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Any knowledgeable PC builders out there?

cubby01

cubby01

aka Buck
My sons want to put together a customized PC. They had a friend put together a BOM for them. I was thinking the price would come in lower than what they came up with. (parts close to 1K shipped from newegg.)

I don't really know anything about this stuff. I'm hoping someone can take a look and tell me this a reasonable BOM or what's overkill (or underkill somewhere). Can they get similar off-the-shelf for less? If it's about the same I'd go for the assembly for the build experience they'd get.

TIA

$185 Intel Core i5-650 Clarkdale 3.2GHz LGA 1156 73W Dual-Core Desktop Processor BX80616I5650

$33 GIGABYTE gz-ph2a3 Black SGCC ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

$130 ASUS P7P55D-E LX LGA 1156 Intel P55 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard

$270 GIGABYTE GV-N470UD-13I GeForce GTX 470 (Fermi) 1280MB 320-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card

$96 Rosewill Xtreme Series RX750-S-B 750W Continuous @40°C ,80 PLUS Certified, ATX12V v2.2 & EPS12V v2.91, SLI Ready CrossFire Ready, Active PFC "Compatible with Core i7, i5" Power Supply

$110 CORSAIR XMS3 8GB (4 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory Model CMX8GX3M4A1333C9

$140 Western Digital Caviar Black WD6402AAEX 640GB 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

$24 SAMSUNG 22X DVD±R DVD Burner Black IDE Model SH-S222L LightScribe Support - OEM
 
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I've built every pc I've ever owned, so I'll toss in my thoughts.

There is only one reason to build your own these days, and that's to make sure you get exactly what you need. That is, the processor, memory, drives, video and sound cards that you need to run the games or other apps that you use on a regular basis. You never build your own to save money, because there's no way you can match the $499 specials at Frys or wherever.

That list above looks like a helluva box at a very good price. I'd take it in a heartbeat. The only thought I'd add is that I'd probably put in a bigger hard drive. A WD Caviar 7200 rpm drive is a superior drive, but with prices as low as they are these days I'd go for at least 1TB, if not 2TB.
 
Building a PC is very easy - I've done a few - not in a while though. I've had this Gateway reman box for 4 years now. Good luck.
 
Some good parts and good prices there. When I built my PC it was almost exactly $1k, including the monitor, and every single itme was on sale. For the most part, that list is excellent. However, I would look into perhaps a better power supply, and a video card, it seems silly (to me) to drop that much on a video card...great specs, but at a price. I would look into what your sons want to run, and see what it requires. Look for sales on video cards and compare, some times manufactuers will rebadge a older "great" card and drop the price substantially.

You will definitely want a 64 bit OS. Everything looks to be in order, really...as Fisherdude mentioned, you never build a PC for economy, it's just for fun, and education, you can really learn a lot about PC's building one.

A benefit of buying a Hi-Po pc is that it will "last" longer than a lower, consumer based pc, since it won't run into as many performance issues with more demanding programs.

Don't forget fans, try to find the best noise ratio to CFM, if/when you build it, I highly recommend the free software SIS Sandra to monitor system temps and the like, highly usefull and free:yes:
 
I just built a machine with similar components about 3 months ago, 755D MoBo, 4 Gig of Corsair, memory, t I went cheap on the Video Card though since I'm not a gamer.

I would suggest paying just a little more and getting the Quad Core processor:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115067


The Asus board with that chip works really well for me, no blue screens or lockups ever.

With all that new hardware it's time to step up to Windows 7, I got the Home Premium upgrade version for $109, I had to call MS though to install it, it won't accept the serial number if you install it clean.
 
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Eric H said:
With all that new hardware it's time to step up to Windows 7, I got the Home Premium upgrade version for $109, I had to call MS though to install it, it won't accept the serial number if you install it clean.
Click to expand...

I would suggest, if his sons are students, to see if there are any software deals that apply to students. Checking microsofts page, a Student can get windows 7 professional for $64, which isn't too bad.

I'll add that a quad core wouldn't be a bad idea, but I run a dual core and it pretty much never has any problems - even with being stuck on a budget motherboard.
 
Eric H said:
I just built a machine with similar components about 3 months ago, 755D MoBo, 4 Gig of Corsair, memory, t I went cheap on the Video Card though since I'm not a gamer.

I would suggest paying just a little more and getting the Quad Core processor:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115067

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115067

The Asus board with that chip works really well for me, no blue screens or lockups ever.

