So, lately, I’ve been feeling the need to upgrade my computer. I’d like to build a whole new one from scratch, just buying the parts. I’d like something high end (being a gamer) but also within a budget of $1,000. Seeing as you guys are the experts, I thought I’d ask you how to go about it since I really don’t know much about which parts to buy. I don’t think I’d have any trouble assembling it if I had all the ingredients, but just as I shop for groceries, I want the right ingredients to make the best chowder I can possibly make.
Get an i5 4670k (or maybe 4690k depending on how much money you can spend on a processor) and a 970. That will probably be $500, then put the other $500 into the other stuff like a case, mobo, PSU, RAM, and HDD. Should probably be around $1000. If you can’t get that under $1000 then maybe wait for the 960/960ti which should be out soon. Really not much of a point in getting any other card at the moment.
What kind of difference do different motherboards make? I’m such a noob with all this. Does a $50 difference make much of an impact?
I’ve never really heard much of anything about choosing one. As long as it has all the features you want I’d say it’s probably good enough. I really just picked one at random in my price range for the two I got. I would suggest ATX and not micro-ATX though. Just check it has the correct socket of the CPU that you want and make sure its other features are good. Like anything though you probably want to buy from a reputable brand. I’ve used Asrock and MSI. Asus are pretty good I’ve heard too. Those are the three brands I’m aware of off the top of my head.
I’m not sure. One thing I can say for certain is that cheaper motherboards don’t have as many PCI ports.
I’d highly recommend you use pcpartpicker.com to organize your build, since it should tell you if any of your parts are incompatible.
Higher-priced motherboards usually offer more USB, SATA and PCI-Express slots (and more PCI-E slots running at higher speeds, which improves SLI/Crossfire performance), as well as offering better support for overclocking CPU and RAM. They might also have better heatsinks, nicer design, better built-in networking and sound chips, etc.
Probably not worth going for over something more important to overall performance like a more powerful CPU or GPU (or a SSD).
Thanks guys, I appreciate all the help. So not all motherboards support all CPUs then? From what I’m gathering, it can be tricky to get all your parts to be compatible with each other.
It definitely can! I can’t recommend pcpartpicker.com enough. It does a lot of the hard work for you; you can filter lists of parts by what’s compatible with your build, and shows reviews and scores from other users.
Thanks guys, I appreciate the help. I’ll certainly utilize PC partpicker. Now it’s time to outdo my roommate’s computer and make him jealous again.
^ I was actually going to recommend that site myself. It’s a great place to start if you don’t know where to begin.
This site is also wonderful, sweet stuff.