Out of Pod Experience

not go "obsolete" in less than 3 years

For less than $800?

MOBO: z77 chipset any(decent)one 100-150$
CPU: 2500k or 3570k 220$
GPU: nvidia gtx 660 Ti 300$ for the MSI
RAM: g.skill ripjaws 16Gb 80$
SSD: Samsung 830 128 Gb 90$
HDD storage: 100-150$
Cooling + fans + case: > 150$

TOT: 900-1000$

This will not get obsolete in 3 years but it doesn't inculde stuff like RADI configuration, monitors, keyboard, mouse, speakers and those 'extra' you were talking about. Moreover, when people rigs his own stuff usually they are able to change a single part of their rig when it gets eventually osbolete, so it's hard to say what 'obsolete' means or what you'll want to run on it in the next 2-3 years.

If you want to stay below the 800 bucks cap..... you want a cheap rig which is already almost obsolete but it will run your 3 EVE clients smoothly:

MOBO: something costing 50-80$
CPU: Phenom II or sandy i3 2100 100$
GPU: gtx 650 or any gtx 560/570/580 100-150$
RAM: g.skill ripjaws 8Gb 40$
SSD same as before: 90$
HDD storage: same as before 100-150$
Cooling + fans + case: 100$

TOT: 600-700$

Add some of those extras (or some better part then those I listed) and there you are, 800$ are gone. Personally, since the difference from a semi-obsolete rig to a not-best-but-meh one is about 200$ I'd have no doubt which one to rig.

I'd say just go spend the $800 on a pre-fab :P ($600 system + $200 video card)
Now if you are talking maybe a $1600 system, yeah build, if you have exp or have a local friend to help you that does have exp. $800 bucks though, I can spend that easy in just peripherals... and did this year, and more! *shrugs* I've worked on a lot of systems, have an A+ cert including college credits in desktop support + on the job exp. Why I suggest just buy one is because you have someone to take it back to if it fails the first month or few, no cost replacement. If you build it yourself, you have no one to take it back for replacement. $800 you are trying to be kinda cheap, and buying a pre-fab is the cheap/inexpensive way to go especially if something is/goes faulty.

Build one costing over 1k? sure. Build a multi-unit server? Absolutely! love working on real servers, myself. Re-invent the bargain pc? meh
Good luck hehe

edit: or maybe one of those builder sites like newegg? You can tailor a sub-1k system there. They buy parts in bulk like builders do, so you will get a cheaper price on a bargain pc + warranty, compared to building it yourself due to the extra cost of buying single parts for a build then loosing the whole system over a faulty part which can happen.

Which is why I say sub-1k system, as for a game rig config. If you want it to last, keep in mind the ability to upgrade the video card in a year or two. So you basically want a good mobo (my pref is ASUS). The rest you just upgrade as needed. So you don't need to get a $400 video card today, $100+ would do etc. Ability to upgrade CPU etc. Don't skimp on power supply, some are cheap and go bad more often.

1000w is way over the top. Pc's, even gaming rigs, are getting more efficient. Unless you are planning on running 2 graphics cards, 650w is quite sufficient., a 500w would all most certainly do it but for me the cost saving isn't worth the risk.

Brand wise my Antec has so far provided 5 years of faultless service, so would quite happily have another.

Given your tight budget you should think about reusing your existing psu. They can last a long time and don't have the same problems with swift obsolescence that other components do.

215$ - Intel Core i5-3570 (no k) - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115233
55$ - silent huge fan aftermarket heatsink - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835118133
80$ - H77 ATX mobo - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157302
130$ - 16GB DDR3@1600 7-8-8-24 1.5V - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231537
149$ - 180GB fast and reliable SSD for OS - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820167122
140$ - 3TB slow HDD - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136874
230$ - 2GB GeForce GTX 660 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125443
60$ - Corsair Builder series 500W - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139027
60$ - high air-flow case - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119233
17$ - DVD writer - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827136247
= 1136 USD (+tax and shipping)

You can partition the SSD into 120+60 GB, use the 120GB partition for OS plus frequently used apps, and the 60GB partition as SSD cache for the slow HDD.
Alternatively, just use it all as an OS partition and put more apps and games on it directly.
Or, just get a smaller SSD and save some cash, but, meh, smaller SSDs are also slower, and the savings are not that great.

The GTX 660 is quite sufficient for 3 EVE instances in highest detail in 1080p, also supports 3 monitors simultaneously. You can get a faster one later if you want, but for now (and for the next 2 to 3 years) this one should be quite enough.
Heck, you can even downgrade to a GTX 650 and still get your minimal desired performance.
The MoBo doesn't support SLI, but I honestly and strongly recommend AGAINST SLI, unless you go with at least 3, not 2 video cards, due to microstutter, and you still will have headaches with SLI profiles and such. It's cheaper and much simpler to just get a faster GPU in a few years.

