£1500 build! Options!

Skynet-T800 · 12 Apr 2013 at 18:44

Hi,

Thought I'd post in here as I'm thinking about what components to get!

Mainly for gaming but photography (D800e) & video editing also will be high on my list.

My shopping list is as follows.

Intel i7 3770k
M4 512gb SSD
Asus Z77 Sabertooth Motherboard
Corsair Vengeance Black 16gb
2x Sapphire HD 7970 OC BOOST GFX cards.

Total : £1,589.89 (my budget was about £1,500!)

Question is do I need 2 cards for the likes of battlefield 3/4? How well would one run with my set up?

My PSU is Corsair 850HX has it got enough juice to run the 2 cards?
CPU cooler is Noctua NH-D14.

HDD's i'll keep my old ones for but will get 2x 1tb drives for backing up data!!

Soundcard i'm still using my old Audigy 2 ZS Platinum Pro! I love it for it's external control box! but it's getting very old now.

Thoughts?

Cheers Paul

stulid · 12 Apr 2013 at 18:50

• Get a single card now and maybe another later on?
• The PSU is fine for a pair of those.

Consider a Gigabyte Z77X-UP4 TH board? 8 pack says its a great overclocker.

P.S you can get cashback on a Samsung SSD,

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-163-SA&groupid=701&catid=2104&subcat=2394

£40 it seems - http://www.samsung.com/uk/ssdcashback/

honosuseri · 12 Apr 2013 at 18:53

YOUR BASKET
1 x Plextor M5 Pro 512GB Extreme Series Solid State Drive - (PX-512M5P) £352.99
2 x EVGA GeForce GTX 670 FTW 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with FREE Assassin's Creed III & FTP Currency £314.99 (£629.98)
1 x Intel Core i7-3770K 3.50GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £269.99
1 x MSI Z77 MPower Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 ATX Motherboard with FREE F1 RC Car & MSI HDD Enclosure £149.99
1 x Avexir MPower Yellow Series 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C10 1600MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (AVD3U16001008G-2CM) £79.99
Total : £1,494.94 (includes shipping : £10.00).

What resolution is your panel? If you are at 1080P you might as well just use a single GPU to start. Then you could consider a Hexcore i7 on the 2011 socket.....

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i7-3930K 3.20GHz (Sandybridge-E) Socket LGA2011 Processor - Retail with Dead Space 3 PC Game £467.99
1 x Plextor M5 Pro 512GB Extreme Series Solid State Drive - (PX-512M5P) £352.99
1 x EVGA GeForce GTX 670 FTW 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with FREE Assassin's Creed III & FTP Currency £314.99
1 x Gigabyte X79-UP4 Intel X79 (Socket 2011) DDR3 Motherboard £209.99
1 x Alpenföhn K2 Mount Doom CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £59.99
2 x Patriot Viper "Black Mamba" Generation 3 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-15000C9 1866MHz Dual Channel Kit (PV38G186C9K) £49.99 (£99.98)
Total : £1,517.93 (includes shipping : £10.00).

Frame rating is currently a hot topic. In short AMDs Xfire looks to have higher FPS than Nvidias SLi but some of these frames (in certain games) are "runts" and shouldn't really count. This is what some people have been calling microstuttering, Nvidia has no such issue. AMD may resolve this in time with driver updates but I thought I would mention it all the same.

snips86x · 12 Apr 2013 at 18:56

Do you need everything or just the above?

With a budget like that as well as your Photo & Video editing, I would be looking at something like the 2011:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte ATI Radeon HD 7970 Windforce 3X 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with Crysis 3 & Bioshock PC Games £319.99
1 x Intel Core i7-3820 3.60GHz (Sandybridge-E) Socket LGA2011 Processor - Retail with Dead Space 3 PC Game £239.99
1 x Asus P9X79 Intel X79 (Socket 2011) DDR3 Motherboard £199.99
1 x Samsung 256GB SSD 840 PRO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7PD256BW) ** Cash Back Promo ** £179.99
1 x Corsair Obsidian 650D Gaming Midi Tower - Black £149.99
1 x Silverstone Strider Plus 850W Modular '80 Plus Silver' Power Supply (SST-ST85F-P) £119.99
1 x Patriot Intel Extreme Masters 16GB (4x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17000C11 2133MHz Quad Channel Kit (PVI316G213C1QK) £109.99
1 x Corsair Hydro H100i High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (Socket 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £103.99
1 x OcUK 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £18.98
Total : £1,442.90 (includes shipping : FREE).

