Building a new computer -- what should I worry about, and what's just for geek cool?

[Bitterman]

I've been considering building a gaming PC. My last couple of boxes were off-the-shelf because I didn't intend on gaming rigs; they were just working boxes occasionally pressed into gaming service. During the course of researching parts, I've run across all manner of geek pedigree for parts. My question is, what out there should I actually worry about and what's just geek posturing? Let's be perfectly honest here; a lot of enthusiast gear boils down to "If I can pour 10X more money in, I can extract another 1.2% performance and be King of All Geeks!"

I'm not so much determined to crown myself King of Everything. This box is not my surrogate child, nor my magnum opus. It will be a piece of equipment; a means towards an end rather than an end in itself. I've no intention of spending vast sums for extraordinary bragging rights and a small increase in marginal utility.

My big question is memory. I've read several articles online concerning memory, and the various timings different brands are capable of. In the past I've never worried about memory timings. I've just gotten the right speed and left it at that. This, according to most enthusiast sites, is evidently a grave mistake. Is there appreciable performance to be gained by going for faster timings, or is this fundamentally much ado about nothing?

[GrateSaiyaman]

You need to supply the most important information . . .
How much money do you want to spend?

You can build a box that screams for $1500 and your friends will go, "wow this is fast", unless they are hard-core gamers/overclockers.

You can also build a box that's "damn nice" for $700 give or take $100.

Knowing the price you want to pay will determine the answer for your memory question too.

[Bitterman]

You need to supply the most important information . . .
How much money do you want to spend?

You can build a box that screams for $1500 and your friends will go, "wow this is fast", unless they are hard-core gamers/overclockers.

You can also build a box that's "damn nice" for $700 give or take $100.

Knowing the price you want to pay will determine the answer for your memory question too.


Budget goal: $1000
Not to exceed: $1200

Budget must include case, PSU, hard drive, motherboard, video card, CPU, and memory. Monitor, input devices, and optical drives will be salvaged from older boxes.

[Ty]

You can put together a pretty nice machine for a K note when the monitor is not part of the price. The graphics card ends up being the most expensive component in sub-1K gaming rigs though as long as you're okay with that.

With RAM the biggest issue is voltage. JEDEC standard voltage for DDR2 is 1.8V. Most but not all motherboards will allow you to use RAM that runs at higher voltages. This is how they tighten up the timings and speed to increase performance. I'm not referring to overclocking here, some RAM comes specified with 1.9-2.2V ratings (though sometimes the SPD or serial presence detect will be set for something more conservative to ensure you don't get a blue screen of death on boot). Most Intel motherboards and some others will NOT boot unless you use RAM that runs at 1.8V because anything higher is technically out of spec. RAM that is designed for higher voltages is common though which is why I'm pointing it out.

If you're not an overclocker or a tweaker then I would just get a basic DDR2-800 package that runs at the standard 1.8V. The difference between timings in RAM is so small most people will never notice the difference. It's one of those "last few percent" things that only hardcore builders really care about.

[KomoriKiri]

Memory timings are ultimately minor improvements. You're better off making sure you get enough rather than shaving a little off the timing ("enough" depends on what OS and games you're planning on).

For video cards, it's usually better to get the best of the last gen rather than the second-best of the current gen (best of the current gen is just way too pricey), although that may be overkill too. Again, depends on the games.

Main thing I'd suggest considering is noise. Computers can get really loud really quickly, but if you pick your parts with care you can have pretty much a silent box without spending a huge amount. You can get good motherboards and video cards that run fanless, and variable speed, large fans for the case. Personally, especially because I do use the computer to watch anime, I find the silence to be worth a lot more than a few FPS...

Wraith
rw-rw-rw-: The file protection of the beast

[Kellory]

Budget goal: $1000
Not to exceed: $1200

Intel 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo Processor: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115003) $222.00

EVGA 122-CK-NF63-TR LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 680i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188019) $145.00

PC Power & Cooling Silencer 610 EPS12V EPS12V 610W PSU: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817703005) $150.00

G.SKILL 2GB DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 RAM: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231098) $89.00

XFX PVT84JUDD3 GeForce 8600GT 256MB Video Card: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150229) $140.00

Thermaltake Tsunami VA3000BWA ATX Case: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811133132) $115

Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD5000AAKS 500GB Hard Drive: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136073) $110.00

Grand Total: $1026.00 + Shipping and Handling.

