Thinking about building a new rig...

Since I'm running off a 6-year old Dell E521 Dual Core (albeit with upgraded RAM and an XFX HD4670 video card), I've been thinking about upgrading my rig. Here's what I'm thinking would run pretty damn fast for gaming, without breaking my budget too badly (~$1035, since I already got the hard drive):

Motherboard: ASUS SABERTOOTH Z77
CPU: Intel Core i7-3770 Ivy Bridge 3.4GHz (3.9GHz Turbo) LGA 1155 77W Quad-Core Processor
Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda 1TB SATA 7200rpm 3GB/s 32MB Cache
RAM: 16GB GeiL Black Dragon DDR3 SDRAM
Video Card: XFX Double D Black Edition Radeon HD 7770 1095MHz 1GB GDDR5
Case: Antec Three Hundred ATX Mid Tower
Power Supply: Rosewill HIVE-750 (750W)
OS: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-bit

Any thoughts or suggestions?

 

I agree with Dihm here. If you aren't doing a lot of non-gaming that requires a lot of threads, go with the i5 core as it's cheaper and you get great performance. And I was doing a comparison with cost in regards to Sandy Bridge v Ivy Bridge and the cost difference between a SB and an IB i5 3.3ghz is nothing. If you step up one level for the i5 SB v IB you begin to see a bit of a price difference, ~$20 difference between the two. So Ivy Bridge seems to be minimal in cost increase. As for if this is a multipurpose machine or a gaming machine, if mainly gaming your graphics card will be the most important thing on the computer as it will do most of the work. As such you'd want to get, at minimum, a 560 Ti Fermi card with 2gb RAM or whatever the equivalent is for an ATI card. The rest of the build looks solid.

 

Are SSDs really worth it? Also, is it better to upgrade your the drive with the operating system on it or the one where you install all your games (for me I keep them separate).

Also probably time for me to upgrade my GPU... have a 450GTX thats getting long in the tooth.

 

You can get the 30ish gigs for ~100 now. Not enough to do my full game directory installs but enough to rotate the ones I'm currently playing.

 

I'd highly recommend going SSD. I just built a FEA Simulation workstation for R&D at my office and I moved the OS and main applications to the SSD. It is very quick. You notice it in pretty much everything you do. And if you do choose to go SSD, I'd suggest nothing smaller than 120gb. You figure you'll want your OS on there which needs space to grow as it's patched as well as a few applications you use frequently. Use a SATA drive for all your storage and misc. application needs.

 

One of the main reasons I was looking at the i7 was that I figured I would get more longevity out of a more up-to-date processor, since stuff like video cards, ram, etc. I can upgrade more easily down the road. Is the only real advantage of the i7 over the i5 threading?

As per Sandy Bridge vs. Ivy Bridge, one main draw I saw to Ivy the power draw required is soo much lower. With Sandy bridge I'd probably want to go to a more powerful power supply, and all that wattage has to go into waste heat, which would further impede the system. Given minimal price difference, I can't see any reason not to go with Ivory Bridge.

And is the GTX 560 Ti really that big of an improvement vs. a GTX 560 or an HD 6870? I wouldn't mind much a ~$30 increase from the HD7770 card I was looking at, but the jump for the Ti is pretty steep. What's the return on investment? (and thanks for the link, Dihm!)

As per the SSD, I've been eying them a bit, but waiting for the price point to come down a little on the higher capacity ones... I'm expecting that if I wait a few months the 240GB ones will be similar to where the 120GB ones are now.

 

That 750w power supply you have is more than enough to power that build you have, whether you go SB or IB. I have a 750w PSU on my i5 SB with the GTX 560 Ti card and I don't think I've ever gone over 550-600w.

As for longevity, I'd not look at the CPU as much as the MoBo. Will it support upgrades down the road? That's where you'll want to focus if you're concerned about future upgrades. In regards to the differences between i5 and i7, one is the CPU cache. I know the i7 has a higher cache available for redundant tasks. Same with hyper-threading. The i7 brings more threads to the table than the i5 but that does have a lot depending on whether the CPU is logical core or physical core. And of course the i7 OC's at a much higher rate than the i5.

As for the graphics cards, here's a breakdown between what you're looking at (7770) and the 560 Ti Fermi:




The cost difference is the kicker though. ~$130 more for the 560 Ti Fermi.

 

In my OP: mind you I do this for a living

Since money is main priority and gaming the second

go i5 2600k the i7 isnt worth the extra bucks, ATI 6870, and be VERY picky about your PSU brand / model too many crap ones out there

Ivy Bridge is too new, and the mobos are too pricey yet to be a value so Id go with a sandy bridge and Z77

SSD: get a Corsair GT 120GB for $130 the 240GBs aint going to be near $130 in a few months, maybe in 2013 but a 120 is big enough for Win7 and a bunch of games and they make a difference

 

So... almost twice the price but 4x faster? That's impressive. How's the comparison between the GTX 560 and the GTX 560 Ti? I'm seeing a definite improvement between the HD 7770 and the GTX 560, but I can't find the 2GB Ti in this chart, and the improvement between the 1GB 560 and 560 Ti doesn't seem that worthwhile.
http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/2012-vga-gpgpu/compare,2950.html?prod[5393]=on&prod[5392]=on&prod[5451]=on

 

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/336694-33-difference-560ti

 

Thanks - here's something handy I hadn't seen before:
http://www.hwcompare.com/10981/geforce-gtx-560-vs-geforce-gtx-560-ti/

Looks like the TI gets a bit of a boost, but the 560 is the winner on price point.

However...
http://www.hwcompare.com/12054/geforce-gtx-560-ti-vs-radeon-hd-7850/
http://www.hwcompare.com/12039/geforce-gtx-560-vs-radeon-hd-7850/
That Radeon HD 7850 is looking like a nice GPU - I like the low power draw, too. Same price point as the 560 Ti, I think I'm between taht and the straight GTX 560 as a bargain deal. Hmmm...

 

Whichever way you go, remember to give proper attention to the graphics card. It is the lifeblood of the gaming rig.

 

Ok, new plan:

Motherboard: ASUS SABERTOOTH Z77
CPU: Intel Core i5-3570 Ivy Bridge 3.4GHz (3.8GHz Turbo) LGA 1155 77W Quad-Core Processor
Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda 1TB SATA 7200rpm 3GB/s 32MB Cache
RAM: 16GB GeiL Black Dragon DDR3 SDRAM
Video Card: Sapphire Radeon HD7850 1200MHz 2GB GDDR5
Case: Antec Three Hundred ATX Mid Tower
Power Supply: Rosewill HIVE-750 (750W)
OS: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-bit

Around $1088, plus shipping. Thanks for the help everyone!

 

Yeah, I'll have to keep an eye open.