The motherboard & PSU allow you x/Fire if you want to upgrade to it later. 1 of these cards will be fine for BF3, but for BF4, it's all speculation. Another few months and we should have more details on the requirements of the game.

The 2011 socket is great for photo & video editing as not only will you have the use of the Quad channel RAM, but you can upgrade to the hex-core if needed as well as Ivy-E being released in Q3 of 2013.

I've only added the H100 as it would look like a nice clean build with the window on the case, just personal preference, great for overclocking also.

If it's just the above, hows this:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Samsung 512GB SSD 840 PRO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7PD512BW) ** Cash Back Promo ** £449.99
1 x Gigabyte ATI Radeon HD 7970 Windforce 3X 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with Crysis 3 & Bioshock PC Games £319.99
1 x Intel Core i7-3820 3.60GHz (Sandybridge-E) Socket LGA2011 Processor - Retail with Dead Space 3 PC Game £239.99
1 x Asus P9X79 Intel X79 (Socket 2011) DDR3 Motherboard £199.99
1 x Patriot Intel Extreme Masters 16GB (4x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17000C11 2133MHz Quad Channel Kit (PVI316G213C1QK) £109.99
1 x Corsair Hydro H100i High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (Socket 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £103.99
Total : £1,423.94 (includes shipping : FREE).

stulid · 12 Apr 2013 at 18:59

snips86x said:
Do you need everything or just the above?

With a budget like that as well as your Photo & Video editing, I would be looking at something like the 2011:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte ATI Radeon HD 7970 Windforce 3X 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with Crysis 3 & Bioshock PC Games £319.99
1 x Intel Core i7-3820 3.60GHz (Sandybridge-E) Socket LGA2011 Processor - Retail with Dead Space 3 PC Game £239.99
1 x Asus P9X79 Intel X79 (Socket 2011) DDR3 Motherboard £199.99
1 x Samsung 256GB SSD 840 PRO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7PD256BW) ** Cash Back Promo ** £179.99
1 x Corsair Obsidian 650D Gaming Midi Tower - Black £149.99
1 x Silverstone Strider Plus 850W Modular '80 Plus Silver' Power Supply (SST-ST85F-P) £119.99
1 x Patriot Intel Extreme Masters 16GB (4x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17000C11 2133MHz Quad Channel Kit (PVI316G213C1QK) £109.99
1 x Corsair Hydro H100i High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (Socket 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £103.99
1 x OcUK 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £18.98
Total : £1,442.90 (includes shipping : FREE).

The motherboard & PSU allow you x/Fire if you want to upgrade to it later. 1 of these cards will be fine for BF3, but for BF4, it's all speculation. Another few months and we should have more details on the requirements of the game.

The 2011 socket is great for photo & video editing as not only will you have the use of the Quad channel RAM, but you can upgrade to the hex-core if needed as well as Ivy-E being released in Q3 of 2013.

I've only added the H100 as it would look like a nice clean build with the window on the case, just personal preference.

Nice, and I see that SSD has cashback also like the 500Gb version does I added above.

Also the H110 is a bigger cooler and fits in that case.

snips86x · 12 Apr 2013 at 18:59

stulid said:
Nice, and I see that SSD has cashback also like the 500Gb version does I added above.

Also the H110 is a bigger cooler and fits in that case.

That's great, would assume the cooling would be more efficient as the RAD & fans are bigger.

stulid · 12 Apr 2013 at 19:00

snips86x said:
That's great, would assume the cooling would be more efficient as the RAD & fans are bigger.

It must be, surface area is king.

snips86x · 12 Apr 2013 at 19:11

stulid said:
It must be, surface area is king.

Slightly off topic, but do you know if the H110's fans are using spacers? Would assume with the price of the unit, they would have thought of most things, inc this.

stulid · 12 Apr 2013 at 19:18

snips86x said:
Slightly off topic, but do you know if the H110's fans are using spacers? Would assume with the price of the unit, they would have thought of most things, inc this.

How do you mean?

snips86x · 12 Apr 2013 at 19:31

stulid said:
How do you mean?

Surely if the fans are too close to the surface of the RAD, there would be a blind spot right where the centre of the fan is. Spacers would keep the fans slightly away from the RAD allowing the blind spot to be covered which means more airflow.

