Plans for my future gaming PC.

[Cooges]

Hey People, just wondering about my gaming build(first build ever).

Budget of $1500 AUD

Case: Corsair Graphite 600t whitewith red L.E.Ds (ordered)

PSU: Corsair AX760

Mobo: Asus Sabertooth z77

CPU: Intel i5 3570k

CPU Cooling: Corsair H100

RAM: Corsair Vengence 1600MHz(Black)

GPU: Either 660 ti or 7950 or other.

SSD: Sandisk Extreme ssd 120GB

(Overkill)

just need a gpu for sli/crossfire for later on and able to get 50 fps on highest settings 1080p in most games eg far cry 3, BF3 (other demanding games).

Thanks for your time Suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

[Guest]

Stretch it another $82 and you'll get one of the best 670's out there - a heap of room for OC'ing.

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=wish_lists&wlcId=126056&action=wish_lists

3570k, Sabertooth, H100i, Vengeance 1600 8gb, 600T, Silverstone Strider plus 750w (I reckon you could go down to a 600), intel 320 SSD and a MSI GTX670 PE - beast of a card.

The reason why I swapped over your PSU was because for what they're worth, Gold and platinum PSU's aren't worth the extra cost. That PSU is 80+ Silver and is completely modular.

I don't quite know what you want to do for main storage though, have you already got a HD?

[Vitalius]

Everything is awesome for what you want. You might not be able to get 50 FPS on those settings at that resolution in those games with one card, but since you plan to SLI/Crossfire later, you should be fine.

The video I linked to shows what PhysX can do, but just remember that Borderlands 2 has it utilized very well and not all games do that. I prefer Nvidia simply because PhysX looks awesome. Nvidia is preferred if you want to game at a high resolution on one monitor while AMD is preferred if you want to game on multiple monitors. You can do either with both though, but that's not recommended.

You need some form of large storage, such as a 1 TB HDD or something similar to backup all your stuff, that and 120GB will not be enough for many games + an OS.

Other than that, that's a great build. How much RAM exactly will you be putting in it?

[Cooges]

Stretch it another $82 and you'll get one of the best 670's out there - a heap of room for OC'ing.

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=wish_lists&wlcId=126056&action=wish_lists

3570k, Sabertooth, H100i, Vengeance 1600 8gb, 600T, Silverstone Strider plus 750w (I reckon you could go down to a 600), intel 320 SSD and a MSI GTX670 PE - beast of a card.

The reason why I swapped over your PSU was because for what they're worth, Gold and platinum PSU's aren't worth the extra cost. That PSU is 80+ Silver and is completely modular.

I don't quite know what you want to do for main storage though, have you already got a HD?

i might be able to salvage one from an older pc.

[Cooges]

Everything is awesome for what you want. You might not be able to get 50 FPS on those settings at that resolution in those games with one card, but since you plan to SLI/Crossfire later, you should be fine.

The video I linked to shows what PhysX can do, but just remember that Borderlands 2 has it utilized very well and not all games do that. I prefer Nvidia simply because PhysX looks awesome. Nvidia is preferred if you want to game at a high resolution on one monitor while AMD is preferred if you want to game on multiple monitors. You can do either with both though, but that's not recommended.

You need some form of large storage, such as a 1 TB HDD or something similar to backup all your stuff, that and 120GB will not be enough for many games + an OS.

Other than that, that's a great build. How much RAM exactly will you be putting in it?

thanks, i would end up getting a HDD.

i would be putting 8gb in it for the moment

and yes physx really does make borderlands 2 a better looking game.

[Hobox]

Definitely upgrade to the H100i, and I would try to get a 670 over a 660 Ti if you can.

Something else you might want to research a bit into is the case. I've seen a lot of people complaining about the integrity of the 600T. It's awfully wobbly when you move it for a case of it's price. You might not mind it, but there might be better cases for the price. Corsair charges a lot for their low end cases.

Never mind that, got the cases mixed up.

[Cooges]

Definitely upgrade to the H100i, and I would try to get a 670 over a 660 Ti if you can.

Something else you might want to research a bit into is the case. I've seen a lot of people complaining about the integrity of the 600T. It's awfully wobbly when you move it for a case of it's price. You might not mind it, but there might be better cases for the price. Corsair charges a lot for their low end cases.

Never mind that, got the cases mixed up.

thanks for the feedback will get h100i and 670.With the 600t i have never heard of any structural problems but will keep researching it.

