is very little real world benefit to doing it, except for, you know, bragging rights. You'd just end up with a higher power bill and potential stability issues.

 

[htw]

Also, IMO, with SSDs, can't go wrong - just remember, you get what you pay for, like most things in life.

htw

 

[seductive_words]

Just an update, this is what I have so far. I'm just buying parts as I can afford them.

Case - Antec DF-85 (I went with this over the coolermaster case because the air flow system made way more sense and it's super easy to clean)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811129087&Tpk=antec df-85

Power Supply - Raidmax RX-1000AE 1000 watt (1000 watt power supply with a gold rating for a good price, reviews seem okay as well.)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817152044


So here's some of what I have decided to change up but haven't purchased yet.
Processor - AMD FX-8150 Zambezi 3.6GHz (I decided to to go with this processor instead of the Intel, it seems way more cost effective. Any one have any input on this?)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103960

Motherboard - Asus Crosshair V Formula Z
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131876

SSD - Samsung 830 256GB (From what I have read and hear from friends this is a much better SSD to go with)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820147164

Video Card - GTX-570 ($200 cheaper than the GTX-680, I would rather save the money and wait for a cheap 3-way SLI. Damned if I'm paying $1000 for a GTX-690)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130687

 

[Sassycoco]

I would go with the nine hundred case. It's nicely priced and sleek.

i agree with him or if you want more room id go with the 1200 case.

Other than that id switch to a faster hard drive, and ive got a 580 Gtx Asus 3 slot and it run 4 instances of EQ fine. Just bottle necks the old Q6600 Quad i have.

D3 i have no problem running high graphics on everything. Just a rule of thumb...

1. Graphics cards for towers now a days are getting so beefy that buy the lesser ones are the way to go. or even run them SLI/Crossfire. i dropped 500$$ when the GTX 580 came out because my card was very out dated and i believe it will last me for a very long time!

The q6600 is no bottle neck for eq i run 12 eq account on mine all day

 

[JimJohnson]

I would go with the nine hundred case. It's nicely priced and sleek.

i agree with him or if you want more room id go with the 1200 case.

Other than that id switch to a faster hard drive, and ive got a 580 Gtx Asus 3 slot and it run 4 instances of EQ fine. Just bottle necks the old Q6600 Quad i have.

D3 i have no problem running high graphics on everything. Just a rule of thumb...

1. Graphics cards for towers now a days are getting so beefy that buy the lesser ones are the way to go. or even run them SLI/Crossfire. i dropped 500$$ when the GTX 580 came out because my card was very out dated and i believe it will last me for a very long time!

The q6600 is no bottle neck for eq i run 12 eq account on mine all day

Q6600 Runs a solid 12 with a good video card could push to 16 and still keep decent performance. That was the go to CPU for EQ boxing back in the day. Price for performance could not be beat.