First Major computer purchase

[BuckNasty]

Ok up until now I have done everything on my Uncle's computer which is a 3500$ powerhouse that can do absolutley anything and everything. I do HD video editing multitask across at average 2 screens and am a competive gamer that cannot accept anything but the highest performance. But now I am off to college and don't intend to leave any of the awesomeness that I enjoy now behind. I was directed by friends to newegg.com and they said that they would help me build a computer to take with me to Cal Tech.

I have been saving since my freshman year and after helping to pay for books and tuition and getting graduation money I have around 2,500$ to invest in a top of the line system.

Go.

 

[OldSchoolPC]

Congratulations on your decision to spend $2500 on a gaming rig. You can do a lot of "damage" with that money. Newegg is a great place to purchase the components to build a great machine for $2500. However if you have never built a PC before, and are afraid that you are going to screw up (frying PCs is painful...), I recommend configuring a Dell, or check out Alienware.

 

[BuckNasty]

Yeah I actually have a couple very competent computer wiz friends who are gonna help me who are going to help me assemble it. I just wanted to get some second opinions on which components to purchase. I was thinking of waiting for Bulldozer to come out and get one of their top of the line 8 cores.

 

[HafX]

Congratulations on your decision to spend $2500 on a gaming rig. You can do a lot of "damage" with that money. Newegg is a great place to purchase the components to build a great machine for $2500. However if you have never built a PC before, and are afraid that you are going to screw up (frying PCs is painful...), I recommend configuring a Dell, or check out Alienware.

I would not recommend either of these, Dells have crappy quality for the most part these days (my last Dell, if, which was always, it had an issue recieved parts replaced by Dell which were always refurbished and ended up breaking again within a month.. this was 2 years ago)
Alienware, though cool and a reputable brand overcharges.

You will not need an 8 core, and nor do I believe the Bulldozer will release without issues on its first round of those CPU's. For video editing (the key piece to my recommending this option) and gaming, I would look to the 6 core AMD's as they are built specifically for the latter purpose.

If you have any other questions on what you should get in terms of parts, either post here or feel free to shoot me a PM. Newegg is the best in terms of parts, great customer service, and amazing bundle deals.

 

[VINMAN46]

you could wait or go for the new Intel line, but personally I would wait for Bulldozer

here is a Build I just came up with

CPU - Newegg.com - Intel Core i7-2600K Sandy Bridge 3.4GHz (3.8GHz Turbo Boost) 4 x 256KB L2 Cache 8MB L3 Cache LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor BX80623I72600K
Mobo - Newegg.com - GIGABYTE GA-Z68X-UD4-B3 LGA 1155 Intel Z68 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
Ram - Newegg.com - G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory Model F3-10666CL7D-8GBRH
GPU - Newegg.com - EVGA 015-P3-1580-AR GeForce GTX 580 (Fermi) 1536MB 384-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card
PSU - Newegg.com - ENERMAX NAXN 82+ ENM750AWT 750W

ATX12V v2.3 SLI Ready CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Modular Active PFC Power Supply
HD - Newegg.com - Western Digital Caviar Black WD6401AALS 640GB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive
SSD - Newegg.com - OCZ Agility 3 AGT3-25SAT3-60G 2.5" 60GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
Case - Newegg.com - LIAN LI Lancool PC-K58W Black 0.8 mm SECC, Plastic + Mesh ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
(x2)Moniter - Newegg.com - ASUS VE247H Black 23.6" 2ms Full HD HDMI LED BackLight LCD Monitor w/Speakers 300 cd/m2 10,000,000:1 (ASCR)
OS - Newegg.com - Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-bit - Operating Systems

Total w/o Rebates - $1,920