Things required to build a gaming desktop

Hi there, i have noticed that the number of gamers have arise. Most of the people prefer to play high-end games using their desktop or even laptops. Some example of the games are "Call of duty - Modern warfare 3", "Grand Theft Auto 4" and "Crysis 2. There are also more games out there that are very popular to gamers as there are more and more games releasing every month. So i was thinking to write this hub to share with everyone who is interested to build their very own gaming desktop, as it might be useful for those who decide to buy a computer to build their own desktop as it might be more cheaper and have a better specification of your own choice.

As for the parts that you all will need are,

1. Casing for your desktop.
2. Power supply
3. Mother board
4. Processor / CPU
5. Computer memory / RAM
6. Hard drive / hard disk
7. Graphic card
8. CD / DVD burner
9. Monitor
10. CPU/Processor Cooler (optional)
    

Firstly, you will need a computer case to assemble all your components, i will prefer you guys to search online on different brands and models of the casing to round it up and see which of the case best suits for your preference of your appearance of your gaming PC. The brand that i prefer is cooler master as it is one of the most popular brand uses for gaming, you guys may go to the cooler master website to check it out as there are reviews and picture in it.

Most of the people out there who really loves playing games with high-end games, you will need a powerful power supply to start and have enough power to manage your graphic cards. I will highly recommend you to have a power supply with at least 500 watt so that your computer parts have just the right ammount of energy distributed to each unit. For a gaming computer, i will recommend the output capacity of the power supply to be 500-1000W.

• For motherboard, there are different brands like "ASUS", "GIGABYTE", "MSI". Mainly these brands are the ones quite popular in the market, as they are mostly used to build a desktop for gaming.
  
• Firstly, there will be two kind of sizes, ATX motherboard or Micro ATX motherboard. ATX motherboards are bigger in size and is normally use for gaming. While Micro ATX motherboard is smaller in size and contain lesser components than ATX motherboard.
  
• Secondly, choose your motherboard if you wan to have a INTEL socket or AMD socket, because if the motherboard that you choose does not support the processor that you chosen, you will not be able to use it.
  
• Thirdly, You might want to have a motherboard that supports over-clocking technology to boost your processor to have a better performance for your desktop and the games you play.
  
• Lastly, You will need hard drive for your desktop and u will need SATA ports, so you might want to think on how much hard drive you want to install into your desktop,

For processor, There are mainly two brands for building desktop are INTEL and AMD. I will highly recommend Intel processors as it is more stable for multitasking, gaming and for work, if you do not wish to spend much on processors, i would encourage you guys to go for Intel i5-2500k as it is have a speed of 3.30 GHz and can go up to 3.70 GHz for a maximum frequency. If you have a greater budget, or for those people who like to buy a good processor and use it for a long period of time, i would like you guys to go for Intel i7-2600k as it have a speed of 3.40 GHz and can boost up to 3.8GHz for a maximum frequency.

For AMD, it is mostly just used for gaming because it is cheaper than Intel and mostly their processors can be over-clocked. It may not be a better choice for multitasking because it is focus most on gaming experience and visual experience. So if you guys want to consider taking AMD, i will recommend the AMD Phenom II or AMD phenom II x4 black edition. If you have a greater budget, you might want to but a better processor which is AMD phenom II x6 black edition. Black edition is better than a regular processor in a way of speed and after over-clocking performance and it makes your computer faster.

Computer memory which is RAM as we named it, is a memory used to run and store running programs that we use or open. There are 3 types of RAM, DDR, DDR2 and DDR3, DDR is the oldest kind of RAM and it is very less seen in the market nowadays. DDR2 is currently being used by most people and available at the market. While DDR3 is the latest technology and is already available in the market too. Be sure to check your motherboard that you have chosen if it supports DDR2 or DDR3, if not, the RAM will not fit into the slot. I will recommend Kingston or Corsair brand for your RAM as it have good standard and quality for quite a long time and since we are building our own desktop for gaming and work, i will like you guys to go for at least 4GB of DDR2 or DDR3 RAM. You need not worry so much for the speed as you may change or upgrade anytime.

• Now for hard drive, Hard drive is used for storing data and for installing windows operating systems or updates. Mostly people want their desktop to boot up fast, load and transfer files fast. In order to do that, you will need to have a hard drive which have more speed than normal hard drive, normally the hard drive speed is only 7200rpm, you can buy a hard drive which have a speed of 10,000rpm. But it will cost you more, so i would rather stick with a hard drive with 7200rpm as it is relatively fast for gamers.
  
