Need help/direction building a new system

[Synergy]

My last tower I built myself and a friend helped me install OS, driver, etc... It crashed, perhaps the copy of XP was bad . This was 11 years ago Since then I have been on laptops. I would like to build a midrange system. I don't do online gaming. I will be using it for video editing.

I have always used AMD, no problem with Intel except for price. I am not looking for a high end water cooled, LED lighting. Just want something simple enough power.

I am open to suggestions and websites that have good prices.

[ldivinag]

just buy a powerful machine.

8 gigs of ram minimum.

I7 processor.

if you live near a frys, you can check out machines there.

website "dealnews.com" always has great deals on computers.

i used to have a dell 8000 series. i like the current 8500 series also. not to flashy, but like i said, i7, lots of ram, big chassis to fit internal drives, etc...

under $1000.

i edit on sony vegas.

[bigbearbear]

Why do you want to build one yourself? There are many advantages to going the DIY route, but if you're unfamiliar with the process it'll be very frustrating for you.

Check out this site: http://www.techbargains.com/

They have deals going on daily and you should be able to find something that fits your budget and needs.

Or, if you prefer to pick the parts but leave the building to others, try these guys: http://www.pugetsystems.com/

[Haunt]

Since its going to be for Video Editing you're going to want a High-end processor & Graphics Card. Get the graphics card from NVIDIA of course.

[Synergy]

Why do you want to build one yourself? There are many advantages to going the DIY route, but if you're unfamiliar with the process it'll be very frustrating for you.

Check out this site: http://www.techbargains.com/

They have deals going on daily and you should be able to find something that fits your budget and needs.

Or, if you prefer to pick the parts but leave the building to others, try these guys: http://www.pugetsystems.com/

I like to tweak thing and building myself gives me the flexibility to build what I want. I am pretty competent with computers. I am not up to date on the current CPUs and what not. My last CPU was an AMD Athlon.

So far I am looking at:

AMD FX-8350
MSI 990FXA-GD65V2 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813130677
Looking at 16g ram
Still shopping for a video card

[bigbearbear]

I like to tweak thing and building myself gives me the flexibility to build what I want. I am pretty competent with computers. I am not up to date on the current CPUs and what not. My last CPU was an AMD Athlon.

So far I am looking at:

AMD FX-8350
MSI 990FXA-GD65V2 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813130677
Looking at 16g ram
Still shopping for a video card

For some reasons your original post lead me to think you might not be familiar with the process of building a PC.

I love going DIY myself. I could never find a computer configured to my exact requirement and I hate wasting PC parts and money.

When I came to US back in Dec of 1999, I build a system and the PC case (an old Antec I bought from Frys) is still in use today, running a 24x7 production server for my work. Pretty crazy huh? Over 13 years and I'm still using the same old case, saves a lot of waste too for not having to dump out old PC cases.

For video cards: I've found that many of the manufacturers use cheap fan and heat sinks on their cards, even fairly expensive ones have cheap fans and heat sink. 3 video cards in a row now, I've had the problem of the fan rattling when I power on the computer on a cold morning. The rattling will go away once the computer warms up or if I reboot the computer (somethings a couple of times). This problem appears after using the cards for a while, usually a year or so. The current video card I have is a Galaxy GeForce GTX 670 2 GB, it too developed the problem so I installed a 3rd party heat sink/fan on it. This one: Arctic Cooling Accelero Mono Plus

Another thing about video card is their tech support. I wished I have not went with Galaxy and stayed with eVGA. When I had the problem with my eVGA card, eVGA simply mailed me a replacement heat sink/fan after I told them I'm ok with installing it myself. Galaxy won't do that and require that I send the card in to them, they said it'll take 2 to 3 weeks. So I'll be left without a video card in the mean time, no thanks. Their support is worthless. Go with eVGA if you can. Also, look for cards that do not deviate from reference design, that way, should you need to replace the heat sink/fan later on, it'll be easier to find a compatible one.

