Need help buying a Gaming PC

[TheMangler187]

Hello. So I'm looking to buy a good gaming PC, but need some help. I made a very bad purchase a while ago, and I really don't want to make such mistakes again. So I need people familiar with PCs to help me see the light.

So where should I start... I'm located in Australia and have about a ~$1,600 budget, but can spare a little more if the benefits are good enough. I basically want a gaming PC that will handle games like Battlefield 3 and The Witcher 2 on max settings. I've got my eyes on a GTX 680, but I'm doing pretty good financially at the moment, so I'm also considering a GTX 690 to make absolute sure current gen games will get torn apart on max settings. I guess my monitor will be about 24 or 27 inches I guess. Only one.

Now I've done some research on video cards, but everything else is a little confusing. Like what power supply I need, what kind of motherboard etc.. It'll be just a little bit until I get around to buying the PC, so I've got some time to sort everything out. I just want to make sure I really sort it out properly this time.

Mwave and Pccasegear seem to be alright sites to buy parts from. If you guys have a good build in mind, then I'd greatly appreciate some help. Recommendations and advice are very welcome. Sure I could go to Tomshardware or something, but I feel a little more comfortable talking to you guys about it, even though I haven't been around for very long.

Thanks muchly!

[Synge]

A 690 would be way out of your price range. You could maybe squeeze a 680 into your budget but they're all sold out except for Palit, and I'm not familiar with the brand. You may want to wait for a 660 or 670 (coming out soon).

You could also save your money and go with a 560, it offers plenty of power at a reasonable price.. Anyway, I opted to both save you some cash and give you great parts across the board, this build will max the games you listed no problem, and stayed well within your budget.


CPU - Intel Core i5 2500K [BX80623I52500K] - $225.00 : PC Case Gear

MOBO - ASUS P8Z77-M Motherboard [P8Z77-M] - $115.00 : PC Case Gear

GPU - ASUS GeForce GTX 560Ti DirectCU II TOP 1GB [ENGTX560-DCII-T-1GD5] - $255.00 : PC Case Gear

HDD - Seagate Barracuda 1TB ST1000DM003 [ST1000DM003] - $99.00 : PC Case Gear

RAM - Corsair CMP8GX3M2A1600C9 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 [CMP8GX3M2A1600C9] - $79.00 : PC Case Gear 4 gigs would be enough, but the 8 wasn't much more so why the hell not?

PSU - Corsair TX-650M Modular Power Supply [CMPSU-650TXM] - $135.00 : PC Case Gear

Optical Drive - LG GH24NS90 24x SATA DVD-RW Drive OEM [GH24NS90] - $22.00 : PC Case Gear

OS - Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit with SP1 OEM [GFC-02050-MS] - $95.00 : PC Case Gear

Monitor - ASUS VE248H 24in Widescreen LED Monitor [VE248H] - $199.00 : PC Case Gear

I'll let you pick out a case.

Total: $1225

If you really want a more powerful graphics card (and don't want to maybe wait for 660 or 670) you could swap the 560 ti with ASUS GeForce GTX 580 DirectCU II [ENGTX580-2DIS-1536D5] - $499.00 : PC Case Gear

which would bring the total to $1470 (with no case)

PCCG is easier to navigate so I used them exclusively, you may want to compare prices to see if you can get a better deal.

[TheMangler187]

Thanks for taking the time to pick out those parts man. I really appreciate it. As for the GTX 680, I'll have no trouble fitting that into budget if it's a fair bit stronger than the 580. However I heard the GTX 670 is coming out in just a couple of days, so I'll see what that's like. Sounds like it'll be almost as strong as the 680.

As for the 690... Yeah, I'm not doing THAT good financially, haha. I had a look at the price and my jaw hit the floor. Really, $1,600? That's like 60% more than the US price. Stuff that. I should have known they would have skyrocketed the price for us Aussies...

Also, is it worth buying an overclocked card? Or could you just do it yourself?

[LiNuX]

Also, is it worth buying an overclocked card? Or could you just do it yourself?

Not worth it imo. All overclocking does is heat up your GPU and decrease the life expectancy (whether it's factory overclocked or you overclock it yourself). Also there is no reason to overclock it unless you're experimenting or something actually calls for it because you shouldn't have a problem running any games for at least several years with the current clock speed.

I still have my old 9600GT and I can still run pretty much any game. Granted that I have to use low settings on some games to be able to play but I've never been that big on how things look anyway so it doesn't matter to me. But that's just me.

[TheMangler187]

PC Case Gear has an GIGABYTE GTX 670 OC for $519. Or Inno3D (I think) brand, not OC for $479. Sounds pretty tempting to me. It may just be the card I get. Perhaps.