[RuecanOnRails]

I'd suggest trying to grab a well priced 7970 on sale for gpu. It's better performance to dollar ratio and is capable of hitting the fps you want.

Don't buy into the physX scam, it's simply Nvidia paying extra money to lock out features from their competition. If physx is really important and you cant live without out you can always spend $20 down the road and get a dedicated physx card for a hybrid set up.

The PhysX in Borderlands 2 for example I have enabled (crossfire 6950, 3770k) with all settings maxed at 1080p and I get constant 60fps, I've seen it dip down occasionally but that was when new areas are being loaded.

For the cooling you may be able to save yourself a few extra $ by getting a top of the line air cooler such as the noctua nh-d14 assuming you have room in your case. (they are not loud and even come with a limiter to make it near silent)

What kind of monitor are you running? your monitor set up can cause you to lean one way or another for gpu's.

You say you will be putting in 8gb of ram, for the current price of ram you are better off to buy a 16gb kit for only a few $ more than an 8gb. Just because you dont currently use much ram doesn't mean it will be wasted. Setting up a RamDisk with several GB's of space to store games or speed up some apps can greatly improve fps and loading times (even over using an ssd).

One other side note, buy what you NEED now, don't buy a lower end gpu with the assumption of buying a second one for sli/crossfire later. By the time you decide to get the second card you can most likely sell your current one and take the money you were going to spend and just buy a new current card. Plus there are always new issues you run into when going from single card to dual.

[Guest]

Definitely upgrade to the H100i, and I would try to get a 670 over a 660 Ti if you can.

Something else you might want to research a bit into is the case. I've seen a lot of people complaining about the integrity of the 600T. It's awfully wobbly when you move it for a case of it's price. You might not mind it, but there might be better cases for the price. Corsair charges a lot for their low end cases.

Never mind that, got the cases mixed up.

Quick google search turned up no issues associated with stability :)

[hiyayhi]

The only problem is that you will experience bottlenecks with a 3570k and two GTX 670's

[Cooges]

I'd suggest trying to grab a well priced 7970 on sale for gpu. It's better performance to dollar ratio and is capable of hitting the fps you want.

Don't buy into the physX scam, it's simply Nvidia paying extra money to lock out features from their competition. If physx is really important and you cant live without out you can always spend $20 down the road and get a dedicated physx card for a hybrid set up.

The PhysX in Borderlands 2 for example I have enabled (crossfire 6950, 3770k) with all settings maxed at 1080p and I get constant 60fps, I've seen it dip down occasionally but that was when new areas are being loaded.

For the cooling you may be able to save yourself a few extra $ by getting a top of the line air cooler such as the noctua nh-d14 assuming you have room in your case. (they are not loud and even come with a limiter to make it near silent)

What kind of monitor are you running? your monitor set up can cause you to lean one way or another for gpu's.

You say you will be putting in 8gb of ram, for the current price of ram you are better off to buy a 16gb kit for only a few $ more than an 8gb. Just because you dont currently use much ram doesn't mean it will be wasted. Setting up a RamDisk with several GB's of space to store games or speed up some apps can greatly improve fps and loading times (even over using an ssd).

One other side note, buy what you NEED now, don't buy a lower end gpu with the assumption of buying a second one for sli/crossfire later. By the time you decide to get the second card you can most likely sell your current one and take the money you were going to spend and just buy a new current card. Plus there are always new issues you run into when going from single card to dual.

i will be running 2 1080p 24 or 22 inch monitors, and with the ram, i will be getting 16gb but at the moment i only need 8 but i will buy another dual channel kit later on.

[Cooges]

The only problem is that you will experience bottlenecks with a 3570k and two GTX 670's

the 3570k would bottleneck on a multi monitor gaming display, but for a single gaming screen i don't think it would.

[Spite]

The only problem is that you will experience bottlenecks with a 3570k and two GTX 670's

Lol, no he won't.

OP, looks good. I would definitely recommend the HD 7950 over the GTX 660Ti due to crippled memory bus on the GTX 660Ti as once you start cranking up the AA and/or resolution the GTX 660Ti will start to fall behind the HD 7950 plus you also get an extra 1GB of VRAM with HD 7950.

[killerx525]

@hiyayhi, the 3570k is a powerful CPU and it definitely does NOT bottleneck 2 670.

You can save some cash and get better performance with the 7970.

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=193_1309&products_id=19269

[Cooges]

@hiyayhi, the 3570k is a powerful CPU and it definitely does NOT bottleneck 2 670.

You can save some cash and get better performance with the 7970.

