best new modern gaming computer for BF3

[scottygamer]

Hey I'm in the process of upgrading my gaming system for the launch of battlefield 3 and i'm looking for a few suggestions on who I should buy from. I also need a pc that can handle video editing software so my budget is a little higher than most people want to spend. I just need a system that I won't have to update in 12 months and I want to buy from a company where I can get the most bang for my buck! any suggestions?

[BetaWolf47]

www.newegg.com

Best bang for your buck is to build it yourself. Ask around on PC gaming forums and you can get hooked up with some good tutorials. It's easier than you'd think.

[Berserker]

www.newegg.com

Best bang for your buck is to build it yourself. Ask around on PC gaming forums and you can get hooked up with some good tutorials. It's easier than you'd think.

^Agreed. It's sort of a no-brainer. Way cheaper, and less complicated than building a LEGO set. Actually it's more like that toy you have when you're a baby, where the star-shaped block goes in the star-shaped hole, square-shaped block in the square-shaped hole, etc - except the pieces cost more and you probably don't want to stick them in your mouth.

[heybtbm]

www.newegg.com (http://www.newegg.com)

Best bang for your buck is to build it yourself. Ask around on PC gaming forums and you can get hooked up with some good tutorials. It's easier than you'd think.

This gets my vote too.

It's so easy and definitely rewarding.

[WCP]

Hey man, I know that you're prolly a bit intimidated about assembling your own PC. Maybe you've never done it before, and you're not the type that knows how to do stuff like that, but the truth of the matter, is that it's actually VERY easy to assemble your own PC.

There are complete walk thru video guides on YouTube and other places. Also, by putting it together yourself, you'll not only get the better quality components, you'll get everything MUCH cheaper, allowing you to possibly put even more money into the GPU.

I can give you a quick list of some great items to get. I got all of them myself, and assembled it myself. I have built a PC before, but I hadn't built one in about 11 or 12 years. I was very intimidated and worried myself, but it was much easier that I thought it was going to be. The scariest part was putting on the CPU Heatsink. I kept thinking that I was going to fuck something up, but it worked just fine. Here is a list of parts:



CPU = Intel Core i5-2500K
3.3 GHz (3.7 GHz Turbo), Quad Core, 6 MB L3 Cache ------------------------------ $196.64 with tax, on sale at MicroCenter

Motherboard = Asus P8P67 R3 LGA 1155 P67 ATX Intel Motherboard -------------------------------- $152.94 with tax at MicroCenter

PSU = SeaSonic S12II 520 Bronze 520W ATX12V 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC Power Supply ------------------$74.59 shipped, after tax and shipping (newegg)


Memory = G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) L----------- $69.00 shipped, after tax (newegg)


HDD = Samsung SpinPoint F3 1 TB - 300 MBps - 7200 rpm --------------- $54.07 (newegg)

Case = Antec Three Hundred Black Steel ATX Mid Tower ----------------------------------------- $54.07 / 39.07 (newegg

CPU Heatsink = Cooler Master Hyper 212+ -------------------------------------------------------------- $23.05 after rebate $33.05 before rebate (Frys)


GPU = Gigabyte GTX 560 Ti 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 video card---------------------------------------------------------$268.19 @ newegg after tax and shipping

OS = Windows 7 Professional 64-bit (for students with .edu email addy)
--------------------------------------- $30 (Digital River)

Thermal Paste from Fry's for the CPU Heatsink -------------- $7

2 extra fans for the Antec 300 case - $10


I built this in mid April, so I'm sure many of these parts are MUCH cheaper. I would definitely still get the Intel i5 2500k as your CPU though. It's the best price/performance CPU you can get for gaming. It's very overclockable, and easily overclockable. I paid $197 for it, basically, but I've seen it at Fry's for $179.99, of course with tax it's close to what I paid, but it might be even cheaper somewhere now. Microcenter normally has the best deals on CPU's, if you have one within driving distance.

