Buying a New Gaming Computer

I am a long time Mac user but am thinking about buying a Windows box ONLY for gaming. I know nothing about Windows computers, so can you advise me on what to buy? I have a 30" monitor that uses a dual-link DVI port that I want to use. I am thinking an SSD for HD speed. Other than that I am completely open to advice.

lots and lots of RAM
good vid card with you guessed it - lots of RAM

To me these are the two most important parts. some people will have other opinions on chips, mobos, power supplies and etc.

my two cents..

Thanks Nano. Please guys give me some help here; I honestly cannot sit on the sidelines anymore 'cause it's killing me Larry. I have some money; what should I buy? I even bought Maximum PC magazine to try and get a sense of what is good.

you dont need lots and lots of RAM- your going new tech right? as in DDR3 ram.. 6-8gbs is MORE then enough (of course you'll need a 64 bit OS).. i have 6gbs of DDR3 ram, i never come close to maxing it out, regardless if am, gaming- video editing and so.. .. i have never used more then 3gbs.. so, more aint, better- just more expense- in some cases-- (depending on the quality of ram)

just my 2 cents..


are you Building yourself or buying pre-built? may be a dumb question since your coming from a MAC- just wondering if you any experience building a computer.. building one can be far cheaper then buying a pre-built.. and, far superior to..

how much are you looking to spend?? i just put together a custom build for a lady that uses her computer for video editing. it's sweeeeeeeet and only about $1,100 for everything

I wanted to keep it at under $1500. Again I only plan to use it for gaming so I don't need any fancy schmancy stuff. My assumption is that for games processor type & clock speed and video card are most important right? So that is where I would put my money. I have a dual-link DVI monitor so the video card would need to drive that. I have never built a PC but I have done lots of upgrades to my Macs (RAM/hard drives/PCI cards). Eric, would you be able to put something together for me at that price that would allow me to own Mr. Shifty?

i don't know about owning shifty...some of that is in the player, and not the machine
but yeah, for that price range you can build one helluva machine.
let me throw some things together on newegg and i will send you a sample.

Mr shifty spends far more time learning to fly helicopters these days than playing qw, so it probably wouldn't take much more than a netbook to own me. :p

yeah, we're doing the dual 560ti in SLI, superclocked with lifetime warranty, windows 7 ultimate 64bit, i7-2600k on the Z68 motherboard, 16gb DDR3 RAM, 60gb SATA3 SSD boot drive, 1.5tb SATA3 mechanical drive, coolermaster 212+ processor fan. should be years of fun for Alphabeta
should be able to get between 4.4 and 5ghz on the i7 with minor overclocking.
i really hope he likes it when it's all done with.

EZErich wrote:

yeah, we're doing the dual 560ti in SLI, superclocked with lifetime warranty, windows 7 ultimate 64bit, i7-2600k on the Z68 motherboard, 16gb DDR3 RAM, 60gb SATA3 SSD boot drive, 1.5tb SATA3 mechanical drive, coolermaster 212+ processor fan. should be years of fun for Alphabeta
should be able to get between 4.4 and 5ghz on the i7 with minor overclocking.
i really hope he likes it when it's all done with.

I just got emotionally erect reading this.

it's overkill for ETQW.
but then again, we can't play ETQW forever lol

16 gigs of ram? wow thats an over kill for gaming.

EZErich wrote:

yeah, we're doing the dual 560ti in SLI, superclocked with lifetime warranty, windows 7 ultimate 64bit, i7-2600k on the Z68 motherboard, 16gb DDR3 RAM, 60gb SATA3 SSD boot drive, 1.5tb SATA3 mechanical drive, coolermaster 212+ processor fan. should be years of fun for Alphabeta
should be able to get between 4.4 and 5ghz on the i7 with minor overclocking.
i really hope he likes it when it's all done with.

case?

