First Build Time

[Dunlop]

Well i finally decided to upgrade my system.

What i have decied on so far..

HAF 922 case.

MSI P45 Platinum DDR2, crossfire, GB lan, IEEE MOBO.

Its going to be used for gaming, and want it to be reliable and cool. I dont really know about overclocking or anything, just want something nice.

I want it to be around 500-600 dollars, thats not including the mobo and case. Also i know that price can change really easy with a graphics card, but will decide on that when i get more into the build.

Any opinions would be great. I can spend alot more then 6 but was just trying to give you guys an idea. I dont need an elite system.

Thanks

[RicheemxX]

Do you already own that MSI board or what? Honestly if I were going for a new build I would build on the older 775 platform. I'd go with either a newer AMD setup or a newer Intel Core i3, i5, or i7. That would give you much more of an upgrade path down the road

[Dunlop]

Do you already own that MSI board or what? Honestly if I were going for a new build I would build on the older 775 platform. I'd go with either a newer AMD setup or a newer Intel Core i3, i5, or i7. That would give you much more of an upgrade path down the road

I dont own it yet, just looked like a good board i guess. Whats the 755? Is that a dell? If so what kind of upgrades can be done? Other then what u stated.

I can get that board for like 80 bucks and the case is 100.

Thanks

[ShyguyXPC]

wow, if your thinking socket 775 is Dell, I think you need to do a bit more research before putting together a system.


Socket 775 is the Socket design used by the old Intel Core 2 Series and its Children spin offs (Pentium Dual Core, Celeron Dual Core, etc)

Socket 775 Debuted with the 3rd generation Pentium 4, using HyperThreading (prior to that Pentium 4 was on socket 478, and then 423 before it)

Socket 1156 and 1366 are the two Newest from Intel, with 1366 being well over a year old now. These Sockets use the Pentium G6950 Dual core, Core i3 Dual Core, i5 Dual and Quad Core, and Core i7 Quad core. thats all on Socket 1156. Socket 1366 is exclusively Higher End i7 Quad cores, i7 Six core, and most of the higher end Server grade Xeon CPU's (1156 also has Xeon's but their the cheaper priced ones, 1366 actually offers a Dual core Xeon, which if I remember right is one of the only Dual cores on 1366)

All of Intels latest is primarily used with DDR3 RAM, though I think there are some Hybrid 1156 boards that use DDR3 And DDR2.

AMD's Latest Socket Design is AM3, its primarily intended to be DDR3 RAM but is backwards compatible with DDR2, there are some Socket AM2+/AM3 motherboards that use DDR2.

so basically

Socket 775 is the old Intel Platform for regular Consumers, with its higher grade Server Socket being Socket 771.

Newer Intel is Socket 1156 and 1366

AMD is Socket AM2, AM2+ & AM3, they do also have a much higher end Socket as well for their multiple CPU Opteron Based platforms.

but the ones you'll need to know for your upgrade are Socket 775, 1156, 1366 for Intel

And Socket AM2+ and AM3 for AMD (AM2 is pretty much dead, and each one is the same number of pins basically, if you have an AM3 socket board, you can use any AM2, AM2+ or AM3 CPU in it.

[ShyguyXPC]

Basic list, Motherboard is only capable of Crossfire, and not SLI, so for dual cards they will have to be similar ATI cards.

Motherboard: Newegg.com - MSI P55A-G55 LGA 1156 Intel P55 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard

Board is relatively new, so no pics on Newegg, but here's its MSI website Link to look at MSI Global – Computer, Laptop, Notebook, Desktop, Mainboard, Graphics and more



CPU: Newegg.com - Intel Core i3-530 Clarkdale 2.93GHz 4MB L3 Cache LGA 1156 73W Dual-Core Desktop Processor BX80616I3530

RAM: Newegg.com - Crucial 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1066 (PC3 8500) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model CT2KIT12864BA1067

Video Card: Newegg.com - HIS H575Q1GD Radeon HD 5750 1GB 128-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.1 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card

Power Supply: Newegg.com - Antec BP550 Plus 550W Continuous Power ATX12V V2.2 Modular Active PFC Power Supply

Hard Drive: Newegg.com - Western Digital Caviar Black WD5001AALS 500GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

DVD Drive: Newegg.com - SAMSUNG 24X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 16X DVD+R DL 24X DVD-R 6X DVD-RW 12X DVD-RAM 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-R 4X CD-RW 48X CD-ROM 2MB Cache SATA 24x DVD Burner - Bulk LightScribe Support - CD / DVD Burners

for a $500-600 budget, its hard to work with, but with this list you'll still need a Case, and Operating System, otherwise you'd be good to go with a decent Current Generation Lower Mid Range Gaming system.

minus the case and OS, your looking at $577 before shipping. Selected that video card, as it vents its heat out the back, should help keep internal case temps down a bit as a result.

power supply is more than enough to run the whole system as is, Crossfire, you might want something with a bit more power, but for starters, this list has room to grow.

[Dunlop]

wow, if your thinking socket 775 is Dell, I think you need to do a bit more research before putting together a system.

Yea i ran it as a search with computer systems and it pulled up a Dell optiplex 755. Yea that was a fail.

for a $500-600 budget, its hard to work with, but with this list you'll still need a Case, and Operating System, otherwise you'd be good to go with a decent Current Generation Lower Mid Range Gaming system.

minus the case and OS, your looking at $577 before shipping. Selected that video card, as it vents its heat out the back, should help keep internal case temps down a bit as a result.

Well i do prefer Windows Xp for an OS. But if their are issues with xp on a newer system then i can use the Windows 7 disk that i have right in front of me....32/64bit.

I do have 2 monitors that i would still like to use, keyboard and other stuff like that is not considered in the price.

And as for my 5-6 hundred dollar budget, that would be minus case and mobo and maybe graphics card. Just said that budget because i was thinking on the mobo and case that i picked out was ok.