The GPU, the Gigabyte 560 Ti SOC video card, is one of the best 560 Ti's you can get. I WAY overpaid for it. I was trying to wait around for it to go on sale, but it just wasn't happening, and I got way too impatient and just bought it for it's full price. You can probably get one in the $220 ish range now. Just make sure that whichever 560 Ti you get has dual fans.

If you want to spend alot of money, then get an even better GPU. I just don't know how much you want to spend. I build my PC for just under 1 grand with everything included. You could build a similar machine, maybe go with an even higher end GPU.

As for the motherboard, the Asus P8P67 is definitely the one to get, but get the Deluxe or Pro versions of it. Whichever one you can get for under $150. I got the standard version, and in hindsight, I should have paid $35 more and got the Pro version.

The Samsung Spinpoint F3 is well known as being a very reliable, very fast, high quality hard drive. It gets tons of recomendations. Ideally, you have the money to get a 80 gig SSD drive to have your operating system on, and all the games that you're currently playing (for better load times). I didn't have the extra cash to afford that. I'll try to add that later on the down the road. You shouldn't pay more than like $50 for this.

The best deal for memory at the time of my build was the 8 gigs of G.Skill DDR3 1600 for $69 shipped. Basically, just make sure you get 8 gigs of ram. You won't need anymore than 8 gigs of ram for gaming, so don't worry about getting any more of it.


As for case, you can get a nicer case than the Antec 300. I did buy two extra fans for the Antec 300. They cost $5 each. In hindsight, I might have got the Haf 912. There are better cases, but it just means more money. Personally, I think wasting money on any component is a dangerous gamble to play, because you might as well save that extra money for a future upgrade that WILL be needed, rather than spending it on something now that is just frivolous.


Power Supply is a very key component. You do not want to try to save money here by cutting corners. You want a PSU that is going to be reliable, quiet, and just work well. The Seasonic that I got is absolutely fantastic. Extremely quiet. Super solid. Very high recommended. The only downside to the Seasonic that I got, is that it's only 520 watts. That's perfectly fine for the video card that I have now, but if I was trying to crossfire or SLI in the future, it might not have enough power. So if you ever want to crossfire or SLI, you want something with 850 watts, but you want to make sure it's high quality like Seasonic.

The cooler master hyper 212+ is very much recommended by people who want to overclock. For the money, you just can't beat it. Don't use the Thermal Paste that they include with the Cooler Master though, you got to buy some higher quality paste. I got some at Fry's for about 7 bucks. It's by Shin Etsu , model # is X23-7783D .


Anyways, I can help walk you thru your build if you like, I can do it over AOL Instant Messenger. Just let me know if you need any help.

[FxMercenary]

I just had 3 new gaming desktops built at ibuypower.com

They were pretty cheap.

Intel i7 960
12GB G.Skill DDR3 1600 Triple Channel
ASUS Sabertooth X58 Motherboard
EVGA Superclocked GTX 580 GPU
640GB 64M CACHE Western Digital
Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatality Gamer Edition
Liquid Cooling for CPU
Tons of Fans

Prepped and ready for some BF3!

[portnoyd]

Cyberpower fucking sucks. Avoid at all costs.

[WCP]

I just had 3 new gaming desktops built at ibuypower.com

They were pretty cheap.

Intel i7 960
12GB G.Skill DDR3 1600 Triple Channel
ASUS Sabertooth X58 Motherboard
EVGA Superclocked GTX 580 GPU
640GB 64M CACHE Western Digital
Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatality Gamer Edition
Liquid Cooling for CPU
Tons of Fans

Prepped and ready for some BF3!


How much do those cost?

[otaku]

The best huh? Well I've owned alienware they are the best mass produced (ish) systems out there actually I've owned two. However they can be loud and of course expensive and service is nothing compared to what you will get with origin (started by former AW employees) or falcon nw. If your looking for customization of your case and the ultimate in hardware and flexibility you want origin or falcon. I'd go falcon as they've been around awhile and are on my side of the country. Money is the issue here. I can't and likely won't be able to afford any of them any time soon if ever. The alienwares I had were about 2000 a piece and I was fortunate to acquire them.

