I am looking at building my very first PC. I am not overly tech-savy, though I have cracked open PCs in the past and changed HDDs, in much older computers albeit. I was wondering if I could have your advice on some of the components I have chosen.
I want the computer to be a Light to Moderate gaming system, tackling games like Microsoft Flight Simulator, Simcity and a few more graphic-demanding games relatively easily. I use Photoshop quite frequently also, however I don't commonly deal with huge files. I also need to use programs such as Microsoft Office and the do the occassional video editing on Sony Vegas.
I live in Australia (so we are dealing with the Australian Dollar).
Now, the components I have chosen exceed my budget, so I was wondering if you could help me trim my list to more inexpensive items, but I want to make sure they are all compatible and can tackle the tasks above.
I've gotten rid of the SSD to come closer to the budget - you can get a 120GB SSD for $100 down the road if you wish, or get the SSD now and get the 500GB storage later.
The CPU has great performance for the price, which will perform better in almost all cases compared to the i3 you seleceted previously. I've bumped your RAM up to 8GB @ 1600MHz. You can get a single dimm of 4GB if you wish to save a little more but I'd leave it at that.
The PSU is also 80+ certified, 500W and has a single 12V rail for more reliable power at a good price.
Thanks so much for the help! I'll definitely consider axing the SSD for now, and maybe upgrading in the future. And as for the RAM, an upgrade to 8GB seems like a good idea.
As for the processor, I think I'll switch to the AMD, however the motherboard has a 1155 port for the i3, will the new processor work with the board?
this is close to as cheap as you would want to get a system with a discrete GPU, Australian prices suck unfortunately :( I could do you an APU system quite easily, it's buying microsoft windows that's the real killer in your budget, only allows you ~$670 to spend on the hardware.
you could also get a cheaper motherboard, but you wouldn't be able to crossfire the 7850 in the future.
Thanks for the help. Yes, Australian prices do suck.
Unfortunately I have no way of dodging the price of Windows, but the system you put up does not look bad. Sorry for my lack of knowledge with motherboards, but what limitations would the inability of crossfiring bring?
Oh okay. Thanks for the help. I'm not really ever aiming to use multiple graphics cards in the future, but I can afford to spend a bit extra on the motherboard, so I might go with this build.