First let me start out by saying that I am new to Tech Forums and just want to say hi to everyone. Also I am very new to the PC world and I am in the process of building my first computer.
So on to my question, I am looking for a mid-tower case that is under or around 100 dollars. I have a case now but when I bought it I was worried about price, not functionality or looks. So I have decided to send it back and look for a new one. I would prefer a case that is very functional (since that will make it easier on me to build this computer) also looks would be a plus as well. I would really appreciate any help/input anybody could provide.
So on to what parts I have/ will be getting for this build (if anybody sees any discrepancies here could you tell me please?)
1) Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD3H Intel 7 Series Mobo
2) Either a i5-3570k or the i7-3770k
3) Corsair Vengeance CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9B Desktop Memory Kit 8gb
4) Geforce 660ti (no really sure on the brand yet, or if I'm going to get the msi power edition)
5) Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy SE 70SB057000001 Sound Card
6) COOLER MASTER Hyper 212 EVO
7) OCZ ModXStream Pro 700W Modular Gaming psu (have it)
8) Lite-On iHBS11204 12x Internal Blu-Ray Burner
9) WD Blue WD10EALX 1TB Desktop Hard Drive10) And of course the case =)
Hello All! First post here, but veteran of OCN/TPU (and most BMW forums, but not so relevant).
Anyway, I just wanted to chime in, hoping that I could be of some help!
1) Good MoBo, but depending on your price range, you can really step up to a much better board for not a whole lot more money. Now, the "best" boards (i.e. Asus M5E/M5F, GB UP7, ASR EX9, etc) may be out of your price range, although you can get "open box" Maximus 5 Formula boards for ~$200, but I would strongly suggest looking for something like:
- Gigabyte UD5H ~$170 (3x PCIe3.0 instead of 2x, more connectivity, and better VRMs/MOSFETs/Chokes)
- Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UP4 TH ~$180 (2x Thunderbolt connectors, hugely better power regulation, 3 instead of 2 PCIe3.0 slots, better overclocking)
- ASRock Z77 OC Formula ~$200 w Rebate (excellent power regulation and cooling, 10x total SATA3/6 connectors for huge amounts of storage, very strong overclocking)
- Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UP5 TH ~$210-240 depending on rebates (best power delivery outside of the 2x more expensive UP7, dual-TB connectors + good SATA3/6 options, 3x PCIe3.0, good looking board, and honestly would be my personal choice)
- Asus Z77 Sabertooth ~$200-230 (one of the best of the Z77 boards outside of the "Extreme" models and has pretty much everything you could want)
Just some suggestions...
2) The 3770K will be the better processor in the long-run, with an extra 2MB L3 cache and of course HyperThreading which really does make a difference in any multi-threaded workload. Now that the next-gen of consoles is in the not-too-distant future, and with games becoming more and more heavily multithreaded, I think it is a wise choice to go 4c/8t over 4c/4t. Also, if you have a MicroCenter nearby, you can pick up the 3770K + MB (Sabertooth, UP5, UD5H, Maximus V, and a bunch of Asus P8Z77 boards) for an extra $40 off the already significantly-lower prices (compared to any online retailer I've seen). I got my 3930K + Rampage IV Extreme from MicroCenter for $838 total.
3) I STRONGLY recommend against Corsair memory, as the Vengeance line is just a dressed-up "budget" line with poor IMC's, and their only decent memory, the Dominator kits, come at insane prices. I used to be a big fan of Corsair, but anymore and they rely on their name to sell substandard parts for standard prices while charging a huge premium for "premium" parts. Out of all the various memory kits I've used over the years, there are TWO that I recommend above and beyond anything else, as in, nothing else can touch these...
- G.Skill RipjawsZ 16GB (4x4GB) DDR3-2133 9-11-10-28 kit also available in a 2x4GB kit; I have gotten mine to ~DDR3-2475 10-12-10-30 at 1.655v (DDR3-2425 9-11-11-30 @ 1.66v), as well as DDR3-2133 9-10-9-26 1T 1.65v, DDR3-1866 8-9-8-24 1T 1.575v, and DDR3-1600 6-7-7-21 1T 1.55v... Insanely flexible, and that's with a 3930K, so your IVB setup will be able to push the memory much higher than my 6-core can... Watch for a deal and you can snag the kit (F3-17000CL9Q-16GZHB is the kit model number, I think) for $100, with retail around $120...
- Samsung DDR3-1600 Ultra-Low-Voltage 1.35v RAM 2x4GB Kits; check out the HUGE thread @ OCN about this, with many people hitting DDR3-2800 11-11-11-32 at 1.525v (crazy!), or DDR3 2500-2600 9-11-10-30-to-10-10-10-30 with no more than 1.50v! Plus, it's all of $90 for 16GB!
4) The 660Ti is certainly no slouch, but if you can afford the extra ~$40, you can grab an EVGA GTX670FTW for $349 right now at Newegg! I have one, and it is by far my favorite card that I've used, and it's running under water courtesy of a Heatkiller GPU^3 GTX680 "Hole Edition" Block + Backplate and easily hits 1300core/7850mem. Built on the full GTX680 PCB, it has better cooling and voltage regulation than reference 670's, and unlike the 660 (Ti or not), it has the full 256bit memory bus intact. The memory bus is reason enough to spring for the 670, as the 256bit bus is by far the biggest bottleneck that Kepler has, so losing 25% of that is not something I would ever want to do. Also, the 2GB cards are all you will need, as you won't see 4-6GB of VRAM usage (realistically) until you've already upgraded to the 7xx or 8xx series.
