Could anyone spec me a PC (£600)

stewart1988

stewart1988

stewart1988

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Hi,
It has been a few years since I last built my own pc after getting an iMac about 4-5 years ago and I want to get back to a Windows desktop for a bit of gaming (Diablo 3!) some HD video editing and music production.

I have just over £600 spare (Could maybe stretch a little bit more if needed) to spend and I don't need to buy a monitor, optical drive or Windows. Can £600 get me a decent enough pc for some decent gaming now a days?
No idea what the all the new hardware specs are now a days but I was told a i5 is better than a i7 for gaming? Is this right?

Cheers! :)
 
what size monitor do you have, and what sort of resolution can it run at.

also, is the optical drive a SATA one ?
 
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mp260767 said:
what size monitor do you have, and what sort of resolution can it run at.
Click to expand...

1680 x 1050 (22") but was thinking of hooking up to a 32" 1080p TV and run games at 720p if the gpu couldn't run them at the higher resolution.

Yes 64bit Windows 7 Home (Nice student discount on that) :)
Yes SATA optical
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £179.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £83.99
1 x **B Grade** EVGA GeForce GTX 460 Superclocked 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express G (GX-160-EA) £80.00
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA 6Gb/s 16MB Cache - OEM (ST500DM002) £61.99
1 x Cooler Master Silent Pro Modular 600W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £54.98
1 x Kingston HyperX RED Limited Edition 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3B1RK2/8GX) £35.99
1 x BitFenix Merc Beta Gaming Case - Black £31.99
1 x Logitech G400 3600DPI Gaming Mouse (910-002279) £24.98
1 x Akasa AK-CC4007EP01 Nero 3 CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/1155/1156/1366/2011/AMD AM2/AM2+/AM3/FM1) £21.98
Total : £592.40 (includes shipping : £13.75).




But tomorrow he weakly offers change, so the specs you get now will be naff.
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £179.99
1 x Sapphire HD 6850 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £139.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £83.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA 6Gb/s 16MB Cache - OEM (ST500DM002) £61.99
1 x Cooler Master Silent Pro Modular 600W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £54.98
1 x Kingston HyperX RED Limited Edition 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3B1RK2/8GX) £35.99
1 x BitFenix Merc Beta Gaming Case - Black £31.99
1 x Logitech G400 3600DPI Gaming Mouse (910-002279) £24.98
Total : £628.91 (includes shipping : £12.50).



A little over budget. Have`nt included a cooler, you can always get one later.
There are cheaper 6850`s but not 2gb vram which is better.
 
Excellent cheers for that. Will have a look through all that.
My brother says he has a logitech mx518 he will give me so can save £25 on the mouse.

So whats the change of these cards playing Diablo 3 and maybe some FPS (TF2, L4D, MW2/3) at 1080p or best to go with 720p or my smaller 22" montior?
 
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If you can stretch the extra £60 then the 7850 is a much better card, otherwise just put a 6850 in there.


YOUR BASKET
1 x HIS HD 7850 IceQ X 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (H785QN2G2M) £184.99
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £179.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £83.99
1 x Cooler Master Silent Pro Modular 600W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £54.98
1 x Western Digital Caviar Blue 250GB SATA 6Gb/s 16MB Cache - OEM (WD2500AAKX) £49.99
1 x Kingston HyperX RED Limited Edition 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3B1RK2/8GX) £35.99
1 x BitFenix Merc Beta Gaming Case - Black £31.99
1 x Akasa AK-CC4007EP01 Nero 3 CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/1155/1156/1366/2011/AMD AM2/AM2+/AM3/FM1) £21.98
Total : £658.91 (includes shipping : £12.50).

 
Both cards should play at 1080p. The card i specced comes with a 2year warranty. The 460 Stulid specced comes with a 3year warranty, but check with OCUK as its a B grade and may have already been registered.
 
Cool so I see the only difference will be the GPU.

How are ATI drivers these days? When I used to build years ago I always had problems with ATI drivers.
I was told ATI cards are not as power hungry as Nvidia, so having the temps lower could be a benefit but does that sacrifice frame rates?
 
ATI drivers are better than when they were years ago, but I still find Nvidia drivers just to be more solid.

As for power consumption, you would be right, ATI equivalents tend to use less power, except for the new Nvidia GTX680 (and yet to be released GTX670 etc) which turned everything on its head and made the 7970 look poor as it used less power and only needs two 6pin PCI-E connectors.
 
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stewart1988 said:
Cool so I see the only difference will be the GPU.

How are ATI drivers these days? When I used to build years ago I always had problems with ATI drivers.
I was told ATI cards are not as power hungry as Nvidia, so having the temps lower could be a benefit but does that sacrifice frame rates?
Click to expand...

I would have spec'd the same as stulid but would have used the zalman z9 case. If you dont need the keyboard you could drop that from his spec and get the better Z9 case with it's 4 120mm fans, fan controller and cable management.

Yes that GPU is B grade but i spec it a lot too. The card should be £127 and it's already overclocked. Mine is running @900mhz, you would get 850mhz easy from it which is nigh on 6870 performance. I have it in my HTPC which is connected to a 40 inch 3DTV. It will run BF3 in high-ultra settings and yes it runs well in 3D at 720P too.

You also get cuda support from nvidia as well as SSAO and HBAO occlusion lighting (makes the shadows look pretty lol). AMD only does SSAO
 
Thanks for the info.

Going to contact and check what the warranty is on the B Grade GTX 460 first and then decide.

Would the 4x 120mm fans be noisy? Or are fans and cases much better at reducing noise now?
 
Last edited:
stewart1988 said:
Thanks for the info.

Going to contact and check what the warranty is on the B Grade GTX 460 first and then decide.

Would the 4x 120mm fans be noisy? Or are fans and cases much better at reducing noise now?
Click to expand...

I use the Z9 myself. The case fans aren't really audible over the GPU fan, especially once it kicks in to keep it cool whilst gaming. There is a fan controller so you can set 2 of the fans to a lower speed, which reduces the noise and dims the blue light from the LED.

I would advise taking the fan off the side of the case and moving it to the top. Partly because it does make a rattling sound on the side of the case and secondly heat rises so it makes sense to have the fan at the top pulling the heat out the case.

I must confess to being very tempted to buy one of those B grade 460s to SLI with my current card. It should come with a mini-HDMI to HDMI adapter and some molex adapters so older PSUs can power the GPU. Makes no odds to me but you might "need" the HDMI adpater if you aren't going to use DVI

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £179.99
1 x EVGA GeForce GTX 460 Superclocked FTW 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (01G-P3-1363-KR) £114.95
1 x Gigabyte Z77-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £83.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA 6Gb/s 16MB Cache - OEM (ST500DM002) £61.99
1 x Cooler Master Silent Pro Modular 600W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £54.98
1 x Zalman Z9 Plus Tower Case with Fan Controller - Black £52.99
1 x Kingston HyperX RED Limited Edition 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3B1RK2/8GX) £35.99
1 x LG GH22NS90 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £18.98
Total : £618.86 (includes shipping : £12.50).



That doesnt have the aftermarket heatsink but you get a similar 460 already overclocked to 867mhz (6870 nigh on performance) with the full warranty.
 
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Good point about the mini-HDMI adaptor since I will be needing that so if that's not included that's a few extra quid.

I noticed the case says it has a "temperature sensor" how well does that work and what sort of temps do you get inside the case?
 
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