My £1000 sandybridge pc review.

killianzz

killianzz

killianzz

Associate
Joined
16 Feb 2011
Posts
320
pictures: http://s1110.photobucket.com/albums/h452/killianzz/My pc/

Hi everyone.

Seeing as though I used this forum quite a lot to spec my new pc and bought most of my components from OCUK
I thought I would give it a review now that it is built.
Anyway, this is my first build. My dad had built me budget computers in the past, and I fancied a powerful pc for when I go
back to university. It needed to be quiet and powerful, for use as a HTPC and gaming. As this is my first build any feedback
of any type would be great, also any possible improvements would be appreciated.
The specs are as following:

Case: Lian Li PC-P50 with window.
Motherboard: Asus P8P67 Pro
CPU: 2500k @4.5 ghz
CPU cooler: Noctua D-14
RAM: OCZ Platinum 2x2gb 1600mhz ddr3
GPU: Msi GTX 570 twin frozr II
HDD: 1TB Samsung spinpoint F3
PSU: Corsair TX750W
Keyboard: Razer Lycosa
Mouse: Gigabyte M6980
Monitor: Samsung 23" 1080p job
Windows 7 Ultimate

Original budget was £600 (oops) but final cost was £1000 (excl monitor + OS).

Very impressed with the case. Gaming case cooling performance without the horrible tacky looks. Sleek and oozes quality,
while keeping a discretely aggressive look. Wasnt sure about the window and leds, but with the matching keyboard and mouse leds
I think it looks brilliant. Fans are quiet but I am fussy and will probably replace them with some silent ones. 2x 140mm
and 2x 120 mm, any recommendations? Strangely when I start it up, it turns off after a second, then a couple of seconds later
starts up fine lol. Cable management was ok, could have done with a few more holes so was a bit limited. Also, had to remove
motherboard to fit heatsink backplate. Average CM for a mid tower case I suppose, no experience though so Im not sure,
did the best I could.

P8P67 pro is a great innovative motherboard. Overclocking on it was easy, 4.5ghz reached on 1.27V and I havn't tried any lower
yet. Had some issues with overclocking, see RAM. Dont know what else to say about it really, does everything I need it to.

The 2500k is a remarkable cpu, and that is at stock. I was going to get a 6 core AMD but after receiving a lot of persuasion
and looking at a few benchmarks I decided on sandybridge. Good decision I must say. The D-14 heatsink is an absolute
monster. Keeps my 2500k below 52 deg c under load at 4.5ghz and idle temps are equally impressive. It is quiet and very
powerful. It is MASSIVE though I must say, but not an issue with my case.

My RAM is the only disappointment of my pc. Having set the timings and voltage in the bios, it fails prim95 blend test and
memtest at 1600mhz. Not really an issue during games apart from the odd 'blip' but I would expect it to run at its advertised speed.
Any advice?

My graphics card is simply awesome. I took the longest amount of time choosing this component. About a month of looking
through reviews and forums I decided on the 570. I was going to get a 6950 and unlock the shaders and overclock, but
I decided just to fork out a little more money for my ears sake. I can never hear the fans on it, and it maxes crysis warhead
and almost the original crysis. Stock core is 780 and I can reach 820mhz + on stock voltage, although I leave it at stock.
Always stays cool and quiet. Havn't seen it get over 70 deg c yet. Very impressed.

HDD is quiet and fast, good buy.

PSU looks cool and feels like a quality product. I will only be able to comment on its reliability after a couple of years.
It seems silent. It is not modular, but not really a problem as I cable tied the extra cables and hid them under the hdd tray.

The razer keyboard looks good, and feels good. Only had it a few days but it seems like a good buy, if slightly overpriced.

Mouse was a bargain, never owned a gaming mouse before but it seems like good value. £23 on ocuk for a comfortable and
pleasantly styled gaming mouse cant be bad.

For £1000, I honestly don't think I could have built a better computer. It does everything I need it to perfectly.
Runs cool and quiet while producing ample power. Games look lush and run jitter free.
Future upgrades: HD tv-tuner, 28" 1920x1200 hannspree monitor, saitek joystick, another 1tb hd, quiet case fans,
maybe an SSD, maybe another 570 (hmmmm doubtful, but possible none the less)
I hope this helps anyone who is thinking of buying a similar system, although I doubt it will unless, like myself, you
are a first time builder. Please give me some feedback, good or bad, or any advice etc.

Please bear in mind that I bought the components in March. I built it in March too, so this review is a little bit old, but at least
that means that I can properly comment on it. Also the location is only temporary, It will have a proper desk soon :)
 
Nice system, I would return the ram for a replacement.

I had a problems with OCZ ram on my system, in the end I went Patriot memory.
 
How long have you had the ram for?

You get a lifetime warranty with majority if not all OCZ ram
 
RJC said:
How long have you had the ram for?

