First lets get you a nice big case which will make your life easy and best of all it's really affordable.

CM 932 HAF 139.99USD

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119160

Motherboard: EVGA E758-TR 3-Way SLI 260USD

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188046

CPU: i7 920 280USD

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115202

Optical drive : Sony Optiarc Black 24X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 12X DVD+R DL 26USD

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827118030

HDD: Seagate Barracuda 1tb 7200rpm 90USD

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148433

RAM : CORSAIR DOMINATOR 6GB 188USD
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145224

Power Supply, You're going to want a really good one:

CORSAIR CMPSU-1000HX 1000W 240USD
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139007

Heat sinkNoctua NH-U12P SE1366 72 USD

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835608007

EVGA 295 GTX

OC one is 560, non OC one is 510.OC'd 560USD
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130510

non OC'd
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130504
510USD

All adds up to either 1806 or 1856. Note I did not include tax, shipping, rebate, bonus for combos. Also note that does not include a OS, you should get Vista 64 bit either business or home premium. (That includes a free upgrade to Wins 7). If I am correct the win 7 business has a XP compatability feature. You said you had no budget, yes you could spend a lot more money on better parts but your CPU is fine enough and has a good heat sink to OC to 3.8-4.2 ghz easily, solid ram and the best GPU. Hell if you want you upgrade the CPU to a 950 or 975 but that's another 600/150 USD, you could even SLIx2 with GTX295, pretty positive that PSU should hold, corsair is a really good solid brand.

At the moment Dual Core. That reason being that Dual core CPU are fairly cheaper than Quad core, and don't even mention i7 920, you have to fork over 500 USD on ram, CPU and motherboard for a very small improvement. Maybe future games will take advantage of the i7 but I wouldn't blow all my money for one now.

I'd get an E8500 and easily OC it to 3.8 ghz, most games are not optimized for using four cores, specially since a lot of games are released on both consoles and PC. Yes some games will not run that well without quad but the only game that is would be GTA IV. Now for rest of the current games a 2 core will do the job great. A good solid CPU such as the E8500 should perform fairly well for at least another 1.5-2 years. Maybe by that time more games will optimize 4 cores which would sufice for an upgrade. But by that time quad/6 core CPU would be more affordable.

CPU performance in gaming depends on clock speed, CPU design and software design. If a software (game or what ever) is designed to use only 1 core or two cores, the rest will not benefit you with the performance for that program. Now the other cores could be useful if you're multitasking but that's a different story.

Unfortunatly...

The HAF 922

$99...

samuraiguns

I second this, I'd say just save 150 for the 932 but meh for 100 the 922 will do just fine.

It may be a mid tower but it's long enough to fix any GPU

I've had this rig since last November.

E8500 @ 3.8 ghz (400*9.5)

Corsair 4gb 800 mhz

GA EP45-DS3L

CM 932 HAF

500 gb 7200 rpm HDD

Antec EA650

HIS HD4870 Turbo (780/1000) 512mb

Arctic cooler 7 pro

G15 Keyboard

G5 Mouse

Acer 23 in 1080p (1920x1080)

CM 932 HAF

Giga Byte EP45-DS3L

Intel E8500 @ 3.8 (400*9.5)

Corsair 4gb 800 mhz

Vista Home premium 64 bit (Already pre ordered Windows 7)

HIS HD4870 512mb (780/1000)

Asus 23 in. 1080p (1920x1080)

Earth watts Antec EA650 (650W)

Around october I should have 500-600 dollars. I'll obviously save it but I was wondering if you guys suggest I save up for a new GPU or save up for new CPU/MOBO/RAM like 1336 socket or 1156 socket? Or buy a corsair 750/850 power supply in october and save for a new GPU around January/February?

What processor and RAM are you using? Also what case, if you have an extremely small case then you'd probaly be better off using uatx motherboard, but that is very rare. Other than the case it all depends on the current components you have.

[QUOTE="eikast"]

[QUOTE="Slig0"]

I totally disagree. E8500 is only a higher clocked E8400. That is like buying an I7 950 over 920 for 0.4 clock difference that "justifies" $200 price difference. So, save money and get a decent PII or an I7, and of course a better graphics card like GTX260.

JigglyWiggly_

There is not a 200 dollar difference. Not even the E8400 to E8600 is a 200 dolalr price difference.

E8400 is 167.99

E8500 is 189.99

E8600 is 269.99

E8600 is not worth it unless you have a lot of money and don't mind upgrading when the time comes when more games make use of quad core, but when that time comes current CPU will not be that great. Also keep in mind there are very few PC exclusive games, even the new crysis game is going to be released on consoles.

Quad is okay for gaming, and would be worth it if the motherboard/ram wasn't so expensive. I have an E8500 @ 400*9.5 (E8400 has its multiplier locked at 9.0) and I have had no trouble with games. I have a HD4870 512 so I wasn't able to push the graphics on GTA because of the locked graphic settings. (I only tried it around the time it was released for the PC)

In my opinion the 20 dollars is worth the extra .5 multiplier. The difference is if you set the FSB to 400mhz would be 3.8ghz vs 3.6 ghz.

I was talking about the new Intel/AMD chips.

The quads and duo work on the same motherboard, however the new AMD and Intel chips require new motherboards (80% positive about AMD) which have DDR3 RAM which results in a more expensive combo.

Did you check your connection to the front panel where the reset switch is?Id_basic

Ya. But even without that shouldn't it be able to restart within windows.

bump =(