[cars_willkillyou]

I want to be able to play movies in HD. I want to be really fast, and consistently. I want to be able to play and run video games smoothly. I want to buy the parts individually and assemble it myself.

what are prices and how much work/knowledge do i need. I am good with building things and have some knowledge of the workings of computers.

[uhler]

Originally Posted by cars_willkillyou

I want to be able to play movies in HD. I want to be really fast, and consistently. I want to be able to play and run video games smoothly. I want to buy the parts individually and assemble it myself.

what are prices and how much work/knowledge do i need. I am good with building things and have some knowledge of the workings of computers.

i had a friend that custom made computers. he actually made my pc before i bought my laptop. i wish he was around now so he can help me fix my laptop for free or or a small fee.

[cars_willkillyou]

you should have turned him on to sonic youth.

[vulva]

get the latest nvidia gfx card, 4GB of RAM, make sure any hardware you get is compatible with XP (avoid vista like the plague), you can get cheap 1TB HDDs all over the place, with all that you'll be fine.

[cars_willkillyou]

Originally Posted by vulva

get the latest nvidia gfx card, 4GB of RAM, make sure any hardware you get is compatible with XP (avoid vista like the plague), you can get cheap 1TB HDDs all over the place, with all that you'll be fine.

i already have a 500 gb external hd. I might get another 500 gb hd as my internal hard drive. I hate vista. Even when it works, it looks like shit. I was told that 2 graphic cards might be necessary for some video games.

what kind of processor should i get? I also want a really good sound card, as I will be using my computer for recording and personal enjoyment.

I also need to run photoshops and possibly film editing programs.

I want a lot, and im gonna spend a lot, but I also want to save a lot.

[vulva]

I'm in class right now, so I'm not able to give the best advice on specifics right now. later this evening I'll do some research for you.
Here is another suggestion as well. Look in to hackintosh compatibility as well. Someone created a hacked version of OSX which you can use PC parts for. This way you can also run shit like garageband, pro tools and all mac software. You can set up a dual boot on your main HDD so that you're able to switch between the two OSes through a split partition.

Like I said, I'll look in to parts for you later this evening

[cars_willkillyou]

that would be awesome.

[vulva]

Eh, I'm taking IT classes right now anyways, it's basically just extra hwmrk

[nicfit]

Originally Posted by cars_willkillyou

i already have a 500 gb external hd. I might get another 500 gb hd as my internal hard drive. I hate vista. Even when it works, it looks like shit. I was told that 2 graphic cards might be necessary for some video games.

what kind of processor should i get? I also want a really good sound card, as I will be using my computer for recording and personal enjoyment.

I also need to run photoshops and possibly film editing programs.

I want a lot, and im gonna spend a lot, but I also want to save a lot.

ok, so, you'd better give a "budget limit" to this thing or you'd be swamped with options, not all viable.

first really important thing: do you already have a monitor or will you buy a new one? Ideas on resolution? This will make the graphic card(s) requirement change dramatically.

I'd say: get a quad core, prices are going down from january 18th coz of the new i7 cpus:

 

If you want to play games, 1 powerful card would be enough with almost everything up to full hd res, but as I said if you get a 1680x1050 monitor you won't even need the most powerful one or a sli-crossfire configuration. Also, as it seems like you wanna watch movies too with this machine, you gotta consider 2 graphic cards = double the heat, 2 fans moving = more noise = more heat to be dissipated.

my take is:
a good, spacious case = Cooler Master cm590
a great cpu= q9550
4 gb of good 800mhz ram with good timings (no need for higer frequencies if you're not into overclocking, which is something you won't need to do with such a cpu, basically, at least not for a good while)
a x38 based motherboard (Asus p5e, gigabyte x38 ) not the latest chipset available but really powerful (especially if you plan to use 2x graphic cards, as it has 2x 16x pci-e slots ) , will be cheaper and powerful.
a good SILENT power supply (Corsair hx650 or Enermax modu/pro 82+ 625W)
A good video card, balanced with your screen's resolution
for the hd, a better solution would be buyin a mono-platter, fast (and relatively silent) one as main hd for OS and programs ( WD aaks 250gb is ohkay) or better yet an SSD drive if you REALLY wanan spend a lot, then add another bigger drive to store data.
I'd say add a blu ray RW and you're set.

for the "recording" tips, give us some more infos on the "professionality level" you want to achieve or tell us something more about the things you want to record/edit, prices and models vary too much to give a suggestion based on just the "I want a really good sound card" bit.


