Budget PC Build - can someone critique it?

y2viks

y2viks

y2viks

Associate
Joined
31 Dec 2003
Posts
1,652
Location
I Freed Fishfingers 13/08
Hi,

I've had my P4 for years now and I thought it's time for an upgrade... a cheap upgrade :)

Here's what I have specced so far -

MSI P31 Neo2-FR Intel P31 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard - (£46.99)
Antec NSK 4480 Mini Tower Case (Silver) - 380W Earth Watts PSU - (£54.04)
2 x OcUK 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C5 800MHz DDR2 Dual Channel Kit - (£46.98)
Intel Pentium Dual-Core E5200 "LGA775 Core 2" 2.50GHz (800FSB) - Retail - (£58.74)
Asus GeForce EN8800 GT 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail - (£75.19)

Which all comes to a grand total of £281.93. I've got a monitor, DVD drive, Harddrives etc all ready so I'm ok on that front

Will the PSU be enough to power the graphics card?

Is there anywhere i can improve significantly with not to much of a cost increase?

Thanks

Viks :)
 
Why not go for 2x2GB rather than 2x 2x1GB? Its about £2 cheaper too!

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showp...x2gb) pc2-6400c5 800mhz ddr2 dual channel kit

i would say the psu will be fine with the 8800gt - check this total system power draw with a 8800gt:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/nvidia-geforce-9800gtx-review,1800-12.html

One last thing, what hard drive do you have? You might wanna get a new one as one you would have got with your P4 would be VERY slow compared to some of the new ones out these days.
 
thanks for the links and for the £2 off :D I chose the 2 x 2x1gb sticks because they were in stock and i'm not sure how long the 2x2gb sticks will take to get back in.

I've bought a new 750gb Harddrive literally 2 weeks ago, so I was planning on using that and taking my old IDE drive (purley as recovery storage incase anything happens to my main harddrive) with me.

Do i need arctic silver with a retail processor?
 
Two weeks ago you could get the 2x2GB PC6400 Geil black dragon memory for £50, now its £72, takes the michael if you ask me!

No you dont need to buy any AS, the heatsink comes pre-applied with thermal paste. However I dont know how well it performs myself as I got an arctic freezer 7 for my CPU. A friend of mine used the retail cooler on his Quad core and said he gets a max load temp of 46c, could be just heresay though.
 
If your'e not oc'ing Vik the stock cooler will be fine. I have some MX2 compound if you can borrow as well if you like its really good plus a spare retail cooler off my E8500 dunno if they are any better than the stoock one on the E5200?
 
I wasn't planning on any OCing but i hear a lot about how that chip can OC to well over 3.0, so i might give it a go :)
 
y2viks said:
I wasn't planning on any OCing but i hear a lot about how that chip can OC to well over 3.0, so i might give it a go :)
Click to expand...

Well maybe you should have my spare cooler then if you are not going to get a after market one the stock one for the e8500 has got to better than the e5200.. hasn't it?
 
Rebel Master said:
All intel stock coolers are the same.
Click to expand...

All c2d are, the intel celeron E1200 comes with a smaller one.

Apparently that mobo isn't very good at all, but OcUK don't sell the gigabite p31 board anymore, that board is fantastic though...
 
If i go for the 4850 would the PSU still be able to handle it?

What card could i use with it for SLI?
 
Ok from the original spec I'm now looking at :

MSI P35 Neo2-FR Intel P35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard - (£70.49)
Antec NSK 4480 Mini Tower Case (Silver) - 380W Earth Watts PSU - (£54.04)
GeIL 4GB (2x2GB) PC2-8500C5 1066MHz Black Dragon DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GB24GB8500C5DC) - (£75.19)
Intel Pentium Dual-Core E5200 "LGA775 Core 2" 2.50GHz (800FSB) - Retail - (£58.74)
Asus ATI Radeon HD 4850 512MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail - (£115.14)

I went with a different motherboard because i'd heard a few bad reviews of the MSI P31 Neo2-FR Intel P31 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard - (£46.99) i specced before.
 
Can you recommend a better PSU and case which works out somewhere near the same price?

Thank :)
 
[TW]Fox;12480233 said:
Another 4850 but from what I've been reading lately Crossfire (Dual ATI cards) on a P35 motherboard isn't very good :(
Click to expand...

thanks for the advice :)

I was thinking about it but then snapped myself out of it also. I started on a £250 budget and i'm up to £370 now so I'm trying to keep myself in check :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom