Can I get this for under £1000?

Andrew G · 29 Jan 2010 at 17:15

Hi Girls and Guys

My Brother has a very old PC and has managed to coble together £1000 for a new machine. He has monitor (new at X-mas) and keyboard mouse but would need everything else. I have a few fans about I can use in the case front and on the cooler. I am torn between spec'ing an i7 for a longer gap before needing an upgrade over that of a slightly cheaper i5 system. He will be playing games on it so I went with the i7 with a cheaper graphics card that could be added to at a later date or upgraded for another single GPU unit. He is willing to stretch the budget to the below but no further unless it is really justified. Is there anything limiting me getting this setup out to 4ghz at a later date to extend to system?

Many Thanks

Didaco · 29 Jan 2010 at 17:16

get a 650w corsair instead
you could crossfire 5850's with 650 w so you have no excuses

buttkinz · 29 Jan 2010 at 17:18

if hes gaming id advise an i5 setup or a phenom II 965, you wont notice the difference while gaming, its all gpu limited over about 1280x1024. i7 show their muscle when encoding etc.

marc512 · 29 Jan 2010 at 18:15

as what he said above. Go for i5. Save yourself £100-200 and spend on something else. Like a keyboard and mouse and monitor.

Ast3r · 29 Jan 2010 at 18:19

buttkinz is right.The difference between AM3,i5 and i7 will be very very small in games(1-2%).AM3 is the cheapest between the three but offers the same amount of performance.Here's a very good AM3 rig.The PhII 955 can be overclocked to 3.5-3.6Ghz on stock voltage and for 3.8-4.0Ghz you'll need between 1.4-1.55v.However I don't suggest going over 1.4v with air cooling.The Titan Fenrir will handle the heat just fine until 1.45v.Also with AM3 you'll save a lot of money of which you can invest in a better GPU like the HD5870.

Andrew G · 29 Jan 2010 at 18:21

This would an i5 roll out anything pop out as limiting for gaming with future overclocking?

RJC · 29 Jan 2010 at 18:26

You will need dual channel ram for i5, not tripple channel, also the motherboard is on the expensive side.

Andrew G · 29 Jan 2010 at 18:39

So something along the lines of

would anyone rate the titan over the ThermoLab Baram?

I must admit I have shied away from the AMD & Ati offerings of late. From reading reviews I can see Ati have turned it around, funny how you come fun circle as I was an ATI fan back in the day of the 1st dual GPU cards (Rage Fury MAXX). But personally I still don't think they have it in the CPU market yet.

CAT-THE-FIFTH · 29 Jan 2010 at 18:43

reygjabla · 29 Jan 2010 at 19:27

For your OS, get a student edition of W7 Home premium for £30 something.
The modular PSU is much better in an Antec 300 Case.

Andrew G · 29 Jan 2010 at 19:49

reygjabla said:
For your OS, get a student edition of W7 Home premium for £30 something.
The modular PSU is much better in an Antec 300 Case.

I'm not a student where would I get such a thing?

arknor · 29 Jan 2010 at 19:49

i'd go with the post above me http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=15851738&postcount=10

dont bother for i5 if you would spend a lot on an i5 mobo you may aswell just go i7 as its not much more.

you dont have to get triple channel for i7 either they will run dual channel perfectly fine so if you dont need more than 4gb you can save some money.

google i7 dual channel vs triple channel.

theres not much of a performance difference

Andrew G · 29 Jan 2010 at 20:04

arknor said:
i'd go with the post above me http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=15851738&postcount=10

dont bother for i5 if you would spend a lot on an i5 mobo you may aswell just go i7 as its not much more.

you dont have to get triple channel for i7 either they will run dual channel perfectly fine so if you dont need more than 4gb you can save some money.

google i7 dual channel vs triple channel.

theres not much of a performance difference

really? Please don't get me wrong I do appreciate the input but I have a few questions.

Ok the above is an i7 which is where I thought I wanted to be, but from reading which is confirmed on here an i7 is huge overkill, with the i5 I can get an 5870 which would be better in gaming no? Can't see how I can get student OS price so above would still need £80 added to it, unless someone can apply me with the correct info. Personally I don't mind the non modular PSU since there is a cubby hole in the case and with a few stick on cable blocks it disappears. Aren't you looking at £200 for a an i7 mobo that will allow you to play with the memory? (1800/2000Mhz) vs £150 for a solid i5 I wouldn't call £50 almost the same. Then the cpu and memory prices are less which allows the nicer gpu would that not make a rounder gaming system?

MeMeMeMe · 29 Jan 2010 at 20:16

i5 +5870 and amd PII +5870 would both be better for gaming than i7+5850.

If gaming, don't count out amd. There are plenty of areas that i5 can beat AMD, but gaming is not one of them - if anything, AMD has the edge here.

Insanties_birth · 29 Jan 2010 at 20:28

Andrew G said:
really? Please don't get me wrong I do appreciate the input but I have a few questions.

Ok the above is an i7 which is where I thought I wanted to be, but from reading which is confirmed on here an i7 is huge overkill, with the i5 I can get an 5870 which would be better in gaming no? Can't see how I can get student OS price so above would still need £80 added to it, unless someone can apply me with the correct info. Personally I don't mind the non modular PSU since there is a cubby hole in the case and with a few stick on cable blocks it disappears. Aren't you looking at £200 for a an i7 mobo that will allow you to play with the memory? (1800/2000Mhz) vs £150 for a solid i5 I wouldn't call £50 almost the same. Then the cpu and memory prices are less which allows the nicer gpu would that not make a rounder gaming system?

Speaking on a gaming system then yeah I'd probably agree. That would let you crossfirfe 5870's down the line if you wish too. 4gb ram is generally enough ram for everything and would allow you to run everything at the moment and with current ram prices sticks are a rip off anyway so the less the better price wise.