PSU? -- i wouldnt drop it less then 1000w... imo..

and yeah - 16gbs of RAM is way overkill.. fun overkill
(unless he's running it as a web server)

case: cooler master storm scout

the research i looked at for the SLi gtx 560s is that they max around 298 watts for the cards alone. so the psu is just 775watts. if it won't bench properly then i have an extra 1000watt psu here i will put in for him instead.

http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-560-ti-sli-review/14

do a ram disk for some fun with that extra ram
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ram-memory-upgrade,2778-8.html

EZErich wrote:

case: cooler master storm scout

the research i looked at for the SLi gtx 560s is that they max around 298 watts for the cards alone. so the psu is just 775watts. if it won't bench properly then i have an extra 1000watt psu here i will put in for him instead.

http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-560-ti-sli-review/14

nice case- am not much of a 'mid' size, fan.. prefer 'full' towers, more room to work with, easier cable management for me..

with SLI, that cpu. all that ram and fans and so on- more juice is never a bad thing..

again, just me and my opinion..


going to be a sweet rig..

After all the flames I received for my innocent "any Mac users out there question" I am finally joining the Dark Side for gaming. Now I expect you all to help me optimize this beast so I can pown you.

alphabeta wrote:

After all the flames I received for my innocent "any Mac users out there question" I am finally joining the Dark Side for gaming. Now I expect you all to help me optimize this beast so I can pown you.

may i be the first to say--

Screw YOU!

with that beast of a RIG your on your own...






-- on a serious note- i7 2600 right? to lazy to scroll the entire thread- it's a 3.4gzh? leave it as is.. plenty of power right under the hood.. SLI- i never OC SLI cards.. no need.. there is no game, SLI cant kick the shit out of with default settings.. case in point- i have SLI 470GTX's- been playing MEtro2033 DX11 max settings- was getting 150-170 FPS- again, with Default settings-- what more do you need! ?
but to each his own...

i7-2600k and they overclock easily to 4.4ghz with just the flip of a switch
sorry, but i am definitely going to overclock it for him.
i agree that i am not overclocking the video cards.
they have a lifetime warranty and i don't want to void that.
they are already clocked at 900mhz, that's plenty.

EZErich wrote:

sorry, but i am definitely going to overclock it for him.

LOL- dont apologize man- OC away, like i've said, to each his own..

For a good Gaming machine, I recomend this:

A good Mother slot 1155 chipset Z68 with USB3 and SATA3 (6gb)

Intel I5-2500K (more has no much effect in gaming performance)

A good DDR3 8GB 1600 mhz (2x4GB dual channel)(more RAM or more Mhz is useless in today gaming, but DDR3 is cheap now and is no bad to buy 16GB)

A good SATA3 HDD 2TB or 3TB (not green series, 7200rpm) with a Small SDD (32GB or 64GB) for caching with Intel Smart Response Technology (SRT) (this only in Z68)

A good powersupply of 750W (single) or +850W for SLI/Crossfire

No less than Nvidia GTX 560 or ATI 6870
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-performance-radeon-geforce,2997.html

Monitor LED Samsung PX2370
http://www.samsung.com/us/computer/monitors/LS23WHUKFK/ZA

Case NZXT like Guardian 921 RB (blue led), the others models are very good too
http://www.nzxt.com/new/products/crafted_series/guardian_921_rb

A good mouse and keyboard (like Razer or logitech)

A good Home theater 5.1 and/or headphones (like Sennheiser)

You know, I never understood why you guys didn't go for triple channel over dual channel for ram on an intel platform.
And for pete's sake, why is everyone stuck in this gay ass 1080p mode for computers. All vid card can easily surpass that res. Yes the response time is a little slow and price is high, but demand a little more and get your head out of the 1080p fad, the res is not that great really when you think about it.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824176177

running my 23" screen at 1920 x 1080 60Hz, 32 bit colour.

model: Dell ST2310

Cloister_the_Stupid wrote:

You know, I never understood why you guys didn't go for triple channel over dual channel for ram on an intel platform.
And for pete's sake, why is everyone stuck in this gay ass 1080p mode for computers. All vid card can easily surpass that res. Yes the response time is a little slow and price is high, but demand a little more and get your head out of the 1080p fad, the res is not that great really when you think about it.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824176177

Gaming at more than 1080p is nice, but need a lot more horsepower in VGA to play at high details.
IPS monitors are not targeted for gaming or view movies because IPS have high response time (aka ghosting), IPS are designed for professionals designers because IPS have a lot better color gamut than TN (a CRT monitor has better color gamut than today TN LCD´s).

But, in the last year, IPS has become much better (in price and in response time), maybe in one or two years IPS will have 2ms and could compete with the arriving OLED displays.

It was just a quick look without going for something specific. I just hate how we've become stuck in this 1080p fad.