Gaming Build (£1500 Budget)

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Lancashire UK
Hello

Ok so im going to have ago at building my own computer for the 1st time, ive got a max budget of around £1500. Ive got all the peripherals such as keybored, mouse and monitor etc so the money is just for the tower. So im hope you could spec me a very nice build and can you please include everything i will need including OS etc. I was going to try Water Cooling but seen as its my 1st build i think i should just go with air for the moment.

If you got any questions please ask and ill try to answere them :)

Thanks Steven
 
Download win7 for the OS:

*OVERCLOCKED* Intel Core i7 920 D0 Stepping (SLBEJ) 2.66Ghz @ 4.00GHz / Gigabyte EX58-UD5 Intel X58 Motherboard / Patriot Viper 6GB DDR3 PC3-12800C8 1600MHz DDR3 Bundle + World in Conflict Game £539.99
(£469.56) £539.99
(£469.56)
2 x Powercolor ATI Radeon HD 4890 PCS+ BattleForge Edition 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card Powercolor ATI Radeon HD 4890 PCS+ BattleForge Edition 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £167.99
(£146.08) £335.98
(£292.16)
OCZ Agility Series 60GB 2.5" SATA-II Solid State Hard Drive (OCZSSD2-1AGT60G) OCZ Agility Series 60GB 2.5" SATA-II Solid State Hard Drive (OCZSSD2-1AGT60G) £151.98
(£132.16) £151.98
(£132.16)
Be Quiet! Dark Power Pro 850W ATX2.2 Modular SLi Compliant Power Supply Be Quiet! Dark Power Pro 850W ATX2.2 Modular SLi Compliant Power Supply £140.99
(£122.60) £140.99
(£122.60)
Antec 1200 Twelve Hundred Ultimate Gaming Case - Black (No PSU) Antec 1200 Twelve Hundred Ultimate Gaming Case - Black (No PSU) £137.99
(£119.99) £137.99
(£119.99)
LG GGC-H20L Blu-Ray Reader & HD-DVD ROM Serial ATA Drive - Retail LG GGC-H20L Blu-Ray Reader & HD-DVD ROM Serial ATA Drive - Retail £79.99
(£69.56) £79.99
(£69.56)
2 x Western Digital Caviar Black 500GB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (WD5001AALS) Western Digital Caviar Black 500GB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (WD5001AALS) £44.99
(£39.12) £89.98
(£78.24)
Sub Total : £1,284.27
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £13.75
VAT is being charged at 15% VAT : £194.70
Total : £1,492.72
 
^ Looks good.

Some alternatives:

Coolermaster HAF922 case £91.99 inc VAT - Cooling is on a par with the antec 1200, loads of room inside (if you wanted to watercool later, the top 200mm fan can be moved to the side grill, and a 2x120mm rad installed in the top.

Pros: cheaper than the antec 1200, tool-less, plenty of room
Cons: Not to everyones taste, but the red LEDs can be turned off.

PSU: Corsair HX 850W ATX Modular SLI Compliant Power Supply (CMPSU-850HXUK) £134.99 This is a top top quality PSU.

SSD: Samsung PB22-J 64GB 2.5" SATA-II Solid State Hard Drive (MMCRE64G5MXP-OVB)
£137.99 I think this is faster than the OCZ agility.

GFX: Asus GeForce GTX 260 TOP 896MB GDDR3 PCI-Express Graphics Card (Includes Terminator Salvation PC Game) x2 (SLI) £259.96
(Not as fast as a pair of 4890s, but cheaper, and still a very powerfull combination).

This changes would save you £142.01 compared to the above. You can save a further £59.99 if you don't want to watch blue-ray movies and just get a generic DVD writer.
 