These are just approximates. Prices on RAM and CPU's can fluxuate a bit depending on model and type. You can skimp a bit, for example going with a Intel Core 2 Duo E6320 Conroe 1.86GHz Processor: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115015) for $165.00 instead. Wont slow most systems and games up much. Dont be fooled by the relative low GHz speeds of the Core 2 Duo's and Quad cores. They are screaming fast (as in faster than the old P4 4.0GHz) even at 1.8 without overclock. But the 2.4 is still the best bang for the buck. Quad core is nice, but unless you are heavily multi tasking it's not really worth it. Few games take advantage of quad core tech, and there will be new ones in a year or so that will automatically distribute the load rather than relying on the programs to do so. But that's 2008 tech and will be expensive in the first runs anyway.

Case, well, get what you like. I just chose a good mid level case with good airflow. You can get cheaper, and without an 8800 series video card it wont matter much.

Hard Drives, well, 1 500gig one will hold you up fine. Personally I suggest 2 hard drives though. 1 60-80 gig drive for about 50-60 bucks only for your C Windows partition, along with a larger 250+ drivee for 70-100 bucks for everything else. Games and stuff tend to run faster and better when running off a seperate drive so you dont have conflicts between virtual memory searching and random drive searches and the game/program itself. It's not much of an improvement, but I do think it helps quite a bit. It'd only add another 20-40 bucks depending on make/model too.

One thing I've been suggesting to all my friends is a Logitech MX518 Optical Gaming-Grade Mouse (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16826104178) for about 34 bucks. Expensive for a mouse to be sure, but it has 2 thumb buttons which will automatically move you forward or backwards on webpages. Once I got used to that, it made web browsing so much better. The variable mouse pointer sensativity was also nice in games since it can be changed on the fly. Head shots in Halo became quite a bit easier for example.

And finally, if you have the budget, I suggest a 19-20 inch widescreen monitor. They can be had for between 150-250 bucks. Or less depending on rebates and specials at the time. But they are awesome and really add to the viewable real estate on screen.

But yes, 1.8v timing on memory. Especially if using an Intel brand motherboard. As Ty said, the specs for RAM only go up to 1.8. Because apparently past 2.4 the silicone in the RAM actually can begin to sublimate off. Bad juju there, and I've seen RAM factory spec'd for 2.6v. Any kind of RAM timings or overclocking will gain minimal results anyway. Good if you are looking to max your benchmark scores, but it wont help you much visibly in any game. Cheap, stock, 1.8v DDR2 800 RAM will do you fine.

I went with EVGA for a motherboard because they have a very active forum site and a good return policy. From what I've read, most issues with multiple DOA EVGA boards are probably user error or something insane. Also, be careful on some cases. My Thermaltake Armor case cost about $170 and came with instructions. However, the instructions did not tell you to put the mylar tabs on the metal pieces where the motherboard goes. If you dont, that can result in shorts in the motherboard. So be sure to do your homework on your case. Even a really good case may have some weird things about them that the manuals dont talk about.

And finally, go with XP for now with an OS. Or anything other than Vista. Dont get me wrong, I love Vista, it's a pretty awesome OS. It's just got a few too many driver issues right now though. If your using the computer for stuff like web browsing and maybe stuff like Photoshop, then Vista isnt a bad choice. But if you are a gamer, then XP is still where it's at. But in 6 months to a year most of the Vista issues will have been worked out and I'll suggest switching over. To exceed 3.75gigs of RAM if nothing else.

[Bitterman]

Intel 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo Processor: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115003) $222.00

EVGA 122-CK-NF63-TR LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 680i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188019) $145.00

PC Power & Cooling Silencer 610 EPS12V EPS12V 610W PSU: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817703005) $150.00

G.SKILL 2GB DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 RAM: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231098) $89.00

XFX PVT84JUDD3 GeForce 8600GT 256MB Video Card: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150229) $140.00

Thermaltake Tsunami VA3000BWA ATX Case: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811133132) $115

Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD5000AAKS 500GB Hard Drive: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136073) $110.00

Grand Total: $1026.00 + Shipping and Handling.

