Building gaming PC. Suggestions?

[JeffHarris]

I want to build a gaming PC, and my budget is about $800-$850.

I've put together some decent systems but the video card is always the sticking point. The best I could get at that price (when combining with a core i7 or high end i5) was a Radeon HD 5770 or comparable cards.

Basically I just want to make sure there isn't a much better system out there for the same price.

Here are my preferences:

-Intel-based
-Quad core processor
-At least 4 GB DDR3 RAM
-1 TB Hard Drive
-Video card that could run, let's say Battlefield 3 on medium settings with a comfortable FPS.

Less important: Blu-ray drive

Any help would be appreciated.

[PCC-William]

I'd definitely go with one of the less-expensive Intel quad-cores: an i5, rather than an i7. That is likely to be your biggest single cost in a system like this, though the video card may come in close.

If you are intent on building yourself, look on websites like Newegg which have sales all the time - even if it means picking up items one or two at a time to get the best prices.

Lastly, if you can manage it, I would go with a nVidia graphics card rather than ATI... but get the best thing you can for the money, since your budget range will limit your choices.

Good luck & have fun building

[dbetkowski]

Lastly, if you can manage it, I would go with a nVidia graphics card rather than ATI...

Hi William,

Just curious - why do you recommend Nvidia over ATI ?

I'm currently opting for the MSI Radeon HD 6950 2GB over the MSI GeForce GTX 560/570 Ti due to the extra gig of vram. Do you feel the nvidia cards would be a better choice? I've used both in the past and never had issues with either, so at this time i'm not biased either way Although I do prefer ATI's numbering over Nvidia

[PCC-William]

I've generally had better experiences with nVidia... or perhaps more precisely, our tech support folks complain about nVidia cards less often It has been a while since I personally owned an ATI card, and the Radeon 5770 my brother has seems to have served him well.

The complaints I hear about usual relate to driver support for features or games - but of course goof-ups and such can happen with either GPU manufacturer

[dbetkowski]

ah ok, thanks. I'll cross my fingers for an issue-free 6950 experience then

Just out of curiosity, have you noticed any decline or improvements since ATI was acquired by AMD?

[PCC-William]

The only thing I've noticed since the acquisition by AMD is that they've been able to integrate their CPUs and video chips more tightly - you can get "APUs" now which are a combination of a mid-range CPU and GPU on the same chip, giving a decent performance option for basic gaming at a low price.