Holiday 2010 System Builder's Guide
by AnandTech Staff, edited by Jarred Walton on November 19, 2010 2:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Guides
- Systems
- Holiday 2010
| Ryan's High-End Gaming System | ||
| Hardware | Component | Price |
| Processor |
Intel Core i7-950 Bloomfield 45nm (Quad-core + HTT, 3.06 to 3.33 GHz, 8MB L3, 130W) |
$295 |
| Motherboard | EVGA X58 SLI3 (Intel X58+ICH10R, LGA1366) | $210 |
| Video | EVGA GeForce GTX 580 1.5GB | $510 |
| Alt. Video | Sapphire Radeon HD 5970 2GB | $460 |
| Memory |
Corsair XMS3 6GB (3x2GB) DDR3 1600 (TR3X6G1600C9) |
$120 |
| Hard Drive | Western Digital Caviar Black 1.5TB (WD1501FASS) | $120 |
| SSD | OCZ Vertex 2 120GB (-$30 MIR) | $205 |
| Optical Drive | LG 22X DVDRW (GH22LS50) | $17 |
| Sound Card | Creative SoundBlaster X-Fi Titanium | $80 |
| Case | Antec P183 Black Aluminum | $155 |
| HSF | Tuniq Tower 120 Extreme | $65 |
| Power Supply | Antec TPQ-850 (850W) | $150 |
| Monitor | HP ZR24W (24" 1920x1200, S-IPS) | $400 |
| Alt. Monitor | ASUS VG236H w/3D Kit (23" 1920x1080 TN, 120Hz) | $475 |
| Total System Price (Range based on GPU and LCD choice) | $2277-$2402 | |
Although PC gaming can actually be quite cheap these days (see our midrange systems from Jarred and Vivek), for the hardcore among us a system built with a GTX 460/6850 class video card isn't going to cut it when it comes getting the most out of the PC's graphical advantage. For that you need to turn to something faster, better, more expandable, and ideally not much louder. To accomplish this goal I went to work on piecing together a system for around $2000 that should be able to tackle everything short of Crysis on Enthusiast settings.
The centerpiece of the system is one of NVIDIA's new GeForce GTX 580s, which currently holds the mantle as the fastest single-GPU card on the market. Being NVIDIA's highest-end video card the GTX 580 is by far the most expensive component in our system, but it does a great job of mixing performance, image quality (transparency AA), and reasonable amounts of noise. As all the GTX 580s on the market are reference cards, the choice comes down to the manufacturer and whether you want a factory overclocked model or not; in this case I went with EVGA based on availability, their overclocking tools, and their lifetime warranty.
An alternative here is the Radeon HD 5970, which ends up being cheaper. The performance is actually better than the GTX 580 so long as we're not VRAM limited, but the dual-GPU card means we give up some flexibility as 4-way CF scaling is limited at best, and the 5970 is a louder card than the GTX 580. However this option is a better choice if you want to take advantage of AMD's Eyefinity system in combination with 3 cheap 1080P TN monitors.
With our GTX 580 in hand we want to pair it with a fast processor and an SLI-capable motherboard to leave future expansion on the table. For this I'm going with an X58 board, specifically EVGA's X58 SLI3 as it offers strong overclocking abilities and is one of the cheapest SLI capable X58 boards on the market. EVGA has also equipped it with third-party USB3.0 and SATA 6Gbps controllers, giving the board plenty of capability in the future with new generation USB and SATA devices.
For the processor I chose Intel's cheapest X58 Core i7, the Core i7 950. At 3.06GHz base and a 3.33GHz Turbo mode it's already fairly fast, but at this stage in the game Bloomfield overclocking is dead simple. Combined with the massive Tuniq Tower 120 Extreme cooler, there's a very good chance of hitting 4GHz (or more!) on the 950, which should be plenty for even the most stubborn single-threaded game. Just be sure to install the Tuniq Tower on the motherboard before installing the motherboard in the case.
Since this is primarily an overclocked gaming system, I selected Corsair's XMS3 6GB triple-channel DDR3 1600 kit. The CAS9 latency at DDR3 1600 speeds is nothing to write home about, but gaming is rarely latency sensitive and the high speeds of the RAM will be very helpful for overclocking. 12GB is also an option here at a higher price, but at the moment only a couple of games are capable of using more than 2GB/4GB of RAM since few games come with a 64-bit executable.