Compelling. Were I building the rig today, I might go for something similar. Right now my top choice of case is a Cooler Master Centurion. I'm also evaluating the cost/benefit of the nVidia 8800GS. The only part I question is your choice of PSU. Does the PC Power and Cooling Silencer 610 run loud at load?

My current plan calls to wait until October-November to begin final evaluation of available parts. At that time I'll look at the state of Mac hardware and determine whether I'd like to acquire a new gaming rig or go back to OS X for my mainstream computing and give up gaming until the next major hardware cycle. By that time there may be price drops to make the 8800GS fit within my budget, and I'll evaluate the C2D 6850.

[Ty]

Budget goal: $1000
Not to exceed: $1200

Intel 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo Processor: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115003) $222.00

EVGA 122-CK-NF63-TR LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 680i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188019) $145.00

PC Power & Cooling Silencer 610 EPS12V EPS12V 610W PSU: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817703005) $150.00

G.SKILL 2GB DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 RAM: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231098) $89.00

XFX PVT84JUDD3 GeForce 8600GT 256MB Video Card: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150229) $140.00

Thermaltake Tsunami VA3000BWA ATX Case: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811133132) $115

Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD5000AAKS 500GB Hard Drive: (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136073) $110.00

Grand Total: $1026.00 + Shipping and Handling.


If I may suggest an alternative:
replace the powersupply with a 500W coolmax unit, the case with anything $40 cheaper (I'm fond of Cooler Master cases personally), and drop down to a 320GB harddrive and you have enough money to swap the graphics card out for a GeForce 8800GTS 320MB edition which is waaaay more capable than the 8600 series and necessary for a serious gamer. He'll never miss the 180GB nor the 100watts. :)

edit: noticing Bitterman's post just above I see he's fond of Cooler Master cases too. I can say that the Coolmax powersupply I mentioned is inaudible when you get one of their silent 120mm fan series models. They also make modulars but they cost more (and it's worth it to eliminate the cable mess).

Is this (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119106) the Centurion case you're looking at? They're great for the price. It allows 120mm fans in both the front and rear which is great for silent cooling. I didn't keep the fans that came with it though, and replaced them with Scythe S-Flex 1,200 RPM models which are silent and have no dorky lights in them. If you care about noise you should find fans that use fluid dynamic bearings for everything.

[Bitterman]

If I may suggest an alternative:
replace the powersupply with a 500W coolmax unit, the case with anything $40 cheaper (I'm fond of Cooler Master cases personally), and drop down to a 320GB harddrive and you have enough money to swap the graphics card out for a GeForce 8800GTS 320MB edition which is waaaay more capable than the 8600 series and necessary for a serious gamer. He'll never miss the 180GB nor the 100watts. :)

Yeah, that's basically what I was planning on. Though at Kellory's suggestion I might go for two hard drives. One 80GB to load the OS, and another for all storage. I did that in my last gaming rig (built circa 2000), and while it didn't add a great deal of performance to the machine it was good enough (and currently cheap enough, considering contemporary storage costs) that I'm thinking about doing it again.

But at this point, I'm re-considering building a gaming rig at all. When it all boils down there aren't that many games I want to play on PC. The big upcoming title for me is Starcraft 2. But that probably won't be out for another year or two, so I might as well wait until it's out before looking at specific gear. Right now it's just frustrating to look at the game shelf in stores and think, "I might want to play this. But even if I did, my rig can't run it." Which is admittedly not a good reason to want to build a new rig. It's just apparently the reason that tempts me.

[Kellory]

The case doesnt really matter much. That Coolmax looks fine. To me a case is more about looks than anything else. Although if you are looking at an 8800 series card, make sure it fits. Most cases are very tight because an 8800 series card is long. I mean really long.

The thing about PSU's is that I never suggest skimping on them. Modular and multi rails are more PR selling points than practical. Modular does help in reducing clutter, but a little work and some velcro fixes that too. The thing about modular is that it is just another point of failure because you are attaching things to a powersource.

The PC Power and Cooling PSU is dead silent though, even under load. At least as far a load as I can get it. Since it's a single rail and I dont use the full amount, it isnt really under a load.

