Looking for a new rig

[Sithos]

It seems that I'll be coming into a good chunk of coin in a month or so and I want to relegate my current system to the status of "let the kids have it". It's about at the end of it's upgradability and will likely not be able to play any game that comes out in about a year or two.

I want to buy a whole new system that will easily play almost any game thats coming in the foreseeable future. I've always had the mid to low end specs and this time I would like to experience something high end.

I'd like to place a cap of $2.500ish give or take a few hundred either way. Otherwise I'd just go insane and get every bell and whistle which most I'd not know how to use.

Basically I'm after speed and performance with longevity also in mind. By that I mean I'd rather not have to drop even more coin to upgrade a part in a year or so.

I've heard of dual video cards,dual processors and that means absolutely nadda to me other than possibly better performance and even more headaches. Also there's the AMD 64 vs Intel Core Duo etc ... basically I need help :P

I'd like to stay away from the mess known as Vista but I am under the impression (maybe wrong) that some games in the near future will be running with Dx10 in mind which Vista supports but XP may not. Having said that if Vista is the way to go then so be it. Just that I am leery due to some of the horror stories I've heard.

I've also been a Radeon user for the last several years and this time around I'd like to try Nvidia. Heard there's even supposedly 512mb cards out there (WTF!!)

Normally I just go down to my local computer store (every 5ish years) and tell them "Hey I want to play this game and here is the specs to play it" and they then offer me the basic pre-built packages. This time around I want to be able to walk into EB Games and pick up a title and not have to worry about being able to play it at all. So I figured my best bet to get a great system would be to tap into your collective brains!

Also please keep in mind I'm from the great white north eh? And some companies charge insane amounts to ship here.

Thanks in advance for any help you can give.

[Tikker]

amd is eating intel dust at the moment

core 2 duo, or quad core beats the ever loving piss out of anything amd has at the moment

nvidia 8800 is also probably top of the line card out there right now

are you comfortable putting your own machine together?

[Sithos]

I'd rather it already be built. I can put it together but that would leave me buying the machine piece by piece and thats where I'll run into issues. I don't know all these fancy schmancy names they have. I wouldn't know what mobo to buy that would fit the vid card or ram I'd buy. I might end up with 1 Dimm slot for 2 gigs of ram etc :p Or a power supply that is to small to power the system etc. I know it's somewhat a waste but I'd rather pay the extra atm.

I always swore that if I came into money I'd get a damn good system (and pay off those bastards at O.S.A.P). And within a month I'll be able to do so.

[Tikker]

well, if you can put it together, it's not hard to give you an exact list of what to order

[Sithos]

Lets give it a whirl!

[Lyion]

http://www.cyberpowerpc.com/system/infxfhd.asp?v=d

Good support, not expensive, no hours wasted putting it together if you don't care to.

[Tikker]

We only ship to the 50 US states and APO/FPO addresses as listed in the selection box above. We do not ship internationally or to Puerto Rico, Guam, and US Virgin Islands.

try again~

probably NCIX is going to be the best canadian retailer to order parts from

[Lyion]

I swear by Newegg, but I'm unsure if they deliver to Canada.

Here in the US you can buy a prebuilt for fairly close to the assemble yourself cost. If you don't care to build it yourself, I wouldn't waste your time.

Prior to '05 I solely built my own, but now the cost differential is negligible, and the time saved and single point of contact for issues is nicer for me.

[Tikker]

newegg also does not ship to canada

Here, it's still way cheaper to buy parts, and assemble yourself

send me a list of what kinda stuff you want/need sithos, and I'll help you put together something from canadian retailers

[Lionking]

I use these boys: <a href="http://www.directron.com/">Directron</a> and they ship to Canada. The site is not newb-friendly, though. You need to know what you want.

[Sithos]

Went to NCIX site and "made" a comp with the following:


1 x Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Quad Core Processor LGA775 Conroe 2.40GHZ 1066FSB 8MB Retail Box

1 x EVGA Nforce 680I SLI LGA775 Conroe ATX DDR2 2PCI-E16 2PCI SATA2 Sound GBLAN 1394 Motherboard

1 x Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro LGA775 2500RPM 45CFM

2 x Corsair XMS2 TWIN2X2048-6400C4 2GB 2X1GB PC2-6400 DDR2-800 CL 4-4-4-12 240PIN Dual Channel Memory

1 x EVGA E-GEFORCE 8800GTS 500MHZ 640MB 1.6GHZ GDDR3 Dual DVI-I HDTV Out HDCP DIRECTX10 Video Card

1 x Antec P182 ATX Black Mid Tower Case 4X5.25 1X3.5 6X3.5INT No PS Front USB Audio Firewire

1 x Corsair CMPSU-620HX 620W ATX Triple 12V 50A 24PIN ATX Modular Power Supply 120MM Fan 2X PCI-E

1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500GB SATA2 3GB/S 7200RPM 16MB Cache NCQ Hard Drive

1 x LG GSA-H62N SATA DVD+RW 18X8X16 DVD-RW 18X6X16 DL 10X Black OEM DVD Writer W/ SW

1 x Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium Edition 32BIT DVD OEM

1 x Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-FI Xtreme Gamer 24BIT Sound Card 7.1 PCI Retail Box Bilingual

1 x Acer AL2216WBD 22IN Widescreen LCD Monitor Black 1680X1050 700:1 5MS VGA DVI-D Monitor

Total price is $2640 and change Canadian. Vest II Gold Sli Edition. Something along that line should certainly do for a long while wouldn't it?