As for storage, a high-end system deserves flexibility and speed, so I used both an SSD and a traditional hard drive; unfortunately, the size of modern games makes an all-SSD setup impractical. There are a number of fast SDDs on the market, and while you don't necessarily need something that's great at random reads and writes OCZ's SandForce-1200 based Vertex 2 120GB is no slouch at that or at sustained reads and writes; if nothing else it will keep Windows very responsive. Furthermore at 120GB it's big enough for at least a few games, making it perfect for MMOs and their need to aggressively pre-cache and log everything. For more traditional games that don't hit up local storage between levels, the 1.5TB Western Digital Caviar Black is plenty fast and big enough to hold more games than most people could possibly play at once.
Rounding things out I decided to go with a discrete sound card rather than relying on onboard sound. Creative's X-Fi line is still the premiere line of soundcards for gaming, as they bring the audio quality benefits of a discrete sound card with support for OpenAL for modern games and support for EAX for older games. As for external storage just about any DVD burner will do; I'm using a 22X Samsung but there are a number of alternatives. Blu-ray readers are coming down in price, but at this point there's no momentum to distribute games for PCs on Blu-ray discs.
Housing all of this will be Antec's P183, the latest in Antec's noise-optimized P18x series of cases. Ideally we don't want to make any compromises, and a fast system doesn't need to be noisy. Along with the quieter GTX 580 and the Tuniq Tower 120, the Antec P183 is the third and final piece of the puzzle. The triple-layer panels will deaden what sound comes from the CPU and GPU coolers, and the 120mm fans will provide enough airflow to keep things cool. As a mid-tower case it's not particularly huge so I'd suggest removing the upper hard drive bay to give the video card(s) extra room, and consider a 120mm fan mounted behind that if you ever expand to two cards. Antec does build the bigger P193, but this shouldn't be necessary with external exhaust cards like the GTX 580.
In order to power our existing system and to have enough extra power for SLI in the future you'll need a fairly strong PSU, and the Antec TPQ-850 is exactly that; it's also the 850W version of the PSU we use in our GPU test bed. The TPQ-850 balances our power needs against the P183's longer cable requirements (since the PSU is bottom-mounted), and the half-modular cable system means there's no need to clutter the case with extra cables unless they become necessary.
Finally, in a break from most of the other systems, I'm also going to throw in a monitor with this collection. It's my belief that a good monitor should outlast the rest of the system, so it's better to buy something good now rather than something cheap now and something still-cheap later. While this is a high-end system, 30" monitors are in a price category of their own so that leaves us with 24" LCDs. Our choice here is HP's ZR24W, a 24" 1920x1200 S-IPS monitor. It has fast pixel response times that are good for gaming without needing to compromise on the color palate or color accuracy at an angle. However since our default card here is an NVIDIA card, 3D Vision is also an option; if that piques your interest we'd go with ASUS' top of the line VG236H, which is a 23" 120Hz TN panel. The overall image quality isn't as good as the ZR24W, but a 120Hz monitor can be worth it if you like 3D Vision, or just like the 120Hz experience in general. The VG236H also includes an NVIDIA 3D Vision kit, so it won't be necessary to buy that separately.
My high-end gaming build ultimately comes out to just shy of $2000 without the monitor, or $2400-$2500 with it. Peripherals should add another $50-$200 depending on whether you're going to buy anything on top of the mouse and keyboard, such as gamepads, steering wheels, and joysticks.
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StormyParis - Friday, November 19, 2010 - link
htpc should fit into a stereo cabinet. you're trying to build a NAS + HTPC + desktop into one machine, which makes no sense at all. Split the thing in 3, with a real, small, silent HTPC, a NAS, and a mini-itx desktop, and you're much better off, for pretty much the same price.ajlueke - Friday, November 19, 2010 - link
While it is somewhat a matter of personal preference, I admit, some people really hate giant cases in the living room. I love having everything built into one system, and using it to serve the rest of the house and play Starcraft II on the big screen. The real downside, is then you are using a high end rig to serve you other computers as opposed to a NAS, and a NAS is going to have far superior numbers in the power consumption department.Mathieu Bourgie - Friday, November 19, 2010 - link
Good job on the builds everyone, great idea of getting several members of the AT's team to work together on this.Here are my opinions, suggestions and things that I'd personally change:
Dustin's AMD Pure Budget System:
Hard Drive: Actually, if you shop on Amazon instead, you can snap a Spinpoint F3 500Gb for about $46 and a 1TB for $53, without needing to find any coupons.
Power Supply: I'd mention that the Antec EarthWatts Green EA-380D 380W doesn't include a power cord in its package. Not a big deal for most of us, but still good to knowi f you don't have a spare cord.
