Friend's $1000 Christmas Build - Hardware & Software

Hey FacePunch :) So I found out that my friend, who's been just scraping by with his laptop, barely able to run games like Minecraft or Kerbal Space Program, is getting $1000 for christmas, and is veeery excited to be able to get his first gaming PC. He already has a monitor, but he'll need just about everything else besides a mouse. I'm thinking 770 or maybe a 280x, i5, 8-16GB Ram, 128GB SSD if possible, and then 1-3TB HDD, and Windows 8 unless you guys want to persuade him out of that. 650Watt PSU could maybe do. If you can tell by that, I basically have no clue what I'm doing. So if you guys have any good parts lists for this budget, I'd really appreciate it!

[QUOTE=Biscuit-Boy;43040964]Hey FacePunch :) So I found out that my friend, who's been just scraping by with his laptop, barely able to run games like Minecraft or Kerbal Space Program, is getting $1000 for christmas, and is veeery excited to be able to get his first gaming PC. He already has a monitor, but he'll need just about everything else besides a mouse. I'm thinking 770 or maybe a 280x, i5, 8-16GB Ram, 128GB SSD if possible, and then 1-3TB HDD, and Windows 8 unless you guys want to persuade him out of that. 650Watt PSU could maybe do. If you can tell by that, I basically have no clue what I'm doing. So if you guys have any good parts lists for this budget, I'd really appreciate it![/QUOTE] [url]http://pcpartpicker.com/p/2d7Q9[/url] Fits nicely in. Still needs adjusted abit if he wants to include Windows 8 though. (With OS [url]http://pcpartpicker.com/p/2d82p[/url])

Thanks a ton! This all looks pretty good. Is Corsair Vengeance memory the best kind of memory for the budget, and is the mobo making any sacrifices?

$20 over budget: [url]http://pcpartpicker.com/p/2d9Qp[/url] Not overclockable but within budget: [url]http://pcpartpicker.com/p/2d9U1[/url] I would seriously throw in the extra $20 for overclocking cabaility (and maybe a little more for a better case like the fractal design r4 since that's a budget case). [editline]1st December 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=Biscuit-Boy;43042583]Thanks a ton! This all looks pretty good. Is Corsair Vengeance memory the best kind of memory for the budget, and is the mobo making any sacrifices?[/QUOTE] Corsair is a good brand, but I would not recommend that RAM in particular since it's ridiculously overpriced ($87 for 1600 MHz RAM is [U][B]HORRIBLE[/B][/U]). You could get 2133 MHz ram for that price. The motherboard is low end (the lowest class of motherboards you can buy that can still overclock); although, it's perfectly adequate. However, that processor can't overclock, so there is no reason to pay extra for a low end z87 motherboard. That build is also $100 over-budget.

I think having the CPU cooler is important regardless, although they're both pretty close to the budget. And that's what I was thinking, I doubt having name brand ram is horridly important when it's only a $1000 build.

[QUOTE=Biscuit-Boy;43042656]I think having the CPU cooler is important regardless, although they're both pretty close to the budget. And that's what I was thinking, I doubt having name brand ram is horridly important when it's only a $1000 build.[/QUOTE] G.Skill is the second most respectable brand you can buy, so don't worry, it's still great quality (I use their RAM myself). Also having a heatsink is not important if you aren't overclocking. The heatsink is perfectly capable of cooling an processor at stock clocks.

[QUOTE=Biscuit-Boy;43042656]I think having the CPU cooler is important regardless, although they're both pretty close to the budget. And that's what I was thinking, I doubt having name brand ram is horridly important when it's only a $1000 build.[/QUOTE] GSkill is a pretty decent brand shouldn't have problems there.

For me personally, it was important- the stock CPU fan was leaving my CPU behind at stock clock speeds when rendering in 3DSmax or After Effects and Premiere- Premiere and AE were actually crashing from the CPU overheating even though I've left it stock (i7 3770k). I'll take your word for it, but I don't know if my friend will want to overclock- I know I never do- so thanks for presenting the option.

[QUOTE=Biscuit-Boy;43042691]For me personally, it was important- the stock CPU fan was leaving my CPU behind at stock clock speeds when rendering in 3DSmax or After Effects and Premiere- Premiere and AE were actually crashing from the CPU overheating even though I've left it stock (i7 3770k). I'll take your word for it, but I don't know if my friend will want to overclock- I know I never do- so thanks for presenting the option.[/QUOTE] Then you just need to clean it out/apply new thermal paste. [editline]2nd December 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=Neddy;43042219]Neddy's build[/QUOTE] Why do you have a Z87 mobo but a non overclockable CPU?

[QUOTE=taipan;43043369]Then you just need to clean it out/apply new thermal paste. [editline]2nd December 2013[/editline] Why do you have a Z87 mobo but a non overclockable CPU?[/QUOTE] Is there ever a problem with stock Intel thermal paste application? As well the PC was thoroughly dusted out and about as clean as you can reasonably expect. Installing a third party CPU cooler remedied my problem thoroughly and I haven't had a problem since.

If you have decent airflow even a low end case should be able to keep the stock clocked intel processor cool with just the stock cooler. If you have: a low, low end case + poor cable managment + stock cooler + stock thermal paste, you might have some overheating issues at load.

But if you want to just keep overall lower temps, it's fine to spend $30 on a cooler, I did.

I can't imagine what I would have been doing wrong. High end case, reasonable cable management (messy but spacious), is the stock thermal paste on the fan really that bad? Anyways as far as my friend is concerned springing for the OC processor and fan shouldn't be too difficult.

[QUOTE=Biscuit-Boy;43046025]I can't imagine what I would have been doing wrong. High end case, reasonable cable management (messy but spacious), is the stock thermal paste on the fan really that bad? Anyways as far as my friend is concerned springing for the OC processor and fan shouldn't be too difficult.[/QUOTE] I dont know either. But the stock CPU fan should be able to keep your CPU stable at any task on a standard clock.