[scottygamer]

i actually talked to ibuypower but the person trying to sell me the product acting like they knew less than i did! im still up in the air on this one... WCP, that is great information! i think i might considering having a friend help me with my build so im not feeling soo overwhelmed with everything.

[calthaer]

Build it yourself, according to your own specifications. I made myself a decent machine a few years back with a silent case / fans, and it's barely audible. It's nice.

[WCP]

Build it yourself, according to your own specifications. I made myself a decent machine a few years back with a silent case / fans, and it's barely audible. It's nice.

I second this....


Especially if you have the money that you have, because obviously you must have quite a bit of coin that you're willing to burn if you're even considering something like Alienware. If you're willing to throw that much money at a pre-built system, then you obviously have the money to be able to afford high-quality components, and you'll get MUCH better parts by picking and choosing.

With all the money you'll be saving by putting it together yourself, you'll be able to afford a GTX 580. The GTX 580 will have you covered for some time. In addition to all this, you'll have saved even more money, allowing you to put that money aside towards your first upgrade.

[scottygamer]

ya, i hear a lot of bad things about cyperpower as well. what about origin pc? their genesis model seems to be okay for the price, and when i add similar parts to a new egg shopping cart, the cost isn't really that much more.

ive never built a pc before so i dont think i want to build my own.. =p~

scott

[otaku]

origin is great they're old school alienware guys you'll get great support and badass hardware (lots of options and just really extreme stuff like mobos with watercooling etc) they remind me a bit of voodoo pc in some ways.

[Gamevet]

Hey man, I know that you're prolly a bit intimidated about assembling your own PC. Maybe you've never done it before, and you're not the type that knows how to do stuff like that, but the truth of the matter, is that it's actually VERY easy to assemble your own PC.

There are complete walk thru video guides on YouTube and other places. Also, by putting it together yourself, you'll not only get the better quality components, you'll get everything MUCH cheaper, allowing you to possibly put even more money into the GPU.

I can give you a quick list of some great items to get. I got all of them myself, and assembled it myself. I have built a PC before, but I hadn't built one in about 11 or 12 years. I was very intimidated and worried myself, but it was much easier that I thought it was going to be. The scariest part was putting on the CPU Heatsink. I kept thinking that I was going to fuck something up, but it worked just fine. Here is a list of parts:



Yeah, you have a very nice build.

I put together my first PC build about 4 months ago, and it wasn't quite as hard as I'd thought it would be. My build is pretty much a nice mid-range PC, that could have been much nicer had I did a little more shopping around and not wasted resources on my factory built PC.

I started out with an HP p6120f ($599) that came with a dual-core E6300 @ 2.83 GHZ. I had installed a GTX 250 for my first video card, but later upgraded to a Palit GTX 460 (1024 MB) card for just under $200. I later used Amazon credits to pick up an Intel Q9650 @ 3 Ghz (outperformed 95% of the i5 processors at the time) for around $190 and installed it in my HP. The performance was decent, but I wanted an SLI board, so I ended up buying an XFX nforce 775 motherboard ($75) that supported SLI (PCI-e 2.0), PC2-8500 memory and allowed me to overclock my CPU to 3.3 GHZ.. I'd bought a nice CPU cooler ( Cooler Master Hyper N520) for $35, a 750 watt power supply (Thermaltake) for $80, 8 gigs of PC2-8500 RAM ( Kingston Hyper-X) for @ $130, a Saprano RS mid-tower case ( I had a $50 gift card at Best Buy) for $69, another GTX 460 ($170), 3 fans for @ $35, (2) Seagate 500 gig HDD (7200 rpm) and Windows 7 (System builders) for $90. I pulled an HP light-scribe DVD drive I had on a really old PC and bought a wireless Logitec mouse/keyboard for under $45. While not cutting edge, it's still a solid build that will handle any game I throw at it, with maximum settings, and I'd spent less than $1,000 building it. I'm using 2 HDDs, because I have this system setup to dual-boot Windows XP pro and Windows 7.

I'd definitly recommend buying the i5-2500k processor and board you have. It's one of the best bangs for the buck.