Returning my terrible Dell Inspiron 620s and building my own!...help? :)

[Khoulle]

Alright, so I bought a Dell Inspiron 620s. Took my 9 days to realise how enormous a mistake that way. Been less than 15 days, sent it back and got a full refund. (Woo!) So now I am going to build my own but I am not that technical a person, but I am a quick learner and have read a fair bit so far and these are the parts I have come up with from the website listed below. Any tips or anything would be helpful guys! Like if I left anything out or anything, blah blah blah. Cheers!

Upgrade or New Computer: New Computer

Upgrade on what (you hope): Upgrade over my Dell Inspiron 620s

Willing to Self Build or a Pre-Built: Going to build it myself

How much you want to spend: $1000

How much you can spend: $1500ish

What all you plan to use it for: World of Warcraft, Diablo 3, Guild Wars 2 etc (so, gaming)

What Operating system you want to use & Bit: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

What Resolution you hope to be in: 1920x1080 or higher

What Settings do you Want & how much FPS: Ultra setting at 60+ fps

What Country are you from: Australia

What can you re-use: A 18.5" monitor only, which I hate and plan to use for my dual monitor

Network will be wired or wireless: Wired

Any Additional Info Here: Found all the stuff I want to build the computer on an Australian website, will link the website and what I want from there so you guys can help me. :P

PCCaseGear.com

CPU AMD Phenom II X6 1100T 3.30GHz $212
PSU CoolerMaster GX 750W PSU $109
Motherboard ASRock 970 Extreme4 Motherboard $115
RAM Corsair Vengeance CMZ12GX3M3A2000C10 12GB (3x4GB) DDR3 $185
Video Card VTX3D Radeon HD6970 2GB $329
Optical Drive LG CH12LS28 12X BD-R Blu-ray DVD Combo Drive $79
HDD Western Digital Green 1TB WD10EARX $55
SSD OCZ Agility 3 60GB SSD 2.5" $125 - NOT NECESSARY, JUST WANTED.
Monitor Acer V243HLBD 24in Widescreen Monitor $169
Sound Card Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme PCIe $65
Case Coolermaster Elite 371 Case $45
Cooling System? No idea...
OS Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit with SP1 OEM, around $95...

Total = $1583 ($1468 without the SSD)
This is above I want to spend so just let me know what you think, thanks.

[Fuzzykins]

Australian Configuration (using MWave.com)
Prices and Totals are estimates for Non-USA configurations
CPU: Intel Core i5-2500K 3.3GHz
MB: [Z68] ASRock Z68 Extreme4 ATX
GPU: MSI Twin Frozr III GeForce GTX 570
RAM: G.SKILL Ripjaws X 8GB (2 x 4GB) 1600
HDD: Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB SATA II
PSU: SeaSonic X650 Gold 650W 80 PLUS Gold
CPUHS: Cooler Master Hyper 212+
CASE: Fractal Design Define XL Full Tower
CDROM: LiteOn DVD Burner
OS: Windows 7 Home Premium OEM (64-bit)
Total Price: ~$1509 AU
Configure More

That'll work.

[llDemonll]

Agree with the above for the most part, but I'd do:

Australian Configuration (using MWave.com)
Prices and Totals are estimates for Non-USA configurations
CPU: Intel Core i5-2500K 3.3GHz
MB: [Z68] ASUS P8Z68-V Pro ATX
GPU: MSI Twin Frozr III GeForce GTX 570
RAM: G.SKILL Ripjaws X 8GB (2 x 4GB) 1600
HDD: Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB SATA II
PSU: SeaSonic X750 Gold 750W 80 PLUS Gold
CPUHS: Corsair A70
CASE: Fractal Design Define R3 Mid Tower
CDROM: LiteOn DVD Burner
OS: Windows 7 Home Premium OEM (64-bit)
Total Price: ~$1506 AU
Configure More

Reason being that the 750W will easily support two GTX 570's in the future, and I've used the P8Z68 for a few builds with no problems. Newegg has a bunch of people saying they've had a lot of issues with the ASRock Extreme4 board in Windows 7. The A70 I chose over the 212+ just because it comes with two fans instead of 1. The R3 over the XL for case because of size, if you want a full-tower instead of a mid tower then by all means go with the XL, they are both very nice cases

[Pejo]

I'll just copy/paste in. Lower builds than above but with monitor.

1 x 16011504 - Cooler Master HAF 922 Black Case - Clear Side Panel / Window Included - High Air Flow Black Case (C-RC922MKWN1-WINDOW) [$138.99]

1 x 19010218 - Intel Core i5 2500K - 3.30GHz - Quad Core - Socket LGA1155 - 95W TDP - 4x256KB L2 / 6MB L3 Cache - Intel HD Graphics 3000 - Boxed - Sandy Bridge (BX80623I52500K) [$220.00]

1 x 28023567 - Gigabyte GA-Z68A-D3-B3 Motherboard - Intel LGA1155 - Intel Z68 Chipset - 4x DDR3-2133 - 2x PCIe x16, 3x PCIe x1 & 2x PCI - 2x SATA3 & 4x SATA2 - 2x USB 3.0 & 10x USB 2.0 - CrossFireX Ready - HD Audio - ATX [$138.90]

1 x 37140681 - G.Skill 8GB(2x 4GB) Memory Kit - PC3-10666 (1333MHz) DDR3 - 240-pin DIMM - Timing 9-9-9-24-2N - Unbuffered - Non-ECC (F3-10666CL9D-8GBRL) [$59.99]

1 x 42051070 - MSI GeForce GTX 560 Ti Twin Frozr II Overclock Video Card - GDDR5 1024MB 256Bit VRAM - 880 / 4200MHz Clock - PCIe 2.0 - 2x DVI & 1x Mini HDMI - PhysX & SLI Ready - DirectX 11 & OpenGL 4.1 (N560GTX-TITWINFIIOC) [$249.99]

