£800 new build advice

L1ght

L1ght

L1ght

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Joined
9 Aug 2007
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770
Hi, I haven’t upgraded for about 4 years now and am in need of upgrading badly. I'm looking for a new graphics card, ram, cpu and mobo. I'm sticking with my hard drives. optical drive, case and psu for the time being. I think the psu is about 750w, not sure if that would be ok?
I'll be using my computer for graphic design e.g. photoshop/illustrator Zbrush, and also gaming and movies. I've got a 24" Dell monitor running at 1920x1200 so I think I'll need a good graphics card for upcoming games/ HD movies, as my computer really struggles with any hi res video at the moment.

If anyone could help me find the best components for the money/ performance I'd really appreciate it. Cheers guys
 
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i7 is still very expensive, but can fit it in your budget. The 4870 will be perfect for that resolution, unfortunately the one on offer is out of stock, the XFX is currently the cheapest. If you want to overclock the CPU, drop the i7 down to the oem version (slightly cheaper and doesn't come with the stock cooler) and get a decent aftermarket cooler.

Your 750W PSU should be fine, what make is it? Also what size is the case you already have? Are the hard drives and optical drives sata?
 
Hi. I just checked my psu and its: FSP Group AX500-A 500W ATX12V Power Supply. As this is a 500w psu do you think I will need to upgrade to a more powerful psu?
My budget is quite flexible although I would like to try and stick to the 800 mark, but if I need to spend a bit more for a decent rig then I will.

Any input and help would be really appreciated guys.

Cheers :)
 
L1ght said:
Thanks for the reply, I'll have to check on the make of the PSU. The Case is:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-070-AN&groupid=701&catid=7&subcat=

Although it is the silver version of the case. Both hard drvies and optical drive are not sata.
Would the graphics card you suggested be ok at running the very latest games at 1920x1200 without too much trouble? Thanks again for the input.
Click to expand...

The 4870 won't have any trouble gaming at that resolution. The gigabyte board I've shown has 1 x IDE connector supporting ATA-133/100/66/33 and up to 2 IDE devices, so you should be okay, but IDE is very outdated, maybe throw in a cheap sata DVD/RW drive, can be had for not a lot these days.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CD-099-SA&groupid=701&catid=10&subcat=951
 
Cool thanks for the info. I was thinking about a new optical drive, and was looking at a this blue-ray reader: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CD-059-SO

Seeing as the Samsung dvd writer you suggested is so cheap I'll probably get that aswell.

Does the motherboard have an built in sound card aswell? And would this connect directly to the graphics card for the HDMI output? Just trying to get my head around this :confused:
 
Instead of the Sony blu-ray drive, get this LG one for £15 more. It reads both HD-DVD and Blu-ray, plus it can burn DVDs as well - which the Sony cannot.
 
L1ght said:
Cool thanks for the info. I was thinking about a new optical drive, and was looking at a this blue-ray reader: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CD-059-SO

Seeing as the Samsung dvd writer you suggested is so cheap I'll probably get that aswell.

Does the motherboard have an built in sound card aswell? And would this connect directly to the graphics card for the HDMI output? Just trying to get my head around this :confused:
Click to expand...

The mobo will have onboard sound and im sure there would be a way to get the sound through HDMI.

I'm with icey_haj on this one, get the LG drive instead.
 
Ok, so buying the LG instead of the sony would mean I would'nt have to buy the seperate samsung dvd writer? Hhmm. Looks like a no brainer. £1 cheaper aswell compared to both other drives! The only downside looks like the LG does'nt do double layer DVD writing. Nuts.
 
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Thanks for all the input guys. Looking at the LG today and it seems it does do DVD DL! Looks like I overlooked that. ha

Just one more question..... As none of my hard drvies are SATA would it be worth buying a fairly small yet fast SATA hard drive to run my OS? And if so is there any specific drive you would reccommend? Thanks again :)
 
wow what a thread to read but i would just like to say yes the i7 would be an excellent choice, so would the blu ray drive but you should definately be upgrading your hard drives it makes a significant speed increase just moving from PATA to SATA ll HDDs, file transfer speeds and write speeds are so quick i suggest you get yourself a terrabyte there should be enough room in your budget proving you dont go over board.:D If you would really like to push the boat out have look at SSDs(solid state drives).
 
I am most likely getting the psu and other components ro55o suggested. Ive priced everything up and it looks like this:

Intel Core i7 920 2.66Ghz (Nehalem) (Socket LGA1366) - Retail - £252.99 inc VAT
Gigabyte EX58-UD4P Intel X58 (Socket 1366) PCI-Express DDR3 Motherboard - £206.99 inc VAT
GeIL 6GB DDR3 PC3-8500 1066MHz (3x2GB) Ultra Series Triple Channel Kit (GV36GB1066C7TC) - £101.19 inc VAT
XFX ATI Radeon HD 4870 1024MB GDDR5 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail - £164.99 inc VAT
Coolermaster Real Power 520w Modular Power Supply - £66.69 inc VAT
LG GGC-H20L Blu-Ray Reader & HD-DVD ROM Serial ATA Drive - Retail - £78.19 inc VAT

Total inc VAT and shipping - £882.52

I'd love to go for the Western Digital VelociRaptor 150GB 10000RPM but I'd be way to far over budget. For the time being I'm looking at getting a fast SATA for the OS then replace my older IDE drives a few months down the line.

So I've been looking at maybe this one? Western Digital Caviar Blue 160GB SATA-II 8MB Cache - OEM (WD1600AAJS) - £35.64

Would bring my total up to Total : £918.16 which is perfectly resonable. Any other ideas guys? Not really sure whether I should go for a bigger drive as the prices at the moment are quite low. hhhhmmm
 
HHmmm I was thinking about that aswell. Since I've had this psu I've had no problems. Would you think this spec will need a more powerfull psu? Or should I stick with the one I have? Its actually the newest component on my current rig. Would be nice to save a bit of scratch.
 
Power wise I think it'll be fine, but it only has 1 x PCI Express graphics power connector, the 4870 needs 2, but you can use a converter molex, if you don't have one already.

Edit: Someone asked the same question here. Its borderline really and comes down to how much power is on the 12v rails.
 
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Hah well just a heads up that my 'rock' Seasonic 500W psu is dying, had it 3 years, but maybe my recent upgrades killed it, only had 4870 about a week. 4870 doesnt work in 3d, the dvd drive doesnt burn disks anymore, my c: drive had been acting weird for a week now, had bsod trying to reinstall win 7... I'll make a thread about this :) I now recommend a psu upgrade ;)

update: my psu is fine, i think its my mobo (returned it, waiting for replacement)
 
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