I'm a little behind, what's in store for AMD and Intel in the coming months and year? I hear Sandy Bridge and Bulldozer, but I haven't really followed these things enough to really know enough about what's coming.

Interesting PC question:

If I were to build a server, what kind of components would I want?

I am looking for a web server to handle MySQL queries, and some web-based tasks (like running PHP scripts).

I don't have a set budget, but I'd like it to be reasonable. Any suggestions?

This would be very different than building a Gaming PC - I guess the question would be: What kind of traffic volume are you looking at? How many concurrent users pulling how much data? How bad would it be if it went offline? Bear in mind for a server you want quality components and data stored redundantly - so you'll be looking at multiple HDs with some sort of RAID setup. If this is a relatively small website with non-important data that wouldn't be heartbreaking if it was down for a day or two, you could build a relatively inexpensive server - but if it's for a business with absolutely critical 24/7/365 uptime, that's a different story.

So I recently fried my video card and PCI Express 2 slot (long story) and I need to replace a bunch of stuff. I'm pretty set on an Intel i5 (not sure which yet), but I need some help with a video card. I'm thinking under 200 (unless something sooo much better is slightly over) and I'm looking at ATI cards, specifically HIS. 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=2010380048 50002058 1369840994 1068440865&name=GDDR5

I haven't chosen a mobo yet, but I'm not really worrying about that just yet.

Any advice/guidance is appreciated.

Edit: Copy and paste the whole link to see the 4 cards I was looking at.

I would suggest either: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102898 for the better cooling performance/noise with MIR OR http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150462 for the longer warranty and lower price.

Furthermore your should probably go AMD if you want the best price/performance. Check out: http://paulisageek.com/compare/cpu/

Yeah, that price/performance chart is very nice and useful, thanks! I'm actually going to wait a little bit on replacing/upgrading. Turns out that I can still play HoN with my onboard graphics (it's a Radeon 3300). So I think I'll wait a few months, watch prices fall, and take a look at stuff again. Thanks for that link though, it'x extremely helpful.

No problems, im glad to be of help.

Hey folks, I am looking to build two computers. Been reading this thread and have a small idea but thought I would ask. Here it goes,

Budget - $1-600 per pc

Games - FFXIV, Starcraft 2, Crysis (does not need to be ultra high or whatever just decently with 30 fps), dragon age, and whatever is out or coming out soon.

Applications - Photoshop and other various editing and drawing applications, Music stuff (mixing, burning, ripping, creating, that kind of stuff) Movie stuff, big excell sheets,  and any other everyday things. I generally have many things open at once due to working on something that requires multiple apps or just because I am multitasking.

With that in mind I want at least,

4gb of ram (wth is the difference between ddr2 or ddr3 or whatever it is)

1gb of gpu ram (same as the ram, wth is the difference between ddr2 or ddr3 or whatever it is)

Probably at least a triple core cpu (was looking at the i3 and i5's but do not think the budget allows and I do not know how to overclock)

Word up

Heya, I'm assuming $1-600 = $1,600?  If so, then you can build the same computer I built a few months ago and still have a bit left over.

i7 860 2.8 GHz Quad core

8 GB DDR3 G-Skill RAM

Radeon 5850 1 GB DDR5 GPU

1 TB Caviar Black Hard Drive.

Gigabyte P55 UD3 Motherboard

Lian Li Aluminum Case.

Asus DVD-RW

My total after taxes was just under $1500 CAD.  If you live in the states it will be even cheaper. 

Newegg usually has the best prices, and they have a good RMA policy as well.