Trying to spec a balanced budget gaming rig

[zigzagz]

Hi everyone I'm new here, just joined today.

Deciding on components for a budget rig for $600 - 700 Cdn, that I plan to assemble in the next few weeks.
After weeks of research, leaning towards Phemom II x4 965 rather than i5 2300, I'm not a fanboy either way.
Radeon 56xx or 57xx series seems to offer best buck for my bang - for a system in this price range.
Does the 770x chipset offer better performance than the 785g in a system with separate video?
At this budget level does it make sense to invest more for a 790x chipset or a more robust video card?
I'm a casual gaming fan of arcade racers and fps. GTA 4 & Resident Evil 5 specs are guiding my choices.

I"ll be running XP until sp3 for Win 7 is released. ; )
By then there'll be perhaps a few more games written for 64 bit multi-core systems.
For futureproof reasons I'll be getting a mobo capable of 16 gb ram down the road.

I won't be reusing any components from my existing 2.2 ghz IBM Netvista with recently deceased PowerColor 256 mb video card, but I'll be sticking with my eight ton Gateway Vivitron 21 CRT for now.

[Ctech]

Phenom X4 + 770 board - $180
8GB DDR3 (2x4GB) - $80
Thermaltake case or any other - $80
1TB drive - $60
Cooler Master Heatsink - $30
DVD burner - $20
Radeon 5850 - $200
OCZ 600w PSU - $50

About $700 + tax, could save some money by price matching or switching to 4GB (about $40 less). Decent PC for the price, no point to go lower on the GPU (5770s go for about $140, may as well pay a little extra and have a much better GPU).

[_dangtx_]

howdy and welcome.


well 700 cad canget you something nice...

so youre not that much into gaming...

if you go i3/amd quad you can snatch a 24 incher in the budget too. gonna be tight but hey.

but,if you keep your monitor for now, why not try a nice littler 2500k+mobo? gonna run you in the 400 dollar range,

rams around 50 bucks for 4 gigs, decent budget psu around 75$ or less, soemthing from seasonic or antec in the 500 watts range.


on the other hand a quand am or intel i3 530/540 and mobo will be around 100-150 bucks cheaper, but they wont touch it in
the peformance dept.

if you intend to keep it for a long time, go sandy bridge.

[ilya]

Originally Posted by _dangtx_

well 700 cad can get you something nice...

so youre not that much into gaming...

but,if you keep your monitor for now, why not try a nice littler 2500k+mobo? gonna run you in the 400 dollar range,

if you intend to keep it for a long time, go sandy bridge.

I'm going to suggest this, the newest IGP on the K series Sandy Bridge processors exceeds the minimum requirements for the games you mentioned. You won't be turning up any massive eye candy, but you'll get away with not buying a graphics card. A 2500k on sale+a ~$100 H67 board+2x2gb ram=~$360 and you don't have to worry about a graphics card. However if you want to play any new games you're going to need a dedicated graphics card.

You'll be getting a top of the line system minus the graphics card, which you can purchase later, if you can squeeze some more money out in the future. Only issue is if you plan to overclock, the H67 chipset is limited to the highest turbo multiplier. With turbo, you can still get 3.7ghz in a single threaded application though.

[zigzagz]

wtf? this Sandybridge int g thing is that good? I'll definitely start my research. thx a mil for this tip. This definitely sounds like an option if I put off a video card 'til later.

[spikexp]

Originally Posted by Ctech

Phenom X4 + 770 board - $180

I want link for that
Might find it useful.

i3 are to be compare with athlon II x4, Phenom II x4 are simply a lot better.

i5 2500K + P67A-UD3 + 50$ ram = 400$ = best bang for the buck.

[ilya]

Originally Posted by zigzagz

wtf? this Sandybridge int g thing is that good? I'll definitely start my research. thx a mil for this tip. This definitely sounds like an option if I put off a video card 'til later.

Only the IGP on the K series outperform the GT 220 and 5450 consistently, they also give the rest of the lower end graphics card a run for the money. Thing is, they took the best IGP on the market and paired it with the best overclocking chips atm... Not exactly an ideal combination, especially since you can't use both features at once, at least not until the Z68 chipset comes out.

[zigzagz]

this info on the sandy bridge igp capability is invaluable. The integrated graphics benchmarks are something else. I'm convinced as far as bang for buck goes. I won't have any need for overclocking until 512 bit mobos and 128 core processors arrive. ; )

[Ctech]

Originally Posted by spikexp

I want link for that
Might find it useful.

i3 are to be compare with athlon II x4, Phenom II x4 are simply a lot better.

i5 2500K + P67A-UD3 + 50$ ram = 400$ = best bang for the buck.

NCIX Outlet on eBay, after tax and shipping was $170 and a little change.