One thing, if you want a SILENT pc you'd better buy some aftermarket heatsinks both for cpu and gpu(s).

For the cpu I'd suggest a Zerotherm Zen fz120, cheaper than others and VERY effective.
For the gpu the best bang for the bucks is the Arctic Cooling Accelero s1 rev.2 , especially if you go for ati cards from the HD48xx series (great performance and good prices, and you can buy one, check if performances are godo for you, if not it's easy to add a twin and go for the crossfire setup).

Add schyte slipstream 12cm fans in intake/exhaust for the case and to both the cpu and gpu heatsinks and you'll have a reeeeally powerful and relatively low dbs-producing machine. That is, assuming you'll keep the fans' rpm 800> , which is achievable either buying a rehobus (such as the wonderful scythe Kaze Master) or simply buying the 800rpm version of the fans.

here you go.
/silent pc geek mode off.

[phoenix]

Originally Posted by cars_willkillyou

I want to be able to play movies in HD. I want to be really fast, and consistently. I want to be able to play and run video games smoothly. I want to buy the parts individually and assemble it myself.

what are prices and how much work/knowledge do i need. I am good with building things and have some knowledge of the workings of computers.

None of the stuff you've mentioned is really computer intensive these days.. Unless you're into lots of 3d rendering and after effects in your movie making, mid range specs will do you fine. Better than average graphics card but not ridiculous. Decent sound card wont set you back as much as graphics.. Spend a little extra on your processor to make it last, and yes making sure you fit a non standard heat sink is important for the life of yr system. Dont need anymore than 4gb ram as any 32 bit system will only use 3.2, just make sure your motherboard has the capacity to up it to 8 for when 64 bit OS are reliable with ...life in general.

Are you in the US or EU?

This is how it works on my side of the world..

Find a computer swap meet/market and an asian dude and give him a list of what you want to do, with a fair idea of the stats of the items you're wanting already so you are sure you're buying the right thing, choose a box and put it all together. Its not too hard and most swap meets even have nerds who get off on putting things together for either free or very cheap. voila.

[phoenix]

Originally Posted by nicfit

/silent pc geek mode off.

no, dont stop.. i was enjoying....................

[phoenix]

ps SSD are such a fkn waste of money at this point in time, IMHFemaleO.

[█████████]

actually i would advise you to get the lowest end core i7 (core i7 920).
best bang for the buck.

motherboard:
there's still few hardware support for this new chipset, my suggestion is that you get the asus p6t deluxe.

memory:
buy good quality memory. my suggestion is kingston.
this chipset requires ddr3 memory and the board holds speeds up to 1600mhz.

graphics cards:
that really depends on how much you're willing to spend. my suggestion is the geforce 8800 gts, don't botter geting the 9800 gtx, the performance gain is not worth the price difference.

cooler:
if you're not into insane overclocking a good and easy to install cooler like the asus triton 81 should be enough.

monitor:
if you want to see hd, make sure you get a full hd 1080p monitor.

blu-ray drive:
avoid lg. yes they are cheap, but you will regret later.

[nicfit]

Originally Posted by phoenix

no, dont stop.. i was enjoying....................

mmmmh, ok.

Originally Posted by phoenix

ps SSD are such a fkn waste of money at this point in time, IMHFemaleO.

oh yes, performance-wise they still are not 100% developed and they cost quite a lot (especially considering the lame $$$xGB ratio), but IF you want to spend a lot they do have some nice pros:

pretty fast, no noise, no vibrations, almost no heat production, superlow power consumption, superlow latency.

As for the cpu, as phoenix said even a good "medium" core 2 duo (say, an E8400) will suffice in most of the cases, quads are better basically for HEAVY stuff like intensive 3d rendering or to deal with huge edits (both audio/video), things seemingly a bit "over" the level you (thread started) may need.
Same for the gpus, basically their killer applications are obviously games, and there are jsut a couple out there atm that couldn't be handled with "just" one card.

waiting for inputs on the monitor you'll use and the actual "recording needs" you have to fulfill.