1 x 22040155 - Samsung Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive [$55.00]

1 x 17040381 - Samsung SH-222AB/BEBS Internal 22x DVD Burner - SATA - OEM - Black [$19.99]

1 x 34040736 - Corsair TX-650 V2 650W Enthusiast Series Power Supply - ATX12V v2.31 & EPS12V v2.92 - 80+ BRONZE Certified - 140mm Cooling Fan (CMPSU-650TXv2) [$115.00]

1 x 39090362 - Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium - SP1 - 64-Bit - DVD - Single Pack - OEM (GFC-02050) [$109.00]

1 x 18020515 - Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus Fan Cooler, 120mm, Compatible with Intel & AMD (RR-B10-212P) [$39.99]

LG W2443T-PF Professional 23.6" Full HD Widescreen LCD Monitor - 1920 x 1080 Resolution - 300 cd/m2 Brightness - 30,000: 1 Digital Contrast Ratio - 5ms Response Time - D-SUB & DVI-D with HDCP - Glossy Black $159

$1390ish

You can add in a smaller SSD and just be over 1500

[ArchType]

I agree with the two guys, who put forward pretty solid builds. As for the cooling case, If you are sure the A70 can fit in a medium tower, I'd get that, as I am pretty sure the R3 Xl is not needed

[Uggorthaholy]

Bear in mind that case is largely personal preference, but I agree 100% with Demon's build.

[Biernot]

I agree with the two guys, who put forward pretty solid builds. As for the cooling case, If you are sure the A70 can fit in a medium tower, I'd get that, as I am pretty sure the R3 Xl is not needed

The A70 is actually a pretty medium size. The Hyper 212 is bigger if i remember correctly.

I also vote for Demon's build.
Asus > Asrock. And i prefer my case to be as small as possible (within reason).

And if you want to spend a little less, you could probably opt for the seasonic x-650 and a gtx560 ti (with the option to add another one later).

[Keller]

get a case you like, i personally prefer the nzxt phantom over cooler master's offerings. Also , you can get a cooler master storm case - they're pretty good.

[Muya]

I think I agree with demon more so than fuzzy. The R3 is a beast...the XL just seems like a bit of overkill unless going for an E-ATX board. Plus the A70 looks to be pretty awesome....I hate the 212+, as I've said many times.

You might even wanna knock down the RAM to 4 GB and look into getting a 128 M4 Crucial SSD. That's just me though.

[Uggorthaholy]

I think I agree with demon more so than fuzzy. The R3 is a beast...the XL just seems like a bit of overkill unless going for an E-ATX board. Plus the A70 looks to be pretty awesome....I hate the 212+, as I've said many times.

You might even wanna knock down the RAM to 4 GB and look into getting a 128 M4 Crucial SSD. That's just me though.

in this budget range, better to upgrade other components instead of getting an SSD. Definitely not worth going down from 8gb to 4gb anymore.

[lasheric]

I think I agree with demon more so than fuzzy. The R3 is a beast...the XL just seems like a bit of overkill unless going for an E-ATX board. Plus the A70 looks to be pretty awesome....I hate the 212+, as I've said many times.

You might even wanna knock down the RAM to 4 GB and look into getting a 128 M4 Crucial SSD. That's just me though.

Oh man why! I love my 212+. My card hasn't gone over 40 yet!

[Muya]

I guess uggor. But an SSD is, besides getting a top of the line CPU, the best way to upgrade your computer isn't it?

And lash, the reason why I hate the 212+ is because of my horrible experiences with it. 3 times I tried to seat that piece of crap in my system and 3 times it couldn't even run Prime95 without the CPU instantly going over 90 C. I gave up, went to the NH-D14 and have had 0 problems since then. The installation process on the 212+ was stupidly hard....while the Noctua was pretty freaking easy. Not to mention better paste.

[Uggorthaholy]

I guess uggor. But an SSD is, besides getting a top of the line CPU, the best way to upgrade your computer isn't it?

In terms of load times in upper budget ranges, yes. However, the best upgrades you can typically make, in order :

CPU
GPU
RAM (to an extent - anything over 16GB is just sillyness unless you multitask HARD)
SSD

And lash, the reason why I hate the 212+ is because of my horrible experiences with it. 3 times I tried to seat that piece of crap in my system and 3 times it couldn't even run Prime95 without the CPU instantly going over 90 C. I gave up, went to the NH-D14 and have had 0 problems since then. The installation process on the 212+ was stupidly hard....while the Noctua was pretty freaking easy. Not to mention better paste.

agreed, the 212+ has a horrible mounting system.

[Muya]

I've heard anything over 8GB or RAM is a waste unless you do video editing and dabble in conversions and the like. Most people don't even, realistically, use all 4 GB of RAM unless, like you said, heavily multi-tasking.

I can see GPU upgrading in this case because he doesn't even have a computer. I have an MSI GTX 570 Frozr III and I rather enjoy it. I haven't dabbled in overclocking anything on it yet.

I wanted to try the 212+ because of how great alot of the ratings were. And I see people posting on here the same thing. But the installation videos are horrible. They skip over the most important part of the installation of the actual heatsink on the mounting backplate. I should have just saved myself the time and trouble and gone with a Noctua like my friend first suggested.

[conqq]

Refer to my sig. I'm buying it in waves, the final price is <$1200 due to sales and it should run literally anything on max settings right now. If you don't plan on doing SLI 580s, you can grab 650 or maybe 750w PSU.

(I have an Inspiron 580S that was gifted to me, I know the feeling @OP)