Wow, thanks for all the suggestions & links guys... gonna follow them all up and go from there.
No, this is a straight-up fresh build from scratch apart from Logitech 5.1 speakers. Also (and to Rexxar), wanted to go with LGA2011 to give it some
future-proofing, maybe upgrade the CPU later if need arises. GTX680 (like you said, not a no-name brand) was my choice also, probably best bang for buck ATM. Not into ATI cards, had too many hassles with them in the past (Although I will say I've had 2 8800GT's die on me
, but a
much worse track record with ATI's). How about
Antec towers? Forgot to mention they seem to be good value as well IMHO. Had no probs with the Antec900 with the install of my older son's rig.
Win8 64bit is a bit pricey right now, & Win7 has the proved stability these days, currently running 4 systems with it. What would be the significant gains, if any, by going with Win8? Onboard audio on higher end mobos is usually pretty decent in my experience, & if it fails, I can always chuck in an audio card on a spare PCIe slot. Agree with you on getting other than the garden variety green WD HDD (although they haven't missed a beat on my personal rig). Water cooling will most likely be a
Thermaltake 760i double front case mount or similar, or maybe a closed loop Corsair. Have you tried any of the
dedicated wireless gaming mice? They got some pretty good specs from my read-ups. Oh, and budget is flexible up to $2K if it means a
significant difference. That PLE price you mention seems damn good to me, but I wanna build it myself (with son helping for the "bonding" value, and he gets experience on the guts of a desktop tower), is that a price for just
components, or for a completed tower? If not for a completed rig, is it any less for just the parts?
Agreed, thanks for the input.
Appreciate all the input so far ppls,
all very helpful.
Will let ya's know the specs when I put this rig together.