Multi rails are more problematical because they often do not deliver enough power. Especially for the 8800 series cards. Underpowered cards do work, but not very well. Often given BSoD's and other failures randomly. And this can lead to damage throughout the board itself. Very few multi rail PSU's deliver enough power per rail to power most modern systems completely. Because multi rail does not mean the power is evenly distributed, the power is split pretty much evenly between the rails and often not enough of it is on each rail. It's not impossible to have a massively overpowered PSU that is still not capable of adequately powering a modern graphics card due to it's multi rail power distribution system.

It's up to you though. But as the processor is the brains of your computer the PSU is the heart. A strong heart is usually better than a weak one. And PC Power and Cooling PSU's are expensive for a reason. Top end components across the board. And they are silent and run cool. Something that is really appreciated in a gaming system. But even in a non-gaming build, silent and cool are nice and one less thing to worry about.

One nice thing about the PC Power and Cooling PSU's is that they are top end and rock solid. This means that they run cool even under a load and that they deliver constant power under load. There is almost zero fluctuation in power delivery. Even with a voltage meter people can barely see a discernible fluctuation. You could even run a PC Power and Cooling PSU at 100% load continuously without a problem, with little loss of power due to load or heat. That's pretty good comparatively.

Which video card you get is subject to some debate. And to be honest, if your not going to build the system till October or November, then that is probably going to be a better time to check on them. Right now few games will stress an 8 series card. The 8600 series is about equal to a 7900 series for about the same price, but is also DX10 compatible. The 8800 series is a big step up, but also a big step up in price. And, unless you are an extreme gamer playing just a handful of games, or else doing things like playing several instances of an online game at once, you probably dont need it. Not right now anyway.

Course, I doubt we'll see much improvement in video cards over the next year or so either. Games have yet to really catch up with them, and nVidia is pretty much the only game in town. Till everyone catches up, what we see now will probably remain pretty much top end.

In the end, it does pretty much come down to a cost/benefit ratio. Many parts are higher priced because they feature more (and sometimes better) components. The trick is weeding out the ones that cost a lot more simply for cool factor. RAM is a good example of this. But other things like a PSU, more can get you a much more stable system with fewer headaches. Same can be said with video cards. As a note, if you are doing video playback, an 8600 series will probably work better, if not an ATI card which traditionally does video playback better. I dont know about their current gen cards since I'm a gamer so I'm about nVidia.

[Ty]

I say if you can afford to build a new one and you want to then just do it. :) Computers themselves are a fun hobby and when I built mine I didn't really need a new one yet either. I had a couple of legitimate reasons and just really wanted to do it. It's more satisfying to work on a machine that you put together yourself. There's usually one thing that really compels you. For example mine is audio. The money I saved by not being into gaming (I run a gutless 7300GT card, but it'll probably become an 8500 or 8600GT for the video acceleration abilities someday) I used to buy my insanely awesome soundcard and that alone left me totally satsified and feeling like building the computer was worth the cost.

I'm thinking about writing a review of that card actually. I know Klaus and a couple of others have done pretty long writeups on soundcards in the past.

[GrateSaiyaman]

You have the right idea to wait for a bit. I like to think that the Intel 6850's are going to go down in price pretty soon. Those things are supposed to be blazin'. (http://www23.tomshardware.com/cpu.html)

I've had pretty good luck with Cooler Master cases, they're UPS resistant so you can probably use it when you get it instead of having to file a damage claim.

I've been pretty lucky with Cooler Master PSU's as well as Trermaltake, Apevia and (surprisingly) Raidmax.
The IT guy where I work is an Antec disciple . . . for what it's worth.

One thing that might help with costs is going to Newegg.com and signing up for the newsletter. You'll get one or two ads every week in you e-mail and although most of the time you'll just end up deleting it, you'll have a shot at some really killer deals.
I just picked up a Cooler Master 550W PSU for $25 with free shipping.

Just a personal comment, unless you plan on doing some research into overclocking you might want to consider a rather basic motherboard. The nicer boards are loaded with some cool stuff but unless you have a good grasp of what you are doing most of the adjustments you can make with a nice board will be kind of a waste.
I have DFI Lanparty that can probably be tuned and tweaked to flush my toilet @ 3.5GHz but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone just building their first computer. {I can make my AMD64x2 4800+ do 3GHz for a couple days running seti@home but I found I had to go down to 2.71 GHz to be solid for more than a week or two 24/7.}
:D