Putting together my 2nd PC from scratch

[Gary Childress]

OK. Just pulled the trigger on some RAM. Seemed like a good price, 16GB for 55.00. Someone at Tomshardware also recommended to me. I guess I could have gone cheaper but the last RAM I bought for my computer was very cheap and generic and it lasted all of 4 months before I had to replace it. So hopefully this will be different, of course, you never know.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...-Memory+(Desktop+Memory)-_-G.SKILL-_-20231558

 

[illram]

G.Skill is good. Never had a problem with their memory, buy it all the time. You will not really need the heat shields on those things though, (more for overclocking) but 16GB will be more than enough for whatever you plan on doing with that thing.

 

[Zelig]

Memory brand has pretty much no bearing on reliability, the chips are all manufactured by Samsung, Infineon, Elpida, Hynix, etc.

 

[tokala]

And the reliability pretty much has nothing to to with the chip manufacturer itself.

 

[Zelig]

Yes, that was a bad implication on my part.

You should expect any memory you buy to fail catastrophically at the worst possible time, independent of brand, price or manufacturer.

It can also slowly go corrupt and insidiously cause random data to be written to any plugged in drives, even un-mounted ones, corrupting your data.

 

[illram]

Is there anything Samsung doesn't make??

 

[tokala]

You should expect any memory you buy to fail catastrophically at the worst possible time, independent of brand, price or manufacturer.

It's a bit of a consolation that the probability for this to happen is rather modest. Some numbers from 1/2 yearly RMA statistics of a big french retailer (also for other hardware):

http://www.hardware.fr/articles/881-4/memoires.html

Kingston and Crucial live up to their good reputation, it seems.

Stay away from OCZ SSDs.

 

[GoodGame]

I've been very happy with a couple of iterations of Corsair, and dissatisfied with single ventures with OCZ and G.Skill. My understanding of RAM manufacture is that quality runs with lots/batches, not necessarily with specific brands though.

 

[tokala]

My understanding of RAM manufacture is that quality runs with lots/batches, not necessarily with specific brands though.

That's for the chips itself, not the assembled modules. There every company sets their own priorities regarding the balance between stability/compatibility, price and specified performance.

 

[Gary Childress]

Saw this motherboard today for 75.00:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130653

Looks like a good deal maybe? Thoughts?

EDIT: Looked at some of the reviews and it seems that quite a few people have had problems with the board. Maybe not...

 

[tokala]

Yes, if several of the most recent user comments comment on a faulty board, it looks as if a bad batch is out there.

It's not unusual for the first batches of a new design to act up, but usually this is rectified with some BIOS updates.

And generally MSI products are rarely under the "recommended by geeks" category.

 

[Gary Childress]

Well...here's my parts list so far:

* CASE: Corsair 300R (Already purchased) $80.00

* CPU: i5-3570k (someone at Tomshardware talked me into saving a few $ on the CPU)

* Motherboard: Still not sure which one I want. Will probably buy whatever is the best deal tomorrow.

* GPU: GeForce GTX 550 Ti (cannibalized from my old machine)

* PSU: Corsair TX650W (cannibalized from my old machine)

* RAM: G skill 2x8 GB (already purchased) $60.00

* SSD: Intel 330 240GB (already purchased) $140.00

* HDD: Will cannibalize my old one.

* DVD/burner: Will cannibalize my old one.

* OS: Window 7. I will be trying to use the same installation I have on my old machine because I will be trashing my old system and my Windows 7 is relatively new. So I don't want to lose it.

What do you guys think so far?

 

[tokala]

* CPU: i5-3570k (someone at Tomshardware talked me into saving a few $ on the CPU)

Still not worth even $5 more, if you do not get an overclocking capable board.

And I wouldn't buy a mainboard just because it's a "special offer".

 

[GoodGame]

If I read right, I think Gary downgraded his CPU choice to save a few dollars, but was stuck with a K version.


Also, although the 300R case supports mATX and ATX, go with ATX---cools easier and easier to assemble components on it.

I'd probably go with the Intel branding of motherboards, and I'd pick from these:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813121640

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813121641

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813121508

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813121599

If you read the fine-print, in green, there's some rebates or gifts attached with each that might affect the final 'value/price'.

 

[tokala]

Intel usually isn't exactly the right place to look for mainboards with lots of features and expandability for a reasonable price
Half of your "recommendations" don't even have connectors for the USB 3.0 frontports.


But just to sway Gary back to an i7, I found something quite unexpected:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117286

an "i7-3750P" in all but the name, for just $30 more than the i5-3570 (not-K)

You lose the integrated graphics, and about 3% speed compared to the i7-3770. For $55 less thats a real bargain.

Being a Xeon, it has of course no overclocking capability.

Should be officially supported by the mainboard though. Not unexpectedly, the Asrock B75 Pro3 does have it on the CPU support list.

Crazy intel product lineup

 

[Gary Childress]

This CPU says "server processor". What is the difference? Is a server processor also good for gaming and 3D stuff?

Have to say I'm a little dissappointed iwth the sales so far today. I've seen some better prices just in the past couple weeks than what is out there today.

 

[tokala]

It's exactly the same piece of silicon as a i7-3770, just with a few things disabled (and a few things enabled that are only relevant for the professionals), and labeled differently.
And it will behave exactly as one, only a tad slower, if supported by the board.

There are only very few truly different CPU types for each generation, they get just binned in different speed flavours and not all goodies gets enabled on the cheaper variants.

As for the "Sale" what I saw at Newegg was mostly older stuff getting good offers (last generation Bulldozers, last generation Intel boards), or even worse stuff with a bad reputation...

 

[Quintillus]

The sales weren't as good this year as last year. Particularly on $200-ish CPUs. Like Tokala said, some good Bulldozer prices, but overall... I think I got a better deal last year on my CPU than I could this year, even with technological improvements.

Edit: Funny, the exact same RAM I bought last Black Friday is on sale for the exact same price.

 

[Gary Childress]

Well, I need to make a choice on a Motherboard at some point here. When I do get a CPU it will be either i5-3570 or i7-3770. Here are a couple mobos that caught my eye today for whatever reason. One thing I'm leaning toward is the UEFI bios.

1. ASRock: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157330

2. MSI: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130653

Thoughts? Suggestions?

PS. My RAM arrived yesterday. Can't wait to start building!

EDIT: Actually I think I may get that Xeon server processor recommended above, the more I look at the reviews for it the more I'm starting to like the idea.

EDIT #2: OK, I bought the Intel Xeon Quad-Core E3-1230V2 for $240.22 including shipping at Amazon. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0085MQUTU/ref=ox_ya_os_product

That leaves only a motherboard as my last component I need to purchase.

 

[tokala]

Thoughts? Suggestions?

Still the same as last week