Does this make sense? :confused:

stulid · 12 Apr 2013 at 19:42

snips86x said:
Surely if the fans are too close to the surface of the RAD, there would be a blind spot right where the centre of the fan is. Spacers would keep the fans slightly away from the RAD allowing the blind spot to be covered which means more airflow.

Does this make sense?

Ah, see what you mean.

I don't think there are any spacers, maybe the fans frame is shaped to "focus" air flow"?

Noctua do fans like this which have lots of little tricks to center the flow.

Skynet-T800 · 12 Apr 2013 at 21:46

Too much choice

I forgot to mention my case is the Corsair Obsidian 650D

I have the Samsung S23A750D LED panel & NEC multisync 20.1" IPS panel will get rid of both for a nice 27" IPS panel at the end of the year!

Software wise I'm using Adobe Lightroom & photoshop CS5, Sony Vegas pro 12!
Running windows 7 ultimate 64bit!

stulid · 12 Apr 2013 at 23:26

Well as you already have that case, then the H110 will go in nicely.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte ATI Radeon HD 7970 Windforce 3X 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with Crysis 3 & Bioshock PC Games £319.99
1 x Intel Core i7-3820 3.60GHz (Sandybridge-E) Socket LGA2011 Processor - Retail with Dead Space 3 PC Game £239.99
1 x Gigabyte X79-UP4 Intel X79 (Socket 2011) DDR3 Motherboard £209.99
1 x Samsung 256GB SSD 840 PRO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7PD256BW) ** Cash Back Promo ** £179.99
1 x Silverstone Strider Plus 850W Modular '80 Plus Silver' Power Supply (SST-ST85F-P) £119.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Beast 16GB (4x4GB) PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Quad Channel Kit (KHX16C9T3K4/16X) £95.99
1 x Corsair Hydro H110 280mm High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM3) (CW-9060014-WW) £94.99
1 x OcUK 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £18.98
Total : £1,291.91 (includes shipping : £10.00).

snips86x · 13 Apr 2013 at 07:15

stulid said:
Well as you already have that case, then the H110 will go in nicely.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte ATI Radeon HD 7970 Windforce 3X 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with Crysis 3 & Bioshock PC Games £319.99
1 x Intel Core i7-3820 3.60GHz (Sandybridge-E) Socket LGA2011 Processor - Retail with Dead Space 3 PC Game £239.99
1 x Gigabyte X79-UP4 Intel X79 (Socket 2011) DDR3 Motherboard £209.99
1 x Samsung 256GB SSD 840 PRO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7PD256BW) ** Cash Back Promo ** £179.99
1 x Silverstone Strider Plus 850W Modular '80 Plus Silver' Power Supply (SST-ST85F-P) £119.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Beast 16GB (4x4GB) PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Quad Channel Kit (KHX16C9T3K4/16X) £95.99
1 x Corsair Hydro H110 280mm High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM3) (CW-9060014-WW) £94.99
1 x OcUK 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £18.98
Total : £1,291.91 (includes shipping : £10.00).

Great build, but wouldn't he be better with 1866 or 2133 on X79 for his photo & video work? The price is pretty much the same if not cheaper.

YOUR BASKET
2 x Patriot Viper "Black Mamba" Generation 3 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-15000C9 1866MHz Dual Channel Kit (PV38G186C9K) £49.99 (£99.98)
2 x GeIL EVO Leggera 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17000C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit (GEL38GB2133C11DC) £43.99 (£87.98)
Total : £198.77 (includes shipping : £9.00).

stulid · 13 Apr 2013 at 08:29

snips86x said:
Great build, but wouldn't he be better with 1866 or 2133 on X79 for his photo & video work? The price is pretty much the same if not cheaper.

YOUR BASKET
2 x Patriot Viper "Black Mamba" Generation 3 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-15000C9 1866MHz Dual Channel Kit (PV38G186C9K) £49.99 (£99.98)
2 x GeIL EVO Leggera 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17000C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit (GEL38GB2133C11DC) £43.99 (£87.98)
Total : £198.77 (includes shipping : £9.00).

Sure.

I didn't search to hard.

snips86x · 13 Apr 2013 at 08:46

stulid said:
Sure.

I didn't search to hard.

Can't blame you looking at the time stamp on your post.