First gaming pc

[Bonestock]

Well I didnt see an into section so Ill introduce myself first. My name is Will. I live in Japan and Im new to building gaming pc's. I have built pc's before but not for games and not for myself. I'm currently in the process of building a gaming machine for myself. As I said its the first game machine I've built so Im looking for some advice and useful input. The pc will be used mostly for gaming, but also for video editing and graphics programs. I dont plan on building a new setup for awhile so I hope this setup with support current/future games for awhile. Its been almost 5 years since I've bought a PC game and would like to get some of the new FPS games like Crysis, etc. Is what I have purchased overkill or not good enough?

So far I have purchased:

-Gigabyte MA790FX-DQ6 motherboard
-AMD Phenom 9600 Black Edition CPU (Quad Core 2.3GHz)
-Zalman Ultra Quiet CNPS7500 CPU cooler
-Buffalo Firestix DDR2 800MHz 1GBx2 Ram (Supposed to be one of the best brands on the Japanese market/will upgrade to 4GB's if the Ram is worth it)
-HIS Radeon X1650 Pro IceQ Video Card - 512MB GDDR2, PCI Express, CrossFire Ready, DVI, VGA, HDTV, Vi (might purchase a second card if needed)
-EZCOOL ATX H550_F25 case with 500w PSU
-Windows XP Pro

Still need to purchase: Advice would be much appreciated

-Hard disks (Would like to purchase 2 500Gb disks but dont know which brand)
-DVD/DVD-R drives

Is there anything else I need to purchase. Also, how does my current setup stand up against some of the higher end gaming machines? Thanks for any comments/advice you guys can give me.

 

[Trotter]

Welcome to Tech-Forums. The intro section is pretty far down the page... most miss it for a while.

Nice start for a AMD quad build. Most here have jumped ship for Intel, but Phenom will work.

A 790 board is a great start, and the 9600 BE is a great chip.

Your shortfall right now will be your GFX card. I am running a X1950XT, and I know that Crysis would not be a pretty sight on it/ It would play on medium or so, but it wouldn't go much past it and still be playable. Plus, my card (and your card) are not DX 10. With you running XP, DX10 wouldn't happen anyway, and rumor has it DX11 is not too far away, so the whole case may be moot.

For hard drives, Seagate is number one, with Western Digital a close second. Seagate usually has a better warranty of the two. The other brands work, but Seagate and WD are highly recommended here.

DVD burners are pretty much equal. I have a BenQ and like it. Check the reviews on Newegg to get a better feel for any problem models.

Don't get me wrong... this is a nice setup. But I am trying to point out the weak spots.

 

[SapperX]

I personally would go with WD for hard drive. I never noticed sound coming from my computer, which everyone seems to complain about on tech sites, until I bought a Seagate. It may just be mine, but it is LOUD. I have always loved my WD drives on the other hand.

 

[Bonestock]

ok, thanks for the advice on the graphics card. Im kinda on a budget right now so that card will have to work for me for now. I'll upgrade that at a later date. Since I dont have a CC, I have to buy most of my stuff here with cash.....usually its more expensive than ordering from the states. Ive spent close to a grand on it already (buying usually one or two parts a month) and still have a few things left I have to purchase.

 

[darksideleader]

I personally would go with WD for hard drive. I never noticed sound coming from my computer, which everyone seems to complain about on tech sites, until I bought a Seagate. It may just be mine, but it is LOUD. I have always loved my WD drives on the other hand.

same i always hear not loud but noticable blinking sounds from my seagate but from my WD not a bleep.

and depending on what you do, even a quad-core 2.3 and x1650 is overkill.

an aftermarket cooler is pretty useless in a system like this, unless u want something quieter, but the stock fan aint that loud.
but you bought the black edition anyway, so just watch out next time.

 

[Redmo0n]

First off AMD is good and i have no problem with it.

But if your gaming i would change to Intel, like trotter said most people are on Intel's boat of love now.

