So I have this idea of building my own computer tower, even though I have the generally idea of how to do it and everything and have a few friends who are more skilled at it than I am and will be willing to help out. I need to ask what are some of the best parts that I could get for a DIY project? If you post links of the product that would be extremely helpful too. Thank you ^^

Depends on what you want the computer to do. What exactly are you wanting? Gaming, processing? Personally, a good build for me is a Quad-Core, i7, Windows 7, 8GB RAM with surround sound audio (beats audio) and an nVidia graphics card with 2gb memory. What do you want out of your computer.

if youre going all out id recomend at least 4gb ram, if youre heavy into gaming 8gb would be sweet.
Equally if gaming get a decent graphics card and say, a tri or quad core processor. If youre not gaming dual processor should be more than enough.
Equally, make sure the parts you buy fit your motherboard.
Some processors and graphics cards arent compatible with the motherboard.
Id opt for a sata harddrive too, they have good access speed.
In terms of cooling id go with standard fan ventilation. Liquid cooling is far more efficient but if it leaks, youre finished.
You'll need to get an o.s for it too.
If youre going windows id personaly choose 7 over 8.
You fit it with usb3.0 too for greater transfer speeds.
In terms of disk drive theres plenty choice there, go nuts.
You might want to fit it with an internal blueray reciever and wireless n.i.c as well, unless you plan to connect it using cabling in which case a standard n.i.c would work.

Well I would like to use it for gaming and all other types of media, so the 8 gbs of ram would be perfect. Are there any equipment that would help prevent virus to invade the rest of the machinery?

If gaming:

Quad Core, i7 Processor
8 GB RAM
USB 2.0-3.0 Speeds
DVD or higher Optical Drive
250+ GB Harddisk
nVidia Graphics (2GB+ Video Memory)
Windows 7

Sound is up to you, really. I have Beats Audio but that's rather expensive. Remember to make sure that whatever you buy fits the mother board that you buy.

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Something that you should take a look at:
http://compreviews.about.com/od/tutorials/DoItYourself_Tutorials_on_PC_Hardware.htm

Ktanaqui : Thank you very much, I will have a look at the site and check out the list of equipment that you posted.

Here are a couple of things to watch out for...

1. Make absolute sure that the copy of Windows 7 you buy is 64-bit. I don't know if they still do 32 and 64 as separate discs, but you do not want to install a 32-bit OS if you're going to use 8GB of RAM. You can't actually use more than 3-4GB of RAM with 32-bit OSes. The rest gets ignored by the OS. Depending on how soon you plan to build this, you may want to hold out for Windows 8 64-bit. It's supposed to come out about a month from now. Though unconfirmed, it is rumored that Windows 8 will allow games to communicate with hardware more efficiently than Windows 7 does, which would be beneficial for gaming.

2. Video cards are tricky. You need to look at the specs carefully when selecting. Higher number nVidia cards are not necessarily better than lower numbered ones. They do this really weird back-and-forth across their series. If you know exactly what games you wanna play, it's best to pick the recommended card or a card that contains ALL of the same features as the recommended card. For example. If it says recommend is a GeForce 7600, don't assume that a 8100 would do the trick. Most likely, that's a weaker card. You have to really do good research into what features the card has that makes it capable of running these games. You also want to make sure that you card actually has 2GB of vRAM installed on it, and not just being expandable to it. It's easy when shopping online to see a result that says "2GB of RAM" and the card actually comes with 512MB or something stupid like that. I think professionally built gamer PCs tend to use stuff like GTX550 or GTX570.

Crazy Li : That was a lot of help, I did plan on holding out until windows 8 was released, I heard about it being released, I also thought about using a different OS if I can find a better one. I am going to check with a friend of mine because he said he was working on making one (the last time I talked to him anyway) and I am not sure if he is finished with it or not but if he is I plan on using his. He is really skilled at building computers and managing and creating software and hardware.

software is the only means of preventing virus.
You should know that 8's layout is more like a tablet than a pc so u should be sure thats what you want.
And 64 bit o.s WONT work unless your motherboard has 64 bit data bus, so make sure of that.
I wouldnt advise using a custom o.s. You want games, you will get compatability issues with a custom o.s.
Dont take 250gb hard drive, you'd be amassed how fast it goes. 400gb+ hd, prefrably s.a.t.a, not i.d.e.

I agree with the SATA suggestion (people still use IDE?). Hard drives are pretty cheap these days, so you can probably get a half a TB easily enough. Modern game installations can easily take 10GB or more of your space, so yes, it'll go VERY fast if you're a gamer. It might not hurt to have a secondary HDD just for saving large files with your primary for the OS and essential files.

I think all modern CPUs should support 64-bit architecture by now, but I guess that's something to make sure of too.

Crazy Li : yup,my pc has i.d.e, its such an advanced one that a cheap sata hd wouldnt be much different so i havent bothered changing it.

I feel bad because I really have nothing else to add to this conversation, but I can give you some pointers price-wise at least. First, get the Invisible Hand add-on for your browser, so you can more easily compare prices, and then SHOP AROUND. Don't just take anyone's word for something, because nobody can ever be up to date on all of the best prices everywhere.

