New build advice

[DanW]

Dear lord, I haven't made a post here in a while but... Here goes.


I'm looking for a HTPC that will double up as a gaming rig. My current system seems to have motherboard issues and is getting old now (4 years old). It's perfectly good at maybe being a server but when taxed, bluescreens galore and investigations point to the motherboard.

My budget is around £600, with the PSU reused (Antec Phantom 500W) or £700 with a modular PSU.

The parts list so far (which I'm more than willing to swap and change):
Case:
I'm torn between the Silverstone SST-GD05B Grandia (£73) and the Antec Fusion Remote Veris Black (£120). Both allow for full height cards and will be easier to cool.

Storage: OCZ Agility 2 SSD 90GB (£125), plus a WD500GB drive for anything that doesn't fit on there then music et al is on a NAS box.

Motherboard:
No idea, I don't need on-board graphics at all. But all the motherboards seem to come with it. I've seen the Gigabyte GA-H55M-USB3 H55, and seems to fit the bill.

CPU:
Core i650, I don't think I need 4 cores otherwise I'd probably go for the core i5 i750

Audio:
on-board for now, or possibly going through the HDMI out straight into a Denon AVR-591, instead of the JVC RX-320V I have now.
I may look for something creative based, but how much difference will I really be able to hear on MP3s?
Graphics:
I've no clue about this one. Preferably something that will play Crysis 2 (when it comes out) at almost full settings on 1920x1080 (my current monitor's resolution).

DVD/CD-ROM: I'll be going with a USB drive as I won't be using the drive much/at all, so I'll probably hide it out of the way. This will hopefully solve the main issue SPCR had with the case, so I can get a slightly taller HSF.


All of this because I want a gaming rig that works. If I only wanted a HTPC or similar that worked well, minus the TV Tuner Card, I might consider the Zotac ZBOX Ion Graphics Atom 330 Barebone. Though my WDTV has served it's purpose well (with hacked firmware )


Thanks,
Dan

[ilovejedd]

New Intel motherboards actually don't come with onboard graphics. It just provides output to the graphics die integrated on processors.

Is there a reason you're going for the i5-650 instead of less expensive i3-500 models? More apps/games are taking advantage of quads. If you're spending ~$180 on a processor and buying a discrete GPU anyway, going with an i5-750 is a no-brainer (at least on the Intel camp).

[DanW]

Yeah, I understand the situation with the Intel graphics, but having those ports there when I can't use them as I don't have a core i5 661 or similar seems a little pointless!

The reason I didn't look at the i3? Probably marketing. I've no idea, I've just re-read anandtech's article (http://www.anandtech.com/show/2901/3" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;) on it and really can't see any reason for going core i5. I'm not really that keen on the Turbo-boost tech, and I save myself money which could go towards other parts... hmmm!

Thank you, exactly why I came back here

One final question. Can you use discreet GPU and on-board at the same time? Google isn't helping

[ilovejedd]

One final question. Can you use discreet GPU and on-board at the same time? Google isn't helping

Depends on the implementation. On some motherboards it's either-or while on others, you can have both running at the same time. The only thing you can do is research that specific board model to see if someone has gotten both integrated and discrete GPU working at the same time. On my Intel DH57JG, it was either-or. There's a good chance that Gigabyte motherboard might be the same.