DVD Burner: Why go with an IDE based model, which is out of stock by the way? Because the motherboard comes with a single SATA and a single IDE cable? Hardly a reason if you ask me.
Might as well get a SATA model that can be used for years and years, if you upgrade the system down the road. Going by customer's feedback on NewEgg, ASUS 24x SATA DVD Burner is one of the most reliable model available, for only $20: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
Balraj's Intel Budget System:
The one stick of RAM is an interesting trade off, sure you lose dual-channel but you gain the ability to easily upgrade RAM down the road. Then again, a motherboard with 4 RAM slots would allow for both options.
Blu-Ray: The Samsung SH-B083L/BSBP has pretty bad reviews on NewEgg, I'd get the Samsung SH-B123L instead, which costs $20 more, but is also faster (12x vs 8x).
Power Supply: I cannot skip this: you really want to avoid using a low-end, generic power supply, for reliability purposes and to protect your components. You do not want to cut corners on a power supply.
Jarred's AMD Budget Gaming System:
You mention Crossfire support, but go with a motherboard that has the PCI-Express 16x slots running at 16x and 4x, which would bottleneck performance?
For a similar price, the ASRock 870 EXTREME3 comes with two PCI-Express 16x slots at 8x/8x, which are well spaced to allow both cards to "breath".
125W CPU, with a stock cooler? Sure, it's "adequate" for cooling in most cases, but that stock cooler is going to be heard from miles away when you game for hours and/or during hot summer nights if you don't have an AC. Not much of an issue if you play with headphones, but still, I'd get at least a Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus CPU Cooler.
"Gaming depends primarily on your GPU" "You could even go with a cheaper CPU like the Athlon II X4 645 or the Phenom II X4 810"
Agreed for most games, but there are games that will be CPU bound (Think RTS like SC2, or MMORPG like WoW), where you'll want a powerful CPU that allow the GPU to flex its muscles.
Also, while the X4 645 isn't a bad CPU, losing the L3 cache and the lower frequencies are going to hurt performance quite a bit for video games.
Vivek's Midrange Intel System:
Once again, Crossfire is mentioned, but the second PCI-Express slot runs at 4x...
An ASRock P55 EXTREME4 will fix that and if you want USB 3.0 and SATA 6.0Gb/s at the same time as Crossfire 8x/8x, you'll want an ASUS P7P55D-E Pro, which features a PLX chip, making it one of the few P55 boards that can run SATA 6.0Gb/s, USB 3.0 and Crossfire 8x/8x all at once, unlike most boards where USB 3.0 and SATA 6.0Gb/s will fall back to USB 2.0 and SATA 3.0Gb/s due to the lack of bandwidth (lack of PCI-Express lanes, thanks to the P55 chipset).
PSU: OCZ don't exactly make the most reliable PSUs, with the biggest issue being that reliability varies from a model to another, since they use various manufacturers for their PSUs. You get what you pay for with a PSU and a solid Corsair or Seasonic PSU will serve you much better IMO.
Raja's Midrange AMD Overclocking System:
I actually agree with all your choices and like how you didn't strictly stick to NewEgg. Way to go.
Raja's Midrange Intel Overclocking System:
I'd avoid the ASUS Maximus III GENE like the plague. I used to recommend it, until I'd hear back from so many readers that had issues with it (Read some review on NewEgg) that I had no choice but to stop recommending it, because it's so unreliable.
Ryan's High-End Gaming System:
Way to go for keeping noise somewhat under control. Once again though, an IDE DVD Burner in a 2k+ system? Really?
Also, the sound card is priced at $100, not $75, unless I missed something here.
Brian's Intel Dream PC:
Hahaha, now you're talking! Couldn't agree more on the motherboard, which is a one of a kind.
Just one thing though: You forgot CPU Coolers, since Xeon CPUs don't come with any.
Also, why ECC RAM? ECC seems kind of futile for a Gaming PC.
Keyboard: Yes! Mechanical keyboards are the best. I personally recently got a Filco with MX Cherry Blue switches and that keyboard helped me increase my WPM typing speed tremendously. The feedback and noise is also great for gaming.
Mouse: I've always been a fan of the Logitech MX-518, which remains excellent years after its release and offers a great bang for your buck too.
Don't have much to add to the HTPCs, they make sense and quite frankly, it's a matter of personal tastes too.
Except for a few things mentioned above, great job all on the builds. Although I'm a bit sadden to not have seen any Workstation build.
