Hi
I have been looking for a new PC recently, my current PC is around five years old already.

I have been going through available systems on Ebay (Australia) and i have a short list of the best systems. Any advice on these systems greatly appreciated?

They are in order of highest to lowest price, and not repeating the same seller. I used an excel chart which did not paste in here so good, but it seems understandable enough. The last number is the actual Ebay item number if anyone is curious to see the actual system on sale.

$1,498.00 PCMeal i7 3.5GHz, 8MB Cache H87 Chipset 8GB DDR3 PC-12800 Radeon 4GB 512-bit GDDR5 1TB, SATA III 7200 231090057162

$1,495.00 Kenjun Computers i7 3.4GHz, 8MB Cache Intel Z87 Chipset 16GB DDR3 1600 nVidia GTX760 2GB 1TB SATA3 HDD 7200 290974514983

$1,489.95 PC LAN Pty Ltd i7 4770 Quad Core 3.5Ghz ASUS H87-Pro 8GB Kit DDR3 1600 nvidia GTX 760 2GB 1TB SATA3 360719321535

$1,489.00 DD Computer Online i7-3770 3.4GHz, 8mb cashe ASRock Intel Chipset B75 16GB DDR3 1600Mhz nVidia Geforce GTX760 4GB 1TBs3+120GB SSD SATA III 321081270246

$1,479.95 OZ Mr.Gadgets i7-4770 3.4GHz 8M Cache Intel B85 8GB 1600Mhz DDR3 nVidia Geforce GTX770 2GB 1TB SATA3 151148147376

$1,499.00 Vega Computers i7-4770 3.4Ghz 8M Cache Gigabyte H87M-D3H 32GB DDR3 1600Mhz Gigabyte GTX660 2GB 2TB seagate 231045482373

$1,469.00 Smartcom Computers i7-4770 3.5GHz 8M Cache Gigabyte GA-Z87-HD3 16 GB DDR3 RAM NVIDIA GTX 670 2GB 1TB 200960742134

$1,469.00 PCs&Laptops4U i7 4770 3.4GHz Z87 Chipset 8GB DDR3 AMD R7 260X 2GB 128-bit 1TB + 120GB SSD 331020799694

$1,459.99 pc-tek-clayton i7 3770 3.9GHz Gigabyte or Asus Z series 8GB DDR3 2GB Nvidia GT630 dedicated 2TB + 240GB SSD 221125108782

$1,379.00 Nirv Australia i7-4770 3.4GHz 8M Cache ASUS B85M-E 16GB DDR3-1866MHz nvGeforceGT630 4GB GDDR3 2TB, 64MB Cache WD 141122514506

$1,370.00 PHINKO TECHNOLOGY i7-4770K 3.9Ghz 8MB Cache Gigabyte Z87-D3HP 8GB DDR3 Nv Gigabyte GTX 660 2GB Seagate 2TB 331109714126

$1,349.00 ybesty i7 4930K 3.9GHz 12mb cach MSI/ASUS :(x79) 8GB DDR3 1600MHZ Integrated Onboard Graphics 1TB SATA 7200rpm 181243529931

I started to see more and more shortcomings in the systems closer to price range of $1300 so i stopped right there.

Recommendations?

My favourite system so far is this one: $1,489.00 DD Computer Online i7-3770 3.4GHz, 8mb cashe ASRock Intel Chipset B75 16GB DDR3 1600Mhz nVidia Geforce GTX760 4GB 1TBs3+120GB SSD SATA III 321081270246

I'd pick this one: $1,479.95 OZ Mr.Gadgets i7-4770 3.4GHz 8M Cache Intel B85 8GB 1600Mhz DDR3 nVidia Geforce GTX770 2GB 1TB SATA3 151148147376

When it comes to gaming PCs the video card is by far the most important item and the GTX770 is pretty damn good. This one has a better CPU and video card compared to the one you picked up as your favourite. Games don't need more than 8GB RAM yet. And even when they do, it's very easy to expand your memory.