You get a lifetime warranty with majority if not all OCZ ram
Click to expand...

I've had the ram for about 3 months. Might do some more tinkering with it, as I am too lazy to remove the cpu cooler. I only notice the difference between 1333 and 1600mhz in benchmarks to be honest. Could adding a notch or two of extra voltage help do you think?

BTW: Sorry for the poor quality photos, htc legend camera really doesnt like glass.
 
A great selection of components you picked there. Sorry to hear about your RAM problems but i'm not surprised. Although I like OCZ for their SSD's I have never liked OCZ RAM. There is always somebody having an issue with it whichever forum you look on. Corsair and Mushkin are the only companies I will buy RAM from.

A nice, powerful, tidy Rig you have there. (I spilt 2 drops of coffee on my Lycosa the other night and killed it :( so be careful)
 
Last edited:
Thanks defunkt. Hmm, should have got mushkin but there was a good deal on the OCZ, oops. Sorry to hear about your lycosa. Its a constant battle with mine to keep off dust and fingerprints. It does look good though. It will be even better once i've got around to making some macros. Would you recommend getting an SSD? Money is a little tight at the moment so it would have to be a pretty big performance gain.

BTW, if anyone is building a new system and has any questions about my choice of components then just ask. I am no expert but with the help of the people on here and from building my own system I have learnt a few things. I can safely say that you will be happy with any component from my pc apart from possibly the ram. They are all good value too. The service I received when purchasing from OCUK was great. Delivery was fast and the items were well packed. Just remember when buying from multiple sites for the lowest prices to think about delivery costs, it may actually be cheaper to buy everything from here.
 
What specs did you have before you built this PC and how was OCing your 2500k; can you push it further and what voltage are you running? Not really important but I'm just being nosey :D. Hope my 2500k is a good chip, I can see me having awful luck and getting limited overclock :(.
 
Moothead2 said:
What specs did you have before you built this PC and how was OCing your 2500k; can you push it further and what voltage are you running? Not really important but I'm just being nosey :D. Hope my 2500k is a good chip, I can see me having awful luck and getting limited overclock :(.
Click to expand...

My specs before this pc were a sony vaio dual core laptop (2010) and an imac (2010). I had a custom built pc years ago, I cant remember its specs.
Overclocking the 2500k was not very hard at all to be honest, I got confused at one point, due to the voltage being higher when it wasn't in turbo mode. I think that is normal though due to 'vdroop'. I run it at 4.5ghz @ 1.27V, and I havn't tried lowering the voltage yet, as I understand 1.27V is actually pretty good. I havn't pushed it any further than 4.5ghz but I reckon I could hit at least 4.8ghz without any trouble. I was worried about my chip not being great before I bought it, but in hindsight I think even a bad 2500k chip would still be a fantastic processor. 980X power after a couple of hours overclocking? It really is amazing. Just don't use any auto-overclocking feature, as it will probably use too much voltage. Find a guide on the internet on overclocking a 2500k on your particular motherboard and follow the instructions and it will be a breeze. What motherboard and cpu cooler do you plan on buying? I would recommend the P8P67 pro but I am told the gigabyte range are also excellent. Either of them would be a good choice.
 
killianzz said:
My specs before this pc were a sony vaio dual core laptop (2010) and an imac (2010). I had a custom built pc years ago, I cant remember its specs.
Overclocking the 2500k was not very hard at all to be honest, I got confused at one point, due to the voltage being higher when it wasn't in turbo mode. I think that is normal though due to 'vdroop'. I run it at 4.5ghz @ 1.27V, and I havn't tried lowering the voltage yet, as I understand 1.27V is actually pretty good. I havn't pushed it any further than 4.5ghz but I reckon I could hit at least 4.8ghz without any trouble. I was worried about my chip not being great before I bought it, but in hindsight I think even a bad 2500k chip would still be a fantastic processor. 980X power after a couple of hours overclocking? It really is amazing. Just don't use any auto-overclocking feature, as it will probably use too much voltage. Find a guide on the internet on overclocking a 2500k on your particular motherboard and follow the instructions and it will be a breeze. What motherboard and cpu cooler do you plan on buying? I would recommend the P8P67 pro but I am told the gigabyte range are also excellent. Either of them would be a good choice.
Click to expand...

I'll be using a H50 and the MSI GD53 (Recommended by a lot on here), I'm just waiting for my PSU to arrive (Hopefully tomorrow) and I'll be all set to build. I picked most of my parts by just looking at other peoples threads on here and looking at the specs peopl suggest for them.

Yeah I've heard things like OC Genie use too much voltage which ups the temps quite a bit, i'll be just doing it manually I think. The only thing I don't really get is the Turbo boost. Care to explain :D?

