Digging through my old stuff, I found an old desktop pc I use to use, before I got a laptop, and I feel like it could be easily and cheaply restored, why waste the hardware if I got it right? Problem is, I haven't a clue of what to do with PC tech, usually when I had a seriously problem I'd dust off the insides and prayed for the best. This is the best match I could find The problem is, I didn't use any malware protection at all, and the hard-drive is clogged up with viruses, and none of the files are important to me, that I wanna get a new hard drive, alot of space for the money I'm paying would be ideal. From what I understand, from the logo implanted on the front casing, theres a nvidia graphics card inside, which I don't know if it's good or not. I want to use this PC for media storage (video, music, photos) some gaming, nothing hardcore, like tf2, skyrim, gta v, etc, but I would like hq graphics without having to hear the pc breathing like a madman. So I also don't know what I should do about the processor. Good video-rendering, fast load times, and everyday use is basically what I'm looking for. Lastly, I also don't know a thing about good spy/malware protection, and I don't mind paying for it either. So my question to you hubbers, is what is the best hard drive, graphics card (if i need it), and processor (again, if I need it), and protection software for a reasonable price for what I want (which isnt anything too demanding)?
Alright - here is for a nice quiet pc: (Giving me your budget would have helped.) Noctua fans for their silence (I'm not kidding, they're ugly but extremely silent) If you want to have fast speeds for reads/writes and stuff, I recommend intel 300 series SSDs. You will not regret it if you're fine with a decent 7200rpm HDD, get a WD blue/green or a Seagate drive, find the ones in your price range and datacapacities that you like, I just recommend those brands. (ALWAYS CHECK THE REVIEWS BEFORE YOU BUY THOUGH!) For a graphics card, get either a radeon 7800 series or higher, or get a GTX 680 or higher, (if you want to atleast run decent graphics. I also didn't really check your desktop case too indepth, but the motherboard must be able to fit in it, this may seem like common ense but I have heard many horror stories. for CPU i have a phenom II, but you can get whatever you are into, I recommend something like 6-8 cores + hyperthreading if you're going to be doing a lot of video editing.
Slightly off topic of upgrading, but I placed lights inside my case, and this the result. I tried to two different types.
Check with a nerd to make sure your chosen parts are compatible before you buy Also, understand that a computer's performance is only as fast as its least powerful component
Depends, if your making a gaming computer, With a nice graphics card there is no noticable difference between a mid level CPU and a High end cpu. Not any difference that could be justified by the cost difference.
thank you alot! do you by any chance know of any good website to get this tech cheaper than amazon? I haven't even done much price checking yet, but just wondering before I start compiling a list
I would highly recommend just getting a WD Black HDD for the sake of the long ass warranty and faster speeds compared to the other series. IIRC, Caviar Greens are actually 5400 RPM. For what it's worth, you could also try SSD caching eventually for faster load times without the price of a bigger SSD, but that requires a motherboard that supports it properly which probably isn't the case with AMD stuff from back then. If you plan on streaming media over the internet in the form of your own personal server, I would recommend getting some WD Reds because they can run for just about forever without a hard restart, unlike other hard drives which require a little more care. They happen to be cheaper than WD Blacks but have a great warranty and perform just under it because of the fact that they are designed to be always on. If you go this route though, you might have to invest in some aftermarket cooling for other components, but you can buy them as you see fit, after the fact. For what you are trying to game on, you won't need anything with more power than a GTX 560 Ti, since you can play on Ultra in just about everything you listed except for maybe GTAIV with the hi-res mod. Since GTX 560 Ti is no longer sold really, you can pick up some of the new series for much cheaper than a GTX 680 and it will perform just fine. I would recommend waiting a little bit though because the new AMD cards should be hitting shelves soon and your CPU will bottleneck everything you throw at it anyways... If you decide to upgrade your CPU, I would personally go for Intel because it has features that would be particularly useful for a personal server such as virtualization, but you can get away with using an AMD CPU. In fact, get one of the newer APU series with one of the budget-tier games and performance in games will be significantly better than what it would be otherwise for that price point.