Right now, Intel processors are the top of the top, the cream of the crop, the bee's knees, and you're just not going to get anything better than an Intel Core i7-3960X Extreme. However, if you're not going for the top of the top, and you want a mid-range, plays-most-games-on-high-settings system, you'll probably want to go with AMD which is currently the best bang-for-buck in terms of processors right now. Right now on Newegg, a Quad-Core 2.7GHz AMD A6-3670K is about 90USD, compared to a similar Dual-Core 2.8GHz Core i5-3450s which is almost 200USD! But again, don't just take my word for it, because prices change on a daily basis. But by and large, AMD is cheaper in the mid-range market.

For RAM, I can not recommend G.SKILL high enough. They have an awesome warranty and will replace your modules if they break for just about any reason. Seriously, it takes a lot for me to recommend a specific brand like this, so you might want to think about that. They're usually priced competitively--sometimes more expensive, sometimes less, but generally around the same as most other chips.

Never underestimate the power of an awesome warranty, because no matter how well crafted your PC components are, they will fail one day.

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Also, I can give you some tips for speed. If you have the budget for it, I would highly suggest grabbing a Solid-State Drive (SSD) to put your operating system on, and a separate 10,000 RPM hard drive to put your games, videos and what-not on. If you can't afford this set up, get at least one 10,000 RPM drive, and if you can't afford even that (They are quite expensive) then make sure you don't get anything less than 7200 RPM or doing just about anything will be a grueling experience in listening to your hard disk churn and churn and churn and churn. Forever. If you can afford a RAID array, do it. If you don't know what that is, look into it, it isn't difficult, Windows supports most setups out of the box.

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Ktanaqui : I've got to disagree with you on the Beats audio part. Beats is good for headphones, no question there--but that's only because of the solid build quality, not because they give you somehow magically better performance. A Beats audio sound card is just charging you for the Beats name. In all reality, unless you're actually making studio quality music recordings, the on-board sound chip on your motherboard should be good for anyone, since they all come with a minimum of 5.1 surround sound, but even that's only on budget builds. Most mother boards have 7.1 these days.


And I think that's about all I have to say.

Okay so lets say that I want to possibly one day down the road when I finally get all of the pieces of equipment I need for musical recording what if I want to do that with my own personal computer that I plan on building? Is there a certain sound card that would be high recommended and software too? I plan on having at least a small to medium sized mixer to do some guitar work with and hopefully a full sample album to work on my musical career, but I'm not sure what sound software and things like that I need to be getting.

Beats is probably fine, I don't really know what's the best right now because I'm not in that industry to pay attention to such things. But I wouldn't worry about that now unless that's what you intend to be doing with your computer when you get it.


Also remember that a work computer and a play computer are very different. Just because a computer is super fast for playing games, doesn't mean it will be able to do much work very quickly, and it's the same the other way around.

XxEzraxX : I've always found Sound Blaster (by Creative Labs) sound cards to be good. Sound cards seem to be a dime a dozen these days, though. I've been just using onboard graphics for the last 5 or so years and have been enjoying all the music I listen to just fine out of my 5.1 surround sound speakers. I don't do any music work with actual instruments though, so it could make a difference here. The most I do is synthesize midi music and mix it with soundfonts and whatnot. Still, I find the sound quality from what's build into my motherboard sufficient for producing an acceptable quality. You only really need a sound card if the quality of produced sound is extremely important for you and you have a really sound-sensitive ear. My ears aren't made for music, so I can sense stuff like pitch and tone well. I imagine that if you can, what sound card you have MAY make a difference. But remember that even with a top of the line sound card, you'll still need good quality speakers to hear it. If you have cheapo USB speakers, for instance, the quality of sound may be misrepresented. I recommend getting Logitech brand speakers. Every Logitech speaker set I've ever used sounded really good.

Another note about the operating system issue:

Yes, you want 64-bit. However, if you get Windows 7, you want Windows 7 Professional or Ultimate. If you have either one, you can get a virtual console for supporting 16-bit games too. So, especially if you are into older games as well as newer ones - you want that support across 16-64. 64 Bit Operating Systems can not support 16-Bit programs. Period.

So. Plan on playing Starcraft or any games around that age? Get Windows 7 Professional/Ultimate - 64 Bit. It's a lifesaver.

As far as Windows 8 goes - I'll tell everyone the same thing:
Do not ever buy an operating system the moment it comes out. Always wait at least three months. I typically wait six months, myself. It allows companies to get out the patches needed for their games to make them compatible with the new operating system. The compatibility setting completely negates the point of getting a new OS.

Ktanaqui : I agree with you mostly, but I have to point out that I was using the developer preview of Windows 8 back in March and it was binary compatible with Windows 7 with very few issues, and most of those were older programs that weren't designed for Windows 7 anyway. And while I would on any other OS say you should wait a few months (actually until the first service pack comes out) with the price of Windows 8 set to be cheaper than Windows 7, it's all I can do to recommend it.

XxEzraxX :  I do not grasp the concept that you are trying to deploy.  It would be most helpful to me if you elaborate a little more on what it is that you want to know and be very specific.  Specifications can help me help you faster.

Lazlo Falconi :

Oh? My philosophy on Operating Systems means that I was not aware of this until now. Will Windows 8 also have 16-Bit support? And why the heck was Windows 7 so costly if they're releasing the new one cheaper? Crazy Microsoft...

For gaming purposes,

I personally suggest,

at least:
6-8GB of ram: I prefer Kingston or Corsair
500 GB Hard Drive
2.5Ghz CPU or better
High End Graphics Card: I prefer Nvidia
A decent sound card: I prefer SOUND BLASTER

I hope this helps,
Thomas