Edited to add: Anything here I shouldn't worry about? Anything raise any flags? anything I should add?

[Tacks]

For $2600 i could get you a computer to run the international space station

[10sun]

Went to NCIX site and "made" a comp with the following:


1 x Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Quad Core Processor LGA775 Conroe 2.40GHZ 1066FSB 8MB Retail Box

1 x EVGA Nforce 680I SLI LGA775 Conroe ATX DDR2 2PCI-E16 2PCI SATA2 Sound GBLAN 1394 Motherboard

1 x Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro LGA775 2500RPM 45CFM

2 x Corsair XMS2 TWIN2X2048-6400C4 2GB 2X1GB PC2-6400 DDR2-800 CL 4-4-4-12 240PIN Dual Channel Memory

1 x EVGA E-GEFORCE 8800GTS 500MHZ 640MB 1.6GHZ GDDR3 Dual DVI-I HDTV Out HDCP DIRECTX10 Video Card

1 x Antec P182 ATX Black Mid Tower Case 4X5.25 1X3.5 6X3.5INT No PS Front USB Audio Firewire

1 x Corsair CMPSU-620HX 620W ATX Triple 12V 50A 24PIN ATX Modular Power Supply 120MM Fan 2X PCI-E

1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500GB SATA2 3GB/S 7200RPM 16MB Cache NCQ Hard Drive

1 x LG GSA-H62N SATA DVD+RW 18X8X16 DVD-RW 18X6X16 DL 10X Black OEM DVD Writer W/ SW

1 x Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium Edition 32BIT DVD OEM

1 x Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-FI Xtreme Gamer 24BIT Sound Card 7.1 PCI Retail Box Bilingual

1 x Acer AL2216WBD 22IN Widescreen LCD Monitor Black 1680X1050 700:1 5MS VGA DVI-D Monitor

Total price is $2640 and change Canadian. Vest II Gold Sli Edition. Something along that line should certainly do for a long while wouldn't it?

Edited to add: Anything here I shouldn't worry about? Anything raise any flags? anything I should add?

Get a small 10k rpm drive to install windows & high performance games to.

[Lyion]

1 x Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Quad Core Processor LGA775 Conroe 2.40GHZ 1066FSB 8MB Retail Box

Complete overkill. Get a cheaper Dual Core processor.

1 x EVGA Nforce 680I SLI LGA775 Conroe ATX DDR2 2PCI-E16 2PCI SATA2 Sound GBLAN 1394 Motherboard

1 x Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro LGA775 2500RPM 45CFM

2 x Corsair XMS2 TWIN2X2048-6400C4 2GB 2X1GB PC2-6400 DDR2-800 CL 4-4-4-12 240PIN Dual Channel Memory

Good choice.

1 x EVGA E-GEFORCE 8800GTS 500MHZ 640MB 1.6GHZ GDDR3 Dual DVI-I HDTV Out HDCP DIRECTX10 Video Card

This is your most important gaming piece. Go with an 8800 GTX. It'll last you.

1 x Antec P182 ATX Black Mid Tower Case 4X5.25 1X3.5 6X3.5INT No PS Front USB Audio Firewire

Ok

1 x Corsair CMPSU-620HX 620W ATX Triple 12V 50A 24PIN ATX Modular Power Supply 120MM Fan 2X PCI-E

I'd go with a 750W power supply.

1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 500GB SATA2 3GB/S 7200RPM 16MB Cache NCQ Hard Drive

1 x LG GSA-H62N SATA DVD+RW 18X8X16 DVD-RW 18X6X16 DL 10X Black OEM DVD Writer W/ SW

1 x Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium Edition 32BIT DVD OEM

1 x Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-FI Xtreme Gamer 24BIT Sound Card 7.1 PCI Retail Box Bilingual

1 x Acer AL2216WBD 22IN Widescreen LCD Monitor Black 1680X1050 700:1 5MS VGA DVI-D Monitor

Total price is $2640 and change Canadian. Vest II Gold Sli Edition. Something along that line should certainly do for a long while wouldn't it?

Edited to add: Anything here I shouldn't worry about? Anything raise any flags? anything I should add?

Everything else looks fine. I think Vista is a turd, but I'm not sure if you care to do XP or want it...

[Tikker]

the mobo has 8 channel audio onboard, so you really don't need to add on the sound card (it's a nice card, but a bit redundant)

[Tossica]

What a huge waste of money.

[Harrison]

One could say the same about your over-sized fishbowl.

[Naethyn]

I maybe a fanboi but, ever since I went AMD I'll never go back.

AMD ftw!

[Harrison]

AMD is behind intel at the moment, but they always bounce back and forth.

[Tikker]

I maybe a fanboi but, ever since I went AMD I'll never go back.

AMD ftw!

i've got a couple amd boxes and a couple intel

the intel beat the ever living piss out of the amd's atm for gaming