However, if i picked up this PC i wuld definitely put another HD into it or buy a bigger external HD. 1TB wouldn't be enough for me due to the huge amount of data i have. But maybe it's not a problem for you.

From this one up: they're acceptable. I don't know Australian prices, other than that they're absurdly high.

If you want to overclock or run SLI or Crossfire, favor the ones with a Z87 chipset. H87 and B85 are for mainstream and budget motherboards; they will have fewer bells and whistles.

Thanks for that, i'm definately not up to date with technology, since my last computer is five years old.

The one i chose, i like it because of the solid state drive which i pan to install the OS on and hence it will also be the primary drive for memory cashing. If i understand correctly what a solid state drive is, it should have a very significant impact on performance. But the graphics card system might be better anyway since each seller will have different graphics cards available but SSD should be readily available with all of them.

DD is the only one I really recognise (never got anything from them although friends have). I'd go for one with best CPU+GPU combo in those you listed.

I suppose i prefer a simple but reasonably powerful motherboard.... i used to have the idea of trying to get a more future upgradable motherboard, but that never happens due to hardware becoming incompatible by the time i am ready to upgrade, So i don't care about that side of it anymore. I recognize PcMeal whom i bought my old computer five years ago. It has been a good system but i later found out the motherboard was known to be a bit dodgy (Gigabyte P35-DS3L), so i might not trust them again, but they do have allot of different system configurations on Ebay. Them and also Vega Computers have many different systems too.

In Australia it is the least ridiculous option. I would prefer to buy from a site that lets you build your own system, but in Australia those sites have laughing sound effects in the background because the price is going up so absurdly. Retail - forget it!

Pcmeal flogs a lot of their cpu/mobos on ebay - yes i had considered them once, but since IJK (formerly Umart -- not the current mob who go around with same name now) being close to me, i get most of my stuff from them - prices are 2nd to MSY (infamous for undercutting everyone else but service and available of parts at X Price is erratic). PC Case Gear is another reasonably well known supplier of parts....no idea if they have a bare system option on their website. Definitely do ur research. Sorry i cant be more of help. Been a bit out of the loop since i havent done any upgrades for a few years myself :)

The difference in performance is not that significant for gaming. The only difference is that the loading times will be shorter, but it doesn't matter at all when the game starts running. I really believe that getting higher framerates is much more important than shorter loading times, and a SSD drive will not give you a boost on framerates, but a better video card will. With a more powerful video card you will be able to turn more effects on and achieve higher frames per second and i really believe this is much more important than shorter loading times. IF you install your games on the SSD that is, if you don't there will be almost no difference at all for gaming. The only difference is that Windows will load up faster.

If you want to build a PC for gaming, get the best video card you can.

That has always been my motto.... ever since i got my first graphics card 20 odd years ago which was an Intel 740, the card that truly did punch above its weight, with rock solid performance. the next card i got which had twice the power (on paper) was actually slower and introduced me to this new concept of games that 'crash'??

Similar to what i heard. People who get a SSD seem to mainly use it for the OS bootups. I also vaguely remember it does help with certain games which need to access the HD regularly like as in Max Payne 3 where the game thrashes the HD quite a bit to attempt to get those seemless transitions from action to *cut scenes* etc..
Definitely get the best video card within the budget...

i have been spending allort of time on the net looking at recommended builds etc. But it seems to be so commercialized with links to places selling those items.... it was never that bad last time i did research on a pc five years ago! I'm not going to be able to learn anything that way.

So hopefully i can get a few more opinions here then just take a stab at it and hope for the best?

Thanks for that, i will check it out right away.

The problem with Ebay is that they keep upping their fees every five minutes, so even though the competition is fierce, the cost of doing business on Ebay is just too high, its that simple. And when you look at the useless majority of Australian retailers or internet sellers, well, frankly Ebay still has plenty of elbow room. But just because most of them are idiots, there is no reason they could not be cheaper than Ebay if they really wanted too.