Please point me in the right direction

[ditaneous]

I am, after 4 years of using a (at the time of purchase) decent laptop, I can get a desktop again. After surfing cyberpowerpc, falcon northwest, and others, I know what the high end looks like, but I don't know if it's what I need.

Before I get into specifics, I'll throw down the basic questionnaire.

Budget - Hoping for <$2500, but willing to go a bit higher

Resolution - I plan to be using a 1920x1080 tv for a monitor for a while, which is what I plan to use while gaming. Hoping for at least a constant 60fps on games. I will hopefully be buying a Wacom Cintiq for my art needs later.

Games / Settings Desired - Dishonored, skyrim, borderlands 2, farcry series, planetside 2. Really, all the games I cannot play on my laptop, or can play but are forced to play on lowest settings. I would like to play games while seeing the textures the developers spent so long on (high or ultra).

Any other intensive software or special things you do (Frequent video encoding, 3D modeling, etc) - I work in Autodesk Maya, Autodesk 3DSMax, adobe suite, realflow

Country - Oregon, USA

Parts that can be reused - N/A

Do you need an OS? - Yes, aiming for windows 7

Do you need peripherals (e.g. monitor, mouse, keyboard, speakers, etc)? - Oooo. I plan for a wireless keyboard/mouse. If I cannot get the sound to go through my tv monitor, i'll need speakers. I have a two room apartment, and hope to have 2 tvs/speakers that I can switch back and forth from.


Some things I want (if you dont believe I need these, please tell me)

16gb RAM or more

Nvidia 680 (I have used nvidia in the past, so if there is a radeon equiv that's better, i'm willing to look into it)

ssd cache drive (don't know about this, just want an opinion)

I would like the machine to be fairly quiet and cool, also I would like a no flash case (if I could get a great cooling case that looks like a basic black box, that'd be great.

I am thinking about a capture card, maybe. Not for livestream or anything like that. More for capturing video so I can manipulate it later.

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Now I am ok with building my own, but I don't have that much room here, also it's not the cleanest area (2 people and 2 dogs in a 2 room apartment) so I would prefer a company to build it for me

I would really like for this computer to be a good gaming rig for a few years, and to be good rig with minor replacements for at least 5 years.

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Thank you for reading this.

PS: I am having trouble posting this, so if I accidentally double post this, I apologize and ask mods to please delete my double post if I cannot.

[noteworthynerd]

Some thoughts first:

• I'm not sure how large your TV is, but I don't really recommend gaming on a 1080p screen that is larger than 23-24", after that size the pixels start to stretch and you lose display quality.
• I don't really recommend wireless peripherals for a couple reasons: they take batteries, which die, and they have input lag, which can make a difference, especially in FPS games.
• 16GB of RAM is unnecssary, 8GB is plenty in a gaming PC.
• The 680 is not really worth the money, the 670 is $100 less for almost the exact same performance.
• SSD cache drives are not really necessary anymore, considering that larger SSDs have come down a lot in price.
• I agree 100% on the no flash case, the build I recommend below uses a Fractal Design case. Fractal Design is well known to be "boring but effective". Their cases are not flashy, at all, but they are great for airflow and have awesome build quality. The case also has sound dampening foam, so it should be plenty quiet.
• I'm not sure what this new phenomenon is with everyone wanting to stream, but unless you plan on making a job out of it I would forgo the capture card for now and just go with a normal build... You'll still be able to stream, just not at professional quality.

Here's the build. You could probably buy the parts and assemble it yourself for $200-300 less, but you mentioned not wanting to. Puget seems to be just about the best prebuilt computer company I can find (along with Falcon NW): http://www.pugetsystems.com/configur...97,20301,19949

[ditaneous]

Thank you for your reply Note.

Thank you for telling me what a good gaming pc. I may need to get a wired keyboard/mouse for gaming, but I am holding out hope for a wireless that works well.

The capture card idea was not for streaming, it was more for being able to capture snippets of movies or games so I can play around with green screening or cg model creation and placement within the scene. Doubt it would ever go up on the internet, it's just for me to keep my skills sharp.

[noteworthynerd]

Ah ok, I must have misread your OP.

I don't know a whole lot about capture cards, so hopefully someone else can help you there.

[Deleted]

iirc capture cards are mostly just required in order to stream from a console, if just for capturing fragements of movies maybe fraps will suffice. (not 100% on this)

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i7-3770K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor ($314.99 @ Amazon)
CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-D14 65.0 CFM CPU Cooler ($80.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD3H ATX LGA1155 Motherboard ($144.99 @ Amazon)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($68.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive ($89.99 @ B&H)
Storage: OCZ Vertex 4 128GB 2.5" Solid State Disk ($109.98 @ Outlet PC)
Video Card: Zotac GeForce GTX 680 2GB Video Card ($509.98 @ NCIX US)
Case: BitFenix Merc Beta (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case ($49.98 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: Corsair Professional 750W 80 PLUS Silver Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply ($104.99 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: Lite-On iHAS124-04 DVD/CD Writer ($17.89 @ Outlet PC)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (OEM) (64-bit) ($91.99 @ Amazon)
Total: $1584.76
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2012-12-04 00:18 EST-0500)

should be a nice build to start from with perhaps a few tweaks. (you could go for a 670 and save +-$100 but figured there is already lots of headroom in the budget)
and if you want it build you could check out http://www.ibuypower.com/ and make a setup with the same parts linked earlier (where possible)
or perhaps find a local tech shop who can assemble it for you in order to get a better machine for the same price.

[Xuvial]

That Zotac 680 is pretty damn steep @ $549 (-$40 promo) but still. Why not a Gigabyte one at $449?
http://pcpartpicker.com/part/gigabyt...rd-gvn680oc2gd

Rest is fine.

[Deleted]

That Zotac 680 is pretty damn steep @ $549 (-$40 promo) but still. Why not a Gigabyte one at $449?
http://pcpartpicker.com/part/gigabyt...rd-gvn680oc2gd

Rest is fine.

got a weak spot for zotac AMP cards :P
they are actually quite cheap in the states compared to over here (only thing they do is change the valuta sign from dollar to euro)