My New Spec - Buying end of week/start of next

Hydrogoo · 6 Apr 2011 at 12:41

As some of you are aware I've been pottering around the forums trying to get the best idea of what I'm going to do with my new PC. Based on everyones suggestions and my own preferences I've compiled the following based on a £1200 budget, inclusive of VAT and delivery:

YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI GeForce GTX 580 OC Twin FrozR II 1536MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £359.99
1 x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail with FREE Shogun 2 Game £179.99
1 x Gigabyte P67A-UD4-B3 Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard - (Sandybridge) ** B3 REVISION ** £138.00
1 x NZXT Phantom Enthusiast Full Tower Case - White £109.99
1 x Antec TruePower New Modular 750W Power Supply - With FREE 3D Mark 2011 Advance £87.98
1 x G.Skill RipJawsX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C8 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (F3-12800CL8D-8GBXM) £79.19
1 x Asus Xonar D1 7.1 PCI Sound Card £55.99
2 x Samsung SpinPoint F3 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD103SJ) £42.98
1 x Thermaltake Frio CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366/AM2/AM2+/AM3) £42.98
1 x Sony Optiarc AD-5260S 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM [AD-5260S-0B] £14.98
1 x Crucial RealSSD C300 64GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive £107.99

Total : £1,278.05 (includes shipping : £12.50).

If anyone has any suggestions on places I can improve and save money, then I'm all ears!

Reaper 392 · 6 Apr 2011 at 12:53

you might be able to save a lot of money, but first i need to ask a few questions.

1. what is the PC going to be used for
2. what kind of sound system do you have? onboard audio is generally very good, and you wont notice the difference between it, and a soundcard unless your playing a high quality music file on a very good soundsystem

oh, and i would go with this DVD drive: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CD-060-SO

its 1p cheaper, faster, and most importantly, it isnt the samsung one (ive had one of those samsung ones myself for about 6 weeks, and ive had nothing but problems with it)

Hydrogoo · 6 Apr 2011 at 12:56

It will be used for gaming, mostly newer FPS and such.

cravin penut · 6 Apr 2011 at 13:03

no SSD?

Hydrogoo · 6 Apr 2011 at 13:05

cravin penut said:
no SSD?

/facefalm @ myself

I thought it looked too good to be true...

I have meant to get an SSD. Just missed it off my build, going for a C300 Crucial.

Rexton · 6 Apr 2011 at 13:11

You could save £160 straight away for your SSD by getting a 6950, with a few tweaks you're close in performance to a 580, will run pretty much everything at max easily too...

Reaper 392 · 6 Apr 2011 at 13:14

if its mostly used for gaming, then you can drop the RAM down to 4GB.

hows this?

YOUR BASKET
2 x MSI ATI Radeon HD 6950 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £199.99
1 x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - OEM £161.99
1 x Gigabyte P67A-UD4-B3 Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard - (Sandybridge) ** B3 REVISION ** £138.00
1 x OCZ Vertex 2E 60GB 2.5" SATA-II Solid State Hard Drive (OCZSSD2-2VTXE60G) £119.99
1 x NZXT Phantom Enthusiast Full Tower Case - White £109.99
1 x XFX 750W Black Edition Modular Power Supply £92.99
1 x Asus Xonar D1 7.1 PCI Sound Card £55.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM 1yr Warranty (ST31000528AS) £37.99
1 x OCZ Platinum 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Ultra Low Voltage Dual Channel Kit (OCZ3P1600C9ELV4GK) £36.98
1 x Corsair A50 High-Performance CPU Cooler (Socket AM2/AM3/LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366) £27.98
1 x Sony Optiarc AD-5260S 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £14.98
Total : £1,211.87 (includes shipping : £12.50).

Hydrogoo · 6 Apr 2011 at 13:19

I'm planning on teaching myself PHP as well, so I'd want the extra RAM for a virtual machine to run a LAMP stack on.

I've tried looking at the 6950's and based on previous experience with ATI, they have had bad drivers etc causing lots of compatibility issues in games. Has this changed much?

Another place I *know* that I can save money is my case. However, I can't seem to find another case with good cable management, excellent airflow and looks good. I'm a stickler for a sexy looking pooter.

coldfused · 6 Apr 2011 at 13:27

Perhaps go for a Samsung F3 1TB HDD. I believe the only drive faster than an F3 is a SSD

Hydrogoo · 6 Apr 2011 at 13:35

coldfused said:
Perhaps go for a Samsung F3 1TB HDD. I believe the only drive faster than an F3 is a SSD

I'm using 2 of them for Storage drives. I want the SSD for OS only with a few key programs running off it.

Reaper 392 · 6 Apr 2011 at 13:38

im struggling to see how this build is so much cheaper than yours, when they're almost the same

changed the graphics card back to a 580GTX, and the CPU cooler back to the one you had (dont know a lot about CPU coolers)

YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI GeForce GTX 580 OC Twin FrozR II 1536MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £359.99
1 x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - OEM £161.99
1 x Gigabyte P67A-UD4-B3 Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard - (Sandybridge) ** B3 REVISION ** £138.00
1 x OCZ Vertex 2E 60GB 2.5" SATA-II Solid State Hard Drive (OCZSSD2-2VTXE60G) £119.99
1 x NZXT Phantom Enthusiast Full Tower Case - White £109.99
1 x XFX 650W XXX Edition Modular Power Supply £74.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Genesis Grey 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3X2K2/8GX) £74.39
1 x Asus Xonar D1 7.1 PCI Sound Card £55.99
1 x Thermaltake Frio CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366/AM2/AM2+/AM3) £42.98
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM 1yr Warranty (ST31000528AS) £37.99
1 x Sony Optiarc AD-5260S 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £14.98
Total : £1,206.28 (includes shipping : £12.50).