 

[Bonestock]

This is actually the first time I will be using AMD. I have normally used Intel. A buddy of mine is an AMD fan, so he suggested I give it a try. He said that AMD is faster/cheaper than Intel. Which I can agree with for the most part at least when buying parts. All the Intel chips are more expensive than their AMD counterparts here. Since Im pretty much a beginner when it comes to actual PC knowledge, I thought I would heed his suggestion. Also, at the current moment, I would take anything that is better than my current setup. I was using a Sony Vaio Pentium 4 3.06Ghz laptop but it took a crap on me. The current setup Im using is a emachine 766 MHz, 128MB MAX.......its slow as **** but its all I have to use and it was free. At the time I didnt have the money to go out an buy a new pc so I had to make due. I was originally going to have a friend order me a ASUS Commando mobo and use a Q6600? chip, but my PC buddy advised against using Intel. His reasoning for this is because he says that Intel mobo's have slow FSB speeds and AMD's are much higher. The new AMD mobo I bought has a FSB of 4000+. Now, I dont know what all that means, but thats why Im here.....to learn what I need to.

 

[thirdshiftdj]

faster? No. Cheaper? Most of the time. The Q6600 is a great chip. Just so you know, clock for clock intel will outperform amd. Plus AMD uses "HyperTransport". Trust me w/ the core 2 architecture you can't lose. Nothing wrong w/ a phenom either though.

 

[veg1992]

Well I didnt see an into section so Ill introduce myself first. My name is Will. I live in Japan and Im new to building gaming pc's. I have built pc's before but not for games and not for myself. I'm currently in the process of building a gaming machine for myself. As I said its the first game machine I've built so Im looking for some advice and useful input. The pc will be used mostly for gaming, but also for video editing and graphics programs. I dont plan on building a new setup for awhile so I hope this setup with support current/future games for awhile. Its been almost 5 years since I've bought a PC game and would like to get some of the new FPS games like Crysis, etc. Is what I have purchased overkill or not good enough?

So far I have purchased:

-Gigabyte MA790FX-DQ6 motherboard
-AMD Phenom 9600 Black Edition CPU (Quad Core 2.3GHz)
-Zalman Ultra Quiet CNPS7500 CPU cooler
-Buffalo Firestix DDR2 800MHz 1GBx2 Ram (Supposed to be one of the best brands on the Japanese market/will upgrade to 4GB's if the Ram is worth it)
-HIS Radeon X1650 Pro IceQ Video Card - 512MB GDDR2, PCI Express, CrossFire Ready, DVI, VGA, HDTV, Vi (might purchase a second card if needed)
-EZCOOL ATX H550_F25 case with 500w PSU
-Windows XP Pro

Still need to purchase: Advice would be much appreciated

-Hard disks (Would like to purchase 2 500Gb disks but dont know which brand)
-DVD/DVD-R drives

Is there anything else I need to purchase. Also, how does my current setup stand up against some of the higher end gaming machines? Thanks for any comments/advice you guys can give me.

finally a Phenom build

only things wrong I see are the case and PSU already together, and that x1650pro bottlenecking the heck out of what you got, also that Zalman Cooler, they are good, but a lot of them are overpriced for their performance, like a Tuniq Tower 120, Thermaltake V1, TRUE's are way better coolers for the price

 

[Bonestock]

As far as the graphics cards go, I didnt know that you could use DDR3/4 cards on DDR2 mobo's. I thought they had to stay the same. I paid $85 +s/h for the card, so Ill use it for the time being. I looked on the japanese market for the same card and they were asking $140 for the 256MB version and $180 for the 512 version. I had one friend telling me the card was good for what I need it for and another saying its overkill. From what you guys say, its not enough. Can anyone recommend a replacement card that I should get? As I said, its mostly for gaming but I dont have alot of cash at the moment so Ill need something that is reasonably priced. As far as the CPU cooler goes, the japanese guy at the PC store told me that the CPU didnt come with one. It didnt make any sense to me but I took his word on it. Every other CPU that I have bought has come with a cooler so thats why it didnt make any sense to me. The pc store here doesnt have a large selection of top brand coolers. They are mostly japanese brands from what it seems. The better coolers they did have all seems to be water cooled and Im not ready to go that route just yet. I paid about $40 for the Zalman cooler. Also is the 500w PSU not good enough? How do I tell if I should switch to a different one?

Price I have paid so far:
MOBO-$330
CPU-$300
RAM-$90
G-Card-$100
Case w/ PSU-$100
CPU cooler-$40

HDD will cost $100 a piece for 500GB (unknown brand)
DVD drive-around $70-$80
These prices are approximate since I pay in Japanese yen, not USD.