As for your 4.5 @ 1.27v, that sounds great, you can safely up it to 1.35v (According to threads on here) which could easily help you reach 4.8Ghz. Maybe you should try and hit 5GHz and get into the Sandybridge 5GHz club :cool:.
 
Ive also heard good things about MSI p67 boards. H50 is a good cooler, and I think its actually quieter than the H70.
Turbo boost is basically the feature that enables the processor to jump from its normal 'idle' clockspeed @1.6ghz (if I remember correctly) to 3ghz+ when it needs to. Once you have overclocked to say 4.8ghz, the chip will still idle at 1.6ghz until it faces a higher demand, in which case it will then run at 4.8ghz.
At some point I will see how far I can stretch it (hopefully 5ghz :)) but for day to day, 4.5 ghz is very fast in my opinion. If can get a low voltage and temperatures at up to 4.8ghz then I would consider leaving it run at that, just so I can justify my absolute goliath of a cpu cooler. What is your target overclock? I would imagine that the H50 would be fine for 4.8ghz.
 
Target Overclock is around 4.5-4.6GHz which is incredible since 700Mhz was the max overclock I could do on my previous Phenom II X4 940.

Thanks for the explanation, seems like a very, very handy tool to have, something to tell my dad when he goes on about "That bloody thing is drawing 650w blah blah blah" :D.
 
Moothead2 said:
Target Overclock is around 4.5-4.6GHz which is incredible since 700Mhz was the max overclock I could do on my previous Phenom II X4 940.

Thanks for the explanation, seems like a very, very handy tool to have, something to tell my dad when he goes on about "That bloody thing is drawing 650w blah blah blah" :D.
Click to expand...

You'll hit 4.5-4.6ghz no problem, with a voltage well below 1.35v and your temperatures will be great with that h50. Your welcome and yes it is a great feature. I hope you enjoy your system and that you enjoy building it. I am sure it will exceed your expectations. Forgot to ask, what are the rest of the specs?
I'll pm you my email address in case you need any help/advice. As I said before, Im no expert but I did a lot of research and mine turned out great, so it couldn't hurt.
 
killianzz said:
Thanks defunkt. Hmm, should have got mushkin but there was a good deal on the OCZ, oops. Sorry to hear about your lycosa. Its a constant battle with mine to keep off dust and fingerprints. It does look good though. It will be even better once i've got around to making some macros. Would you recommend getting an SSD? Money is a little tight at the moment so it would have to be a pretty big performance gain.
Click to expand...

There is no way to describe how much of a gain you will get until you go SSD Killanzz. That's the short answer.
Do it as soon as you can afford to. I know they are still a bit pricey and maybe holding on for a while might be a better option but you can say and do that for all computer components and you end up waiting forever. A SSD in your case you will NOT regret! not even for a second. It's impossible to describe and put into words just how much performance gain you get.
Some come on these forums and say things like... "yeah an SSD will help your boot times" to those people I can only presume they have NEVER actually installed or used an SSD. They provide so much more than quicker boot times. They remove bottlenecks and provide a MUCH quicker system in ALL usage. If you can afford one then buy one. as you won't regret it and you will be the next person here (like me) persuading others to try one.
 
Defunkt said:
There is no way to describe how much of a gain you will get until you go SSD Killanzz. That's the short answer.
Do it as soon as you can afford to. I know they are still a bit pricey and maybe holding on for a while might be a better option but you can say and do that for all computer components and you end up waiting forever. A SSD in your case you will NOT regret! not even for a second. It's impossible to describe and put into words just how much performance gain you get.
Some come on these forums and say things like... "yeah an SSD will help your boot times" to those people I can only presume they have NEVER actually installed or used an SSD. They provide so much more than quicker boot times. They remove bottlenecks and provide a MUCH quicker system in ALL usage. If you can afford one then buy one. as you won't regret it and you will be the next person here (like me) persuading others to try one.
Click to expand...

Very convincing. I have heard about the vast performance gains, but it is very convincing when you hear someone swear by them. I completely agree with what you said about waiting for computer components to go down in price - there will always be something better and cheaper in the future, so you may aswell just buy it while your system is 'fresh' and just enjoy it. Given my current financial status I could probably only afford £60 to spend on one tops, which would get me 30gb. How much space does win7 ultimate take up? There is a few other small programs i would put on it, but I wouldn't be bothered putting any games on. Also, could I just copy the windows 7 install straight onto it and then boot it from that? Or would I have to do a fresh install? Still got 2 free marvell 6gb/s ports left, who needs the b3 revision :D Thanks in advance.
 
For anyone who is interested, for security on my pc I use comodo internet security. It is free, uses very little resources, its unobtrusive and seems very secure. It contains a firewall, antivirus, browser security and antispyware (if I remember correctly). I thoroughly recommend it, and before you ask - no I don't work for them lol.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom