Sandy Bridge Gaming Build

[impruv]

My friend has a $1000 budget. Do you think there's a few corners to cut so that he can keep the 6950 but stay under 1000 after tax?
I also noticed the cpu cooler is wrong. What's a good cpu cooler for the sandybridge now a days?

He's looking to order before the end of next week.

The price right now comes to 1091 + tax = $1232.

Could he suffice with a 650w psu instead to cut some costs there? Maybe 6gb of ram instead?

[ilya]

Most of that can be pricematched to significantly lower pricing. Just use a shopbot, copy and paste model numbers and search, I'm not going to do all of it for you.

The Hyper 212 will be good enough, Sandy Bridge doesn't get very hot, even under OC. Just make sure to get it for $20 instead of $30.

A lower wattage PSU will be enough as long as it's a quality unit, unless he plans on crossfire in the near future.

2x4GB of RAM is overkill, but with the way prices are right now, I don't see the point in getting 2x2GB.

If you still have the budget after PM's, you might want to consider the Zalman Z9/Z9Plus. I normally recommend the Coolermaster Elite or Silverstone Precision series for budget cases, but after seeing one of these in person I can't recommend anything else. The Thermaltake V4, although of good quality for the price,($35-$40) only comes with 1 fan, which isn't very good in terms of performance or noise and better offerings from Silverstone/Coolermaster can be had for a similar price. The Zalman Z9 Plus on the other hand, can be had for $57.05 and comes with 4 decent fans, (they're sleeve bearings though) a fan controller/temperature probes, and is of similar build quality.

[MrDiaz]

Yeah man you gotta price match all of that, it should go down at least $150

[Luay79]

I know newegg Canada has these parts for cheaper. Saphire HD6950 for $285. They are both the same hardware and differ in after services and bundles. 750W is more than enough for CF and over clocking. 650W would be a good spot, 550W is the minimum that you can go. Any day now the new line from Seasonic, X Series should be available in Canada. I think it's worth a wait for a few days. There should be reviews popping up by now.
Welcome to Seasonic USA

Your build will not support CF in the future unless you change the motherboard. Counting only the motherboards that support SLI/CF @ 8x8 and overclocks very well, your best buy should be the Asrock Extreme 4. Check it out!

You should seriously upgrade your RAM to 1600. G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB is in a sweet spot in price/performance.
The Best Memory for Sandy Bridge | bit-tech.net

In the future you might want to get the new 23" 1080 IPS panel from Viewsonic. She's a beauty! The year after that you could CF and get 2 more monitors for eyefinity.

[Eldonko]

Looks like a nice system to me, but yeah price match all that stuff. I always check Newegg, Direct Canada, and then everything else with shopbot.

For memory I recommend this: NCIX.com - Buy Mushkin Enhanced Blackline Frostbyte 8GB 2X4GB PC3-12800 DDR3-1600 C9-9-9-24 Dual Channel Memory Kit - 996776 In Canada.

Price match this and still get the MIR: Mushkin Enhanced Blackline Frostbyte 8GB 2X4GB PC3-12800 DDR3-1600 C9-9-9-24 Dual Channel Memory Kit - DirectCanada

[impruv]

Oh, I thought the 1155 and 1156 were different, so I guess the 212+ still works for sandybridge. Cool.

[YukonTrooper]

650W PSU is more than enough.

[spikexp]

You can find better price on the ncix sale page.
change the TX750 for a XFX 750W pricematched at bestdirect.
i5 2500k + P8P67 EVO = 380$ at ncix sale page.
You can save a lot of money or have better for your money...

[impruv]

How does this look now?

[spikexp]

Your pricematch for the TX750 at memoryexpress is not right, you are suppose to take the price BEFORE pricematch (104.99 in this case).

Your current price
i5 2500k + P8P67 = 370$
on ncix sale page
i5 2500k + P8P67 EVO = 390$
or here is the link for the PRO + 2500k
till 26
NCIX.com - Buy NCIX Gaming Bundle ASUS P8P67 ATX P67 3PCI-E16 Motherboard + Intel Core i5 2500K Sandy Bridge CPU - P8P67Pro-2500K In Canada.
Paid 10$ more to have sli support, and better internet lan.


You can also have the hyper 212+ for less
NCIX.com - Buy Coolermaster Hyper 212 Plus Direct Touch 4 Heatpipe Heatsink AM2 AM3 LGA1366 LGA775 LGA1156 120MM - RR-B10-212P-GP In Canada.