NoGooD Posted September 8, 2012 Share Posted September 8, 2012 Didn't know classes needed intense computing If she's taking a video editing, 3-d rendering or photography class, it can be very intensive. @DeathHunter: Heres an analogy for you. Think of a CPU like an engine, RAM like your intake/exhaust, the motherboard like a chassis, the power supply like your fuel and fuel lines and the case like your cooling system. A high performance engine is nice to have, but a good engine will still get you where you need to go. In this situation, the AMD FX-6100 is a perfectly good CPU for your needs unless your girlfriend will be doing one of the things I mentioned above. Powersupply:..if you have bad fuel and/or shoddy fuel lines the vehicle might run, but your bound to have problems with it. A good quality power supply may be rated at a high wattage, but use inferior capacitors which might blow below the rated wattage. Also they may use shoddy cables which can cause a host of issues. Going with a good, brand name power supply generally means you'll have a longer lifespan out of it with fewer issues. Brands to look for are Antec, Corsair, PC Power and Cooling, Enermax and there are others. If you mention a brand, we'll tell you if it's worth a darn. Also with the build you were looking at, 800 watts is way overkill. 600 watts would be more than adequate and still give you room to add stuff later. I figure that setup should pull about 350-420 watts. If someone has a better idea feel free to correct me. The NZXT case you choose is actually a pretty good case at an awesome price point. It's not fancy by any means, but it'll get the job done. It comes with 1-120mm fan which is not bad, but if it's hot where you live, you'll want to buy another fan to fit in the case. Also something to take into account is where you'll be placing the case. Make sure it'll fit where you want it to, and has some room around it for air to flow. Buy a fan off of newegg. They're generally cheaper, you can read which ones people like and you'll likely get it in a few days. Motherboard: If you put a killer engine into a POS chassis, your car might go fast in a straight line, but it'll handle like crap and you'll likely to have a bunch of problems. Same with a motherboard. A decent motherboard will give you better reliability, more options (if you want them) and in general better overall performance. I hate to say it again, but find out the exact model of motherboard and check out reviews for it on newegg.com and/or amazon.com. 6850 video card: Great card for your needs IMO. 2TB hard drive is more than adequate. Just make sure it's at least a 7200RPM hard drive. Western Digital drives like their "green" eco drives rotate at 5400 RPM and are quite a bit slower in general. Generally if a drive says it's "eco" or "green", that means it's slow. Kind of like how the term "Organic" means "tastes like dirt". The Western Digital Caviar Blacks that Tulsa recommended are indeed awesome drives. I have one and it's the fasted drive I own, besides my SSD (I have 5TB worth of hard drives on my primary desktop alone, another 3TB on my media server) RAM: Ram is basically like your bolt on's. If you get an intake that isn't matched to the motor your mounting it on, you'll have performance issues. Same with your exhaust. As the others have said. 4gb x 2 is better than 2gb x 4. Everyone here has their own brands they prefer, but in general as long as it's matched dual pairs it should be fine. Often times if you know the make/model of the motherboard you are going to use, you can goto the RAM manufactures website and look for RAM they've tested on that particular board. On my last build I had an issue where the motherboard manufacturer recommended one serial number of RAM, and the RAM manufacturer recommended another. I tried both..and the the motherboard manufacturer recommended RAM had issues. There was literally 1 letter difference in the serial number. Looks like your on the right track though man. Just make sure the motherboard and powersupply are of a brand name. If you aren't sure just ask here and 5 people will tell you whether it sucks or not. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ajnl Posted September 8, 2012 Share Posted September 8, 2012 If she's taking a video editing, 3-d rendering or photography class, it can be very intensive. haha, yeah I know. I was just joking around. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoGooD Posted September 11, 2012 Share Posted September 11, 2012 haha, yeah I know. I was just joking around. Doh! You got me, lol. I thought you were serious. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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