Hey
So I've decided to build a gaming rig which I hope will be able to play todays high end games and near future games, these include: Dragon age, Bioshock 2 and Mass Effect 2. I will also be happy if I can just get to play those high end games at high settings that have been released over the past years.
At the moment chassis and power supply is not a problem. Unfortunately I already have a motherboard, ASUS PQ5L SE, which I have my doubts about it, as it's not exactly new on the market. I'm willing to go out there and buy a new one, but I'm scottish and cheap, so I'd like to keep the best budget rather than shelling out my hard earned money
I would like suggestions on:
Processor
Graphics card
Memory
Hard drive
DVD drive
I appreciate all help And will be very grateful for suggestions
Well there are many points to consider, as your obviously aware, lets start with what you have, the case and PSU, what are the make\model of these ?
I ask for a couple of reasons, high spec systems need good cooling, and the case plays a massive part in that, and todays video cards are massive, so you need to be sure it will fit, now the PSU is the heart of your system, and should NEVER be skimped on, when a PSU goes bad it can take the whole system with it, so no point wasting money on high end kit to gamble on a cheap PSU, so it will help us to know what your working with.
The motherboard is problematic, to begin I can't find it on the Asus site, so can't check it's spec, in it's own right it's probably a good board, but with the recent massive jump to i7, i5 and i3 boards it is a world apart, normally ram can be used on the next few builds, but when a big jump in tech is involved it means you need new ram again, my point is what it will cost you for 4gig or so of ram, you may as well pay a bit more for 6gig of the newer ram which will hopefully serve through a couple of upgrades, at least until the next big jump in tech.
Price is your biggest issue, a cheap top gaming system does not equate, so we need to know what kind of budget your looking at, the top video card alone is approx £500, although there are numerous good cards in the £300 range, so as you see it can get very expensive very quickly, so if you can fill in these blanks with your thoughts we will try and get you what you hope to achieve, as best that can be within the range you set anyway.
The case is certainly a quality make, so should be quite able to serve your needs well, the PSU worries me, if it's all in Chinese then there is a serious risk of it being a cheap and nasty unit, it could serve well for years without issue, BUT, when a PSU goes bad it can take everything else with it, so if your spending lots of money on quality kit, skimping on the PSU is suicidal, and could cost you dearly, Chinese items are often substandard, just look around on eBay from those buying from there, so such an important item I'd strongly suggest getting a superior unit for peace of mind if nothing more.
Your motherboard, as I said it is limiting, the best you can hope for with that is 8gig of DDR2 ram and a core2 quad CPU, in itself still quite respectable, but with i7 etc out now it is dated, so you need to choose between a new board, and accompanying extras, or stay with what you have, and buy cheap on the CPU and ram thus freeing up some money for a superior PSU which if you buy right, will serve you through numerous upgrade to come, so my advice is buy the biggest\best you can afford, it will serve you well, I favour PCP&C as they are regarded the best, but there are cheaper ones that will serve well, here are a couple worth considering. http://www.ebuyer.com/product/168473 http://www.ebuyer.com/product/143019
Hard drive is a no brainer for me, get them in pairs and use raid creating a mirrored array, this makes backing up automatic, then add in another pair when money allows and have raid0 + 1, so you get speed along with back up, an alternate option is get smaller drives for the OS\installation etc, and use these as storage. http://www.ebuyer.com/product/146082
And will be very grateful for suggestions