[nicfit]

Originally Posted by █████████

actually i would advise you to get the lowest end core i7 (core i7 920).
best bang for the buck.

motherboard:
there's still few hardware support for this new chipset, my suggestion is that you get the asus p6t deluxe.

memory:
buy good quality memory. my suggestion is kingston.
this chipset requires ddr3 memory and the board holds speeds up to 1600mhz.

graphics cards:
that really depends on how much you're willing to spend. my suggestion is the geforce 8800 gts, don't botter geting the 9800 gtx, the performance gain is not worth the price difference.

cooler:
if you're not into insane overclocking a good and easy to install cooler like the asus triton 81 should be enough.

monitor:
if you want to see hd, make sure you get a full hd 1080p monitor.

blu-ray drive:
avoid lg. yes they are cheap, but you will regret later.

fishfinger, buying a socket1366 now is still too early imo, prices for the new system (i7, lga1366 mobo, ddr3 triple channel ram) are too high, power consumption and heat are still high and soon there will be the new 32nm cpus which will perform better and drain less power with less heat produced and there's a new socket ahead....
With a lga775 system he'll have PLENTY of power (there are still few softwares/games actually optimized for 4 cores) for almost half the price of an i7 rig.
As in this field "future proof" is a bit of an impossible thing with all the new technologies indtroduced constantly I'd say saving money+having a powerful machine which will serve well for a good while= win win situation.
My suggestion for the heatsink is based on the "silent pc" side of the things rather than actual temp issues.
The asus you mentioned has a backplate?

[█████████]

Originally Posted by nicfit

fishfinger, buying a socket1366 now is still too early imo, prices for the new system (i7, lga1366 mobo, ddr3 triple channel ram) are too high, power consumption and heat are still high and soon there will be the new 32nm cpus which will perform better and drain less power with less heat produced

maybe not so soon, and they will be supported by the board i've suggested.

Originally Posted by nicfit

and there's a new socket ahead....
With a lga775 system he'll have PLENTY of power
(there are still few softwares/games actually optimized for 4 cores)

that's true, though games in the very near future i'll tend to be more and more "threaded" i guess.

Originally Posted by nicfit

for almost half the price of an i7 rig.
As in this field "future proof" is a bit of an impossible thing with all the new technologies indtroduced constantly I'd say saving money+having a powerful machine which will
serve well for a good while= win win situation.

in my opinion, in the middle and long term the initial extra price will be worth it.

Originally Posted by nicfit

My suggestion for the heatsink is based on the "silent pc" side of the things rather than actual temp issues.
The asus you mentioned has a backplate?

yes.

i'm not saying you are not make making valids points, nic.

anyway,
i'll be receiving a machine very similar to the one i've described precisely today.
i can post benchmarks, pictures or whatever if you want me to.

[nicfit]

Originally Posted by █████████

i'm not saying you are not make making valids points, nic.

anyway,
i'll be receiving a machine very similar to the one i've described precisely today.
i can post benchmarks, pictures or whatever if you want me to.

Oh nice!
I'd be interested in some temp tests under heavy load.

about the heatsink, the Zerotherm has a similar mounting procedure to the one you mentioned, then...backplate + screws with springs he he.

you're right about the middle-long term benefits of an i7 based setup, but I think a "standar user" would not notice the performance increase in daily use...the REAL differences will be seen mostly in benchmarks and REALLY heavy processes, which looks like they won't be the cup of tea of the thread opener...but I might be wrong .
That's why I'd stick with a 775platform as of now, mainly becuz of good prices in all departments.
As of now the only game that I could easily tell that needs 3 (or more) cores to work well is GTA IV, but it's quite poorly optimized on many levels... obviously future games will rely more on multi cores, but heck, a q9550 (slightly overclocked, if needed) is a frickin' beast.
Either programmers will sit back and say "hey, i7 are powerful, let's forget about optimization and drink some booze" or it will work well for a quite long time, imo.
Intel is on par with its roadmap and wants to deliver 32nm cpu's before the end of 2009, if I'm not mistaken. I know I'm talking about a quite long period "technologically speaking"...
but still, I'd prefer to wait a bit more and save quite a lot now for a "supersetup" then (when ddr3, mobos and cpu will cost less, while being reeeeeeeally powerful nonetheless..) rather than spending more now that prices are higher coz of all the new things just to get "overproportioned" power for my present limited needs he he. Electricity bills might become an issue if he uses the pc 24/7 ha ha.
I'm a bit dizzy so perhaps this isn't the most articulated of posts, forgive me, hope you get what I mean.

btw, I'm searching for a freaking mini itx case with some decent height to put in low noise fans(8 to 12 cm ones), and no luck...damn.

