Looking to build rig for heavy gaming. Where to start?

[Apokalipse]

You could get a cheaper Phenom II X4 955, 790X board and 4GB RAM and get a 5870 instead of the 5850.
games depend more on the video card than on the CPU

 

[patonb]

^Oh yha, there you go and making the choices even harder!

 

[LetJimiTakeOver]

You could get a cheaper Phenom II X4 955, 790X board and 4GB RAM and get a 5870 instead of the 5850.
games depend more on the video card than on the CPU

I'd be willing to do that if necessary.

But I'd like to hear other people's opinions on this.

 

[Apokalipse]

Gigabyte 790XTA-UD4 + Phenom II 955 - $250

4GB G.Skill ECO DDR3-1600 (7-8-7-24 @ 1.35V) - $110

XFX 5870 1GB - $380
Or if you can actually see one in stock:
Visiontek 5870 1GB (reference design) - $395

 

[LetJimiTakeOver]

Thanks for the replies Apokalipse but I can't order from Newegg because I'm in Ireland. But I've just found a website called komplett.ie where I can purchase my components.

So far, my build is looking like this:

RAM: Crucial Ballistix 6 GB DDR3
GFX: ASUS RADEON EAH5870
HDD: WD5001AALS - Hard drive - 500 GB
CPU: Intel Core i7 920 / 2.66 GH
CPU Cooling: ZALMAN CNPS 9900 LED CPU cooler
Motherboard: ASUS Rampage II Extreme X58
PSU: Corsair TX750W
OS: Windows 7 Home Premium, 64bit

All of which comes to 1659.75 euro. I chose a cheap hard drive and Optical drive so I would have more to spend in other areas. All that for 1.6k looks good to me. Is it a good deal?

Also I have no idea what case to buy. Can someone please recommend me one from http://www.komplett.ie/Komplett/catalog/ZKB_01COM/02_PCCASE/default.aspx

 

[VishKapish]

The antec 900/1200 or Cooler Master HAF would be your best bet. If you want a mid tower, then get a Antec 300 (Or just pick whatever looks coolest, we aren't the ones that have to stare at it). Since your overclocking, you will need a heatsink. Here's slaymate's recommendations:

The Noctua NH-D14 , Thermalright TRUE or the Prolimatech Megahalems should be your top choices in air cooling.

If your interested in a "Good" Custom Water-Cooling Loop you should expect to pay $200-$300 but it will give you your best performance.

 

[Alive.777]

Ok, what you have to understand is the core i7 920 will handle any hardware you put in the pc, ANYTHING without going government grade parts. Getting a better graphics card with out changing you cpu will increase your gaming perfromance greatly. There will be no bottleneck what so ever.

 

[LetJimiTakeOver]

The antec 900/1200 or Cooler Master HAF would be your best bet. If you want a mid tower, then get a Antec 300 (Or just pick whatever looks coolest, we aren't the ones that have to stare at it). Since your overclocking, you will need a heatsink. Here's slaymate's recommendations:

Would this do for a case? Komplett.ie - Webshop for PC components, Sound & Vision, Digital Imaging and Gaming

I don't care how it looks.

Also, about the heatsink... If I have a CPU cooler (ZALMAN 9900) do I still need a heatsink?

 

[CalcProgrammer1]

The i7 920 and 930 are great CPU's and you won't need anything better to run a graphics card. I would recommend an HD5870 over the 5850, I have one and it is a very good gaming card. I have an Eyefinity setup (3 1920x1080 monitors) and it renders smoothly across all of them. Eyefinity is a feature of the HD5000 series chips that lets you use multiple monitors as one giant monitor for gaming.

An nVidia GTX470 would work too, it's cost-comparable to the 5870. The GTX480 is more expensive.

 

[LetJimiTakeOver]

I'm probably gonna go with the 5870 if all goes according to plan.

Ok so I've decided to go with a Lian Li PC-7FN case. Looks very good quality for a low price.



Question about cooling. If I have a Zalman 9900 cooling my CPU, do I still need to buy a heatsink? The CPU will be OC'd BTW.