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Newcomer to Intel

I've always been an AMD fanboy but recently I have heard that Intel's new line of chips are blowing AMD's out of the water.  Since I'm in the market for a new gaming-capable PC, I decided to price out some Intel-based solutions.

I'm by no means a gamer that looks to squeeze every last drop of performance out of his gaming rig.  I just want it to play PC games, look nice, and run smooth.  I realize that building a PC that'll run the latest game on the market at 120+ FPS at 1900x1600 resolution is a great buffer for games that are soon to be released but I don't believe in spending 3x as much on the PC as I should.  I don't overclock, I have bad luck with that.  I prefer to build my PCs leaving plenty of room for upgrades in the future.  So I guess the best way to describe me is a value performance gamer.

My problem is, however, that I haven't kept up on ANYTHING Intel-related in the past 4 years.  I have always been happy with AMD and I've never really kept up on new techs or anything at all in the world of Intel.  I have no clue what intel chips compare to which AMD chips.

My first look into speccing out an Intel rig had me come up with an outrageous price.  So much, that I could buy two AMD rigs for the price of one Intel rig.  That's cost prohibitive and nothing different of what I remember it being years ago.

That being said, I am absolutely clueless as to what to look at.  I can shop via NewEgg and build an AMD machine then find Intel-based components that meet my functionality requirements and are in the same price range and go that way and hope I get a similar-if-not-better machine.

If you had $500 to spend on a CPU, motherboard, and memory, would AMD or Intel get you the better bang for the buck?

And to make things more interesting, here are my requirements for any motherboard I buy:

  • RAM capacity at least 8 GB
  • At least 4x slots for RAM (4x240pin) and must be dual-channel compatable
  • At least 1x Gigabit onboard NIC
  • At least 2x PCI express 2.0 x16 slots
  • At least 4x SATA 3.0 interfaces
  • Have RAID 5 capability for the SATA controller
  • At least 1x PATA interface
  • Has to be a known good brand (Usually ASUS, Gigabyte, intel, XFX)

Published Monday, May 19, 2008 9:10 AM by joecasanova

Comments

# Newcomer to Intel @ Monday, May 19, 2008 6:10 PM

Newcomer to Intel AMD or Intel, that's a question. Created by joecasanova , 05-20-2008

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# re: Newcomer to Intel @ Tuesday, May 20, 2008 12:51 PM

Easy answer... GIGABYTE GA-X48-DS4 m/b. Latest chipset & great for down the road upgrades.

Use this memory:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820134581

This is an excellent CPU for this board:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117165

This combo will keep you going for a few years.

radiored

# re: Newcomer to Intel @ Wednesday, May 21, 2008 2:06 PM

fyi, my $3k from tax refund+rebate got me a Canon 5D and a decent gaming machine for under $500 at 10467 3dMark06.  You might need to go back OC'ing to get that value/performance, and don't spend alot when you plan to OC or you beat the whole purpose of it (unless you're competing for benchmarks or bragging rights).  Just my $0.02

My rig:  oc'd amd3600+(2.9Ghz, 1.5v, 324x9), g.skill 6400phu2-2gbhz (cpu/6, 2.2v, 4-4-4-12-2T), oc'd XFX8800gt 256mb (gpu@725mhz, mem@850Mhz, shader@1813mhz), Gigabyte m61ps3, Zalman 9500A, Zalman ZM-STG1, old Lian-Li PC-7 case.  Note the cpu and mobo:  they're cheap and less $$$ lost if I bust the cpu or plan to upgrade to an Intel system or a higher AMD cpu.  Others can be re-used.

aso3

# re: Newcomer to Intel @ Thursday, May 22, 2008 8:01 AM

Thanks for all the replies!

I've been doing quite a bit of research since I originally made the blog entry and here's what I'm aiming to purchase:

Motherboard:  http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16813188024

CPU:  http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16819115037

Memory:  http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16820145184

Which comes to a subtotal of $519.98, which is in my ball park.

I'm finally making the switch to Intel.  I never thought this day would come!

I opted for the Evga over the Gigabit that radiored suggested because the Evga has 3x PCIe 2.0 slots so it gives me more upgradeability in the future.

What's the advantage of the Xeon in this case over a traditional Pentium?

And I went with dual-channel memory over individual sticks.

I already have the case, capable PSU, cd-rom, etc.

joecasanova

# re: Newcomer to Intel @ Thursday, June 05, 2008 3:53 AM

that ram seems over priced when compaired to other deals out there,

and allthough that is an amazing motherboard, the tri-sli seems a bit overboard.

that processor paired with a good chipset, will overclock very well, not that it is needed with 6mb l2cache @ 3GHz. in my opinion the 45nm technology really sets intel apart.

but what ever suits you, that was just my two cents.

jcool460

# re: Newcomer to Intel @ Tuesday, July 15, 2008 9:51 PM

I was in your exact situation about a month ago.  The Intel choices are so vast it's bordering on insane.

After a lot of homework, review reading, and coming to grips with the fact that I really *don't* need the "latest and greatest", I "settled" on:

PROC:http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115037

MOBO:http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131297

RAM:http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145184

I paired all of that with this video card:http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121253

...and I could honestly not be more pleased with my purchase.  With Nehalem due by years end, "future proof" is more of a pipe dream than it usually would be, so I decided to go a bit conservative with everything.  Should last me awhile though, my usual turn-around between core upgrades is about 2 years.

Good luck with your hunt!!!

etrigan420

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