You can upgrade to a 3570k for a few extra bucks, but honestly, I doubt you'll actually ever need to overclock your CPU significantly, and you will probably never use the integrated graphics anyway. If you really want future-proofing, get a 3770k. It will probably be quite enough for at least 5 years, but it's quite a bit extra.
The case is pretty damn good at cooling everything inside. Heck, you can even disable the TurboBoost too, and use the stock cooler instead of the aftermarket one, save some extra cash, it won't go kablooey nor melty on you.

The total power load of your system is probably only around 350W under full load (maybe even less), so even a 500W PSU is already a bit overkill.
You can upgrade to a 600W PSU if you want ( http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139028 , for just 10$ extra) if you think you might overclock stuff a bit.
More than that would just cost you in terms of wasted power due to inefficiencies (and you don't really need it for anything anyway). 1000W is way, way overkill, even for heavy-duty overclocking (but in that case you probably also want water cooling). You're already way over your initial budget anyway.

Just a couple thoughts and suggestions:

A 1000W PSU is pretty overkill on a budget gaming PC, and even for a higher end PC, it's really only needed if you plan on OCing it. Figure this one pulls 77W on max load for the CPU, 6W per fan, 20-30W for the motherboard, 5-10W for the SSD, 30-40W for the Cooler, 64W for the GPU, and maybe 10W for the RAM.

So it'll bring it to about 249W on full load with everything pushed to 100% usage. More likely, you'll be running at between 30 and 60% of that as a very rough estimate. Double the CPU and GPU load if you OC them. PSU performance is a bell curve with peak efficiency at 50% load, which drops off on either end to min. efficiency. This means that with a mild OC on this setup the PSU should be right near 50% load, which is good.

I didn't include a second SSD because if you do RAID you'll need the same kind, and if you just back-up you can use an HDD, possibly existing if they're still good.

If you go with the Cooler above, two things: Mount the fan and radiator first, with the plastic still on the waterblock and it outside the chassis, then fit it to the CPU. People say the hose is a bit stiff, (which is good I suppose), so you have to be careful with it to avoid damaging anything.

Also, make sure you enable the shutdown state on your CPU, as if it really is as quiet as they suggest and the pump dies, you may not know until your PC melts. The shutdown will stop that from occurring, (70C or less setting to avoid damage), and give you a good idea what's wrong.

Rad is good mounted outside the chassis on the back, or even the top with either push pull, or pull configuration with 2 or 1 fan(s) respectively. You might even be able to mount it inside on the top as there are knockouts for fans there, on the chassis I linked.

The manufacturer product page for the motherboard will contain links to CPU and RAM compatibility lists. It might even be in the manual.

TPM headers, (only really useful if you have Window Ultimate installed as it supports them), allow you to connect encryption modules to keep your information safe. They are painful to find and purchase in Canada, and not much better in the US I imagine, and you'll probably need to find an adapter or jury-rig one depending on the header. Stupid painful; never done it.

If you're really set on a 1000W PSU, you might want to look at these:

Stupid awesome: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151110

Good Price right now; not familiar, but is coming up apparently: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817553008

Jaw-dropping awesome, but a little overkill: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817171062

None of these are Platinum, which is stupid.

These are:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817703037

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817171074

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151105

Purely based on brand for most of those, as I'm completely unfamiliar with others, or they've had a mixed reputation in the past. Most of those have been pretty solid as far as these products go. 80P certified does mean something though, but not really, until you hit the Silver level. That's where the quality of components starts showing when combined with quality of design.

That said, there's a lot of non 80P PSUs that have been very good in the past and have excellent reputations, but most of those were before 80P was a standard.

1000w? Just one computer right? not three... hehe
Here, this might help: Newegg PSU calculator

Corsair. Should be a good one for whatever wattage you need.

Beyond that, I'd just say Nvidia card, seems like my ATI's ALWAYS fail not to mention poor drivers. ATI was my fav for years, but no longer. There are a lot of good audio cards so I wont mention brand, but if you can swing it get some Boss speakers. I do a lot of sound and music composing + editing, Boss is just freakin awesome when I'm not using my studio sets.

I have no issues with my audio card, when I press a key on my midi synth, I get instantaneous response not only from sound output but in my editor/recorder as well. I also run line 6 guitarport, fantastically crisp and clear system response. And that while I'm not only on input, but running multiple instruments on output all at the same time ...and recording.

Now if you are talking old sound card architecture, those were pretty rough. Now they plug into pci-e, built in DAC, multi-core processors, current memory standards etc etc etc. No issues here
Of course I put more $$ into my sound system than my video (4x), but I know how hard it is to get good audio editing support which is more demanding than game audio support. If you want good audio, make sure the mobo has a pci-e slot for it... though you don't need to spend 4x the cost to get something good of course.

Thanks for all the tips and advice guys. Really helps clarify some things and point towards other things.


Sadly I'm not manly enough to lift weights. However, what vestigial machismo I still possess does demands that I compensate by building stuff with my bare hands... that may or may not have used to scratch myself (there is always the stick).