Friday, September 21, 2012

May 2011 $700 Build - Computers - Hardware

Quick Rundown:

Case Antec Nine Hundred Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case $100GPU XFX Radeon HD 6950 1GB $210CPU AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition Deneb 3.2GHz $120 Motherboard ASUS M4A79XTD $90 Memory A-DATA XPG Gaming Series 4GB $46PSU Antec EarthWatts EA750 750W $80 Hard Drive SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM $65 DVD LG Black DVDRW SuperMulti Drive Black SATA Model GH22NS50 $19

Note: Prices are subject to change. If prices change within the current month I will update the article to meet standards.

A Closer Look:

Antec Nine Hundred Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case $100

With a budget of $700, there is a wide variety of cases to choose from. In all honesty, you could skip reading this and choose your own case that fits the $700 budget. Nonetheless, I personally believe that this is the best case at this price point. Simply because of the airflow: 2 120mm intake fans, 1 120mm exhaust fan, and 1 200mm monster exhaust fan. And these arent your run-of-the-mill flimsy fans, these fans are sturdy and pump out large amounts of air. Setting these fans at their lowest settings keeps all your parts at alarmingly low temperatures. Crafted with black steel, this thing is a tank and can withstand tough beatings during those LAN parties. The aesthetics of the case are also something to behold. The sleek black contrasts well with the blue LEDs that are dispersed throughout the case. The two exposed intake fans in the front and exhaust fan on the top of the case create an overall crafty and genuine feel of a gamer case. The interior provides durable suppo rt for your hard drives and theres plenty of room for expansion and additional fans. The only concern with this case is the cable management. If youre nitpicky about messy wiring then I suggest you choose another case or mod this one. Overall, its an amazing case that will cool your parts.

XFX Radeon HD 6950 1GB $210

Now this is an absolute beast of a graphics card. Is there anything I can really say that describes how overwhelmingly beastly this card is? I mean, the only way you truly will understand just how powerful this thing is by simply using it. This card will max out Crysis and will continue to function as one of the leading budget video cards for years to come. This monster will last you for a long time running future released games at high to max settings.

AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition Deneb 3.2GHz $120

This is an excellent performing CPU right out of the box. Even though its a black edition and has the potential to be overclocked, it will still run efficiently. There is only one drawback, the stock fan is loud, but its not so loud that its unbearable to use your computer, its probably just a little louder than your current CPU. You will eventually adapt to the CPUs fan speed unless you have extraordinarily reduced latent inhibition, which I doubt. However, if its so burdensome, you could invest in another CPU cooler for around $20-30, and then maybe you could overclock it a little.

ASUS M4A79XTD $90

This is an all around great motherboard for its price and will fit this build to its utmost performance. It offers 2 PCI Express 2.0 x16 slots to support your crossfire/sli needs if you ever decide to add an additional graphics card in the future. But lets be real, you wont ever need to upgrade that beast of a graphics card in a long time, so 2 PCI Express 2.0 x16 slots is kind of irrelevant at this moment. Unless you plan to get a PCI E Solid State Drive for faster speeds in the future, but youre a budget builder so I doubt youll ever shell out the money for one of those expensive things. Nonetheless, it also has 2 PCI slots and PCI Express x1 slots for future upgrades such as sound cards and wireless cards. The motherboard provides ample room so your mammoth of a graphics card doesnt block out these ports. It has 4 memory slots supporting up to 16GB which is more than enough for our 2x2GB of RAM, but this is for future expandability. Overall this motherboard is the perfe ct board to fit this specific builds needs. Disregarding future expandability it will serve its purpose well.

A-DATA XPG Gaming Series 4GB $46

Memory is becoming cheaper every month. So this ram is absolutely one of the best types of ram you could have in your PC. It complements all your other parts so well, in that it could overclock efficiently and provides very little heat. At $46 this is the best bang for your buck memory. Because its DDR3 and only takes up 2 slots of the motherboards memory slots, there is additional room for expansion if you ever want to bring your memory up to 8GB. But I highly doubt youll ever need that much until 2-3 years into the future. For now, 4GB is plenty for all your gaming needs.

Antec EarthWatts EA750 750W $80

The 750W is going to power up that monster of a GPU. And in the case you decide to overclock your GPU and CPU, this power supply will be there to power your overclocking desires. The overall logistics of the power supply return a very low failure rate and will keep your computer powered for many years to come. Overall, it is an excellent edition to the build. However, if you feel that this is pushing it and you can get away with a cheaper power supply that is modular, then by all means go for it. But stick to this power supply if you want something that will last quite a while and supports overclocking.

SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM $65

This is quite simply best bang for your buck hard drive. At 1 terabyte and 7200RPM, this thing will load your games at a speed that is only surpassed by its expensive 10000RPM and Solid State counterparts which in my opinion arent worth the money. 10000RPM and Solid State drives will lower in price in the near future, and its just not worth it to pay outrageous prices for 2-3 seconds in decreased loading times. To be blunt, this is the best 1 terabyte hard drive out there. No questions.

LG Black DVDRW SuperMulti Drive Black SATA Model GH22NS50 $19

This is simply a cheap and reliable DVD burner. Pretty standard these days.

Closing Remarks:

So this isnt quite $700, but $730. Not a problem, if that $30 is above your budget, then simply replace the case with a NZXT M59 and that should save you $55. Nonetheless, this computer is an amazing computer that will last for years to come without the need for upgrades. There is really no need to go above a $700-750 budget unless you want a computer thats the best of the best. But at this moment in time, the best of the best computer has outrageous prices that is probably 10 times more expensive than this computer. And it will probably max out the same games that this computer will. The fact that this computer will last for many years and continue to max out games means whats the point in spending more?



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