P.S. For those who wonder about my experience building PCs and the like, I’m a computer enthusiast with 10 years of experience in building, fixing and modifying computers, who has been writing about/offering PC Builds of all kinds (Gaming, HTPC, Workstations, etc.) at various price points on my own blog (www.hardware-revolution.com) for over two years and a half now.
Cheers,
Mathieu
Ben90 - Friday, November 19, 2010 - link
I agree completely on the inclusion of a mechanical keyboard, they are the SSDs of the keyboard world. Once you try to type on rubber domes again it feels absolutely horrible.Personally I am a Cherry Black guy as I like the linear travel for gaming, but for typing its impossible to beat Cherry Blues unless quietness is a metric.
bji - Friday, November 19, 2010 - link
How do you feel about scissor switch keyboards? I like them as I find them to be much less mushy than rubber dome keyboards, but alot quieter and with less key travel than mechanical keyboards. I use the Kensington "Slim Type Keyboard" (that's what it says on the bottom, I can't remember the exact model number) and highly recommend it.Tom_S - Friday, November 19, 2010 - link
Concerning keyboards etc. I *have* been living under a rock and had not heard of the DAS keyboard that sounds interesting, but while under the rock I have been using my Northgate and Avant keyboards (made by CVT Inc) which were always the gold standard in mechanical keyboards. I looked at the site, and it appears that the lesser of the Avant kbds is not available right now, but the Stellar is.http://www.cvtinc.com/products/keyboards/menu.htm
I concede that these are old fashioned - not USB without an adapter, no USB hub, but they have been around since the 1980's and are noteworthy. To further date myself, one of their features has been to remap the left ctrl and caps lock keys (moving ctrl next to the "a" key), for those of us still used to old terminals and editors/programming environments that use control keys.
strikeback03 - Friday, November 19, 2010 - link
Are the current Samsung HDDs any good? A couple years ago I bought a Samsung HDD recommended on this site for a build for work. First one wouldn't allow an OS install. RMAed it, got a replacement. That one died a few months later. RMAed that, bought one from another brand, and after testing the third Samsung to be sure it could be formatted when we got it just kept it on the side for emergency use. Can't say I'm anxious to try again.Mathieu Bourgie - Friday, November 19, 2010 - link
Samsung HDDs are some of the best drives on the market in my opinion. Their F3 and F4 (The 7,200 rpm 320GB model that is) line-up offer some of the best throughputs rates in MB/s, are very reliable and emit very little heat.For the average latency time, the Western Digital drives tend to be better, although they run hotter and have slightly lower reliability. For Gaming, I'd say that WD drives are the best, but quite frankly, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference between a system equipped with Samsung or WD drives.
Also, keep in mind warranty: W.D. offers 5 years on their Black Caviar line-up, as opposed to 3 years on their Caviar Blue and 3 years for Samsung drives.
JarredWalton - Friday, November 19, 2010 - link
I did try to price-check everything using our internal pricing tools (Dynamite-Data is an AnandTech affiliate of sorts), so where I could find clearly better prices from other than Newegg I went that route. Obviously, 10 systems or whatever makes it a bit difficult to get every little detail, which is why some IDE DVDRW drives slipped in. Oops!The CrossFire/SLI issue on lower end motherboards (i.e. P55 with x16/x4) was another one that I wracked my brain on for a good long time. I'd really like to go the Biostar route on Vivek's setup (or the overclocking board), but truthfully I'm a bit gun-shy with Biostar. I've had decent boards in the past from them, and other boards that sucked hard. Price is another item that I kept running into -- I don't want to recommend an expensive Intel board when SB is coming so soon.
I'll try to go through and update the optical drives to be SATA, though. Shame on my fellow writers for being so lazy! :-) Thanks for the comments.
JarredWalton - Friday, November 19, 2010 - link
Okay, I made some updates and added some additional commentary where appropriate. But I chose to disagree (or let the editors disagree at least) with some of your comments. IMO, there's no need for aftermarket cooling on CPUs if you don't intend to overclock, so I left my build without one.The other big issue is Newegg reviews; they're just not reliable by any stretch. We've had motherboards that our guys loved that get mediocre scores at Newegg because of idiot users. "Gee... my memory isn't working and I plugged it in, never looked at the BIOS, never updated the BIOS. What's wrong with this board!?" Likewise, some items get 5 eggs not because they're the best but because a lot of buyers think they're a great value... and they wouldn't know quality if it walked up and punched them in the nose. So, while I generally avoid stuff that gets 3 eggs or less, the 4/5 egg stuff may be decent, good, or great depending on the user. Plus, people with problems are about 10X more likely to post as people where everything worked fine.
Anyway, thanks for the corrections/suggestions.