[cars_willkillyou]

Originally Posted by nicfit

ok, so, you'd better give a "budget limit" to this thing or you'd be swamped with options, not all viable.

first really important thing: do you already have a monitor or will you buy a new one? Ideas on resolution? This will make the graphic card(s) requirement change dramatically.

I'd say: get a quad core, prices are going down from january 18th coz of the new i7 cpus:

 

If you want to play games, 1 powerful card would be enough with almost everything up to full hd res, but as I said if you get a 1680x1050 monitor you won't even need the most powerful one or a sli-crossfire configuration. Also, as it seems like you wanna watch movies too with this machine, you gotta consider 2 graphic cards = double the heat, 2 fans moving = more noise = more heat to be dissipated.

my take is:
a good, spacious case = Cooler Master cm590
a great cpu= q9550
4 gb of good 800mhz ram with good timings (no need for higer frequencies if you're not into overclocking, which is something you won't need to do with such a cpu, basically, at least not for a good while)
a x38 based motherboard (Asus p5e, gigabyte x38 ) not the latest chipset available but really powerful (especially if you plan to use 2x graphic cards, as it has 2x 16x pci-e slots ) , will be cheaper and powerful.
a good SILENT power supply (Corsair hx650 or Enermax modu/pro 82+ 625W)
A good video card, balanced with your screen's resolution
for the hd, a better solution would be buyin a mono-platter, fast (and relatively silent) one as main hd for OS and programs ( WD aaks 250gb is ohkay) or better yet an SSD drive if you REALLY wanan spend a lot, then add another bigger drive to store data.
I'd say add a blu ray RW and you're set.

for the "recording" tips, give us some more infos on the "professionality level" you want to achieve or tell us something more about the things you want to record/edit, prices and models vary too much to give a suggestion based on just the "I want a really good sound card" bit.


One thing, if you want a SILENT pc you'd better buy some aftermarket heatsinks both for cpu and gpu(s).

For the cpu I'd suggest a Zerotherm Zen fz120, cheaper than others and VERY effective.
For the gpu the best bang for the bucks is the Arctic Cooling Accelero s1 rev.2 , especially if you go for ati cards from the HD48xx series (great performance and good prices, and you can buy one, check if performances are godo for you, if not it's easy to add a twin and go for the crossfire setup).

Add schyte slipstream 12cm fans in intake/exhaust for the case and to both the cpu and gpu heatsinks and you'll have a reeeeally powerful and relatively low dbs-producing machine. That is, assuming you'll keep the fans' rpm 800> , which is achievable either buying a rehobus (such as the wonderful scythe Kaze Master) or simply buying the 800rpm version of the fans.

here you go.
/silent pc geek mode off.

this is very informative, and I appreciate that a lot. Unfortunately, I don't really know how to interpret that graph.

As far as music production is concerned, I am going to need to be able to make recording that are loud and noisy, but at other times clean and crisp sounds. I guess, given my stereo system, I dont need a super high-end sound card, just something a little better than average.

I dont want to spend over 1,000 on the computer. Right now I have a 19" samsung flat panel, which is a nice picture, but I have a 52" RCA rear-projection HDTV in the shop, and I want to hook it up to my computer. As far as my demands for a graphic card/processor, I want a computer that has the capability to display an image in 1080p (or the equivalent if that measurement in resolution doesnt apply to computers). I wont NEED 1080p for awhile, but if I ever do upgrade to a better screen, I want to be able to notice the difference.

also, I think 4 gigs of ram is plenty.

So I guess the major points are as followed:
Really good resolution/rendering
Fast downloading/uploading
Decent sound quality
consistent and reliable (i dont want my hardware to ever fail. I dont mind reformatting a hard drive from time to time, but I dont want to replace anything unless i am simply upgrading)
Fast dvd/cd burners. (do they make blu-ray burners yet?)

[cars_willkillyou]

Processor:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819103249

Mother Board:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131323

Video Card:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814162020

Sound Card:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16829102015

Hard Drive:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822136040

RAM:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820145197

Case:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811166015


This is what I have so far. Any suggestions?

[cars_willkillyou]

http://secure.newegg.com/Shopping/Sh...px?Submit=view