With all that new hardware it's time to step up to Windows 7, I got the Home Premium upgrade version for $109, I had to call MS though to install it, it won't accept the serial number if you install it clean.
Click to expand...

I wasn't paying close enough attention the first time. This is an excellent suggestion.
 
i5 with 1156 MoBo, and then a $270 vid card?

AMD rules the roost with video cards right now (and has for the last year & more). Plus, they are less of a power hog. And cheaper, much of the time. A Radeon HD 6870 is $25 cheaper and faster with many games. But my biggest complaint is power usage (and heat) with the nVidia cards. The sweet spot with video cards is probably the Radeon HD 6850, which offers excellent performance for less than $200.

Built an i7 930 system back in June with all the bells & whistles (and a Radeon HD 5850), and am pretty pleased. But I built a system for my sister in September, using an AMD Phenom II 965 Black Edition, running at 3.4GHz, and if I had known that it was going to run so well I might have gone that route instead when I built my own system and saved $200.

Win7 Ultimate 64-bit is mandatory.
 
sounds to me like a good rig.

looks to be good performance, and well priced parts of good quality.

I want me one of those.

you are going to want to stick a 64bit os on that.
 
I forgot to mention this 2.8 Quad is overclocked to 3.6 without a hiccup. :yes:

The speed difference is noticeable, it's slightly noisier because it also bumped up the fan speed to keep it cool but the funny thing is this Intel machine runs far cooler overall than the 1.6 Ghz AMD Semperon box it replaced ever did.
 
Thanks for the quick feedback so far.

You know it wasn't presented as a 'gaming rig' but the friend who provided the list for them is more heavily into gaming and I assume that's what they are thinking about as well. They have Mac laptops that they use today (white plastic shelled macbooks, maybe 3 or 4 years old now), and we offered to move them up the mac chain with newer Mac laptops. They countered with building desktop rigs saying they didn't need more in a laptop and they could run about any OS they wanted to on it. Student Win7 pro at $64 sounds like a heck of a deal.
 
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EchoWars said:
i5 with 1156 MoBo, and then a $270 vid card?

AMD rules the roost with video cards right now (and has for the last year & more). Plus, they are less of a power hog. And cheaper, much of the time. A Radeon HD 6870 is $25 cheaper and faster with many games. But my biggest complaint is power usage (and heat) with the nVidia cards. The sweet spot with video cards is probably the Radeon HD 6850, which offers excellent performance for less than $200.
Click to expand...

Thanks Glen. Input like that is why I posted the question.
 
cubby01 said:
Thanks for the quick feedback so far.

You know it wasn't presented as a 'gaming rig' but the friend who provided the list for them is more heavily into gaming and I assume that's what they are thinking about as well. They have Mac laptops that they use today (white plastic shelled macbooks, maybe 3 or 4 years old now), and we offered to move them up the mac chain with newer Mac laptops. They countered with building desktop rigs saying they didn't need more in a laptop and they could run about any OS they wanted to on it. Student Win7 at $64 sounds like a heck of a deal.
Click to expand...


It may not have been presented as a gaming rig, but it surely is!:yes:
 
A note about Windows 7: Microsoft has changed the rules a bit with regard to OEM and retail software. In years past, with previous versions of Windows, you could buy the OEM version and use it any way you wanted to (provided you loaded it onto only ONE computer). With Windows 7, OEM versions will be tied to the motherboard that it is activated on for life. If the system blows up and needs a new motherboard, Microsoft will see it as a new computer when the time comes to activate the operating system, and it will be denied. Same deal if, in a couple of years, you upgrade or rebuild your system and that upgrade includes a new motherboard...M$ will see it as a new computer and activation will be denied.

If you buy the full retail version of the operating system, it of course can only be loaded onto one system, but it can be moved to a new system if you needed to do so.

Lastly, the number of scams for Windows 7 software out there is totally off the charts. Unscrupulous dealers are buying (for example) 100 authentic keys through Microsoft, and selling thousands of copies of Windows with these 100 keys. So the keys will actually work...for a while. Then M$ catches wind of all these duplicates out there, and blocks them. Might be the day after you install the op-system, might be months later. Bottom line is that if you buy your copy of Windows on eBay you are almost certainly guaranteed to get a bogus copy of the disk, and a key that will eventually be blocked by Microsoft. You can't get a legitimate retail copy of Win7 Ultimate for $100. A previous poster suggested that Win7 can be bought for $64 as a student, but I am not aware of any deals for the operating system offered to college students...I know that Microsoft offers a great deal on their Office software for students, but I can't find any links for deals on Win7 for students from M$. Link? (Edit: Found a deal for Windows 7 Professional Upgrade for students here: http://www.microsoft.com/student/en/us/windows/buynow/default.aspx, no deals for full versions, and nothing for Win7 Ultimate.)