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Your basket
Product Name Qty Price Line Total
Intel Core i7 920 D0 Stepping (SLBEJ) 2.66Ghz (Nehalem) (Socket LGA1366) - OEM + World In Conflict PC Game £204.99
(£178.25) £204.99
(£178.25)
Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD3R Intel X58 (Socket 1366) PCI-Express DDR3 Motherboard £143.99
(£125.21) £143.99
(£125.21)
Antec 902 Nine Hundred Two Ultimate Gaming Case - Black (No PSU) £94.99
(£82.60) £94.99
(£82.60)
Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium SP1 64-Bit - OEM (66I-01939) £81.98
(£71.29) £81.98
(£71.29)
OCZ Gold 6GB (3x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C8 (1600MHz) Tri-Channel (OCZ3G1600LV6GK) £77.99
(£67.82) £77.99
(£67.82)
Corsair TX 650W ATX SLi Compliant Power Supply (CMPSU-650TXUK) £71.98
(£62.59) £71.98
(£62.59)
Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (ST31000528AS) £64.99
(£56.51) £64.99
(£56.51)
Akasa AK-967 Nero Direct Contact Heatpipe CPU Cooler (AM2/AM2+/939/LGA775/LGA1366) £23.99
(£20.86) £23.99
(£20.86)
LG GH22NS30 22x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - OEM £18.99
(£16.51) £18.99
(£16.51)
Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound (3.5g) £6.89
(£5.99) £6.89
(£5.99)
Sub Total : £687.63
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £12.50
VAT is being charged at 15% VAT : £105.02
Total : £805.15

I didn't choose the card, one reason because of DX11, but if i were to choose i'd get a GTX 260 to last me till the DX11 cards or an ATI card that's cheap but decent to last till then, but it would round you off to about £1000 so you'll save £500 to get the DX11 cards (which i hope will cover it) and i might up the PSU for the DX11 cards, possibly 850w.
 
I personally think spending that kind of money on a PC is retarded. You can get most modern games to play very well on a build costing £500-600 max.


I said i have a max of £1500 to spend as i have no idea what the better components will cost. Plus i would like it to last me a long time.
 
give the man a chance, he has worked hard for the money and he wants to spend £1500 on it. I'm planning a build with a similar budget soon as well, and so let people do what they want with their money. (P.S: if they want like a £3000 build, then obviously a waste, but £1500 is fine.)

EDIT: Beaten to it :P
 
Don't do it - you can do a lot of other things with that kind of money. You can get a pretty decent machine for £600 that'll last a couple of years. Alright it won't play Crysis at 1080p with maximum details, but its all a law of diminishing returns with this stuff.

This opinion is likely to be about as popular as cancer on this particular forum, but that's just my view. I know plenty of people who've dropped £1k plus on their PC only to regret it later.
 
Thanks for the fast replys guys, how long is it before these DX11 cards are comming out?

ATI claim that their DX11 parts will be out intime for win7 release (whether these are mainstream or performance parts is unclear.)
Nvidia appears to be having trouble with yields @40nm, so they may be delayed until early 2010 with their "GT300".
 
@chris.hoops: he's planning on an i7 build I beleive, in which case he'll need a socket Intel 1366 (X58 Chipset) board. It's just as future proof as AM3 because sockets aren't gonna be changing soon.
 
Hey Steven, got your build here:

If you want, you can swap the GTX 260 for something more powerful, but I thought that this will last you fine until the GT300's come out, whenever that is in the near future. You've got an SSD for OS, and a Spinpoint 1TB for apps. Feel free to swap the case around too. This is a really kick ass PC, for £200 under budget, and it should last you perfectly for a couple of years. The £200 you save can go to your GTX 300.

 
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Well, his board costs £150, whereas you can pick up a good AM3 for £100.

His i7 costs about £200, whereas you can get a phenom ii 720 for £110. IMHO the performance diff in current games will be negligible for the most part (with the exception of very CPU intensive games like FSX). They are both more than fast enough for current games, particularly when overclocked. I don't think this is going to change a lot in the near future, either.

In fact, unless you're running molecular simulations to find a cure for cancer, i can't see the point in i7 at all. Sorry that's just my opinion. This is a machine for playing games at the end of the day, and doesn't warrant a large financial commitment.
 
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the battle between AMD and Intel will go on for a while, but with core i5 coming soon, it's best to get a i7 while you can. When someone gives a budget, you respond to that, rather than your own opinion.
 
I'm no AMD fanboy. I'm just pointing out the fact that no-one really needs the uber performance hardware that's out there at the moment.

What is better - an expensive PC that's pointlessly fast, or a good PC and a nice holiday somewhere sunny? Or maybe pay off a few of those credit card bills etc. etc.
 
don't forget, some lucky fellas can have an expensive PC, and still have the nice holiday and all that, but this thread is to help Steven, so leave it at that please.
 
Thanks for more replys

As for the thread i didnt meen to start a conflict here lol, i just had no idea about prices atm and that would just be my budget, i dont see a problem with it but it seem some people do.

Anyway thanks for the speccs so far they look nice :)
 
don't worry steven, we're a very opinionated forum, lol.

any more questions or things you'd like in your spec?
 
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