PC Case: If you're still looking for one, and if you plan to keep your PC case for a long time, beware that many of the cases come with cheap sleeve bearing fans. They are ok for a few years, but after a while they'll start to squeak and require lubing. Lubing the fan is no big deal, except that you'll need to power down your computer and remove it from the case. Depending on the case your choose or have currently, this may range from easy to a real pain the neck. So if you're still picking your PC case, and don't mind lubing the fan, pick a bigger one that is easier to work on. If you have to pick a small one to save space, I recommend that you replace the fans with ball bearing types or the fancier Magnetic Barometric types when the rest of the components are not yet installed. That way there's much less chance of you needing to work on the fans later on.

Good luck with your build.

[stilly]

I like to tweak thing and building myself gives me the flexibility to build what I want. I am pretty competent with computers. I am not up to date on the current CPUs and what not. My last CPU was an AMD Athlon.

So far I am looking at:

AMD FX-8350
MSI 990FXA-GD65V2 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813130677
Looking at 16g ram
Still shopping for a video card

I have always said that the average person does not need more than 2-4GB of RAM.

BUT apparently the average person does not really encode video. After some review, it might be a good idea to load up on RAM so all I can say is look for ram in the 1600+ range or that will run in async with your cpu. I am an AMD guy myself and I would guess that what you have listed looks about decent with what I might look at also. The FX chipset I think outperformed the GX chipset so I would look for a 990FX board which looks like what you have, the only difference I might make would be to get a Biostar over an MSI but only because I last built a Biostar for a gamer and it turned out great and the mobo was only like $125 or so... Good stuff... This was about 7 or so months ago though so things might have changed a bit.- But he got a Phenom X6 1100 for the CPU.

For RAM I would look for Kingston. For some reason I have always had bad luck with crucial. I think they just suck. Kingston always seems to work in just about every board I put it in. Good luck.

OH and stay AWAY from FRY'S. There is a reason why it is also called the F-store and the next time you go there have a closer look at what you might buy and see if you can find a QUALITY INSPECTED label on it. That means it was used and returned and still being sold at full retail and there is a chance that it is missing parts or NOT at all what it says it is (in the case of motherboards). Fountain Valley store was VERY bad at this with motherboards at the only time I went there.

[NoSpam]

I like to tweak thing and building myself gives me the flexibility to build what I want. I am pretty competent with computers. I am not up to date on the current CPUs and what not. My last CPU was an AMD Athlon.

So far I am looking at:

AMD FX-8350
MSI 990FXA-GD65V2 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813130677
Looking at 16g ram
Still shopping for a video card

Your build is far above what an average person would need. You could probably let it sit unused for 3 years, and still be above what the average person needs.

If you're not a gamer or high end video encoder, you DO NOT need a 4.2ghz 8-core cpu, or 16gb ram. You will not need an add-on video card either. Integrated graphics on motherboards are fine for most things, such as playing bluray discs, handling tv tuners, and they can handle some low-to-med gaming. The key to "useful" speed these days is through the use of an SSD hard drive.

I recommend saving $70 on the cpu by getting this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103962

Spend only half as much on the motherboard with this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103962

Add 8gb ram, and an SSD drive that is at least 120gb for the OS. Add a 5400rpm HHD for storing your media.

I have an entire home lab with multiple PC's, laptops, netbooks, tablets, smartphones, etc. Just for reference, my most used PC is my home media PC which uses an AMD E-350 1.6ghz dual core cpu (it's a netbook cpu). It is probably no faster than your ancient athlon II, but it's completely usable with a SSD drive. There is nothing I can't do on it with reasonable speed, other than high fps gaming. The good points are that it was $100 for cpu/motherboard/video all integrated, uses extremely low power, and fits into a case the size of my XBOX360. It also only uses about 40w of power.

Regardless of what cpu/motherboard combo you go for, get an SSD!

[NoSpam]

ooops, motherboard link should be this one:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128565

[NoSpam]

ooops, motherboard link should be this one:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128565