So, after talking to the lovely tech help people at MTS, I've decided to turn my gaming woe lemons into computer self-building lemonade! Crrrazy!


Here are my specs at the moment. If anyone has any feedback/suggestions/tips, please do share!

• CPU: Deciding between the i5 2500K or i3 2100. (The 2100 is $90 cheaper, and I'm not sure I would notice the difference since I don't really play games besides the Sims... Maybe the new SimCity when it comes out? i3 processors are apparently not great for TS3. That makes that simple!
• Motherboard: GigabyteGA-Z68AP-D3 or ASRock H61M/U3S3 (The H61 is $20-30 cheaper, depending on rebates, has USB 3.0, and may be fine especially if I go with the 2100 CPU?)
• PSU: Corsair Enthusiast TX 650W — PURCHASED!
• GPU: Sapphire Radeon HD 6870 — PURCHASED!
• RAM: G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 8GB-1333 — PURCHASED!
• SSD: Samsung 830 Series MZ-7PC128D/AM 2.5" 128GB — PURCHASED! (Holding off on a HDD at the moment while waiting for prices to go down. In the meantime, maybe just reuse the 250GB from my current desktop since I doubt I'd be able to sell it?)
• ODD: LG DVD burner 
• OS: Windows 7 — purchased (Can't get overly excited about Windows since really most of my computing heart belongs to my aging MacBook Pro.)
• Monitor: ASUS PA238Q 23" LED IPS panel — PURCHASED! (Picked up an almost new one from a neighbor for $200! Yay! So, so, so much nicer than my little old IBM LCD.)

The other major decision still up in the air is the case. I think I've got it narrowed down to:

  
The NZXT Source 210 Elite White. $50 and love the look—kind of a mod, '60s plastic-era thing going on, and it looks like a scaled down version of the Corsair Graphite Series 600T that I'd been really taken with. At less than a third of the price. Since it's cheap, I'd probably want to add some dust filters and maybe a few other little things; but this is currently the top contender. (Maybe???)

  
The Fractal Design Define Mini or

  
The Fractal Design Arc Mini
Both of these run $106 and would require a micro ATX board. Fractal Design has a Scandinavian pedigree, and the quality of these cases is supposed to be very good. Twice the price of the NZXT, but I wouldn't feel like I had to add anything to them.

THOUGHTS?

On the cases especially, since those don't really require technical knowledge, but on anything else if you have experience. Honestly, 5 days ago, this would all have sounded like a jumble of letters and numbers and dollar signs to me, but I've learned a ton and feel so much more computer literate now!

This is obviously absorbing most of my computer energy these days, so it may be a little while before I have sim updates. But hopefully when it's all done, Ste-Margo will be back in a big, big way!