@ DVD $20 is cheap cheap cheap. Even if you never want the write function, it's still worthwhile. Saving $4 isn't worth it on that, especially when you can usually get one of these in a combo for free.
@ GFX 1 is enough
@ motherboard No. The problem exists due to Intel>>AMD. Don't worry about it too much. Any normal user won't notice it. Anand isn't a normal user.
@ PSU the psu is not modular. People are saying that's a negative point, when it's really a choice. It's like saying that a con of an Intel x58 motherboard is that it won't support sandy bridge, or lynnfield processors.

So long as you buy a retail motherboard, you'll get all the cables you need. Non retail motherboards (open box, oem) are much cheaper, but don't come with that stuff (maybe not even the manual). Worthwhile if you have the stuff laying around, but not worthwhile if it's your first computer. Sata connectors and molex adapters are worthwhile to have a few of laying around. You'll never know when you need to add a few more.

I still need to buy thermal compound stuff though right?

If you buy a retail version of a processor (XXXXXXXXBOX for amd) it will come with a stock heatsink, which has thermal compound spread on the heatsink already. AMD's really good about attaching heatsinks, though the stock heatsink itself isn't all that great. Intel's stock heatsink is surprisingly good for being a stock, but is only worthwhile in low profile/quiet designs.

If you buy a separate heatsink (I reccomend the hyper 212, tuniq tower 120 extreme, or spire eclipse, or virtually anything else listed on frostytech's top 10) then you'll need to buy compound, in which case arctic silver is probably the best. It's my opinion that it doesn't matter all that much after taking a class in transport phenomena.

Here's what I got so far: (shipping is $5)

As far as I can tell, all I need now is HDD to put everything else on. I don't need more than 250GB here, but would like some decent speed. I'm not going to be doing RAID either.
I won't have the money until the 15th, so there's still plenty of time to go over stuff.

Also, what's a good image hosting site that doesn't compress? I've lost all trust in photobucket looking at how shitty they compressed and shrunk my SS.

tinypic, imageshack. Don't put anything over 2k.

Get the spinpoint I mentioned for $50. It's $500, but it's the best HDD in the smallest size you can get. If you really want speed, you can get a (veloci)raptor.

update:

If you care about speed as much as you say, you probably want the raptor. It's expensive per gig, but you don't seem like you need anything more than 500GB so they should be fairly reasonable.

I don't really care about speed when it comes to just playing the music or w/e that's going to be on that drive. The SSD is where the speed is.

With that build you won't need to OC for SC2 it'll run it perfectly at max. settings.
SC2 is a very resources friendly game (like all blizzard games) so if you need to OC then it's for rendering, unpacking, converting and that sort of stuff that just needs time. Or maybe for new, very demanding games.

Didn't know there was an f4. Looks good.

Ex, it sounded like you were hold yourself back on the RAM you picked. What would be the next one up for you?
-Due to the combo deal, stick with it. It isn't the ABSOLUTE BEST DDR3 1600 RAM, but you aren't benchmarking, you aren't encoding 1080p 12GB movies, and you aren't rendering huge screens of 3D models. Latency and frequency are a non-issue for you. There is better, but at a higher price which isn't worth paying.

@the dvd drive: Can I get something even cheaper, because I don't even want writing functionality at all.
-No. Bottom of the bin are ~20$ for SATA and you do not want IDE. You might be able to save literally 2$ by giving up write functionality, and that'd make no sense at all.

@the GFX: did you want me to buy 2 of these?
-That's up to you. If you want more GFX power, get two. If not, don't. I don't think you need two, but its an open upgrade path.

@motherboard: were you holding yourself back here too? Is there something better for more money w/o that bottle necking problem?
-No. AMD chipsets will always be the limitation of AMD setups. That board is excellent, and if you need to, you can tweak some settings to make the chipset move even faster.

@PSU: What's this talk of people being disappointed at a lack of modular cables?
-Modular means you can remove cables you're not using. Modular PSUs have higher resistance due to the connection points (bad), and are much more expensive to get a good one. You don't need modular, its a non-issue for you. The M59 has plenty of places to tuck away, route, and hide cables.

