I take it there is no second build, as the link for it is a DVD drive.
Generally that build's pretty dire, Asus motherboards are tat, The velociraptor drives are seriously outclassed by SSDs now, and obviously you're without a graphics card, power supply and case. On a $2500 budget if you don't need peripherals you can go for quite a high end system.
The case is currently out of stock, but at $25 shipping, it's probably easier to get it elsewhere.
This system totals $2258 with $35 of mail-in rebates (including the case), so well within budget. Spending more is pretty much unnecessary, you don't gain very much for the money.
The upgrades I would potentially consider if you do though, are switching the HD5970 for two of these:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150476 That's an extra $125, but an extra $40 of rebates. Will give you a bit less than 20% extra performance.
Alternatively, you could perhaps spend the extra $205 and upgrade the SSD to 160GB:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820167024
GTX480s are hugely expensive and not really any more powerful than the HD5870s I mentioned at the bottom. I'd also avoid Phenom II CPUs as they are a lot slower than the Core i7.
Originally posted by sammorris: GTX480s are hugely expensive and not really any more powerful than the HD5870s I mentioned at the bottom. I'd also avoid Phenom II CPUs as they are a lot slower than the Core i7.
Wow, I can't believe I made that mistake, schoolboy error :P
I spec 1366 CPUs so rarely, just followed the trap.
Don't get the Gene board, it's terrible. Why on earth you'd want a microATX board in a full size case I've no idea, that plus it's an Asus board, which are pretty bad anyway. Stick with a full size Gigabyte as before, like an X58A-UD3R or higher.
Spinpoint F4s are also eco drives, so they'll be slow for installing games, a 180GB SSD won't necessarily fit them all, so I'd say change the drive back to the Caviar Black I specified.
Sapphire Vapor X cards may be cheaper than the XFX, but unlike the XFX are hideously unreliable and very loud. Stick with XFX.