Bottom line is that you absolutely have to buy your software from a known, reputable supplier (such as Newegg or Multiwave, or direct from Microsoft).
 
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EchoWars said:
Bottom line is that you absolutely have to buy your software from a known, reputable supplier (such as Newegg or Multiwave, or direct from Microsoft).
Click to expand...

Direct from the source, that looks to be the real deal, and it's $64 direct, but only for students. I have also gotten discounted versions of Multisim, and If you have a valid email, you can "rent" a student version of Autocad for free from autodesk. There are a lot of interesting benefits out there for students:yes:

Edit; how does the "upgrade" work, will it only run if xp is detected?, may have jumped the gun a bit, should've read it more thouroughly:o

Edit2; not to make another post, but Andyman has a good point - a number I had missed, the Hard drive is about 2x higher than it need to be, good 500Gb-1Tb drives are about $50-$60 now, the $140 would make sense if it was one of those "raptor" hard drives, which have faster RPM, suppposedly for better/faster gaming access, though I think normal drives are perfect for almost any application. Heck, these days you don't have to wait for a HD sale fro those prices.
 
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I don't know as much as the rest of the guys here, but judging from the video, they're gamers and those guys and the HD video guys are the ones that need the state of the art stuff. The only thing that looks kinda funky to me is the HD; that seems high for only 640GB. I bought a 1TB 7200 rpm Seagate Barracuda last summer on sale for $59, so $140 for 640G seems high, but I don't know how it compares to the WD.


But then again, what do I know. My "new" machine is a 2.8 g P4 with 2.0gig of RAM and 160 GB HD with the 1TB parked in the open bay for storage. that I scored for $30 out garage saleing. It's all I need to keep busy online and do my eBay stuff, but I don't play games, so I don't need all that extra power.

Have fun!!
 
33&athird said:
Direct from the source, that looks to be the real deal, and it's $64 direct, but only for students. I have also gotten discounted versions of Multisim, and If you have a valid email, you can "rent" a student version of Autocad for free from autodesk. There are a lot of interesting benefits out there for students:yes:
Click to expand...
I found the link after I posted (and before you posted this response).
Edit; how does the "upgrade" work, will it only run if xp is detected?, may have jumped the gun a bit, should've read it more thouroughly:o
Click to expand...
You MUST have a legitimate and activated version of Windows XP or Windows Vista installed on the system before the Windows 7 upgrade disk will proceed with an installation, thus if you have a new computer build, we're talking about going to all the trouble to load XP or Vista, just so you can pop in the Win7 disk and blow it all away.
 
Alternative:
Newegg:
ASUS M4A89GTD PRO/USB3 AM3 AMD 890GX - $145
AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition Deneb 3.4GHz - $160
CORSAIR HX Series CMPSU-650HX 650W Power Supply - $110
ASUS EAH6850 DirectCU/2DIS/1GD5 Radeon HD 6850 1GB - $200
Western Digital Caviar Black WD1001FALS 1TB 7200 RPM - $88
(5 year warranty on the HDD)

Crucial:
4GB kit (2GBx2), Ballistix Tracer 240-pin DIMM, DDR3 PC3-12800 - $98
(8GB is overkill, unless you have some special apps that need it...you can always add more later)

Spend the money where is counts...good memory (Crucial is very reliable, and I'd buy nothing else), and a serious power supply (the Corsair HX series I listed above is excellent), a quad-core processor, and a reliable motherboard. A $33 case will likely be a source of frustration in the end. A good Lian Li or Silverstone aluminum case will add a lot to pride of ownership and is something that will survive many rebuilds in the future, and most have 120mm fans, which run quieter. The retail AMD processor I listed comes with a heatsink and fan that is adequate, but there's a lot of fairly inexpensive aftermarket heatsink/fan kits that do a lot better...but the stock setup is fine for starters.

Microcenter is out in Overland Park, and everything you can buy there is a plus. They are usually pretty competitive with online prices (except that you get to pay JoCo sales tax), but if there's a problem with the build, all it'll take to remedy the situation is a drive across town rather than shipping something back to Newegg or whoever.

I'd still buy my memory direct from Crucial, regardless.
 
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