Sorry ladies and gents if I am beating a dead horse here, but I'm looking to build a desktop in the near future. I stumbled upon this site and it seems everyone is very helpful and knowledgeable so I figured I would see what everyones opinion here was. So first and foremost thank you for any help and advice.

Ok enough butt kissing I am sure people post these types of questions all the time but here is what I am looking for.

I want to spend up to or around $2000 on my next PC. I want it to be able to play the latest games and be able to handle a fairly heavy workload. I know my way around computers and understand a lot about them but I am not by any means an expert.

So here it is. I am giving you my credit card and telling you to build my PC for me. I don't need a monitor but would like to buy a new one if there is extra $$ left over from building the PC. Also flashy lights and a sweet case are a plus because I am a sucker for that sort of stuff but not a necessity by any means.

Thanks for your help ahead of time!

This post has been edited by JROLLA: Mar 16 2008, 12:06 PM

Well I'm building myself a sweet gaming case also, but my budget is not quite as high as yours. Anyway I'll give you some of my advise on what I've learned so far.

For a case, the Antec Nine Hundred is really sweet. It has tons and tons of cooling. I bought it through NewEgg for $120 minus another $40 for mail in rebate so it will actually only end up being $80... don't think you can beat it.

For a motherboard, I was looking into an eVGA 680i nVidia, but I ended up finding a really good deal on an XFX nForce 680i LTsli for about $130 at MicroCenter so I bought that one. I don't think you can go wrong with either one.

As for a processor, I've heard some good things about the Qx6850, but once again I went a little cheaper and bought a Q6600 for $200 at MicroCenter also. (If you are planning on keeping you computer for a while, then definitely go for a quad core, but if you just want the best performance for you buck right now go for a dual core).

For a hard drive, the Western Digital Rapter 150Gb runs at 10,000 RPM so it is the best out there for $150 also at MicroCenter.

RAM I'm not sure about, I've heard that the DDR3's still have a lot of problems with them, but the Corsair XMS3 Dominator is the best there. Your looking at about $600 for 4Gb worth. Or you can go with DDR2 and get the Corsair XMS2 Dominator or Corsair XMS2 DHX for 4GB worth for $80 at MicroCenter.

You'll need a decent power supply also, so I'd go with the Ante True Power Quattro 1000W. I just picked one of them up at Buy.com for $188. Can't beat the price for the watage, and I've heard they're good PS's

As far as Video Cards, I'm not up on them as I'd like to be, but I just bought myself a MSI 512MB DDR3 GeForce 8800GT at NewEgg for $220 minus a $30 rebate to total of $190. If I had the extra cash though (or when I have the extra cash) I'd get two of them to SLI because 2 is always better than 1

So if you go by these guidelines I think you'll have a decent amount left over for a monitor. Let me know what you think and what you do end up getting when you do. Good luck.

This post has been edited by dhitchner: Mar 16 2008, 08:46 PM

Answer these questions and I'll get back to you tomorrow
1. Do you have any intentions on overclocking?
2. Aside from gaming, do you do any multimedia work? If so, what?
3. What is your current monitor?
4. Do you have any old optical drives (what color if you do?) or hard drives that you may want to salvage? Do they use an IDE interface?
James

This post has been edited by james_8970: Mar 17 2008, 06:20 PM

1. No over clocking planned.

2. Basic photoshop and some video and audio editing.

3. My current monitor is an HP vs17e


4. No old drives.

Thanks alot ahead of time! Also big thank you to dhitchner

$2000 is a lot of money considering you already have a monitor.
Here's what I would suggest (you should also wait for james_8970's suggestion)

Case - You should pick this one yourself, this is mostly a personal preference. If you want a silent case, I'd suggest an Antec P182 for $134.79.

Motherboard - Gigabyte P35-DS3L for $89.99. This one however only has 4 SATA connections so if you're looking at adding more than 4 SATA drives (dvd-writer and hard drives) then I'd suggest looking at the Gigabyte P35-DS3R.

RAM - Since you're not overclocking, you should get the Corsair 2GB for $53.00 (or $28.00 after rebate). Or you could get a 4GB for $114.00 ($74.00 after rebate).

Hard drives - Seagate 500GB 32MB cache for $109.99. You'd probably need more than 500GB so I'd suggest getting another one since a 1TB costs way more than if you buy 2x500GB.

Processor - Since you're doing multimedia work, I'd suggest getting a quad core like the Intel Q6600 for $254.99. There's also new quad cores coming out but since you're not overclocking, I don't see the point in getting the new one (and it also might cost a little bit more than the Q6600).

Powersupply - For a modular PSU (you only hook up the cables you need so you don't have any unused cables connected to the powersupply) I'd suggest the Corsair 520HX for $124.99 (or $114.99). For a non-modular PSU, I'd suggest a Corsair 550VX for $99.99 (or $79.99 after rebate)

Video Card - For multimedia work, I'd suggest an ATI card like HIS Radeon HD 3870 512 MB for $189.99.

DVD-writer - This is pretty cheap, I'd suggest getting a Pioneer for $28.99

OS - If you're going with 2GB of RAM, I suggest Vista 32-bit Home Premium for $99.99. If you're going with a 4GB of RAM, I suggest getting a Vista 64-bit Home Premium for the same price. This is because a 32-bit system won't see all 4GB of RAM but a 64-bit will.

Total comes down to around $1300. Hope that helps a little.

EDIT: I would also point out that the ATI Radeon HD 3870 512MB are suppose to drop down in prices again.

Kamille

This post has been edited by kamille316: Mar 19 2008, 10:39 AM

Thank you very much! with 700$ to spare that would be awesome.

Wow! With a budget of $2000 dollars you can get a screaming fast computer.

(Don't forget the Nvidia GeForce 9600 GT came out! ) --- Nvidia GeForce 9600 GT Extreme

This post has been edited by AgentMES: Mar 19 2008, 03:08 PM

Motherboard
PSU
CPU You should start seeing these soon. I recomend the E8400 over the Q6600 if you can purchase one before you purchaes your hardware, otherwise the Q6600 is a good buy as well.
Hard drive
Optical drive
RAM
Video card
Monitor

Just a heads up, using a 32bit OS, you'll only see around 3.3GB of RAM with this setup. If you got a 64bit OS, you'd see all of the 4GB (but performance will not be much different) and you may experience some issues with older hardware (e.g. prints, scanners and so on). As you probably noticed, I never mentioned a case, I'm going to leave that up to you to decide as I believe it's more so based on personal preference. When looking for a case, just be sure that it is ATX compatible.
James

This post has been edited by james_8970: Mar 19 2008, 05:42 PM