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=193_1309&products_id=19269

picking the right gpu is a tough decision, Lots of opinions. gonna be a long night looking at benchmarks.

[Guest]

@hiyayhi, the 3570k is a powerful CPU and it definitely does NOT bottleneck 2 670.

You can save some cash and get better performance with the 7970.

http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=193_1309&products_id=19269

Tiny Tom Logan has done a fair few of them - www.overclockers3d.net :)

[RuecanOnRails]

Picking any piece of hardware is tough. Looking at benchmarks alone is not always enough due to the silicon lottery. You may get lucky and get a gpu that overclocks beyond any expectations or you might get one with very limited overclocking.

You should look for the average that people are able to get out of the various pieces of hardware. silicon lottery is another thing to keep in mind if you decide to crossfire or sli, one card may not overclock as well and the sli/crossfire is only as fast as the slowest card I believe.

In my experiences I've been very lucky and have gotten some decent gpu's that are great at over clocking. More so from AMD's line up which is why I've stuck with AMD for the past couple generations (I lean towards XFX for the most part)

[Cooges]

Picking any piece of hardware is tough. Looking at benchmarks alone is not always enough due to the silicon lottery. You may get lucky and get a gpu that overclocks beyond any expectations or you might get one with very limited overclocking.

You should look for the average that people are able to get out of the various pieces of hardware. silicon lottery is another thing to keep in mind if you decide to crossfire or sli, one card may not overclock as well and the sli/crossfire is only as fast as the slowest card I believe.

In my experiences I've been very lucky and have gotten some decent gpu's that are great at over clocking. More so from AMD's line up which is why I've stuck with AMD for the past couple generations (I lean towards XFX for the most part)

Definitely, well at this point its either the 670 or the 7970 both very good cards, at this point its which one has a red and black heatsink. Probably leaning towards the Asus 7970. Opinions?

[Guest]

Picking any piece of hardware is tough. Looking at benchmarks alone is not always enough due to the silicon lottery. You may get lucky and get a gpu that overclocks beyond any expectations or you might get one with very limited overclocking.

You should look for the average that people are able to get out of the various pieces of hardware. silicon lottery is another thing to keep in mind if you decide to crossfire or sli, one card may not overclock as well and the sli/crossfire is only as fast as the slowest card I believe.

In my experiences I've been very lucky and have gotten some decent gpu's that are great at over clocking. More so from AMD's line up which is why I've stuck with AMD for the past couple generations (I lean towards XFX for the most part)

That MSI 670 card I linked you to you can seriously overclock due to a) pretty good cooling solution with Twin Frozr 4 and b) tripple over voltage...

Which 7970 are you looking at?

[Wats]

You don't need a sabertooth (unless you reallly like the way it looks). if you want asus get a mid range asus, they let you unlock many hertz, spend that savings on the video card. oh and a 3570k wouldn't bottle neck anything.

[Guest]

You don't need a sabertooth (unless you reallly like the way it looks).

That's the main reason people buy them :P

Personally; P8Z77's or RoG if we're talking Asus 1155

[Hobox]

Definitely upgrade to the H100i, and I would try to get a 670 over a 660 Ti if you can.

Something else you might want to research a bit into is the case. I've seen a lot of people complaining about the integrity of the 600T. It's awfully wobbly when you move it for a case of it's price. You might not mind it, but there might be better cases for the price. Corsair charges a lot for their low end cases.

Never mind that, got the cases mixed up.

I'm sorry, I totally got that case mixed up. It's their Carbide series of cases that are pretty wobbly. Namely the 500R.

[Cooges]

Picking any piece of hardware is tough. Looking at benchmarks alone is not always enough due to the silicon lottery. You may get lucky and get a gpu that overclocks beyond any expectations or you might get one with very limited overclocking.

You should look for the average that people are able to get out of the various pieces of hardware. silicon lottery is another thing to keep in mind if you decide to crossfire or sli, one card may not overclock as well and the sli/crossfire is only as fast as the slowest card I believe.

In my experiences I've been very lucky and have gotten some decent gpu's that are great at over clocking. More so from AMD's line up which is why I've stuck with AMD for the past couple generations (I lean towards XFX for the most part)

the msi one or the asus one

[Cooges]

You don't need a sabertooth (unless you reallly like the way it looks). if you want asus get a mid range asus, they let you unlock many hertz, spend that savings on the video card. oh and a 3570k wouldn't bottle neck anything.

yeah i dont need the sabertooth, but im really invested in the looks