Hydrogoo · 6 Apr 2011 at 13:47

Reaper 392 said:
im struggling to see how this build is so much cheaper than yours, when they're almost the same

changed the graphics card back to a 580GTX, and the CPU cooler back to the one you had (dont know a lot about CPU coolers)

YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI GeForce GTX 580 OC Twin FrozR II 1536MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £359.99
1 x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - OEM £161.99
1 x Gigabyte P67A-UD4-B3 Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard - (Sandybridge) ** B3 REVISION ** £138.00
1 x OCZ Vertex 2E 60GB 2.5" SATA-II Solid State Hard Drive (OCZSSD2-2VTXE60G) £119.99
1 x NZXT Phantom Enthusiast Full Tower Case - White £109.99
1 x XFX 650W XXX Edition Modular Power Supply £74.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Genesis Grey 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3X2K2/8GX) £74.39
1 x Asus Xonar D1 7.1 PCI Sound Card £55.99
1 x Thermaltake Frio CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366/AM2/AM2+/AM3) £42.98
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM 1yr Warranty (ST31000528AS) £37.99
1 x Sony Optiarc AD-5260S 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £14.98
Total : £1,206.28 (includes shipping : £12.50).

You are shaving pounds off here and there and it is all adding up. This is looking a bit better price wise. I would however swap out that noisy seagate drive for a samsung drive, The only reason I'm trying to shave cash off is to appease the wife. Less I spend, the happier she is.

I could also save a further £12 by getting this:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-007-CR

instead of the vertex.

coldfused · 6 Apr 2011 at 13:54

Hydrogoo said:
I could also save a further £12 by getting this:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-007-CR
instead of the vertex.

The C300 has faster read speeds 340MB/s compared to 280MB/s of the Vertex 2 - also there's 4GB more. I have a C300, absolutely fanastic.

Hydrogoo · 6 Apr 2011 at 14:04

Ok, I've redone this again, and without the luxury of my home PC (at work atm) the formatting might be a bit crap:

1x MSI GeForce GTX 580 OC Twin FrozR II 1536MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £359.99
1x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - OEM £161.99
1x Gigabyte P67A-UD4-B3 Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard - (Sandybridge) ** B3 REVISION ** £138.00
1x NZXT Phantom Enthusiast Full Tower Case - White £109.99
1x Crucial RealSSD C300 64GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive (CTFDDAC064MAG-1G1) £107.99
1x G.Skill RipJawsX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (F3-12800CL9D-8GBXL ) £76.79
1x XFX 650W XXX Edition Modular Power Supply £74.99
2x Samsung SpinPoint F3 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD103SJ) £42.98
1x Thermaltake Frio CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366/AM2/AM2+/AM3) £42.98
1x Asus Xonar DS 7.1 PCI Sound Card £39.98
1x Sony Optiarc AD-5260S 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £14.98

Total : £1,228.64 inc Delivery

Will a 650W PSU be sufficient to power all of this gear whilst still allowing me to overclock the CPU?

Reaper 392 · 6 Apr 2011 at 14:33

650W will be plenty. its only if you want to use a second graphics card in crossfire that you will need more (or start being silly with the number of HDD and DVD drives).

i have the 500GB seagate drive, and havent noticed any noise from it myself (although my standard AMD cooler probably has something to do with that)

ps. did you mean to put 2 HDDs in there?

Hydrogoo · 6 Apr 2011 at 14:35

Yes, I'm still pondering on whether or not to RAID them, my games etc will be installed to there so 1Tb is sufficient for my needs, however, I also like partitioning my drives and seperating programs from games from music from films etc. I'm OCD like that. Already cleaned my current HDD's out ready for the copy to my new PC!

Reaper 392 · 6 Apr 2011 at 14:43

Hydrogoo said:
Yes, I'm still pondering on whether or not to RAID them, my games etc will be installed to there so 1Tb is sufficient for my needs, however, I also like partitioning my drives and seperating programs from games from music from films etc. I'm OCD like that. Already cleaned my current HDD's out ready for the copy to my new PC!

ok, wasnt sure if you pressed buy twice by accident, or wanted to do some RAID thing

Hydrogoo · 6 Apr 2011 at 15:19

No, its definitely a must for me. Got a total of 700Gb nearly filled atm. More space is required.

Hydrogoo · 6 Apr 2011 at 20:29

YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI GeForce GTX 580 OC Twin FrozR II 1536MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £389.99
1 x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - OEM £161.99
1 x Gigabyte P67A-UD4-B3 Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard - (Sandybridge) ** B3 REVISION ** £138.00
1 x Crucial RealSSD C300 64GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive (CTFDDAC064MAG-1G1) £107.99
1 x Antec TruePower New Modular 750W Power Supply - With FREE 3D Mark 2011 Advance £87.98
1 x G.Skill RipJawsX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (F3-12800CL9D-8GBXL ) £76.79
1 x Coolermaster CM-690 II Advanced Dominator Case - Black £74.99
1 x Asus Xonar D1 7.1 PCI Sound Card £55.99
2 x Samsung SpinPoint F3 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD103SJ) £42.98
1 x Thermaltake Frio CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366/AM2/AM2+/AM3) £42.98
1 x Sony Optiarc AD-5260S 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £14.98
Total : £1,254.14 (includes shipping : £13.75).

This is what I'm looking at now. What sort of PSU do you think would be sufficent to allow me to OC this build? would 650W be ample?

John101 · 6 Apr 2011 at 21:10

To save money I would scrap the sound card and change the cpu cooler to this....
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-001-CS the corsair HS is a good choice for that price and you wont see much of a difference...

The on board sound on motherboards are usually fine for gaming/everyday use too. Apart from that the build looks good!