I still need to buy cables right? Help with that.
-No actually you don't. All the cables you need will be included.

Now, for cooling.
Good thermal compounds:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835100007
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835186020
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835154003
The MX-2 would be my personal choice.

For heatsinks:
I won't link any because I don't like the prices I'm seeing. But try and get either a Scythe MUGEN 2 RevB, or a Cooler Master Hyper 212+. For about the same price as what the MUGENs are going for, is the Thermolab BARAM which I'm using to cool my i7 920 @ 4GHz. The mounting system is a pain in the ass but its one solid cooler.


IMPORTANT:
I noticed the M59 doesn't have a front fan included. Front fan brings in air and blows over the HDD cages. This is IMO an absolute must. Grab one of these:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835200049

Post has been edited 2 time(s), last time on Aug 8 2010, 12:04 am by Excalibur.

Seriously don't bother with a velociraptor. Get an SSD + whatever size HD(s) you need for storage. Also personally I would save up for an extra month or two however long it takes and get a 64gb SSD over a 32gb (especially because the 32gb ones generally have slower performance - instead of using 8x8gb channels, they use 4x8gb, and therefore you get half the throughput), but this really comes down to a size thing. If you're certain that you'll feel happy with a 32gb system drive, even 2-3 years from now, then a 32gb is fine.

Running Win7 64-bit on my computer: 14.9gb Windows directory, 0.5gb Program Files directory, 1.15gb Program Files (x86) directory, 7.92gb Starcraft 2 directory. I have 31.2gb free out of 59.5 usable (64gb SSD). I've installed Office (trimmed out programs/features I don't use), SC2 and windows on this drive, and a few other very small programs/utilities (browser based things, mainly). So certainly a 32gb hdd would be do-able. One thing I have done however, is moved my User folder over to my storage drive and set up an NTFS symlink to it, so instead of storing my user data on the system drive it is really on my storage drive, but Windows can't tell the difference. My User directory is 5.65gb, and this is where downloads are saved by default, so it is worth moving it (note I have a bunch of crap I could easily move/delete in there atm). As mentioned earlier I set my page file to be 2gb on the SSD and 2gb on the storage drive, and then there is also hybernation that takes up your RAM size as a shadow backup also - you can disable this or possibly move it to another drive, but it is another thing to be aware of.

Something happened at work that reminded me to say something here: Someone had said 'Ha I don't know shit about computers but I can just click what I need to and that's enough.', and I realized I have a lot of respect for the way you're handling this build Clans. I respect that you not only want reasons for the parts we suggest, which is obviously smart, but because you're using this experience to learn more about computers as a whole. Every build I've done, every problem I've troubleshooted, every error I've fixed has been a learning experience that has gotten me the knowledge I use to help others, and its nice to see someone learning how to help themselves in the process.

ty
I don't know If I should upgrade the SSD to this http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227528 or this http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227394

stick with the $80 vertex 2.

The real benefit of having an SSD is not the transfer rate/throughput, but the read speed and response time. When you consider response times are 0.01 ms, and hard drives are 10 ms, that's where the 1000x faster comes in.

It's not a vertex 2 though. The $174 one is the vertex 2.

I'm also having a real hard time figuring out which ocz ssd's have sandforce, and which don't. From what I've gathered, it's very important.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Aug 8 2010, 6:54 pm by ClansAreForGays.

reading Rantent's topic, I remember something else I want, a sound card. I'm gonna be doing any audio editing, but I want my music to sound as good as possible. Something affordable that gets the job done.

If it's not the features you need (optical out, 5.1, etc.) then you won't need a dedicated sound card just for quality. Nobody except audiophiles will hear the difference.

Nude, I am not a hardcore audiophile and I can tell you the difference between onboard and my 5? year old sound card is night and day.

CAFG, try this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16829132013

Hard to believe since I've experienced differently. And I'm using a good sony stereo and care for quality more than the average person.
Also you haven't specified (in the other topic) in which ways the loss of sound quality manifests itself.

Besides, just to clarify, audiophile is a body attribute, not something you can train by being passionate about it.