Quiet, Capable Gamer, $2000

[Gollan]

I’m replacing a computer I built in the fall of 2004! At the time it was a beast of a system that tore up Half-Life 2 and Far Cry and everything else for a few years. It’s still a great machine but definitely showing its age. I’m finally in a position to build a new rig, so...

Goals:

• Under $2000
• Quiet
• Rock-solid stability (*)
• Capable gamer
• Capable photo and video editor
• Blazing fast system start
• Everything mail-order from Canada (**)

(*) I enjoy tweaking for performance on a new system but I leave things alone after I get it stable.

(**) I live in a remote community in northern Ontario, so *everything* has to be shipped.

Here is my proposed build:

Motherboard	ASUS P8P67 (REV 3.0) LGA 1155 Intel P67 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX
CPU		Intel Core i7-2600K Sandy Bridge 3.4GHz (3.8GHz Turbo Boost) LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core
Cooler		Scythe Mugen-2 Rev. B
Thermal Paste	Arctic Silver 5 HIGH-DENSITY Polysynthetic Silver Thermal Compound 3.5 Gram 
Memory		G.SKILL Ripjaws X F3-10666CL9D-8GBXL 8GB 2X4GB DDR3-1333 CL9-9-9-24 (qualified for board and cheaper than the 1600 set)
SSD (pri)	Corsair Force Series 120GB 2.5IN SATA2 Solid State Disk Flash Drive SSD Sandforce.
Hard Drv (sec)	Western Digital Caviar Black 2TB SATA2 7200RPM 3.6MS 64MB 3.5IN Dual Proc Hard Drive OEM
PSU		Corsair TX750 V2 750W ATX 12V Single Rail 60A 24PIN ATX Power Supply Active PFC 80PLUS Bronze
DVD Drive	ASUS DRW-24B3LT 24X SATA DVD Writer OEM Lightscribe Black
Operating Sys	MS Windows 7 Home Premium Edition 64BIT DVD OEM
Case		??? (see below)
Video Card	??? (see below)

All of the above, estimating $160 for the case and $300 for the video card, comes to $1864 if purchased a la carte from NCIX.

Omissions:

Video Card – I estimated $300, but really I want to be able to play any new FPS game with a good amount of detail and edit photos and videos. I don’t want to skimp, but the $819.99 Asus ENGTX570 is out of the question! How about:

EVGA GeForce GTX 570 HD Fermi 732MHZ 1280MB GDDR5 2XDVI HDMI DisplayPort PCI-E Video Card for $339.99?

Is this a reasonable card for the proposed rig? Would another $100 toward the video card be worthwhile? Will this card be reasonably quiet?

Case – I’ve looked at so many and I just don’t know! I estimated $160 in the budget. I’d like to have an eSATA and some USB ports out front (or on a front panel). Ideally it will fit the Scythe Mugen-2 Rev. B cooler I selected. The old rig sits in an Antec P160 and I like the look of it but it seems to amplify fan noise. I don’t want glowing fan lights (they look good on *other* builders’ rigs). I’ve been looking at the Corsair Graphite 600T. I was also looking at the Antec P183. Suggestions?

Cooling – I value QUIET, and would be willing to put more of the budget toward it. Would a liquid cooler kit such as the Corsair H60 or H70 be worthwhile?

PSU – I chose the Corsair TX750 V2 750W, but could I safely use a 650W unit? The “modular gold” version of this PSU (AX750 CMPSU-750AX is another $50. Given that I’ve never had any trouble neatly bundling unused cables, is there any other reason to go with the higher cost unit?

I welcome your comments, suggestions, constructive criticism, and questions. Thanks for your help.