General Gaming Rig, Looking to play PS2

[termhn]

Here's my current thinking. Most parts are being ordered off of newegg, with the exception being a hard drive, which I will be buying at a local store because they have good deals on hard drives for some reason :P

1. What is your budget and does that include shipping/taxes? ~450 dollars (without graphics card, though another 4850 for crossfire would be nice if I could fit it in, such as here: http://www.compuvest.com/Desc.jsp?iid=1731732 ) and it includes shipping/taxes.

2. Where do you live? South-west US

3. What do you need this computer to do (like gaming, Photoshop, and so on)? Gaming, video editing, run a smallish minecraft server (possibly)

4. What parts will you need for the computer? Please list what parts specifically. RAM, MOBO, CPU, HD, PSU.

5. Are you reusing any parts for this computer? If so please say what parts. Yes, and old crappy case (spray painting it, don't really care about looks that much), a DVD drive, and a HD4850 card.

6. What kind of monitor/resolution do you have or want to get to use for the computer? 1280x720-1920x1080 depending on the game. Hopefully 1080 for ps2.

7. Do you have a legit OS? If so what OS and is it 32-bit or 64-bit? Not currently, planned to buy W7 64-bit.

8. What are you looking for the motherboard to have feature wise? Like SLI, Crossfire, Firewire, USB 3.0, Sata 6.0 Gb/s, and so on. Crossfire, Firewire, Sata 6.0 Gb/s. USB 3.0 not necessary but if it's possible why not

9. Any plans to overclock the CPU or GPU? Not particularly.

10. What time kind of time frame are you planning on ordering these parts? About a week.

My current build goes as follows:
Intel i5-2400
Radeon HD 4850 (512Mb I think)
HD: Whatever is a good deal at the time, hopefully 320GB or more.
PSU: Coolmax (I know, not the most well-known) ZX-600 80 plus certified
Crucial Ballistix 8GB DDR3 RAM
Biostar H61MGC Mobo

Depending on how much I get for it, another possible path would be to sell the 4850 and buy a nVidia 460.

[Goku]

I suggest waiting for Ivy Bridge to come out. Should be very soon. Current plan looks solid too.

[termhn]

Yeah, I've thought over Ivy, and from early benchmarks it looks like performance increase is only 5-10% over Sandy, except in the graphics department. The onboard graphics are like a 100% increase, but that doesn't really matter to us gamers because we have discrete graphics anyway. Thanks for the feedback

[Goku]

With it being so close it really makes no sense to get SB at this point.

[termhn]

Originally Posted by Goku

With it being so close it really makes no sense to get SB at this point.

Meh, they might drop prices a little... IMO if there's little difference it won't really matter for me, and I'm pretty anxious to get this thing built, lol

[Goku]

Let me look into the time frame of the launch again. Pretty sure it was Mid April, if its later and you do not want to want SB will just be as good of a processor as IB is anyway.

[termhn]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure I heard it was mid-late april, though I think I want to order my parts within the next week.

[Goku]

This drives me nuts. The processor went from being launched in November -> March -> April. Now the launch date is the end of April. I perfectly understand if you do not want to wait, 20 days is a good amount of time.

Do you know the prices on all those items from the store? Is there a frys/microcenter in your area?

What case do you have specifically? Even if you do not want to buy now I highly recommend moving up to a better case in the future. These last multiple builds so there is no reason not to invest in a good one, not just for looks but also cooling capabilities.

I don't recommend 4800 crossfire at this point in time. A GTX 460 would yield similar performance, but without the issues of multi gpu and only having 512MB vram.

That PSU doesn't have any reviews. There is known quality PSUs for that price point (goes for $50 on NE), so you are better off with one of those IMO.

I'll post up a build later, so you can compare it to what you are currently looking at.

[termhn]

Yeah, I've gone back and forth on it. I think I would probably go to dual 4850s first, then to a 460. Reason being that I really only get a significant amount of money 2-3 times per year, and 2 of the main ones are close to each other. In that time, I get enough money to probably even go to a 6870 or whatever the equivalent is next year, and I think the CPU should last at least a few years as well as most of the rest of my build.

EDIT: I have no microcenters near me, but I have two Fry's locations close. That's where I'll be buying my Hard Drive. For that matter, I could by most of my parts (or compareable ones) for about the same price at Fry's.

[Goku]

Frys is good. Can you avoid sales tax going newegg or amazon?

About the cards. You can find deals on 460s for $100 after Mir. That you are better off with. I can only recommend going xfire if it's like a 6 month gap filler till you can get a better one.

[termhn]

That's pretty much what I was thinking it would be... however, I have a little bit of a new plan cause I have about $70 more than I originally guessed I might try and sell the 4850, and if I can get $60-$70 for it, I could get a 6850 I think Oh and yeah, I can save tax by using Newegg/Amazon.

[Goku]

That is too much for a used 4850. These days I would expect no more then $40 and $50. Well I wouldn't spend anymore anyway.

6850 is also a good option verse going for a 460/4850 Xfire.

[termhn]

Here's my current plan:
1. Put together build as currently stands
2. Receive a bit more money in a week or two
3. If I need to, try to sell 4850 at about $50 price point, can probably drop lower depending on how much I get, or maybe not at all
4. Buy either 460, 6850, or 6870

[Goku]

Before I do this build how serious are you about multi gpu? It requires a more expensive mobo is all.

[termhn]

Probably not. Single more powerful is what I'd like