• Next, you will need to decide on how much disk space you want for your desktop, there are several disk space for hard drive ranging from 80GB to 1TB. So if you want to download or install games or files that require large amount of disk space, i will recommend you to go for at least 500GB. But do not worry as you can buy hard drive and install into you desktop anytime.
  
• Lastly, there are 2 cables for connecting your hard drive to your motherboard, the two cables are ( Advanced Technology Attachment ) ATA or ( Advanced Technology Attachment ) SATA cables. ATA is a rather old type of cable that is longer in width and lesser being seen in gaming computer, while SATA cables is commonly used as it is cheaper and have a faster transfer speed.

As we know that there are a lot of games out there which require graphic cards that are powerful to play high-end games without lag or poor quality. So first of all, you will be wondering which brand to choose between Nvidia or Ati graphics card, both brands can be used for gaming purpose but you will need to see whether it can support the games that you will be playing.

For ATI graphic cards, it is more suitable with a AMD processor as it is easier to overclock and crossfire. I will now recommend you guys to some graphic card to suit different types of game, example like, casual games, online games, hardcore games or games which require ultra high graphics.

• For casual gamers - you might want to consider to get ATI Radeon HD 5550.
• For online gamers - you might want to consider to get ATI Radeon HD 5750.
• For hardcore gamers - you might want to consider to get AMD Radeon HD 6850.

• For gamers who love to play games that look realistic that require ultra high graphics - you might want to consider to get AMD Radeon HD 6970.

Last of all, if you guys think that you want to CrossFireX in the future, you will need to have a motherboard and graphic card with CrossFireX compatible. CrossFireX is a technology that connect 2 graphic card and uses it in a single desktop so that it can produce extremely high graphic performance. You can have more detail from HERE.

For NVIDIA Graphic cards, it is more straight forward in the way of their products series and models. They are categorized into GeForce, GeForce GT, GeForce GTS and GeForce GTX.

• GeForce - For users who play online games or video editing, can consider to get GeForce 210.
  
• GeForce GT and GTS - For people who plays mild performance games that require mild graphic-resolution or watching High-Definition (HD) or even 3D movies, can consider to get GeForce GTS 250.
  
• GeForce GTX - For people who want the best out of their graphic cards and want ultimate gaming experience for all the games that you play, you might consider to go for GeForce GTX 460.

Lastly, NVIDIA Graphic cards do have SLI Technology ( using two graphic card in a desktop ) to boost all your graphic performance to the ultimate and there will not be any worries on what types of games you want to play. You can see further details about SLI HERE.

NOTE:

• If you want to SLI or CrossFireX, make sure that your both graphic cards and motherboard are compatible for SLI or CrossFireX.
• You might need to change your power supply to a higher watt as your both graphic cards need to take in more power so that it will have the best performance, i will recommend you guys to change to 1000W power supply if you decide to SLI or CrossFireX.
• Go for a higher category if you have the money as more and more of the games being released require high graphics.
  

Last component that is needed for your desktop before it is done, it is the CD/DVD Drive. You need not focus so much on this component as we does not use it so often, you can just consider on buying a normal CD/DVD drive that can use for burning and installing games.

Now when your desktop is done, you will need a monitor. For gamers, i will prefer you guys to choose a monitor at least 20-inch, as it is big enough to play any games that you have in mind. There will be three types of cables for you to connect to your graphic card which is VGA (Video Graphic Array) or DVI (Digital Visual Interface) or HDMI (High-Definition Multimedia Interface).

VGA and DVI cables are most commonly used for gaming purpose as it comes together with the monitor that you are buying so you need not spend extra money to get the cables.

HDMI is commonly used for internet TV or even some monitors, it is rather more expensive than VGA or DVI. It is because that it supports high-definition TV or monitors and the graphic looks more sharper.

So if you are choosing between VGA or DVI, i would recommend DVI as it supports higher resolution. In conclusion, any of the cables or monitor does not decrease the performance in games.

In my concern, there are a lot of people after building their gaming desktop, playing games for many hours non-stop. It will make the processor heat up and eventually over-heat, but it seldoms happen. So if you are those people who play games for a long period of time, i will recommend you to get a CPU cooler, Cooler master V8. It have 8 heat sinking pipes and it does not cause loud noises while gaming is in progress.

In conclusion, i would like to say that if you want your desktop to stay in good condition,

• You can run a Disk Cleanup and Disk Defragmenter once every two weeks.
  
• You might also want to run anti-virus scan once every week or so.

Playing games can be fun and exciting but you will need to take care of your health,

• Play for 1 hour and take a rest for 15 - 30 minutes.
• Do not sit so near to the monitor as it will spoil your eyes, sit at a comfortable distance so that your eyes would not be tired easily.
• Do not skip your meals just to play your games as it is unhealthy.