5) If you get one of the better MB's listed above, you can erase this entirely. I do professional audio recording, mixing, and editing, and I can tell you that 99.5% of people who have sound cards in their PC are getting NO BETTER SOUND THAN THE ONBOARD!!! The newest onboard CODEC's are impressive, especially the ALC898, and while I do have an HT|Omega Claro Halo PCIex1 card, I use it almost exclusively for professional-level work and use the onboard for "fun" (and this is listening via Grado RS1i's/PS1000's, Behringer Bi-Amped Studio Monitor 3-way speakers powered by a quartet of McIntosh Labs amplifiers, and so forth). Buy an inexpensive headphone amp, and enjoy the good sound you'll already have
6) The 212+Evo is a great HSF for the money, but I want to tell you something that I hope will always stick in your head: "Every 10C you lower the average operating temperature of a component, you double its life expectancy". HEAT KILLS! Now, while I must say that custom liquid cooling is BY FAR the best way to go for a daily-use rig, it's not cheap. So, for air cooling, you're looking at MORE than just the HSF, you have to match the case, the heatsink, the case fans, the heatsink fans, and so forth, and balance everything well.
Depending on the MB you get, you may actually be significantly better off with a downward-blowing HSF to prevent your VRM's from getting too hot, as tower heatsinks tend to prevent them from getting much cooling (although with the GB UP-series boards, that's far less an issue).
If you do go with the Hyper212+EVO, I would definitely recommend upgrading the fan to a set of fans (push-pull), and going with some high-static-pressure fans such as the Koolance 120x25mm or 120x38mm 2600rpm fans which, for just $6-8/ea, push an astonishing 5.4mmH2O/6.4mmH2O pressure and 107.4cfm/118cfm (plus, they are dual-ball-bearing motors!), while being completely reasonable in volume! They are my absolute favorite fans for Heatsinks and Radiators, and outside of some extremely pricey Sanyo Denkei fans, I have yet to own a single fan that is better-rounded!!!
However, I would consider doubling your budget for a cooler, and getting something with more than 3-4 heatpipes; I find that 5-6x8mm or 8x6mm direct-touch heatpipes is the sweet-spot, personally.
*For Thermal Paste, or TIM, I HIGHLY recommend Prolimatech PK1; it performs better than anything I have ever used outside of the liquid metals, but it is non-conductive (and also very forgiving of imperfect mounts)
7) *skip*
8) Not much to say here except that you should seriously consider getting a single external BD-drive, as you will hardly ever need to use it for anything except movies and occasional .ISO's, so the ability to use it on multiple PC's and take it anywhere outweighs having it inside your case, I promise!!
9) WD Black 1TB or WD RE4 1TB are the best bets, IMO; both still have a full 5-year warranty, and while I prefer the RE4 (basically "very-highly-binned Blacks") as I use RAID arrays in everything and have never lost a single one after the first week of use (if a drive is going to fail, IME, it'll fail in the first week; if it makes it through the first week without a single issue, it'll have a long and happy life; I've had 3 fail in the first week and 6 DOA's out of 76 total RE4's; I blame the AWFUL AWFUL AWFUL SHIPPING OF NEWEGG!!!). The absolute best is the WD Velociraptor, and you can get the 300GB for $69 right now, a great price. I have a number of those as well, and they are the absolute most-reliable and fastest drives out there, period (not including enterprise-level SAS 15krpm drives...), and I have had the same exact 8-disk RAID5E (RAID5 + Hot Spare) array of 600GB VR's running off an LSI RAID Controller Card (with 4GB DDR3 cache and Battery backup) for 422 days now without one error or one drive loss; average throughput on sequential reads/writes is ~650MB/s read and 670-700MB/s write with the upgraded RAID Card cache.
I would next recommend the WD Blue 1GB EZEX, with the 1TB/platter. Very fast, and very consistent. Expect ~135-160MB/s average reads/writes throughout the entire drive (~180MB/s or more if you short-stroke it).
However, I have to suggest that you get an SSD above ALL ELSE!!! Stay away from OCZ, and stick with Samsung or Intel (or Crucial). I have yet to find a better all-around SSD than the Samsung 830 256GB. It is almost 100% reliable, is made 100% in-house, uses <25nm Toggle-NAND and a proprietary 3-core controller, and it is equally fast with uncompressed and compressed files. Companies like OCZ show you "best case scenario", but I have never once NOT gotten BETTER than advertised numbers with my Samsung!! Seriously, it outperforms its specs by 4-18%!! Also, check the "SSD Torture Test" and you will see that it has survived over a hundred-thousand read/write cycles without dying, while the OCZ/Corsair/etc all were dead before the Samsung even showed the slightest signs of wear!
For $150-160, a 256GB Samsung 830 is the absolute best money you will spend on this PC, I promise! Intel SSD's are good, but too expensive. Crucial are equivalently priced and not quite as reliable (but better than most), but significantly slower. OCZ has a bad rap for a reason. Corsair is EXTREMELY hit or miss.
As for a case: the NZXT Switch 810, which you can get for $110 right now at Micro Center, is the absolute best case I've ever owned outside of a $835 custom CaseLabs TH10. In fact, I like the Switch 810 just as much as the TH10!
The Switch is truly the best mix of air/water cooling case capabilities on the market, bar none. 9x 140mm/120mm fans total (comes with 4), and it's set up to have a very good balance of intake/exhaust. The quality is very high, and I wouldn't choose anything else over it (pre-built), not a $480 Silverstone, a $600 Lian-Li, or especially not a $300 Corsair 800D or CM Cosmos II.
Pack it with good fans, and you will be loving life
I really hope this helps!!!